for a timeline of General Flynn’s up and dramatic down see this link:
It is clear that on December 29th, after President Obama placed sanctions on the Russian Government for “meddling” in the 2016 election, General Flynn had a conversation with the Russian Ambassador to the United States, Sergey Kislyak.
As former head of the Defense Intelligence Agency, General Flynn knew or should have known that the conversation would be recorded by US intelligence.
In the conversation, General Flynn discussed President Obama’s sanctions. He then denied publicly that he did so for the next month and a half. Even now, he simply “doesn’t recall”. News sources state that it was an extended conversation
Washington Post Article
White House officials, including Vice President Pence, stated that Flynn never talked about the sanctions in the conversation. When that became public before the Inauguration, Intelligence Officials became concerned that Flynn might be subject to Russian blackmail, since he did have conversations about the sanctions and then apparently told (at least Vice President Pence) that he did not.
On January 12th, David Ignatius of the Washington Post raised the question of Flynn’s conversation (and clearly had sources providing him with information about the recorded calls).
On January 15th Vice President Pence stated that the sanctions were not talked about, and on January 23rd Sean Spicer repeated this in a press conference.
On January 26th, the Acting Attorney General, Sally Yates, informed the White House Counsel of the concerns. On January 30th, she was fired for refusing to enforce the immigrant ban. The Counsel to the President, Mike McGahn briefed the President and a small group of aides. Pence and Spicer were not informed.
The Trump Administration knew that General Flynn lied to Vice President Pence and the rest of the Administration about the phone call (and didn’t tell Pence or Spicer until February 9th), and Administration knew and tried to “gut it out” to see if it would go away.
It clearly is possible (especially in light of today’s New York Times story) that the Trump Administration knew and condoned the phone calls, and General Flynn has “fallen on his sword” for the Administration.
New York Times – Trump Campaign Aides Had Repeated Contacts With Russian Intelligence
The nature of the Trump Administration and Russia – another topic to talk about.
