Two weeks after Donald Trump’s Justice Department agreed to a financial settlement with former White House national security advisor Michael Flynn, the stench of the deal still lingers. In fact, a key congressional Democrat wants a closer look into the agreement that deserves to be seen as a major national controversy. The Hill reported:

Rep. Jamie Raskin (Md.), the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, is demanding files related to the Justice Department’s settlement with Michael Flynn, arguing it ‘offers a road map for this epically corrupt President to keep paying out his political underlings’ with taxpayer funds.

A few years ago, Flynn, a former foreign agent and Trump confidant, decided to file an audacious lawsuit, claiming he’d faced wrongful prosecution and seeking $50 million in taxpayer money.

The complaint was difficult to take seriously. Indeed, after federal prosecutors first charged Flynn — he was accused of lying to the FBI about his conversations with the Russian government, lying to investigators about being a paid foreign agent and acting illegally as an unregistered foreign agent while working on Trump’s 2016 campaign — he admitted he lied, pleaded guilty twice in open court and became a cooperating witness with then-special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation.

Flynn then changed lawyers, at which point he stopped helping the Mueller probe and decided he was no longer guilty of the crimes to which he had already pleaded guilty. Soon after, then-Attorney General Bill Barr took an interest in the case, and the DOJ announced it was dropping all of the charges against Trump’s former aide.

As difficult as it was to believe, Barr’s DOJ concluded that it could not prove Flynn was guilty of the crimes to which Flynn had already pleaded guilty. (A retired judge examined what transpired and ultimately accused the DOJ of exercising a “gross abuse of prosecutorial power.”)

Late on a Wednesday afternoon, the day before Thanksgiving 2020, Trump quietly pardoned Flynn. It was among the most corrupt moves the president made during his first term.

Flynn, however, wasn’t content with a simple pardon. He also wanted a payout, claiming federal law enforcement subjected him to malicious prosecution when they charged him.

Trump’s DOJ agreed and decided to reward Flynn with a $1.25 million check.

Raskin has asked all the right questions about the fiasco, which the Maryland Democrat characterized as a blatant and unlawful abuse of public trust.

“The American people are watching this Department squander their tax dollars, handing over giant sums to the President’s friends for claims that multiple federal judges have rejected as having no legal merit. The American people deserve a full accounting of why our tax dollars are being used that way,” Raskin wrote in his letter to acting Attorney General Todd Blanche.

In a written statement about his efforts, the ranking member on the House Judiciary Committee added that the DOJ’s decision “to siphon taxpayer funds into the pockets of a prominent political ally is an act of collusion that defies both federal law and longstanding Supreme Court precedent. This extraordinary payout mirrors the elements of a criminal conspiracy to defraud the United States and is an intentional conversion of public funds for private, political gain.”

The DOJ has not yet responded or commented on Raskin’s demands. Watch this space.

This post updates our related earlier coverage.

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