In the flood of information taking center stage in the political sphere about Jared Kushner and the controversy surrounding security clearances, one overlooked report has made its way back to the forefront detailing an act that could derail any possible defense Kushner could present against potential charges from the Southern District of New York.
In December of 2016 — after the election, but while Barack Obama was still the President of the United States — Kushner used his role in the Trump transition to order Trump’s former national security advisor Michael Flynn to essentially commit a crime by sabotaging Obama’s foreign policy with Israel.
At the time, the United Nations was considering a resolution that would have condemned Israel’s illegal settlements in the West Bank, calling them a “flagrant violation of international law.” But Kushner — and Trump, of course — had other plans for the Netanyahu regime, including the full intention of moving the US embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, a hotly-contested holy site for both Jews and Palestinians.
To that end, Kushner instructed Flynn to call various members of the UN Security Council and convince them to block the resolution. While the effort was unsuccessful, it was telling that the first person that Flynn called was Russian Federation Ambassador Sergey Kislyak — the same operative for Putin that met with so many of Trump’s team at the Mayflower Hotel that has been the center of questions since the beginning of the investigation into the Trump campaign’s contacts with Russia.
Importantly, however, Flynn then lied to the FBI about having called Kislyak.
That lie formed part of the basis for charges against Flynn that he later pled guilty to — and which led to him working with federal investigators in the Russia probe. That means that Kushner’s role in whatever charges may be coming down the pike is cemented in history as an established fact: Kushner absolutely violated the Logan Act, which prohibits any private US citizen from undermining a sitting president’s foreign policy by contacting foreign entities acting on behalf of the United States.
In fact, Kushner is referenced in the Mueller filing that came the following December as “a very senior member of the Presidential Transition Team” — meaning that whether Mueller charged Jared or left it for the Southern District to do so (since Kushner may have been in New York at the time of the order), he was already in the system as the one directing the crime.
That also means that unless Trump wants to cop to not being in control of his own presidency and team, he’s responsible in the end.
Featured image via screen capture
