Lindsey Halligan Is A Real Lawyer And Any Unsolicited Meltdowns She Has In Your DMs Are OFF THE RECORD
Just, the incompetent stupid of it all.
Sure is a hot news week for leakers, and you journalists and mommybloggers are going to extra enjoy this one!
This regime is terrible at so many things, and being not very ALL CLEAR ON OPSEC is for sure one of them. The latest drop comes courtesy of loose lips Lindsey Halligan herself, the top prosecutor for the Eastern District of Virginia and (previously?) Donald Trump’s personal lawyer, who Signal-chatted Lawfare Senior Editor Anna Bower to say that YUH HUH, there is too evidence New York AG Letitia James did a crime, but I won’t tell you what it is, and you are a bad reporter!
The whole thing is jaw-dropping insane/stupid, and you should click and go read it.
To quick recap, the DOJ under Donald John Trump has been laser-focused on lock-em-upping his political enemies, including New York Attorney General Letitia James, the prosecutor with the audacity to expose Trump as no genius businessman, but a lying fraud who made millions while deceiving banks, insurance companies and the taxman. And after 10 months of Herculean effort, including DOJ goon Ed Martin peeking in James’s windows like a pervert, and Trump forcing out his own handpicked US Attorney Eric Siebert and installing Halligan at EDVA, he got what he wanted.
PREVIOUSLY!
On October 9 a grand jury indicted James on two FELONY counts in EDVA: bank fraud and making false statements to a financial institution, each with a maximum sentence of 30 years and a $1 million fine. The charges are based on the accusation that she lied to lenders that a property she bought in Norfolk in 2020 would be used as a “second home,” in order to get a better interest rate on the mortgage, and instead used it as a “rental investment property, renting the property to a family of (3).”
And then two days later The New York Times dug up a truffle: there was evidence that James didn’t break the law doing that thing at all. Because James’s tenant, her grandniece, testified to a different grand jury in June that she actually did not pay rent to James, James visited and stayed over sometimes, too, and not only that, but short-term rentals were actually allowed under the loan’s terms.
But, there’s no defense presented at a grand jury hearing, so Halligan was able to present whatever cherry-picked evidence she could find to bring Daddy his indictment with this new grand jury.
Anna Bower re-tweeted this story, with her opinion that the Times’s story was “important exculpatory evidence.”
And that retweet did not sit right with Lindsey Halligan, who messaged Bower over Signal immediately to tell her that she had it all wrong.
Whoa right there! When have you ever heard prosecutors publicly talk about the details of an ongoing case to a reporter? They don’t, or if they do they are very very careful, because why jeopardize a case by yapping your trap if you could just shut up instead? You can only imagine Bower’s eyebrows jumping to her hairline.
Halligan repeatedly refused to say what it was that the Times story got wrong, even as she chided Bower for not “checking her facts.” Did she sincerely think that a senior legal reporter was going to be like, oh no, I am a bad reporter and retweeter! I will back off from this story and retweet no more! It is baffling. But that is apparently the level of horse sense Halligan has.
Here is but a sampling of the back-and-forth Bower was forced to endure from Halligan:
“Ok, I’m all ears,” I said after thanking her. “What am I getting wrong?”
“Honestly, so much,” Halligan replied. “I can’t tell you everything but your reporting in particular is just way off.” She then said it was clear to her that I jump to “biased conclusions” based on what I read rather than “truly looking into the evidence.”
OK?
I sent Halligan a link to the post in which I summarized Thompson’s grand jury testimony as reported by the Times. “Are you saying that something I said in this post is inaccurate?” I asked. “And if so, what?”
Halligan replied: “You’re assuming exculpatory evidence without knowing what you’re talking about. It’s just bizarre to me. If you have any questions, before you report, feel free to reach out to me. But jumping to conclusions does your credibility no good.”
Halligan’s real beef seemed to be with the Times, not me, though she wasn’t saying what was wrong with the Times’s story either. I brought this up in my response, pointing out that my post explicitly credited the Times story, not my own reporting. “Did they get something wrong?” I asked.
“Yes they did but you went with it!” she said. “Without even fact checking anything!!!!”
Again, this was about a retweet.
“Continue to do what you have been and you’ll be completely discredited when the evidence comes out,” said Halligan to Bower about her very bad retweet that Halligan refused to explain the badness of.
And no, Halligan did not say “off the record” or “this is background.” At least, not until after Bower reached out to the Justice Department for a response. Then Halligan frantically texted Bower that the whole thing was retroactively off the record, just as Bower was approaching deadline. “By the way—everything I ever sent you is off record. You’re not a journalist so it’s weird saying that but just letting you know.”
Whoops, that’s not how it works.
Also not how it works: claiming that because your Signal messages are set to automatically GO POOF disappear, that somehow reporters are not allowed to share them. But Halligan tried anyway!
“It’s obvious the whole convo is off record. There’s disappearing messages and it’s on signal.”
It’s just obvious!
Oh boy, was Justice Department spokesclown Natalie Baldassarre pissed about all this when Bower reached out. While also extra-confirming that the messages were authentic, of course:
You clearly didn’t get the response you wanted—which was information handed over to you without having to dig into the facts of the case to craft a truthful story—so you thought you’d “tattletale” to main justice. Lindsay [sic] Halligan was attempting to point you to facts, not gossip, but when clarifying that she would adhere to the rule of the law and not disclose Grand Jury information, you threaten to leak an entire conversation. Good luck ever getting anyone to talk to you when you publish their texts.
Facts? She can’t even spell the name of the top prosecutor right when public relations is her whole job! Incompetent lickspittles all.
Meanwhile, in the EDVA, the purity purges carried on. Halligan also fired Elizabeth Yusi, who oversees major criminal prosecutions in the Norfolk office. Yusi had been worrying to coworkers that she was about to get fired for refusing to prosecute James, and it turns out she was right. And Halligan fired two more in her office: Kristin Bird, the deputy chief of the Narcotics and Violent Crime Unit, and Maggie Cleary, who was head prosecutor for like a week in between Erik Siebert getting forced out and Halligan getting installed.
The massacres will continue until the president’s credibility is restored!
How many actual bad hombre criminals are now going to walk free because the office is bleeding away every lawyer who won’t pretzel the rule of law to punish Trump’s enemies? Sigh.
Anyway, if you want more on this batshit story, enjoy Lawfare’s Benjamin Wittes and Anna Bower discussing!
[Lawfare / New York Times archive link / CBS / Anna Bower on BlueSky]
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By the way—every comment I ever posted on Wonkette is off-record. Comments aren't allowed so it’s weird saying that but just letting you know.
Republicans are too emotional to hold public office.