President Trump tweeted Thursday morning that his former national security adviser Michael Flynn — for whom special counsel Robert Mueller recommended little to no prison time last week — got "a great deal."
"They gave General Flynn a great deal because they were embarrassed by the way he was treated - the FBI said he didn’t lie and they overrode the FBI. They want to scare everybody into making up stories that are not true by catching them in the smallest of misstatements. Sad! WITCH HUNT!"
Reality check: In his sentencing memo, Mueller explained that Flynn deserved leniency for lying to the FBI because he had offered "substantial assistance" in the special counsel's investigation into the Trump campaign's contacts with Russia. Flynn's defense attorneys claimed in their own sentencing memo that, prior to Flynn's initial January 2017 interview with the FBI, agents decided not to warn Flynn of the penalties of lying, and that Flynn was "unguarded" and "saw the FBI agents as allies."