Why is this stickied? The Durham saga is fascinating, but these types of 'breaking' habbenings news have a hard time making an appropriate "splash" (thus feeding the "nothing's habbenings" retards). Does this experiment work? Here are the details (without the pics, which you can't read, anyway):

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Michael Sussman is in deep trouble. The judge in his case just really made things hard for him and the others. I’ll have more detailed analysis shortly, but the motions in limine were just granted in part and denied in part, and none of that is good for his defense.

https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.dcd.235638/gov.uscourts.dcd.235638.95.0_5.pdf

@TracyBeanzOfficial

I’m going to thread this as I read it, so you may see some contradictory analysis (MAY) but this will allow me to get the information out more quickly. Here the judge details what this order is about. Note that it DOES NOT cover a lot of the pending motions out there in the case and we need to be careful about jumping to any conclusions. It covers a very small set - whether the government can argue about the validity of the data in the Alfa bank papers and whether Sussman knew, and their witness

So here, we notice that Sussman is playing a bit of a game of cat and mouse with The SC (Special Counsel). The SC says that if Sussman will concede or not dispute that there was no secret channel of communication between Trump servers and Russia, then the SC won’t seek to prove the allegation false. Ie- If Sussman concedes it was BS, Durham won’t prove that he’s a liar in court. If Sussman uses the the data as if it’s legit, the SC wants to be able to prove how wrong he is.

Here the judge says - “that’s great and all, but it’s much more nuanced than that, because the accuracy of that data is important.” The court will allow SC to show evidence that ultimately the FBI decided the data provided was bunk, as well as what steps the FBI needed to take to prove that because that lends to materiality, the basis of the charge. The SC argues that because Sussman lied to the FBI about the origin and didn’t say he was there on behalf of a political client that the FBI took steps it otherwise wouldn’t have taken, hence materiality. This is where my biggest qualm is, because I think the FBI knew and was in on it, and this is where I lean that Durham is protecting the institution. I digress. Next slide.

Here the judge is saying (and revealing I think) that the owners of the companies where the servers purportedly involved won’t be able to take the stand and also, the “other agency” (I believe the CIA) also won’t be able to submit testimony, UNLESS the other agencies investigation had some bearing on what the FBI did. So judge is narrowing scope.

Now we get juicy, because this REALLY hamstrings any possible defense that Sussman may have. Sussman doesn’t want any of the “validity” issues litigated at all. The SC and the judge say “fine” BUT (and it’s a big one). If the government can establish what Sussman knew about the accuracy of the data, it goes to state of mind when he presented to the FBI under the guise of being a good citizen. Similarly, if he says he believed it was true (see where the issue is for him?) the government could say “well Mr. Sussman? We know that’s unreasonable because A. B. C. D.” As an example “we know that isn’t true because we have emails where you discuss how fast and loose this is and how you only needed it to be a house of cards in a breeze because it was meant for both LE cover AND public perception.”

He leaves other bits about this up for debate after further hearings - there’s a lot more to discuss. This order is very narrow. Next slide.

This paragraph is basically telling Sussman he loses on the FBI expert witness that the SC wants to question, because the topics the SC wants to ask about fall within three specific categories the judge will allow- ie: proving that Sussmans lie was material. The jury needs to hear what goes into investigating claims like this, which means there’s some latitude on what comes out based on how the SC questions the witness. Crafty questioning could give us juice.

Basically this order stops the bad actors in their tracks from trying to argue there was a Trump Server/Russia connection. If Sussman even DARE put his toe in that water the judge is saying that the prosecution can offer more on the data. Sussman is not going to be able to keep the lie going as a defense. He’s in a corner. There’s a lot more still to come and this is a VERY narrow ruling, but it’s fair.