The criminal case turns on a 2016 meeting in which Michael Sussmann presented the FBI’s top lawyer with computer data that Sussmann said suggested a secret communications back channel between a Russia-based bank and the Trump Organization.
legal team denied prosecutors’ claims that he lied. And even if jurors believed Sussmann did lie, the defense said the alleged false statement did not matter because he was presenting national security information that the FBI would have looked into no matter the source. At the time of Sussmann’s meeting with the FBI in September 2016, the bureau was already investigating whether Russia and the Trump campaign were colluding to sway the election won by Trump that November.
Nonetheless, the two weeks of testimony in federal court in Washington have exposed the extent to which Democratic interests, opposition research, the media and law enforcement all came to be entangled in the run-up to the presidential election. Sussmann is charged with a single count of making a false statement. That charge carries a maximum five-year prison sentence, though if convicted, Sussmann is likely to get far less — if any — prison time. He did not take the stand during the trial.
Prosecutors say Sussmann lied to Baker by saying he was not participating in the meeting on behalf of a particular client. They say he was actually there on behalf of the Clinton campaign and another client, a technology executive whom the Durham team says tasked researchers with looking for internet traffic involving Trump associates and Russians.
To convict, prosecutors need to show not only that Sussmann lied but that the lie was material — namely, that it mattered or at least could have mattered to the FBI’s work. But Berkowitz reminded jurors that the only false statement that was charged took place during the following day’s meeting, and that no one can be sure exactly what was said because Baker and Sussmann were the only participants and neither took notes.
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