25th November, 2020
By Agency Reporter
U.S. President Donald Trump on Wednesday via Twitter pardoned his former national security adviser Michael Flynn.
Flynn had pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI during the investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election.
“It is my Great Honor to announce that General Michael T. Flynn has been granted a Full Pardon.
“Congratulations to @GenFlynn and his wonderful family, I know you will now have a truly fantastic Thanksgiving!,” Trump wrote.
Flynn, 61, fought to dismiss the government’s case against him this year after he pleaded guilty in December 2017 to lying to investigators about his December 2016 conversations with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak.
The case was related to Russia’s response to the Obama administration kicking Russians out of the United States as retaliation for Russian election interference and related to a U.N. resolution on Israel.
The U.S. government intercepted Flynn’s discussions with Kislyak, after which fired FBI special agent Peter Strzok and FBI agent Joseph Pientka grilled him on the contents of the conversation on Jan. 24, 2017.
Flynn told the court in January that he was “innocent of this crime.”
He filed to withdraw his guilty plea after the Justice Department asked the judge to sentence him to up to six months in prison — though afterward, the department said probation would also be appropriate.
The Justice Department later moved to drop the charges in May, following a deep-dive review by U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Missouri Jeffrey Jensen.
The DOJ said that “continued prosecution of this case would not serve the interests of justice.”