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Trump Gets Bin Win As FEC Drops Investigation Into Stormy Daniels Payments

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Former President Donald Trump got a big win today from the Biden administration when The Federal Election Commission ruled to close its probe into whether Trump broke election laws by allegedly paying $130,000 in hush money to Stormy Daniels.

Trump said of the move, “The Federal Election Commission in Washington, D.C., has totally dropped the phony case against me concerning payments to women relative to the 2016 Presidential Election. It was a case built on lies from Michael Cohen, a corrupt and convicted lawyer, a lawyer in fact who was so corrupt he was sentenced to three years in jail for lying to Congress and many other things having nothing to do with me.

I thank the Commission for their decision, ending this chapter of Fake News. Between two sleazebag lawyers, Michael Avenatti and Michael Cohen, we were all able to witness law and justice in our Country at its lowest,” Trump added.

In a joint post-vote statement, the Republicans, commissioners Sean J. Cooksey and James E. “Trey” Trainor III said:

“The Commission regularly dismisses matters where other government agencies have already adequately enforced and vindicated the Commission’s interests.

“Furthermore, by the time Office of the General Counsel’s recommendations came before us, the Commission was facing an extensive enforcement docket backlog resulting from a prolonged lack of a quorum, and these matters were already statute-of-limitations imperiled,” they wrote.

One Republican member recused himself from the case, and one Democrat didn’t show up to vote so the case was shelved.

“To conclude that a payment, made 13 days before Election Day to hush up a suddenly newsworthy 10-year-old story, was not campaign-related, without so much as conducting an investigation, defies reality,” they wrote in their own joint statement.

“But putting that aside, Cohen testified under oath that he made the payment for the principal purpose of influencing the election. This more than satisfies the Commission’s ‘reason to believe’ standard to authorize an investigation,” they added.

The commission’s Democrat members who voted to keep the probe alive, Shana Broussard and  Ellen L. Weintraub, said:

“To conclude that a payment, made 13 days before Election Day to hush up a suddenly newsworthy 10-year-old story, was not campaign-related, without so much as conducting an investigation, defies reality.

“But putting that aside, Cohen testified under oath that he made the payment for the principal purpose of influencing the election. This more than satisfies the Commission’s ‘reason to believe’ standard to authorize an investigation.

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