White House lawyer moved transcript of Trump call to classified server after Ukraine adviser raised

[UpInArms]

Source: Washington Post

Moments after President Trump ended his phone call with Ukraine’s president on July 25, an unsettled national security aide rushed to the office of White House lawyer John Eisenberg.

Army Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, the top Ukraine adviser at the White House, had been listening to the call and was disturbed by the pressure Trump had applied to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate his political rivals, according to people familiar with Vindman’s testimony to lawmakers this week.

Vindman told Eisenberg, the White House’s legal adviser on national security issues, that what the president did was wrong, said the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the ongoing investigation.

Scribbling notes on a yellow legal pad, Eisenberg proposed a step that other officials have said is at odds with long-standing White House protocol: moving a transcript of the call to a highly classified server and restricting access to it, according to two people familiar with Vindman’s account.

... snip ...

Eisenberg, who worked in the Washington office of the law firm Kirkland & Ellis before joining the Trump administration, also served in the Justice Department during the George W. Bush administration. He has been deputy White House counsel overseeing national security issues since Trump’s inauguration, serving under both former White House counsel Donald McGahn and his successor, Pat Cipollone.

Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/white-house-lawyer-moved-transcript-of-trump-call-to-classified-server-after-ukraine-adviser-raised-alarms/2019/10/30/ba0fbdb6-fb4e-11e9-8190-6be4deb56e01_story.html?outputType=amp

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Kirkland & Ellis

"On the roster of former Kirkland lawyers who have served in the Bush administration are Ciongoli; Philbin; Clement; Steven Bradbury, acting head of the Office of Legal Counsel; R. Alexander Acosta, head of the Civil Rights Division; Kannon Shanmugam and Daryl Joseffer, both litigators in the Office of the Solicitor General; Jeffrey Clark, a senior official in the Environmental and Natural Resources Division; and John Wood, chief of staff at the Department of Homeland Security. Kirkland partner Jay Lefkowitz, who served as domestic policy adviser in the White House, returned to the firm in 2003.

"It's no coincidence that the firm is also home to Starr, the former D.C. Circuit judge and Whitewater independent counsel. In 1993, after leaving the post of solicitor general, Starr went to Kirkland with a handful of other former Justice Department officials, and the group set about building an appellate litigation practice with a conservative ideological bent.

"Starr's reputation as a leading conservative thinker drew young lawyers to Kirkland who identified with his politics. Nearly all came from prestigious appellate and Supreme Court clerkships. Perhaps without fully intending it, Kirkland's recruiting efforts built a farm team for the current Republican administration. Starr, who is of counsel at Kirkland and dean of Pepperdine University School of Law, declined comment.

[NurseJackie]

1. Which is worse? The crime, or the cover-up?

[monk3431]

2. Nail on the head

That's what got Nixon impeached. This clown is no Nixon or Clinton. He has no integrity.

[ProudMNDemocrat]

4. In the Nixon case, the COVER-UP proved more damaging...

As is in this case, but worse.

Here, there are witnesses who agree that there was a quid-pro-quo going on. That Trump was indeed pressuring Ukraine President Zelensky for political favors , and then hiding the evidence somewhere else.

Trump keeps talking about the word-for-word phone transcript he says he released. LIE!! A summary is not the same as a word-for-word transcript. Lt. Colonel Vindman filled in the blanks with his deposition.

Donald Trump is proving himself to NOT be all that smart and totally ignorant as to how Government works. His ignorance will be his undoing, for he is NO "stable genius".

[bullimiami]

5. The crime is a crime. The coverup, another crime. The conspiracy, yet another crime.

[NurseJackie]

6. Three for three...

... and that's ONLY this instance.

[lagomorph777]

12. Unfortunately for Eisenberg, he couldn't stuff all the witnesses into that server.

I think that's called the Eisenberg Uncertainty Principle.

[crickets]

13. I see what you did there.

[gab13by13]

3. We have to start going after these enablers,

Put pressure on these lawyers some how. Complain to the bar association. I know they have been asked to testify before the House but what are the chances of that happening?

We need to go after Barr, he is more dangerous than Trump.

[bucolic_frolic]

7. This is like hiding the moonshine under the passenger's seat /nt

[Perseus]

8. What on earth makes people try to protect a crook?

People who are supposed to care for their country, what makes them try to protect a crook and incriminate themselves with criminal activities? What is going on?

As a lawyer you have to know that what you are doing is wrong, its like the doctors who prescribed opioids, they had to know they were doing something wrong.

I have been breaking my head thinking about all these, republicans trying to defend the crook instead of the country, instead of trying to learn the truth. Where have integrity, morals, honesty, dignity and principles gone?

Every time I see a Jim Jordan spewing stupidity I ask myself the same questions. Did this people work hard to become representatives in Congress or Senate, or other positions in government so they could show the World how useless they are as human beings? What is going on?

[unblock]

9. these people are brainwashed into thinking that republicans are the only people who matter

to them, everyone else is the enemy. that includes a majority of americans, which makes no sense to any reasonable person. but to them, the rest of us are lesser beings, invaders, criminals, evil, whatever.

they are convinced that anything they do, whether it's criminal or evil or stupid or whatever, it's nowhere near as bad as letting democrats win. because all hell would break loose if poor people had access to decent health care, i guess....

[FakeNoose]

10. Eisenberg the White House lawyer became implicated in the coverup

... however he had nothing to do with the original crime. I'm sure all these White House lawyers can see they are trapped in one way or another. Why don't they become the whistleblowers?

Another observation: What is it about the Kirkland & Ellis law firm that so many of these guys who came from there are doing all the dirty deeds for Chump? Have they no professional pride or patriotism - ever?

[Nitram]

11. Interesting. No, this was not a cover up. Restricting access actually secured the transcript and

insured a record would be left of anyone who accessed it. Eisenberg put the transcript out of Trump's reach before he could have it destroyed.