Former President Donald Trump's inauguration chairman Tom Barrack is attempting to dismiss criminal charges he incurred for allegedly illegally lobbying for the UAE.
On Monday, Barrack filed a motion to dismiss with a series of arguments, as cited by legal analyst Marcy Wheeler.
In analyzing Barrack's filing, Wheeler noted that one of the main claims being made in his defense is that his lobbying couldn't possibly be illegal because former Attorney General Bill Barr didn't charge him in 2019.
But while Barrack was charged later in 2021, all of the preliminary work by Justice Department investigators happened under the Trump administration.
Another claim from Barrack is that he went through a security clearance investigation and was nearing approval before he withdrew due to John Kelly's resistance to bringing him on staff.
Wheeler also notes that Barrack claimed that he should not be lumped in with the Jan. 6 attackers because he's much better than them.
"On July 20, 2021, after two years of silence, more than a dozen armed FBI agents burst into a Los Angeles office where Mr. Barrack was attending a business meeting and took him into custody," said the filing. "He was incarcerated in a California general population prison for four days until he was released under extremely harsh and virtually unprecedented bail conditions."
These are all of the same conditions the Jan. 6 attackers have faced, but it's clear Barrack thinks he should be treated far better than typical criminals.
Wheeler went on to cite a section of the case that she believes was an attempt "to avoid implicating Jared Kushner."
This is a genuinely interesting complaint bc I think the timing was done to avoid implicating Jared.pic.twitter.com/7QVGBImllz— emptywheel (@emptywheel) 1643661725
