{"id":1495058,"date":"2022-05-27T16:14:56","date_gmt":"2022-05-27T20:14:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1495058"},"modified":"2022-05-27T16:15:00","modified_gmt":"2022-05-27T20:15:00","slug":"michael-sussmann-trial-goes-to-jury-after-former-clinton-attorney-declines-to-testify","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/michael-sussmann-trial-goes-to-jury-after-former-clinton-attorney-declines-to-testify\/","title":{"rendered":"Michael Sussmann Trial Goes To Jury After Former Clinton Attorney Declines To Testify"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"float:left\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">26<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fmichael-sussmann-trial-goes-to-jury-after-former-clinton-attorney-declines-to-testify%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1495058&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>Testimony in the case of former <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailywire.com\/topic\/hillary-clinton\">Hillary Clinton<\/a> campaign attorney Michael Sussmann wrapped up Friday after the defendant decided against taking the stand.<\/p>\n<p>Special counsel John Durham\u2019s team of prosecutors and Sussmann\u2019s defense team made closing arguments on Friday morning before Judge Christopher Cooper handed the case over to the jury for deliberation. Sussmann is <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailywire.com\/news\/sussmann-trial-opens-lawyers-spar-over-defendants-2016-lie-to-fbi\">charged with one count of lying to the FBI<\/a> during a September 2016 meeting with then-FBI general counsel James Baker.<\/p>\n<p>Prosecutors told the jury that the evidence of Sussmann\u2019s guilt is \u201coverwhelming,\u201d according to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/news\/2022\/05\/27\/prosecution-clinton-campaign-attorney-00035682\">Politico<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe defendant knew that he had to hide his clients if there was any chance of getting his allegations into the FBI,\u201d assistant special counsel Jonathan Algor said. \u201cIt wasn\u2019t about national security. It was about promoting opposition research against the opposition candidate Donald Trump.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere are sometimes close cases,\u201d prosecutor Andrew DeFilippis added. \u201cThis is not even close to a close case.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Defense attorneys portrayed Sussmann as a victim and said prosecutors were manipulating facts to make Sussmann appear guilty of a crime he never committed.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe special counsel\u2019s office bought a snow-making machine and blew that over the lawn, and they want you to think it snowed,\u201d defense attorney Sean Berkowitz said, according to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/politics\/sussmann-defense-closing-argument-slams-durham-case-misdirection-smoke-and-mirrors\">Fox News<\/a>. The attorney described the prosecution\u2019s case as \u201cmisdirection\u201d and \u201csmoke and mirrors.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Berkowitz said Sussmann is a \u201cserious national security lawyer who received what he believed to be credible data from a world-leading DNS expert,\u201d referring to tech executive Rodney Joffe, who was one of Sussmann\u2019s clients at the time of the 2016 meeting.<\/p>\n<p>Sussmann is alleged to have lied to Baker in 2016 about representing the Clinton campaign and Joffe during their meeting over later-debunked claims that the Trump Organization was keeping a backchannel with Russia\u2019s Alfa-Bank.<\/p>\n<p>The charge itself is over the narrow question of whether Sussmann lied in the meeting itself. During the trial, prosecutors presented evidence from before and after the meeting showing and suggesting that Sussmann presented himself to Baker as a concerned citizen, not as operating on behalf of Clinton\u2019s 2016 campaign for president.<\/p>\n<p>The day before the meeting, Sussmann sent Baker a text requesting a meeting with him over \u201csensitive\u201d material he wished to show the bureau.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cJim \u2014 it\u2019s Michael Sussmann. I have something time-sensitive (and sensitive) I need to discuss. Do you have availability for a short meeting tomorrow? I\u2019m coming on my own \u2014 not on behalf of a client or company \u2014 want to help the Bureau. Thanks,\u201d Sussmann\u2019s text says, according to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/news\/2022\/05\/27\/prosecution-clinton-campaign-attorney-00035682\">The Wall Street Journal<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Baker responded: \u201cOk. I will find a time. What might work for you?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Baker did not take contemporaneous notes during the meeting, though he testified that <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailywire.com\/news\/former-top-fbi-official-testifies-sussmann-100-hid-ties-to-clinton-campaign-during-2016-meeting\">he is \u201c100%\u201d positive<\/a> Sussmann continued to characterize himself as a concerned citizen. Baker met with two FBI officials after the meeting with Sussmann, and notes from each say that, in Baker\u2019s recollection, Sussmann presented the Alfa-Bank data on behalf of himself only.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Testimony in the case of former Hillary Clinton campaign attorney Michael Sussmann wrapped up Friday after the defendant decided against taking the stand. Special counsel John Durham\u2019s team of prosecutors and Sussmann\u2019s defense team made closing arguments on Friday morning before Judge Christopher Cooper handed the case over to the jury for deliberation. Sussmann is &#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":70,"featured_media":1495090,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1495058","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1495058","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/70"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1495058"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1495058\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1495090"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1495058"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1495058"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1495058"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}