Today the DOJ files their surreply to the game-changing Flynn motion to compel Brady material filed by defense attorney Sidney Powell (full pdf below).  Within the DOJ filing the prosecution generally makes four arguments:

1. The government had no legal obligation to provide exculpatory Brady material prior to the plea agreement (Nov 30th, 2017).
2. After the plea agreement the government had no legal obligation to provide exculpatory Brady material that was not directly related to the evidence about the charge of Flynn lying to investigators during the January 24th, 2017, interview.
3. The government uses odd language to claim a draft of the Flynn interview report (FD-302) does not exist prior to their Feb 10th construct: “Even if an earlier draft of the [302] once existed, there is no reason to believe it would materially differ” from the agents’ notes.  Sounds sketchy, like they know an earlier draft does likely exist.
4. The government severely understates the conflict of interest created by the DOJ using the leverage of an incorrectly completed FARA submission to pressure the Flynn plea.

Flynn’s attorney Sidney Powell will now be allowed to file a sur-surreply to the position of the DOJ prosecutors.
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Senator Lindsey Graham, who has increasingly come under pressure for doing nothing as the powerful Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, announces today that he will be abdicating his chairmanship immediately after the 2020 presidential election:

(Via Politico) Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) plans to hand the chairmanship of the Senate Judiciary Committee back to Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa.) in the next Congress.  Graham took over the panel this year from Grassley, who left to chair the Senate Finance Committee.

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House republican and democrat leadership both held press conferences today immediately after the successful passage of the House Impeachment Inquiry Resolution.
Republicans:

Repost by Request – with intro:   After the 2018 mid-terms, and in preparation for the “impeachment” strategy, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff and House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler hired Lawfare group members to become House committee staff.
Chairman Schiff hired former SDNY U.S. Attorney Daniel Goldman (link), and Chairman Nadler hired  Obama Administration lawyer Norm Eisen and criminal defense attorney Barry Berke (link).  House Speaker Nancy Pelosi then hired Douglas Letter as House General Counsel – all are within the Lawfare network.

[Barry Berke, left and Norm Eisen, right – pictured exiting the HSCI scif with Jerry Nadler on the same day Pelosi’s “Impeachment Inquiry” Resolution was released, 10/29/19]

After Goldman, Eisen, Berke and Letter were hired in late 2018, Pelosi then went about changing the Rules of the House in January ’19.  Few were paying attention until recently.
In the last month many people have surmised that Pelosi and Schiff moved to utilize the Ukraine/NSC impeachment angle *after* the Mueller angle for impeachment ran into trouble. However, CTH research (widely criticized in 2018) doesn’t reflect the Whistle-blower impeachment plan as an ‘add-on’.  Instead, what we see is the use of the HPSCI; and the use of embeds within National Security Council staff; by design.  The Schiff events of today were always part of a prior planned design.
Only two committees hired Lawfare staff in 2018: Judiciary (Eisen & Berke) and HPSCI (Goldman).  This evidences a 2018 plan to use the Judiciary and HPSCI for the impeachment process as designed by the Lawfare contractors.  This design is also outlined in the year of public advice from the mother-ship, Lawfare.
They impeachment crew always planned to use the House Intelligence Committee; and they always planned to use activated sleeper cells within the National Security Staff.  None of this is organic; none of this current action was contingent upon a Trump phone call.  The whistle-blower approach was always going to be used; the only issue was: ‘how’?
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Paul Sperry from RealClearInvestigations has outlined the CIA “whistle-blower” who originated the hearsay complaint against President Trump as Eric Ciaramella.
According to the researched outline, Ciaramella worked closely with Democrat operative, Alexandra Chalupa in 2016 to advance the anti-Trump effort; and this year Ciaramella worked closely with HPSCI Chairman Adam Schiff’s staff to continue his efforts.

(RCPI) […] Federal documents reveal that the 33-year-old Ciaramella, a registered Democrat held over from the Obama White House, previously worked with former Vice President Joe Biden and former CIA Director John Brennan, a vocal critic of Trump who helped initiate the Russia “collusion” investigation of the Trump campaign during the 2016 election.
Further, Ciaramella (pronounced char-a-MEL-ah) left his National Security Council posting in the White House’s West Wing in mid-2017 amid concerns about negative leaks to the media. He has since returned to CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia.

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Earlier today President Trump tweeted a funny meme of the Hero canine from the Baghdadi raid getting a medal featuring a dog paw:

Cute and funny right?
Not so fast…
Unfortunately, highlighting the absolute jaw-dropping level of media nuttery, the White House reporters actually lost their minds about it; called the White House, demanded explanations, wrote articles about it not being real; and generally went bananas.
No, seriously; they did.  Look:
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Ranking member of the Judiciary Committee, Doug Collins, appears on Fox News with Laura Hannity to discuss the politically constructed House impeachment resolution.

It’s a good thing the DOJ did not wait for a ruling from Judge Howell.  Instead, a three-judge panel of the DC Circuit Court of Appeals has issued an emergency administrative stay; blocking the release of the Mueller grand jury materials to the House Judiciary Committee pending the court review of the appeal from the DOJ.

The ‘stay’ suspends implementation of Judge Howell’s ruling last week until the court has the opportunity for review, and further formal motions are filed to appeal the decision.
In my humble opinion, activist judge Howell was going to wait to rule on the stay motion until after the House voted on their resolution creating the framework for their ‘impeachment inquiry. With that vote, Howell would likely have ruled against the ‘stay’ motion.   The direct move to the appeals court impedes Howell’s judicial agenda.
The appellate court ruling avoids Howell’s outcome.  Additionally, the undisclosed motive behind the House vote; to conjoin the HJC’s newly gained judicial enforcement authority, and judicial recognition of an official impeachment investigation; is somewhat softened.

Slick moves by Pelosi and Schiff’s Lawfare team.  Today the contracted legal staff within House Intelligence Committee have produced a House “Impeachment Inquiry” resolution to be voted on tomorrow.  The resolution (full pdf below) contains the rules constructed by Shiff’s Lawfare staff, for public HPSCI hearings.

The House impeachment resolution blocks President Trump’s lawyers from participating in the House process until the hand-off to the Judiciary Committee for article assembly.
Within the House resolution is a process to transfer the evidence from the three investigative committee chairs: Schiff, Engel and Maloney, to Jerry Nadler at Judiciary. [The process within Judicary will be assembling the ‘articles of impeachment’.]
What Pelosi/Schiff et al have assembled is a format for a highly controlled public spectacle prior to a predetermined transfer of evidence to Jerry Nadler (Judicary).  With the intent to construct a pantomime for public absorption in mind, the rules are written for maximum narrative construction. [ex. Lawfare lawyers will question witnesses]
The rules within the resolution outline the guidance for at least one public hearing from the HPSCI prior to transfer to Judiciary.  The Oversight Committee, Foreign Affairs Committee and Intelligence Committee are assembling publicly under the House Intelligence Committee (HPSCI) for that/those public hearing(s).
Key points from rules:
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Very worrisome.  As we feared representative Doug Collins and representative Jim Jordan have no idea what Nancy Pelosi is doing on Thursday or why she is doing it. [Outlined Here] This level of naivete’ is why republicans always lose.
The House GOP and the Executive branch do not have skilled lawyers insightful enough to see behind the moves that Speaker Pelosi is making.  They are clueless. WATCH: