Quote (Goomshill @ Mar 11 2020 08:06pm)

Because it wasn't an investigation into Trump or the Trump campaign at the time, and AG's haven't recused themselves in similar cases of partisan accusations in the past.
Sessions recused himself on March 2nd, 2017, before any official investigation was opened, and did so specifically because of the accusations by the democrats that he had lied under oath, as Nancy Pelosi directly accused a few days earlier. Up until that point, the only publicly admitted detail of 'Crossfire Hurricane' was that they were looking into Flynn, with the vague description in an article by the NYT a couple weeks prior of the FBI looking at contacts between Trump officials and Russia, without firm details. Without any official investigation, without any actual wrongdoing to examine, its unprecedented for an AG to step aside. That's what happens *after* there's specific allegations and evidence of a crime by the administration.

Just look at the sequence of events, Sessions never recused himself just because of the democrats and media's furor with the wild rumors of the Steele Dossier leaking out, he didn't recuse himself when people were calling for a special prosecutor to look into Trump campaign officials communicating with Russia, but within just a couple days of the media running a news cycle accusing *him* of talking to Russians and lying about it, *that's* when he recused himself citing his personal involvement. Except that narrative was complete bullshit and he knew it. He wasn't stepping aside because supporting Trump was a conflict, he was stepping aside because he became a target.

Quote (Goomshill @ Mar 11 2020 08:06pm)

Because it wasn't an investigation into Trump or the Trump campaign at the time, and AG's haven't recused themselves in similar cases of partisan accusations in the past.
Sessions recused himself on March 2nd, 2017, before any official investigation was opened, and did so specifically because of the accusations by the democrats that he had lied under oath, as Nancy Pelosi directly accused a few days earlier. Up until that point, the only publicly admitted detail of 'Crossfire Hurricane' was that they were looking into Flynn, with the vague description in an article by the NYT a couple weeks prior of the FBI looking at contacts between Trump officials and Russia, without firm details. Without any official investigation, without any actual wrongdoing to examine, its unprecedented for an AG to step aside. That's what happens *after* there's specific allegations and evidence of a crime by the administration.

Just look at the sequence of events, Sessions never recused himself just because of the democrats and media's furor with the wild rumors of the Steele Dossier leaking out, he didn't recuse himself when people were calling for a special prosecutor to look into Trump campaign officials communicating with Russia, but within just a couple days of the media running a news cycle accusing *him* of talking to Russians and lying about it, *that's* when he recused himself citing his personal involvement. Except that narrative was complete bullshit and he knew it. He wasn't stepping aside because supporting Trump was a conflict, he was stepping aside because he became a target.

Quote (IceMage @ Mar 11 2020 07:56pm)

Glad you're thinking of me. To be sure, I was avoiding you by replying in this thread.

Quote

I'm just astounded how detached from reality you are. But what's more surprising, is how you can't even comprehend how other people see things differently. I don't know what happened to you post-Trump, but it's probably the most remarkable psychological shift I've ever seen. I don't know how it's even possible, because at this point I don't think you're joking around.

Quote (Thor123422 @ Mar 11 2020 08:16pm)

Even if we take everything you say at face value the best we can say is that Sessions was a bit too hasty and would have still had to recuse himself once the probe was officially underway.

Quote (Goomshill @ Mar 11 2020 08:18pm)

Passive aggression is truly the best flavor of aggression.



Its been over a year since the Mueller Report and you're still hung up on whats 'reality', what's 'propaganda' and 'nonsense'.
The folks who took to the conspiracy theories with Occam's & Hanlon's Razors turned out to be right, the folks who saw nefarious schemes lurking behind every hollow bombshell turned out to be wrong.



Probably yes. There's an imaginable world where it never escalated into a full investigation, given that Sessions recusing himself was the spark that cascaded into that special counsel, but with Comey & McCabe setting fires behind the scenes I doubt even a truly devoted Sessions could have stamped them out. But that's all hindsight and speculation. What we do know is that Sessions took heat from Al Franken and Pelosi and the next day crumpled like a tin can

Quote (thesnipa @ Mar 11 2020 09:03pm)

from the sessions perspective if he doesn't recuse:

best case scenario: he leads an investigation that finds no evidence of collusion or earmarks of active interference by the Russians. is seen by the public as covering for trump.

worst case scenario: he finds something, and either has to hide it (and have it leaked he did so) or expose trump and his movement he's actively engaged in.

even with hindsight nothing would be found AND he'd be forced to investigate only trump its a loss for him. and he didn't have any hindsight into what would come other than that everyone wanted trump investigated.

Quote (Goomshill @ Mar 11 2020 09:16pm)

I think a lot of the trouble here is the recency bias and timeline. There wasn't a (known) investigation at the time and the administration was resisting calls for any investigation. Even after Sessions was recused, it took a cascade of headlines for the next 2 months before Comey was fired and the immediate aftermath led to Mueller's appointment in a matter of days. We can say today that its likely if not a certainty that there would be an investigation and it would need a special prosecutor eventually, but at the time they didn't know that. We know about Comey and McCabe's secret initiatives and Crossfire Hurricane, they didn't. Sessions did know that he was innocent of any conspiracy theories and should have been reasonably sure there was no 'there' there with the rest of the campaign officials. If you know there's no fire, seeing smoke doesn't make you think calling in the fire brigade is an inevitability. But what we did know is that Democrats were screaming about it and the media was having an absolute circus pointing fingers, and within just a few days of fingers being pointed at Sessions, he ditched.

Quote (Ghot @ 11 Mar 2020 19:35)

U.S. Supreme Court allows Trump's 'Remain in Mexico' asylum policy

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-court-immigration/u-s-supreme-court-allows-trumps-remain-in-mexico-asylum-policy-idUSKBN20Y2ZA

Even more winning.

Quote (Goomshill @ Mar 11 2020 08:18pm)

Probably yes. There's an imaginable world where it never escalated into a full investigation, given that Sessions recusing himself was the spark that cascaded into that special counsel, but with Comey & McCabe setting fires behind the scenes I doubt even a truly devoted Sessions could have stamped them out. But that's all hindsight and speculation. What we do know is that Sessions took heat from Al Franken and Pelosi and the next day crumpled like a tin can

Quote (Black XistenZ @ Mar 12 2020 08:08am)

It should be noted that this was not the SCOTUS's final ruling on the case - it just allowed the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP, colloquially called "remain in mexico policy") to stay in effect while the administration appeals the 9th circuit ruling against MPP. It is still possible that the Supreme Court strikes the MPP down in the end, although I think that's quite unlikely.