Robert Mueller released his sentencing memo for former national security adviser Michael Flynn late on Friday, which suggested that the retired general offered the special counsel’s Russia investigation “substantial” assistance.
However, reports suggest that the biggest bombshell in Mueller’s heavily redacted court document is that the probe into the Trump campaign’s contacts with Russian officials was not even the most important investigation for which Flynn provided his “substantial” help. What was the most important one? Mueller leaves the answer a mystery, except to say that it is a “criminal” investigation, as the addendum to the sentencing memo filed with the United States District Court in Washington D.C. states.
Otherwise, the details of the criminal investigation are redacted, obscured by heavy black lines. But as journalist and Russia investigation expert Marcy Wheeler notes on her Empty Wheel blog, the criminal investigation is listed first in the six-page, heavily redacted document outlining Flynn’s help to Mueller’s investigation. The details on such were given three full paragraphs totaling about 20 lines of type. However, the section on Russian collusion is given just 12 lines of detail, plus a nine-line “introductory paragraph.”
“The Mueller investigation is actually the second thing listed, which I take to suggest that the Mueller investigation is just the second most important,” Wheeler wrote.
“My wild-a** guess is that these consist of A) a criminal national security investigation (the Turkish investigation tied to Reza Zarrab could be one possibility), B) the Mueller investigation, and C) a counterintelligence investigation into the Russians. But obviously the first and third are just a guess.”
Another “guess” as to the substance of the mysterious criminal investigation came from former Justice Department spokesperson and legal expert Matthew Miller, who wrote on Twitter that the redacted portion of the Mueller memo may detail information Flynn gave about George Nader, a shadowy Lebanese-American businessman and convicted pedophile who serves as an emissary for the government of the United Arab Emirates. Earlier this year, the Inquisitr published a report on Nader and his ties to the Russia probe, as well as at least two other Trump scandals.
Nader, according to a New York Times exposé, met at Trump Tower on August 3, 2016 with Donald Trump Jr. and Joel Zamel, an Israeli specialist is utilizing social media to influence public opinion.
At that meeting, Nader “told Donald Trump Jr. that the princes who led Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates were eager to help his father win election as president,” the Times reported.
“This has always been the hardest part of the investigation to understand, even with some really great reporting around it. Miller wrote on Twitter .
“But everything about the facts we know have stunk, and it’s clear Mueller has been all over it.”
