Michael Flynn
On Feb. 14, 2017 Michael Flynn resigned his position as Trump's National Security Adviser due to possible violations of the Logan Act for discussing sanctions with the Russian Ambassador before Trump was inaugurated.
Timeline
| 2015.12.10 | Flynn is paid $45,386 by RT. medium.com (See also Russia) |
| 2016.07 | Flynn's firm invites members of Congress to preview encryption technology, then begins lecturing them on why they should extradite Turkish dissidents. thedailybeast.com |
| 2016.09.19 | According to the Ex Director of the CIA, Flynn secretly meets with Turkish officials to discuss a plan to kidnap a political rival of Turkeys leader from his home in Pennsylvania and deliver him to the Turkish government. rawstory.com (See also Turkey) During this same time Flynn was being paid by Turkey for his undisclosed work as a foreign agent. |
| 2016.10.09 | Flynn tweets for people to follow and promotes the book of a famed alt-right rape apologist who claims the goal of diversity is white genocide. mediamatters.org |
| 2017.03.14 | Documents reveal debunked Clinton scandal figure was on Michael Flynn's payroll. msnbc.com |
| 2017.03.16 | Documents reveal Flynn was paid $45,386 by RT. medium.com (See also Russia, First 100 Days) |
| 2017.03.25 | Sources claim Flynn has turned on Trump and become a witness for the FBI. rawstory.com (See also 2016 Campaign) |
| 2017.05.08 | Former Obama Administration officials say President Obama warned Trump about hiring Michael Flynn during a post-election conversation in the Oval Office. nytimes.com (See also Russia, Russian Meddling in Election) |
| 2017.05.10 | Senate intelligence committee subpoenas Michael Flynn regarding interactions with Russian officials. cnn.com (See also Russian Meddling in Election, Russia) |
| 2017.06.02 | Robert Mueller, the special counsel investigating possible ties between the Trump election campaign and Russia, is expanding his probe to assume control of a grand jury investigation into former national security adviser Michael Flynn. reuters.com (See also Legal Activity, Corruption) |
| 2017.06.06 | The day after Trump asked FBI director James B. Comey to end an investigation into his former national security adviser, Mr. Comey confronted Attorney General Jeff Sessions and said he did not want to be left alone again with the president, believing Mr. Sessions should protect the F.B.I. from White House influence. nytimes.com (See also Jeff Sessions, Russian Meddling in Election, Legal Activity, Corruption) |
| 2017.06.06 | The nation’s top intelligence official told associates in March that Trump asked him if he could intervene with FBI Director James Comey to get the bureau to back off its focus on former national security adviser Michael Flynn in its Russia probe. washingtonpost.com (See also Russian Meddling in Election, Corruption, Russia, 2016 Election) |
| 2017.06.07 | Fired FBI Director James B. Comey said Trump told him at the White House “I need loyalty, I expect loyalty” during their private dinner conversation in January, according to written remarks from Comey offering a vivid preview of his testimony Thursday before the Senate Intelligence Committee. washingtonpost.com (See also Corruption, Feuds, Unpresidential Behavior, Legal Activity, Russian Meddling in Election) |
| 2017.06.07 | Former US director of national intelligence James Clapper says events in Washington now are more serious than the Watergate scandal of the 1970s, and that it is imperative investigators get to the bottom of the Trump administration’s links with the Putin regime. theguardian.com (See also Corruption, Trump Relationship with Russia, Russian Meddling in Election, James Mattis, John Kelly, H.R. McMaster) |
| 2017.06.07 | In his 9 one-on-one conversations with Trump, former FBI chief, James B. Comey said Trump pressured him for loyalty, sought forbearance for Michael Flynn and asked him to lift the “cloud” of a Russia investigation hanging over the administration. bloomberg.com (See also Legal Activity, Unpresidential Behavior, Russian Meddling in Election, Feuds, Corruption) |
| 2017.06.07 | James Comey’s seven-page written statement, released by the Senate Intelligence Committee recounts, in spare and simple prose, a set of facts to which Comey is prepared to testify under oath tomorrow, and is the most shocking single document compiled about the official conduct of the public duties of any President since the Watergate tapes. lawfareblog.com (See also Corruption, Russian Meddling in Election, Legal Activity) |
| 2017.06.08 | Former FBI Director James Comey accused the president and his top aides of lying, suggesting president wanted special treatment in exchange for loyalty, and that he believes he lost his job because of how he handled the Russia investigation. abcnews.go.com (See also Corruption, Legal Activity, Russian Meddling in Election) |
| 2017.06.08 | In the first hour of former FBI Director James Comey's testimony on Capitol Hill about the nature and details of his relationship with Trump, he called the president a liar twice, flashing anger at Trump's characterization that the bureau was disorganized and chaotic. cnn.com (See also Unpresidential Behavior, Legal Activity, Corruption) |
| 2017.06.08 | James B. Comey, said under oath in an extraordinary Senate hearing that he believed President Trump had tried to derail an investigation into his national security adviser, and accused the president of lying and defaming him and the F.B.I. nytimes.com (See also Unpresidential Behavior, Legal Activity, Russian Meddling in Election, Trump Relationship with Russia) |
| 2017.06.15 | Special counsel Bob Mueller is investigating the finances and business dealings of Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law and adviser, as part of the investigation into Russia’s interference in the 2016 presidential election. washingtonpost.com (See also Jared Kushner, Russian Meddling in Election, Legal Activity) |
| 2017.06.20 | Despite senior officials across the government convinced that Michael T. Flynn had become vulnerable to Russian blackmail, every day for three weeks, the CIA director Mike Pompeo briefed Trump on the nation's most sensitive intelligence with Mr. Flynn. nytimes.com (See also Mike Pompeo, Russia, Trump Relationship with Russia, Russian Meddling in Election, Corruption) |
| 2017.06.22 | More than a month after suggesting he may have secretly recorded his meetings with FBI Director James Comey, Trump admitted that he has no such tapes. buzzfeed.com (See also Corruption, Legal Activity, Trump Relationship with Russia, Russian Meddling in Election, Unpresidential Behavior) |
| 2017.06.29 | The Wall Street Journal reports that Russian hackers discussed during the 2016 presidential campaign if they could obtain emails deleted by Hillary Clinton and get them to Michael Flynn, the retired general who was then a member of the Trump campaign. buzzfeed.com (See also 2016 Campaign, Corruption, Russian Meddling in Election) |
| 2017.07.13 | In response to a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit, the Justice Department released Attorney General Jeff Sessions’s SF-86 security-clearance that shows he denied having any contact with foreign governments or their representatives. theatlantic.com (See also Jeff Sessions, Administration Errors, Russia) He did. |
| 2017.08.04 | Investigators working for the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, recently asked the White House for documents related to the former national security adviser Michael T. Flynn, and have questioned witnesses about whether he was secretly paid by the Turkish government during the final months of the presidential campaign. nytimes.com (See also Corruption, Conflicts of Interest, 2016 Campaign) |
Assessments
Daniel Benjamin–Politico Magazine
In his Feb. 14, 2017 article, Benjamin raised the question he did not want lose in the chaos:
Who told Flynn to call Sergey Kislyak, the Russian ambassador to the United States? Because I’m convinced Flynn didn’t do it of his own accord. Flynn is a bit player in a much larger story regarding the president’s relationship with the Kremlin, and it’s this story the press needs to focus on.
There is little doubt that Trump elevated Flynn because of his loyalty and the optics of having a recently retired three-star general parroting his views, which few other generals of that rank would consider doing. But Flynn was no grand strategist. He would not have been capable of running a complex political realignment with Russia, and he was woefully ill-cast for the role of national security adviser.