Pardon Mike Flynn

By Dan Calabrese —— Bio and Archives March 6, 2018

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Supposedly one of the worst things Donald Trump ever did as president was to ask James Comey to go easy on Mike Flynn. It was supposed to be obstruction of justice, or interfering in an investigation, or whatever. It's now turning out that the opposite is true: The harassment of Flynn by Robert Mueller and the FBI is one of the worst things the government has done to an individual in a very long time. Flynn erred when he misled FBI interrogators about his contacts with Russian officials, but he did it out of fear because of the pointless political firestorm that was growing at the time - and still hasn't entirely subsided - about everything and anything to do with Russians. He didn't do it to cover up some underlying crime. To this day there is no evidence such a crime was committed by Flynn or anyone else.

Yet for that very reason - Mueller has to justify his investigation and there is no underlying crime that will do the job for him - he feels the need to hound people over process crimes like "misleading the FBI," and that's why Mike Flynn has become his sacrificial lamb. The situation is so bad for Flynn that he is now having to sell his house to pay his legal fees:

Flynn's 13-year-old, three-bedroom townhouse in Old Town Alexandria outside Washington, which he bought three years ago, was listed for sale in December with an asking price of $895,000 — money he will use to pay his high legal defense debts, his brother Joe Flynn said Monday. The retired three-star general and former Defense Intelligence Agency director withdrew to his hometown of Middletown, R.I., last year after he was dismissed by President Donald Trump 24 days into his role as national security adviser, later becoming embroiled in Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation. Flynn pleaded guilty on Dec. 1 to lying to FBI agents about his contacts with Russian officials. He misled agents during a White House meeting early in 2017. "I'm not going to sugarcoat it, this has been a trying experience” for Flynn and his wife, Lori, his youngest brother told ABC News. "It has been a crucible and it's not over." Mueller is digging into whether Trump's presidential campaign colluded with Russian government efforts to disrupt or influence the 2016 election.

The investigators led by the former FBI director — once a colleague of Flynn's — scrutinized the general's contacts with Russians, such as the Kremlin’s ambassador in Washington, to whom he spoke about fighting ISIS and possibly other matters at the president-elect’s direction during the post-election transition.

This is a travesty. Just because Flynn did the wrong thing in misleading agents during the interrogation is certainly not a serious enough offense to bring about the complete upheaval of his life, which is exactly what Mueller is inflicting upon him. Mike Flynn agreed to serve President Trump as national security adviser during a time when a lot of establishment Republicans were running for the tall grass, making it difficult to staff the incoming administration. Flynn stepped up and was willing to do it. When the left and the media decided to hitch their rhetorical wagons to the whole Russia thing, perfectly innocuous contacts with Russian officials and citizens suddenly became politically toxic. Conversations Flynn had, which were nothing more than him doing his job, suddenly made him a target for political and now legal attacks. This entire thing has never been legitimized by any real evidence of wrongdoing - be it collusion or anything else - and yet Mike Flynn's entire life has been turned upside down because Robert Mueller needs a scalp. This needs to stop, and stop now. President Trump should pardon Flynn immediately, and people who believe in justice should raise money to pay off his legal fees so he can keep his house. I would contribute. Furthermore, if Robert Mueller doesn't produce real evidence of collusion with Russia in the next 30 days, President Trump should fire him and direct the Department of Justice to shut down his investigation. He's turned into what most special counsels turn into - an investigator in pursuit of a crime that doesn't exist, trying to find excuses to charge someone - anyone - with a crime of any sort so he doesn't have to explain why he blew through millions of dollars and accomplished nothing. When people who committed no real crime have to sell their homes to pay their lawyers, the whole thing has gone too far. End it. Now. And start with a pardon of Mike Flynn before his life is irreversibly ruined.