1600: Trump baits the hook, dangles pardon for Manafort

Will 'truth' set him free?

In one sense, Donald Trump had to be pleased that Paul Manafort was talking. Specifically, that Manafort's lawyers got a fill from their client on what special counsel Robert Mueller's investigators were grilling him about. Which Manafort's lawyers passed on to Trump's lawyers so they could dope out what Mueller has — or is trying to get — on the president, The New York Times reported.

That arrangement blindsided Mueller's office, which now says Manafort, under the guise of cooperation for a lighter sentence, repeatedly lied to them. The leniency deal for his financial fraud conviction and plea bargain to other crimes is dead. But Trump made it clearer Wednesday that a bigger reward could await his former campaign chairman.

A Manafort pardon is "not off the table," Trump said in a New York Post interview.

“It was never discussed, but I wouldn’t take it off the table. Why would I take it off the table?” the president said.

In the interview and a morning Twitter rant, he charged Mueller was trying to get witnesses to lie. About what, Trump didn't say explicitly, but he clearly meant what they are being asked about him. "At least 3 major players are intimating that the Angry Mueller Gang of Dems is viciously telling witnesses to lie about facts & they will get relief. This is our Joseph McCarthy Era!" Trump tweeted.

He said Manafort, along with his longtime confidant Roger Stone and right-wing conspiracy theorist Jerome Corsi — two witnesses under investigation for potential coordination with the WikiLeaks dump of hacked Democratic emails in 2016 — were "actually very brave." (All three now claim their past boasts about WikiLeaks connections were purely self-puffery.)

Between the lines, Trump's tribute to the trio looks like a hint that resisting Mueller could earn any or all of them a get-out-of-jail card. As Trump has said before, he's not trying to obstruct justice — another question under Mueller's investigation — he's just "fighting back." For more, see Candice Ferrette's story for Newsday.

Treason's greetings

The Mueller tweet was followed by a series of postings that were off the wall, even by Trump standards.

He retweeted a meme from a fringe site called The Trump Train that depicted a host of political opponents such as Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, along with Mueller and even his deputy attorney general, Rod Rosenstein, behind jail bars. The caption: “Now that Russia collusion is a proven lie, when do the trials for treason begin?”

The Post asked him why he posted a lock-him-up image of Rosenstein. “He should have never picked a special counsel,” Trump replied. He then declined to answer a question on whether he intends to fire Rosenstein. 

Another Trump Train retweet stated "Illegals can get up to $3,874 a month under Federal Assistance program." 

That's totally false for the United States. The $3,874 figure comes from the one-time payments made in Canada — Canada! — to legally admitted families of refugees. Immigrants who are in the United States illegally do not qualify for most federal benefits. 

Now fix this

Former Trump "fixer" Michael Cohen suddenly popped into Manhattan federal court Thursday and pleaded guilty to lying to Congress about a Trump organization planned for Moscow.  

As Newsday's John Riley reports, Cohen said he lied about discussions with Trump on the Moscow deal in 2016 to be consistent with the president’s “political messaging” and claims that political and commercial contacts with Moscow ended before the Iowa caucuses.

Prosecutors in court were from Mueller's office. More detail is expected later.

Khashoggi's gone, so carry on

To those who think Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman should be held accountable for the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, the Trump administration has a message: We've moved on, so why can't you?

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, in a Wall Street Journal op-ed, ridiculed the "Capitol Hill caterwauling and media pile-on," and those in the "salons of Washington" who would weaken the "U.S.-Saudi Arabia partnership." He threw in whataboutism too: "Is it any coincidence that the people using the Khashoggi murder as a cudgel against President Trump’s Saudi Arabia policy are the same people who supported Barack Obama’s rapprochement with Iran," a brutal regime, Pompeo wrote.

Pompeo and Defense Secretary Jim Mattis told skeptical senators from both parties in a closed-door briefing that there's no smoking gun linking the prince to the killing, though the CIA has expressed high confidence of his involvement. Many senators were angry that CIA director Gina Haspel wasn't brought along for the briefing. Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), normally a Trump ally, said he will block key votes until he hears from Haspel. “Anything that you need me for to get out of town — I ain’t doing it until we hear from the CIA.” he said.

In a rebuke to Trump, the Senate voted 63-37 to advance a resolution that would cut off most U.S. military aid to Saudi war operations in Yemen.

Janison: No cakewalk with China

Eighteen months ago, Trump bonded with Chinese President Xi Jinping at Mar-a-Lago over a "beautiful piece of chocolate cake" and a missile launch against Syria. But the trade war seems to have turned the relationship from sweet to sour.

They will meet again Saturday at the G-20 summit in Buenos Aires, writes Newsday's Dan Janison, amid suspense over whether a truce on tariffs or an escalation will come out of it. Among the uncertainties is whether the trade hawks or doves will drive Trump's approach.

The president believes “there is a good possibility that we can make a deal” and he “is open to it,” Trump adviser Larry Kudlow said this week. If not, more tariffs will be imposed, he suggested.

Sold short

Trump has gone public with his pique about the Federal Reserve chairman he picked, Jerome Powell. The Washington Post reports that earlier this year, he seriously considered keeping the Obama-era chair, Janet Yellen, and was highly impressed with her in an interview. But he also saw one way she failed to measure up.

According to current and former officials who spoke to the newspaper, Trump told economic aides on several occasions that the 5-foot, 3-inch economist was not tall enough to lead the central bank and quizzed them on whether they agreed.

All in for the wall again

 A day after telling The Washington Post he might have another way to get his Mexican border wall built if Democrats in Congress won't go along, Trump said in a Politico interview that he would "totally be willing" to shut down the government if he doesn't get it.

"I don't do anything . . . just for political gain," Trump said. "But I will tell you, politically speaking, that issue is a total winner."  He wants $5 billion. "I am firm," he said.

Tunnel vision

Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo said he came away from a White House meeting Wednesday with President Donald Trump feeling “positive” about prospects for resuscitating the crucial Gateway infrastructure project, reports Newsday’s Matthew Chayes.

Cuomo said he got the president’s attention with images of the dilapidated conditions in the existing rail tunnels under the Hudson River. What he didn’t get yet: a timeline or a funding commitment.

 “We are nowhere right now,” Cuomo said. “There is no clock ticking because there is no clock, so we are nowhere. The question is, how would we start a clock and start a process?”

Just another truthless Thursday

The president, whose accusatory tactics and manner often echo those of the infamous Sen. Joe McCarthy of Wisconsin, blamed Mueller for "McCarthyism" in an early Thursday tweet — while dreaming up a new price tag for the cost of the probe. He also feverishly projected onto Hillary Clinton and Democrats "atrocious, and perhaps subversive, crimes." In another, he evokes a gauzy scenario in which "billions" of dollars are "pouring" into the United States due to tariffs, though tariffs actually resemble taxes that are absorbed in many cases by American consumers. Trump also offered a fantasized version of what's happening at General Motors.

What else is happening:

• House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi won her party's nomination Wednesday for House speaker, but to clinch the job in January she faces a final five-week campaign to win over enough of her caucus members who voted against her, reports Newsday's Tom Brune. Her foes include Rep. Kathleen Rice (D-Garden City).
• Stormy Daniels told The Daily Beast she is thinking about dropping lawyer Michael Avenatti, complaining he sued Trump for defaming her against her wishes and launched a crowdfunding site for her legal expenses without telling her. Daniels' story about an affair with Trump opened up potential legal peril for the president, and has his hush-money paymaster, Michael Cohen, facing a prison sentence.
• Melania Trump shook off the social-media mockery of the blood-red Christmas trees she chose to decorate the White House with for the holiday season. “I think they look fantastic. In real life, they look even more beautiful,” she said.
• Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke introduced Trump at the 96th National Christmas Tree Lighting ceremony as "the man who brought Christmas back to America." 
• There is widespread outrage in Mexico over a decision to award Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner the nation's highest honor for foreigners, the Order of the Aztec Eagle, reports The Guardian. Trump began his campaign by disparaging Mexicans as criminals and rapists. The government credits Kushner with helping negotiate a revamp of NAFTA.
• Ivanka Trump told ABC's "Good Morning America" there’s is no comparison between her use of private email and Hillary Clinton's. Asked to reflect on any missteps she's made, Ivanka replied: "I actually have experienced, on a personal level, this tremendous growth in my own sense of self, and seeing more brightly my own compass and signal.”
• Trump isn't holding out hope for a Nobel Peace Prize for his peace efforts with North Korea, he told the New York Post. He recalled his "Apprentice" lost Emmys to "The Amazing Race" in its first two seasons. "That show was terrible,” Trump said. “ ‘Amazing Race’ got it because ‘Amazing Race’ was the establishment.”