“Judicial Watch announced today that a federal court has ordered the FBI to disclose additional details about FBI and other officials “cc-ed” on the memo used to justify launching the “Crossfire Hurricane” spy operation against President Trump and his 2016 presidential campaign.  Judge Carl J. Nichols has given the FBI until June 16, 2022 to respond.  The order comes in a September 2019 FOIA lawsuit Judicial Watch filed after the FBI failed to respond to a request for the memo, known as an “Electronic Communication” or “EC.”  (Judicial Watch v. U.S. Department of Justice (No. 1:19-cv-02743)).

In May 2020, Judicial Watch obtained a redacted version of the previously secret memo, authored by former FBI agent Peter Strzok.  The Biden Justice Department argued that there is no significant public interest in disclosing the names of officials “cc-ed” on the memo.

Judicial Watch filed a motion countering that claim and arguing that the public had a significant interest in knowing who at the FBI had knowledge of the memo and presumably approved the investigation.

The court held a hearing on the dispute in September 2021, and on May 2, 2022 issued a minute order requiring the FBI to file Kevin Brock, a supplemental memorandum of up to 5 pages, supported by affidavit or declaration, explaining the positions and seniority held by any persons whose names are redacted from the “CC:” section of the document.

“The Biden administration is still covering up who was involved in the Obama administration’s unprecedented and illicit spying on Donald J. Trump,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. “This court decision is another step forward in accountability for the worst government corruption scandal in American history.”

In support of its position, Judicial Watch provided the Court with two declarations by Kevin Brock, former assistant director of the Directorate of Intelligence and former FBI principal deputy director of the National Counterterrorism Center.  Brock testified that it is not standard procedure to have an EC drafted, approved, and sent to and from a single agent and that doing so violates FBI oversight protocols:

In the EC document here, the “From” line indicates the EC – and authorization to begin an investigation as required under FBI policy – is from a part of the FBI’s Counterintelligence Division.  The contact listed is Peter Strzok.  The EC was drafted by Peter Strzok.  The EC was approved by Peter Strzok. On the face of the document produced, it appears the EC that initiated a criminal FARA investigation of unidentified members of the Trump presidential campaign was created by Peter Strzok, approved by Peter Strzok, and sent from Peter Strzok to Peter Strzok. This is not usual procedure.

FBI policy prohibits an agent from initiating and approving his or her own case.  Such action violates FBI oversight protocols put in place to protect the American people from an FBI agent acting unilaterally.” (Read more: Judicial Watch, 5/06/2022)  (Archive)

Hillary attends the Met Gala on May 2, 2022, unmasked, while a staffer who is masked, adjusts her dress. (Credit: Jamie McCarthy/Getty Images)

(…) The Clinton Campaign (including Robby Mook and John Podesta), Fusion GPS, Perkins Coie, Rodney Joffe, and the DNC are fighting to keep these e-mails and records secret, reasoning Fusion’s “role was to provide consulting services in support of the legal advice attorneys at Perkins Coie were providing to” the Clinton Campaign.

That argument – that Fusion GPS was helping with “legal advice” – is hopefully the last conspiracy theory they’ll provide to the public, after Fusion GPS has already poisoned America through the FBI, DOJ, and the press, with baseless allegations of secret back-channels between Trump Organization and Russian marketing servers, piss tapes, and broader allegations of Trump/Russia collusion.

Today, Special Counsel Durham addressed those arguments by providing to the court the FEC findings where the agency found “probable cause to believe” the DNC and Hillary for America violated the law by hiding the real purpose of payments meant for Fusion GPS as “legal and compliance consulting.”

In support, he provided the First (link) and Second (link) General Counsel Reports, which recommend that the Federal Election Commission find the DNC and Hillary for America violated election laws (52 USC 30104(b)(5)(A)) “by misreporting the payee of the funds paid to Fusion GPS through Perkins Coie LLP.”

While much of the information in these now-public reports has been known for years (Glenn Simpson’s testimony to Congress, for example), they provide additional context – and newly uncovered details – on how the FEC dismantled the bogus Hillary for America/DNC Billing. Some examples:

• Fusion GPS invoices reflected the work was not “legal advice” or related to legal concerns.

• The FEC report matched Fusion GPS invoices to the amounts paid to its “sub vendors” (including Nellie Ohr). It concluded: “there is no evidence that Fusion provided services other than this opposition research.”

(Read more: Techno Fog, 5/02/2022)  (Archive)

NEW: Fed Court ORDERS Biden FBI to disclose more info about who was involved in spy op against Trump! “This court decision is another step forward in accountability for the worst government corruption scandal in American history.” https://t.co/0ClLdqncB8 pic.twitter.com/JtFrb4mecG

— Judicial Watch ⚖️ (@JudicialWatch) May 17, 2022

“Judicial Watch announced today that a federal court had ordered the FBI to disclose additional details about FBI and other officials “cc-ed” on the memo used to justify launching the “Crossfire Hurricane” spy operation against President Trump and his 2016 presidential campaign.  Judge Carl J. Nichols has given the FBI until June 16, 2022, to respond.  The order comes in a September 2019 FOIA lawsuit Judicial Watch filed after the FBI failed to respond to a request for the memo, known as an “Electronic Communication” or “EC.”  (Judicial Watch v. U.S. Department of Justice (No. 1:19-cv-02743)).

In May 2020, Judicial Watch obtained a redacted version of the previously secret memo, authored by former FBI agent Peter Strzok.  The Biden Justice Department argued that there is no significant public interest in disclosing the names of officials “cc-ed” on the memo.

Judicial Watch filed a motion countering that claim and arguing that the public had a significant interest in knowing who at the FBI had knowledge of the memo and presumably approved the investigation.

The court held a hearing on the dispute in September 2021, and on May 2, 2022, issued a minute order requiring the FBI to file a supplemental memorandum of up to 5 pages, supported by an affidavit or declaration, explaining the positions and seniority held by any persons whose names are redacted from the “CC:” section of the document.

“The Biden administration is still covering up who was involved in the Obama administration’s unprecedented and illicit spying on Donald J. Trump,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. “This court decision is another step forward in accountability for the worst government corruption scandal in American history.” ((Read more: Judicial Watch, 5/17/2022)  (Archive)

Andrey Melnyk, Ukraine’s ambassador to Germany. (Credit: Kay Nietfeld/Getty Images)

“Kiev’s envoy, Andrey Melnik, is under fire for insulting Chancellor Olaf Scholz.

The deputy leader of the Bundestag’s Left Party, Sevim Dagdelen, has accused the Ukrainian ambassador in Berlin, Andrey Melnik, of being a Nazi sympathizer and urged for his immediate expulsion. The move was called for after Melnik insulted Chancellor Olaf Scholz, calling him an “offended liverwurst” for his reluctance to pay a state visit to Ukraine.

“If you don’t expel the Nazi sympathizer Melnik now, you have lost all self-respect,” the MP tweeted on Tuesday.

“Anyone like Melnik who describes the Nazi collaborator Bandera as ‘our hero’ and makes a pilgrimage to his grave or defends the right-wing Azov Battalion as ‘brave’ is actually still benevolently described as a ‘Nazi sympathizer,’” she added. (Read more: Azerbaycan24, 5/3/2022)  (Archive)

The Alfa Gang – L to R: Andrew Sullivan, Hillary Clinton, Special Counsel John Durham, Michael Sussmann, Mark Elias

(…) Hillary for America (or what we might call the Clinton campaign), the DNC, Rodney Joffe, Perkins Coie, and Fusion GPS have all been involved in this privilege fight, submitting declarations in support of their motions against Durham’s access to these documents/e-mails. Here we discussed the Clinton Campaign’s dubious assertion that Fusion GPS was providing “legal advice” to the campaign’s lawyers, Perkins Coie.

We’ve been confident that Durham would win this fight, especially in light of newly-available FEC General Counsel Reports which concluded “there is no evidence that Fusion provided services other than this opposition research.”

Yesterday’s hearing only seems to confirm that Durham will get these records – to an extent (more on that “extent” below). As we updated on Twitter, the Court granted Durham’s motion to compel production of documents for in camera review (meaning review by the judge). The purpose of this step is so the judge can determine whether the attorney-client privilege and/or the work product protections apply to these documents and communications.

The key part of the Clinton Campaign’s “privilege” argument is that Fusion GPS was providing “legal support” or “legal advice” to their attorneys at Perkins Coie. For the 38 e-mails in question, the judge asked the Clinton Campaign lawyer about whether those e-mails might support that theory. (This is important because the judge will look at these e-mails individually – and because the judge recognized that “opposition research . . . does not, under the case law, fall within the attorney-client or work product privileges.”) The Clinton Campaign lawyer response to that question was a damning “I don’t”:

The transcript also sheds light on the content of the e-mails – or at a minimum, the subject matter of the e-mails. All 38 e-mails relate to the Alfa Bank allegations. 30 of those are “internal Fusion emails” and 8 are correspondence involving Rodney Joffe.

(…) The judge also pressed the Hillary for America attorney about the broader Fusion GPS role in “media relations”:

(…) Near the end of the hearing, the judge granted Durham’s request for an in camera review of the 38 emails. In doing so, he observed “there is a distinction between hiring a public relations firm to provide fact-checking or consulting on litigation risk and the affirmative creation and dissemination of research about an opposing candidate or business, for that matter.”

I mentioned that Durham will get these records “to an extent.”

We believe he’ll likely get the 30 the Clinton Campaign was fighting to keep secret. As to the rest? The judge was “dubious” about Durham’s argument that the 8 e-mails regarding Rodney Joffe weren’t privileged, seemingly buying the argument from Joffe’s counsel that “as Mr. Joffe understood, Fusion was a third party that was hired by his counsel to supply resources and expertise that were essential to the legal advice that Mr. Joffe was seeking from Mr. Sussmann on an extremely complex and sensitive matter.” (Read more: Techno Fog, 5/05/2022)  (Archive) (Transcript)

(Timeline editor’s note: It was mentioned in the comments of Techno Fog’s article that the term “In Camera” is Latin for “in a Chamber.”)

“Several high-profile Democratic political operatives and officials are set to take the witness stand next week in the trial of former Hillary Clinton campaign attorney Michael Sussmann, attorneys for both sides revealed in court Monday.

Durham witnesses for Sussmann trial include from left to right, Robby Mook, Marc Elias, Bill Priestap, James Baker and Laura Seago (Credit: public domain)

Mr. Sussmann is denying government charges that he lied to FBI officials when he tried to supply them with information related to possible links between the campaign of Republican rival Donald Trump and Russian banks, links that were subsequently discredited.

Robby Mook, who managed Mrs. Clinton’s 2016 campaign, Clinton campaign attorney Marc Elias and FBI counterintelligence leader Bill Priestap and former top FBI lawyer James Baker are among those called as government witnesses, said prosecutor Andrew DeFilippis.

Brennan, ex-Obama homeland security adviser Lisa Monaco and ex-national intelligence director James Clapper, interviewed by Nicolle Wallace of MSNBC, right, at a 2018 Aspen Institute event. {Credit: Aspen Institute)

“The DOJ’s Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco was caught using a pseudonymous email while in office during the Obama years. This comes as no surprise since Monaco was part of Obama’s secret team that met in the White House basement in 2016 to discuss how to set up Donald Trump in their Trump-Russia collusion sham.

The Gateway Pundit reported on the secret Obama meetings in June of 2018. These meetings were attended by various Obama lackeys per Yahoo.

For the usual interagency sessions, principals and deputies could bring staffers. Not this time. “There were no plus ones,” an attendee recalled. When the subject of a principals’ or deputys’ meeting was a national security matter, the gathering was often held in the Situation Room of the White House. The in‑house video feed of the Sit Room — without audio — would be available to national security officials at the White House and elsewhere, and these officials could at least see that a meeting was in progress and who was attending. For the meetings related to the Russian hack, Susan Rice, Obama’s national security adviser, ordered the video feed turned off. She did not want others in the national security establishment to know what was underway, fearing leaks from within the bureaucracy.

Rice would chair the principals’ meetings — which brought together Brennan; Comey; Kerry; Director of National Intelligence James Clapper; Defense Secretary Ash Carter; Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson; Treasury Secretary Jack Lew; Attorney General Loretta Lynch; and Gen. Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff — with only a few other White House officials present, including White House chief of staff Denis McDonough; homeland security adviser Lisa Monaco, and Colin Kahl, Vice President Joe Biden’s national security adviser. (Kahl had to insist to Rice that he be allowed to attend so that Biden could be fully briefed.)

John Kerry and Tony Blinken from the State Department were also present but not the country’s National Security Director at that time, General Mike Rogers, who could not be trusted to push the Trump Russia lie.

Earlier this week Lisa Monaco told an audience at the University of Chicago that top Republicans including President Trump may be indicted in the sham investigations.

And like always, they know they can count on the fake news media to push their lies.

Via Julie Kelly:

Obama loyalist who got 48 GOP senators to vote for her confirmation again hints she’ll indict Republicans possibly including Trump https://t.co/92eg3yKcwS

— Julie Kelly 🇺🇸 (@julie_kelly2) May 13, 2022

DOJ is threatening nonviolent J6ers with life in prison for “seditious conspiracy,” a crime for which no American has ever been convicted and is so rare federal sentencing guidelines don’t even cover it. Meanwhile DOJ lies to grand jury and is withholding evidence 16 months later https://t.co/xKs5JPKudl

— Julie Kelly 🇺🇸 (@julie_kelly2) May 13, 2022

(Gateway Pundit, 5/13/2022) (Archive)

Former Hillary Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann’s lawyers asked to use explicit text in his trial that showed he was anti-Donald Trump. (Credit: Jose Luis Magana/The Associated Press)

“Former Hillary Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann wants to make sure the jurors at his upcoming trial in heavily Democratic Washington, DC, know he was working against former President Donald Trump — even before they hear any evidence in the case.

In court papers filed ahead of jury selection set for Monday, Sussmann’s lawyers asked federal Judge Christopher Cooper to include an explicit reference to Trump in his preliminary instructions for the trial.

Sussmann’s lawyers also asked Cooper to refer to special counsel John Durham’s prosecutors as “the special counsel” instead of “the government,” which is the preference of Durham, who was appointed by then-Attorney General Bill Barr in October 2020.

In 2016, DC voters favored Clinton over Trump, 90.9% to 4.1%, and Democrats in the nation’s capital now outnumber Republicans, 76.5% to 5.4%, according to an April 30 tally posted online by the DC Board of Elections.

Tom Fitton of the conservative group Judicial Watch said Sussmann’s requests amounted to an attempt to tilt the playing field against Durham.

“The goal of the defense suggests this is a political operation,” he said Tuesday.

(…) In court papers filed late Monday, defense lawyers asked Cooper to summarize Sussmann’s indictment instead of reading it verbatim to the jury before opening statements.

They also requested that the judge note that Sussmann is accused of “conveying particular allegations concerning Donald Trump” when he describes the alleged crime at issue.  (Read more: New York Post, 5/10/2022)  (Archive)

(…) With every development regarding this federal ransacking, two things remain unchanged. It looks increasingly clear that the Trump legal team was cooperating with federal officials regarding the documents in question, so the obstruction of justice allegation gets weaker by the day. Second, where is the crime that precipitated this search of Trump’s home because recent updates only make it seem like the Justice Department cobbled together statutes that aren’t criminal to justify this ransacking?

Trump recognizes Debra Steidel Wall (second left) during a signing of a Proclamation on the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment, August 18, 2020. (Credit: YouTube Clip)

Flashback: Trump honors Debra Seidel Wall, the archivist who triggered Mar-a-Lago raid pic.twitter.com/9nW5gmaq2D

— Tom Elliott (@tomselliott) August 23, 2022

The latest development in this legal fiasco is Acting Archivist Debra Steidel Wall’s role in the document retrieval, where she seems to be one of the leading figures who triggered the FBI raid. As Tom Elliott of Grabien clipped, Trump honored this woman during his presidency, which he cited as a failure on the former president’s part for not draining the swamp (via WaPo):

Acting Archivist Debra Steidel Wall also notified Trump’s lawyer Evan Corcoran that the agency would provide the FBI access to 15 boxes of materials in order to investigate “whether those records were handled in an unlawful manner” and conduct an assessment to determine if any damage might have resulted from the improper handling of materials, according to the May 10 letter.

Matthew G. Olsen was sworn in as Assistant Attorney General of the National Security Division on November 1, 2021. (Credit: justice.gov)

[…]

“As the Department of Justice’s National Security Division explained to you on April 29, 2022: ‘There are important national security interests in the FBI and others in the Intelligence Community getting access to these materials. According to NARA, among the materials in the boxes are over 100 documents with classification markings, comprising more than 700 pages. Some include the highest levels of classification, including Special Access Program (SAP) materials,’” Steidel Wall wrote.

The FBI removed an additional 20 boxes of items from the Mar-a-Lago Club earlier this month, including four sets of top-secret documents and seven other sets of classified information, according to a written inventory of the items seized in the high-profile search of Mar-a-Lago earlier this month.

[…]

Trump’s lawyers sent letters on April 29 and May 1, according to Steidel Wall’s account, to delay the production of the materials to the FBI so that Trump could decide whether to assert executive privilege over the materials. John Solomon, a writer who also serves as one of Trump’s representatives to the National Archives, first posted the text of the letter on Monday.

Steidel Wall ultimately rebuffed their request after consulting with the Department of Justice.

“The question, in this case is not a close one,” Steidel Wall wrote. “The Executive Branch here is seeking access to records belonging to, and in the custody of, the Federal Government itself, not only in order to investigate whether those records were handled in an unlawful manner but also, as the National Security Division explained, to ‘conduct an assessment of the potential damage resulting from the apparent manner in which these materials were stored and transported and take any necessary remedial steps.’”

(Read more: TownHall, 8/24/2022)  (Archive)

“As the trial against Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann begins, questions have emerged over the judge’s apparent conflicts of interest.

In addition to having been “professional acquaintances” with the defendant, US District Judge Christopher “Casey” Cooper, an Obama appointee (who was on Obama’s transition team), is married to lawyer Amy Jeffress who’s representing key ‘Russiagate’ figure Lisa Page in her lawsuit against the FBI. Jeffress also served as a top aide to former Attorney General Eric Holder, while current Attorney General Merrick Garland presided over the 1999 wedding of Cooper and Jeffress.

In a Wednesday Zoom call, Cooper told the parties in the case that he knew Sussmann in the 1990s when both of them worked at the DOJ.

“I worked in the ’90s at the deputy attorney general’s office two years following law school. Mr. Sussmann also worked at the building at the same time in the criminal division. We did not work together or socialize, but I think it’s fair to say we were professional acquaintances,” Cooper said, per the Washington Examiner. “I don’t believe that this creates a conflict, but my regular practice is to disclose these sorts of relationships with lawyers or with parties on the record. And I would advise you that I would be happy to entertain a motion if either side believes there is a conflict on that basis or any other.”

So – both the judge in the Sussmann case and his wife are deeply connected within the Democratic party, and have connections to key individuals involved in the attempt to take down Donald Trump. Interestingly, Cooper was also the judge in the Benghazi ringleader case, where his wife’s ties to the DOJ posed another potential conflict of interest.

Judge Christopher “Casey” Cooper (Credit: public domain)

After graduating from Stanford Law School in 1993, Cooper clerked for Chief Judge Abner J. Mikva on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit from 1994 to 1996. He then went to work as a special assistant to Deputy Attorney General Jamie Gorelick in the Clinton Justice Department. In 2001, he went into private practice for 17 years, working at the firms of Miller, Cassidy, Larroca & Lewin; then Baker Botts, and finally at Covington & Burling, where Holder was a partner before becoming Obama’s first attorney general.

…

In private practice, Cooper and his father-in-law William Jeffress successfully defended senior-level Saudi Arabian government officials in U.S. court against a lawsuit brought by the families of 9/11 victims.

(Read more: Zero Hedge, 5/16/2022)  (Archive)

Glenn Simpson (Credit: Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP)

“We’ve documented the ongoing battle to obtain Fusion GPS e-mails and documents in the Michael Sussmann case. At issue in the Sussmann case are 38 e-mails and attachments between and among Fusion GPS, Rodney Joffe, and Perkins Coie. These 38 e-mails and attachments are among approximately 1,500 documents that Fusion GPS withheld from production to the grand jury based on “privilege.”

What Fusion GPS has to produce.

Today, the court in the Sussmann case made an important ruling and rejected, in large measure, Fusion’s assertion of attorney-client or work-product privilege:

Fusion GPS will have to produce these documents to Special Counsel Durham by May 16, 2022. What do these e-mails and documents contain? The court’s order provides guidance, stating they relate to:

Internal Fusion GPS e-mails discussing the Alfa Bank data and e-mails circulating draft versions of the Alfa Bank white papers that were “ultimately provided to the press and the FBI.”

Here are some examples of what these e-mails might include. These are privilege logs in Fusion GPS’s other litigation relating to the Alfa Bank hoax.

The other emails.

This leaves 16 e-mails and documents remaining. For now, Durham will not get them. These are divided into two categories:

1. Eight of the e-mails involve internal communications among Fusion GPS employees. The court was “unable to tell from the emails or the surrounding circumstances whether they were prepared for a purpose other than assisting Perkins Coie in providing legal advice to the Clinton Campaign in anticipation of litigaiton.” Coming from the court, that’s a long way of saying that the sworn declarations of Fusion/Clinton lawyers (Levy and Elias) were sufficient to meet the “privilege” burden. This doesn’t mean that Durham can’t overcome this hurdle – just that it hasn’t been overcome yet.
2. The other eight e-mails and attachments include those among Fusion GPS’s Laura Seago, Sussmann, and Rodney Joffe. The court observed that the e-mails are consistent with Joffe’s assertion of privilege.

With respect to the Joffe e-mails, we note that he is still a subject – perhaps a target – of the Special Counsel’s investigation. Here’s a portion of the transcript from an evidentiary hearing in the Sussmann case that discusses their ongoing investigation into Joffe:

Because the investigation into Joffe is ongoing, it makes sense that the Special Counsel is hesitant to disclose to the court information that could overcome this purported “privilege.” Keep in mind the crime-fraud exception, where communications are not considered privileged where they “are made in furtherance of a crime, fraud, or other misconduct” (citation omitted). In other words, the Special Counsel may still be able to get Joffe’s e-mails – assuming Joffe is charged under 18 USC 1031. He can also get them through the grand jury process, as we saw with Mueller’s investigation of Paul Manafort.”  (Read more: Techno Fog, 5/12/2022)  (Archive)

(Credit: MarcoPoloUSA/Telegram)

(MarcoPoloUSA/Telegram, 5/14/2022)  (Archive) (BidenLaptopEmails)  (Archive)

“As many as three Hillary Clinton donors — including one who also supported US Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez — are among the prospective jurors for former Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann’s trial.

Special counsel John Durham’s team objected to putting one Clinton contributor on the panel after the man said he would “strive for impartiality as best I can.”

But the prosecution was overruled by Washington, DC, federal Judge Christopher Cooper, who said the man — who works in public policy for Amazon and appeared to be in his 40s — “expressed a high degree of confidence” that he could be impartial.

Cooper, nominated by former President Barack Obama, also said Durham’s prosecutors could use one of its peremptory challenges to strike him from the panel for the trial, the first to result from his three-year probe into the government’s investigations of purported ties between former President Donald Trump and Russia.

Judges can only remove people from a jury pool if questioning reveals they’re not suited for service, including being biased in favor of one side or the other.

Prosecutor John Durham is investigating the origins of the Russia collusion lie. This all leads back to Hillary. Michael Sussmann was one of Hillary’s attorneys in her failed 2016 campaign. During the summer of 2016, her campaign started rumors that candidate Donald Trump was involved with Russia. During the debates, Hillary made all this garbage up and shared it in front of the world. It was all made up by Hillary.” (Read more: The New York Post, 5/16/2022)  (Archive)

The criminal case against Hillary Clinton’s former campaign lawyer Michael Sussman starts Day 1 with Jury Selection and we’ve got the transcripts! #Durham #Sussmann #Clinton

Rodney Joffe, John Durham and Michael Sussmann (Credit: public domain)

“The technology executive who was one of Michael Sussmann’s clients when Sussmann took sketchy claims to the U.S. government was terminated as a confidential informant by the FBI in 2021, prosecutors revealed during Sussmann’s trial on May 17.

Rodney Joffe, the executive, exploited his access to non-public data at multiple technology companies to conduct opposition research into then-presidential candidate Donald Trump ahead of the 2016 election, according to court filings. The firm Joffe worked for, Neustar Security Services, had a Domain Name System (DNS) contract with the office of the presidency in 2016.

Joffe was a confidential informant for the FBI but was terminated “for cause” in 2021, prosecutors said.

Brittain Shaw, one of the prosecutors on Special Counsel John Durham’s team, revealed the information during the questioning of FBI agent David Martin.

The termination was because of how Joffe was involved with the scheme to compile information on the alleged connection between Trump’s business and a Russian bank, Andrew DeFilippis, another prosecutor, said later.

Sean Berkowitz, an attorney for Sussmann, raised concerns during closed session, or without jurors in the room, with remarks about Joffe’s status, asserting they were “prejudicial,” Reuters reported.

U.S. District Court Judge Christopher Cooper, the Obama appointee overseeing the trial, agreed.

Cooper, speaking while jurors weren’t in the room, ordered prosecutors not to discuss the topic again. He said how Joffe handled the information was not part of the trial, and noted the termination did not come for years after the events that are being explored during the trial. In 2016, Joffe was a respected expert, the judge said, echoing the defense. (Read more: The Epoch Times, 5/17/2022)  (Archive)

“It started with disclosure by Special Counsel DeFilippis informing the Court that government witness Dr. Manos Antonakakis (identified as Researcher-1 in the Sussmann indictment) “has decided to invoke his Fifth Amendment right.” He would not be called to the stand. More background on Manos here.

From there it was time for opening statements.

Special Counsel Brittain Shaw made clear that this case is “about privilege: the privilege of a well-connected D.C. lawyer with access to the highest levels of the FBI; the privilege of a lawyer who thought that he could lie to the FBI without consequences.” Using that privilege, Sussmann:

“went straight to the FBI general counsel’s office, the FBI’s top lawyer. He then sat across from that lawyer and lied to him. He told a lie that was designed to achieve a political end, a lie that was designed to inject the FBI into a presidential election.”

Circumventing the political leanings of the jury, the Special Counsel explained that “we are here because the FBI is our institution that should not be used as a political tool for anyone.” She elaborated that Joffe, on behalf of his clients – the Hillary Clinton Campaign and Rodney Joffe – planned to manipulate the FBI, and trigger negative news stories, “to create an October surprise on the eve of the presidential election.” As to the evidence:

You’re going to see emails and phone records that show that beginning in the summer of 2016 the defendant worked with Fusion GPS to develop the Trump/Alfa story and plant it in the press.

She also gave us this preview:

The attorney for Sussmann, in their opening, argued there was no lie. Instead, Sussmann “went to the FBI to help the FBI” – so they wouldn’t be “caught flat-footed” by a New York Times story discussing the purported Alfa Bank/Trump connections. Of course, they admitted as a result of the Sussmann/Baker meeting, the FBI decided it wanted “to investigate.” To condense Sussmann’s defense: no lie and no reason to lie.

More about:

FBI Supervisory Special Agent David Martin

Agent Martin was the first government witness to testify. He explained the technicalities of the DNS data which was alleged to have shown a secret back channel between Alfa Bank and the Trump Organization.

FBI Special Agent Scott Hellman

Hellman was involved in investigating the Alfa Bank allegations. He testified that the evidence (data and white papers explaining the data) provided to then-FBI general counsel James Baker from Sussmann was passed off to none other than the infamous Peter Strzok. (Read more: Techno Fog, 5/17/2022)  (Archive)

Transcript review – Day 2 – Sussmann trial

“Two FBI agents and a Neustar employee testified after opening statements on Tuesday, the second day in the trial of 2016 Hillary Clinton campaign attorney Michael Sussmann, with more witnesses for the prosecution expected to take the stand Wednesday.

David Martin (Credit: public domain)

(…) FBI Special Agents David Martin and Scott Hellman were the prosecution’s first two witnesses, followed by Neustar employee Steve DeJong.

Martin was the prosecution’s expert witness in cybersecurity and DNS data analysis and explained the basics of Domain Name System (DNS) data to the jury, saying that it is essentially maps of names of servers on the internet to numeric IP addresses — like a phonebook mapping someone’s name to a phone number.

The prosecution’s second witness, Hellman, examined the data on the thumb drives that Sussmann had given to Baker in their meeting weeks before the presidential election. One of the FBI agents whose signature was required for a chain of custody form for the drives was former FBI official Peter Strzok.

Scott Hellman (Credit: public domain)

(…) Hellman said the overall conclusion of a connection between Trump and Russia from the data didn’t make any sense because a presidential candidate would not likely put their own name in a domain name that was easily connected to their organization and Russia, if it’s supposedly for secret communication.

“Didn’t ring true at all,” Hellman said. He said the analysis of the data was done “inside of a day,” then given for further analysis to the FBI Chicago Division, which later agreed with his assessment.

Hellman added that he found it “conveniently coincidental” that someone was looking for suspicious activity between the Trump and Russian servers and found it just three weeks after it began.

(…) The third witness for the prosecution, DeJong, had pulled the data regarding the Trump email server and Alfa Bank for then-Neustar CTO Rodney Joffe at his request.

The request from Joffe came through Georgia Tech researcher Manos Antonakakis, which DeJong said was a little uncommon.

While DeJong said he eventually became curious as to why he was told by Joffe to search for DNS data regarding Trump and Alfa Bank, he never asked nor was he given a reason.” (Read more:  JusttheNews, 5/17/2022)  (Archive)

Marc Elias of Perkins Coie, addressing media outside the U.S. Supreme Court after arguing two redistricting cases Dec. 5, 2016. (Credit: Diego M. Radzinschi/ALM)

(…) Now we get to Marc Elias.

Elias meets weekly with Fusion GPS at his office. Typically Peter Fritsch and Glenn Simpson would be in attendance. Generally, those meetings involved discussions of Elias’s “needs” and Fusion GPS’s “work” – which included what Elias described as the “unusual connections” the Trump Campaign had with Russia. They would also report to Elias on their findings related to Trump during the election.

Notably, Elias mentioned Jake Sullivan as someone at the Clinton Campaign who knew about the Trump/Russia research (though there is uncertainty as to whether Sullivan knew about Fusion’s activities). Elias would give the campaign these updates.

A brief aside: Jake Sullivan’s wife is Margaret Goodlander – who serves as counsel to Attorney General Merrick Garland. We understand that she has not recused herself from anything having to do with the Special Counsel’s investigation. We further understand that Goodlander is keeping close tabs on Durham’s investigation. We’ll report on that down the road…

Anyway, Elias also testified that the Clinton Campaign paid them (Perkins Coie) a “flat fee” for their legal services. Why is this important? Because it explains why Sussmann would block bill the Clinton Campaign (see tweet below). (“Block billing” is having a multi-hour entry with a generalized description. Example: “6.5 hours on confidential project.) For flat fee work, attorneys are generally allowed block billing because the client isn’t paying the hourly rate.

That concludes the morning session. We’ll update this post once we receive the afternoon transcript…

(John Haughey/The Epoch Times)

The Special Counsel then walked Elias through a number of billing entries/emails from and involving Sussmann. These included meetings with Elias, meetings with Joffe, and Fusion – and involved “the Alfa-Bank allegations.”

Then there’s the infamous Slate article on the Alfa Bank/Trump connections. Sussmann told Elias that the Alfa Bank data had been provided to the media. And after the Slate article was published, Elias forwarded it to the campaign:

Elias further offered that he would have briefed the Clinton Campaign about the Alfa Bank matter. He also admitted that he had discretion to instruct Fusion GPS to pursue leads and take investigative steps without checking with the Clinton Campaign.

Cross-Examination of Marc Elias:

Some notable moments of the Elias cross-examination included:

• An e-mail from Robby Mook to Elias forwarding an article discussing that reporters at the New York Times are working on a Trump-Russia story (Alfa Bank).
• Sussmann didn’t seek Elias’s authorization or permission to go to the FBI. He couldn’t recall anyone with the Clinton Campaign telling Sussmann to go to the FBI.
• Elias was frustrated with the FBI for not doing anything “particularly helpful in investigating or doing anything to prevent the leaks of the [DNC] emails.”

Re-direct of Marc Elias

• Fusion GPS did not need to consult with Elias before sharing info with the media.
• Elias admitted the existence of an FBI investigation can prompt news stories. He also admitted that FBI investigations can speed up news stories. These questions attacked the heart of the Sussmann defense – and address how the New York Times article from Eric Lichtblau “got stuck” because his editors were reluctant to pursue the story.

(Read more: Techno Fog, 5/18/2022)  (Archive)

Day 3 of the Michael Sussmann Trial. Special Prosecutors called Democratic power lawyer Marc Elias, Former FBI General Counsel James Baker and FusionGPS’s Laura Seago.

Timecodes: 00:00:00 – Intro 00:00:58 – Mindmap Update 00:06:02 – Transcript of the Jury Trial (Sussmann Trial Day 3) 00:10:26 – Witness Deborah Fine (Direct Examination) 00:22:55 – Witness Deborah Fine (Cross-Examination) 00:30:11 – Witness Deborah Fine (Redirect Examination) 00:31:01 – Witness Laura Seago (Direct Examination) 00:52:00 – Witness Laura Seago (Cross-Examination) 01:06:52 – Witness Marc Elias (Direct Examination) 01:51:01 – Juror #8 Issue 01:54:38 – Recap & Conclusion 01:55:10 – YouTube Live Chats #Sussmann #Durham #WatchingtheWatchers

The last witness – former FBI General Counsel James Baker

Recall that Baker was approached by Sussmann for a meeting in September 2016 regarding the Alfa Bank allegations. The lie told at that meeting – that Sussmann wasn’t there on behalf of a client – is at issue in this case.

Sussmann had scheduled the meeting via a text to Baker’s phone. It read:
Baker remarked he was surprised that Sussmann obtained his cell number. They agreed via text to meet at Baker’s FBI office the next day. (Read more: Techno Fog, 5/18/2022)  (Archive)

Baker said he has known Sussmann for years. They worked together in the DOJ and in 2016, “I still considered him a friend and colleague” and that he was working with the DNC “or the Hillary committee” in “connection with cyber matters.” #SussmannTrial

— John Haughey (@JFHaughey58) May 18, 2022

On Sept. 18, 2016, a Sunday evening, Baker said Sussmann texted his personal phone seeking a meeting. Sussmann wrote: “I have something time-sensitive (and sensitive)” and that he was not seeking a meeting on behalf of clients. “I want to help the bureau, thanks.” #SussmannTrial

— John Haughey (@JFHaughey58) May 18, 2022

Sept. 19 Sussmann-Baker meeting is where testimony resumes Thursday. Regarding March 2022 discovery request for text, phone, email records: “The way I thought about it, I’m not out to get Michael. This is not my investigation, this is your, investigation.” #SussmannTrial

— John Haughey (@JFHaughey58) May 18, 2022

Here’s a more in-depth Transcript review of Day 3 – Sussmann Trial

This fellow will be reading pertinent parts from the Sussmann trial transcripts. Definitely one to follow:

Sussmann Day 4 transcript review live in 20! Will also finish Elias from yesterday before jumping into Jim Baker. https://t.co/CuA8DpFi2V

— Robert Gouveia Esq. (@RobGouveiaEsq) May 19, 2022

Here’s Marc Elias testifying that he kept Biden’s National Security Advisor Jake Sulllivan in the loop on the Trump – Alfa Bank Russia hoax. Any reporters going to ask Jake about this? pic.twitter.com/gGoS3lpdyQ

— Arthur Schwartz (@ArthurSchwartz) May 22, 2022

We start with the short testimony of Deborah Fine.

Testimony of Laura Seago

Laura Seago worked with Fusion GPS back in 2016, where she reported directly to Fritsch and Simpson. She has been granted immunity by the Special Counsel for her testimony. She understood Marc Elias to be the Fusion GPS contact for the Clinton Campaign.

Seago stated she was present at a summer 2016 meeting with “Mr. Elias, my colleague Peter Fritsch from Fusion GPS, Mr. Sussmann, and Mr. Sussmann’s client Rodney Joffe.” As to the nature of that meeting:

“The general purpose, to the best of my recollection, was to discuss allegations of communications between the Trump organization and Alfa-Bank.”

Once the Alfa Bank allegations were developed, Seago met with journalist Franklin Foer (who would write the October 31, 2016, Alfa Bank article in Slate). The purpose of that meeting was to discuss “the allegations of communication between the Trump Organization and Alfa-Bank.”

They sold Foer on the Alfa Bank data at that meeting, telling him there were “highly credible computer scientists who seemed to think that these allegations were credible.” These “credible computer scientists” would ultimately be cited in Foer’s article. She admitted that Fusion GPS did nothing to validate the DNS records – something she said was “beyond my capabilities.”

Seago was walked through a number of e-mails she had with Joffe and other members of Fusion GPS. Some of these were privileged (the Joffe e-mails) so the Special Counsel was unable to discuss with Seago the contents. However, she did know about contents of the Joffe e-mails generally:

Finally, she admitted to understanding whose interests were served by planting the Alfa Bank story.

(Read more: Techno Fog, 5/18/2022)  (Archive)

Here’s a more in-depth Transcript review of Day 3 – Sussmann Trial

Day 4 of the Michael Sussmann trial is all Jim Baker, all day. The case against Hillary Clinton’s former lawyer continues with a deep examination of the former FBI agent.

Timecodes: 00:00:00 – Intro 00:00:34 – Mindmap Overview 00:10:08 – Afternoon Session Transcript (Sussmann Trial Day 3) 00:18:00 – Witness Marc Elias (Continued Direct Examination) 00:35:23 – Witness Marc Elias (Cross-Examination) 00:50:30 – Witness Marc Elias (Redirect Examination) 00:59:02 – Reading Superchats 01:00:07 – Did the juries all Hillary’s supporters? 01:05:07 – Morning Session Transcript (Sussmann Trial Day 4) 01:06:50 – Issue on DeFilippis’ Questions 01:10:18 – Witness James Baker (Direct Examination) 01:20:34 – The Proceedings (Sussmann Trial Day 4) 01:26:52 – Witness James Baker (Continued Direct Examination) 02:40:10 – RECAP on the Mindmap 02:40:29 – Reading Superchats & Conclusion #Sussmann #Durham #Trump

“Former Hillary Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann denied he was “representing a client” when he gave the CIA faulty data linking Donald Trump to Russia — and appeared “frustrated” that officials weren’t taking the information seriously, two former agency employees testified Friday.

One ex-spy — identified in court only as “Kevin P.” —  recalled that he and a colleague met with Sussmann at CIA headquarters in Langley, Va., in February 2017, shortly after Trump took office.

Sussmann gave the men two thumb drives that he said came from unidentified “contacts” and showed a secret, cyber backchannel between a Trump Organization server and Russia’s Alfa Bank, Kevin P. said.

“He said he was not representing a client,” the witness testified, adding that Sussmann also said he’d previously given “similar but unrelated” information to the FBI.

Mark Chadason (Credit: Twitter)

(…) Following the meeting at CIA headquarters, Kevin P.’s colleague — identified as “Steve M.” — drafted a memo summarizing what took place and noting that Sussmann had been there on behalf of a client, according to evidence shown to jurors.

But Kevin P. edited the memo to take out the word “client” and replaced it with “contacts,” another exhibit showed.

Sussmann’s meeting in Langley appeared to be the result of an earlier sit-down with retired CIA official Mark Chadason, a former station chief in both Europe and North Africa, who testified that he met with a Sussmann at a hotel in northern Virginia on Jan. 31, 2017, at the request of a mutual friend.

Sussmann told Chadason that he wanted to give the CIA information about a national security issue and had previously reached out to the agency’s general counsel in an attempt to do so, Chadason said.

Sussmann said he got the information from a Republican client but added that he wasn’t “sure if he would reveal himself to the CIA,” the former spook said. (Read more: New York Post, 5/2o/2022)  (Archive)

Michael Sussman trial day Day 5-afternoon transcripts are in and we review two ex-CIA officials, Kevin P. and Mark Chadason, involved in the Hillary Clinton orchestrated Trump-Russia collusion hoax.

Timecodes: 00:00:00 – Intro 00:00:50 – Mindmap Overview 00:07:22 – Superchats 00:08:49 – Afternoon Session Transcript (Sussmann Trial Day 5) 00:11:12 – Witness Mark Chadason (Direct Examination) 00:28:05 – Witness Mark Chadason (Cross-Examination) 00:49:41 – Witness Mark Chadason (Redirect Examination) 00:54:15 – Witness Kevin P. (Direct Examination) 01:12:17 – Witness Kevin P. (Cross-Examination) 01:26:30 – Witness Kevin P. (Redirect Examination) 01:32:26 – Conclusion 01:36:19 – Superchats & Locals Community

#Sussmann #Durham #HillaryForPrison

An ecstatic Hillary Clinton celebrates at the conclusion of the Democratic National Convention where she accepted the nomination on Thursday, July 28, 2016. (Credit: Ben Lowy/ Time)

“Failed presidential candidate Hillary Clinton approved a plan during the 2016 campaign to feed false allegations of Trump-Russia collusion to the media, her campaign manager said Friday.

Testifying to a federal court in the trial of Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann, Robby Mook noted that Clinton signed off on a scheme to send journalists data about possible links between Donald Trump and Russia’s Alfa Bank. The effort was successful, as a news outlet just days before the election published a story that alleged covert connections between Trump and the bank. The allegation has since been debunked, with the FBI finding there was not a nefarious link between Trump and Alfa Bank.

Mook’s testimony is the first confirmation that Clinton was involved in the decision to give the Trump-Alfa Bank story to journalists. Mook said that campaign leaders “weren’t totally confident in” the allegations and wanted to share them with reporters to investigate further. Mook said he discussed the strategy with Clinton, who okayed the plan.

Slate on Oct. 31, 2016, published a report that said a team of anonymous computer researchers had discovered that Trump’s real estate company, the Trump Organization, had a secret communications channel with Alfa Bank. Unmentioned in the story was that the computer researchers were collaborating with Sussmann and other political operatives working for the Clinton campaign.

Mook was asked at the trial to read a statement Clinton released that touted the Slate story. Clinton wrote that “computer scientists have apparently uncovered a covert server linking the Trump Organization to a Russian-based bank.” She linked to a statement from Jake Sullivan, her foreign policy adviser, that said the story “could be the most direct link yet between Donald Trump and Moscow.” (Read more: Washington Free Beacon, 5/20/2022)  (Archive)

UPDATE May 21, 2022

Techno Fog includes a transcript of Mook’s testimony. Dates are put in bold by the timeline editor.

The Robby Mook testimony.

Robert Mook, Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign manager, also testified before the jury Friday. In his testimony, he stated that Hillary Clinton personally approved a plan to spread the lie that Trump was colluding with Russia via secret servers to the media. He also admitted to being briefed on the conspiracy.

Q: Okay. In connection with the general focus on Mr. Trump and Russia, did there come a time when you learned of potential links between the Trump organization, Mr. Trump’s business, and a Russian bank called Alfa-bank?

A: I did. Yes, I was briefed on that.

Q: Approximately when were you first briefed on that, if you remember?

A: I honestly can’t recall.

Q: Who participated in the briefing, if you remember?

A: Myself, Marc Elias, Jen Palmieri, Jake Sullivan, John Podesta. There might have been others, but those are the ones I definitely recall being there.

Mook also admitted that the Clinton campaign was focused on Trump’s relationship with Russia before Summer of 2016.

Q: In the Summer of 2016, was Mr. Trump’s relationship with Russia something that the campaign focused on?

A: Yes. I mean, it was frankly something we were focused on before that time. But absolutely.

Mook however did deny that the Clinton campaign directed Sussman to go to the FBI, despite admitting that Clinton approved the Trump-Russia allegations to be shared with the media.

Q: Were you aware that Mr. Sussman went to the FBI in September of 2016 to give them a heads-up about a New York Times story about Trump and Alfa-Bank?

A: No.

Q: Do you have any recollection of anyone talking to you about going to the FBI on behalf of the campaign on the Trump/Alfa-Bank issue?

A: No.

Q: Did you direct Mr. Sussman to go to the FBI on behalf of the campaign?

A: Absolutely not.

Q: Did you authorize Mr. Sussman to go to the FBI on behalf of the campaign?

A: No.

Q: Did anyone else from the campaign, to your knowledge, direct or authorize Mr. Sussman to go to the FBI on behalf of the campaign?

A: To my knowledge, no.

Mook also said the decision to push the debunked Russia conspiracy to the media was made by him, Sussman, John Podesta, and Palmeri, and that Hillary Clinton agreed with the decision.

Q: And once you learned about it [the Trump-Russia allegations], you started discussing with the campaign whether the campaign should affirmatively push it in the media, right?

A: Correct.

Q: And you had that discussion with Mr. Sullivan?

A: Correct.

Q: With Mr. Podesta?

A: Just to be clear. This is what – I recall those people, correct.

Q: Okay. You had a discussion with Mr. Sullivan?

A: Yes, I recall, yes.

Q: Whether to push it in the media right?

A: Correct.

Q: With Ms. Palmieri?

A: Correct.

Q: With Mr. Podesta?

A: Correct.

Q: But in any event, the decision to provide this to the media was authorized by the campaign, correct?

A: We authorized a staff member of the campaign to provide it to the media.

Regarding Hillary Clinton, Mook said:

Q: Mr. Mook, before the break you had testified that there was a conversation in which you told Ms. Clinton about the proposed plan to provide the Alfa-Bank allegations to the media; is that correct?

A: Correct.

Q: And what was her response?

A: All I remember is that she agreed with the decision.

Some final thoughts: while this trial is about Sussmann’s false statements to the FBI, it’s also more than that.

This is Special Counsel John Durham telling the public the story of the Clinton opposition research machine, and how the campaign, through their lawyers and contractors (Fusion GPS), developed and spread lies to the media to influence the election. It’s the story of Clinton Campaign lawyers to using the FBI to further that strategy of deception. (Read more: Techno Fog, 5/21/2022)  (Archive)

Day 5 of the Durham Prosecution against Hillary Clinton’s former campaign lawyer, Michael Sussmann continues with two witnesses: former FBI General Counsel James Baker and Hillary Clinton Campaign Manager Robbie Mook.

Timecodes: 00:00:00 – Intro 00:00:54 – Mindmap Overview 00:05:00 – Elon Musk Tweets 00:07:59 – Afternoon Session Transcript (Sussmann Trial Day 4) 00:10:01 – Witness James Baker (Direct Examination Continued) 00:40:55 – Witness James Baker (Cross-Examination) 01:24:20 – Superchats 01:28:23 – Morning Session Transcript (Sussmann Trial Day 5) 01:29:20 – Witness James Baker (Cross-Examination Continued) 01:41:54 – Witness James Baker (Redirect Examination) 01:44:47 – Defense Witness Robbie Mook (Direct Examination) 02:03:20 – Defense Witness Robbie Mook (Cross-Examination) 02:45:16 – Defense Witness Robbie Mook (Redirect Examination) 02:52:45 – Recap & Conclusion (Sussmann Trial Day 5)

#Sussmann #Durham #Trump

“In the final weeks leading up to the 2016 election, FBI agents were sent down a rabbit hole of chasing supposed secret communications between then-candidate Donald Trump and a Russia-linked bank. They ultimately found the claim bogus, but not before launching a full investigation and employing both internal and outside experts. The allegation fueled the FBI’s broader probe of alleged Trump–Russia collusion, which also came out empty-handed, but successfully cast a shadow on the first years of Trump’s presidency.

Things might have gone differently on the FBI’s part if the bureau hadn’t kept its agents in the dark about the fact that the secret communications claim came from a lawyer, Michael Sussmann, on the payroll of the Democratic Party, FBI agent Ryan Gaynor testified during Sussmann’s trial in the District of Columbia on May 23.

(…) While the FBI Cyber Division dismissed the allegation within a day, the FBI Chicago Field Office opened a full investigation—as opposed to a preliminary one—noting that this might have informed the broader FBI Trump–Russia probe launched by the FBI headquarters in July 2016.

FBI Field Office (Credit: FBI.gov)

Gaynor said that knowing that Sussmann was being paid to provide the info would have affected the decision on whether to open the Chicago investigation and the decision to designate the investigation as “close hold,” which means filed agents aren’t informed of sources’ identities. In this case, it meant agents in the Chicago office didn’t know the allegation came from somebody on the Clinton campaign’s payroll.

Gaynor was asked by another agent working on the case to find out the source of the claim, which he did. After he learned it was Sussmann and that he was working for the Democratic National Committee (DNC), he ultimately decided, he said, that it wasn’t necessary to lift the “close hold” designation since the FBI couldn’t get close to the DNC anyway due to its policy of not interfering in elections.

Gaynor responded by saying he thought the field agents would be biased against Sussmann if he disclosed to them his DNC ties.

It appears Gaynor was himself a target of the Durham investigation before being reverted back to his status as a witness. (Read more: The Epoch Times, 5/23/2022)  (Archive)

The criminal case against Hillary Clinton’s former campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann continues, with Durham prosecutors calling two former FBI agents to testify about their involvement in the Russia Collusion hoax.

Timecodes: 00:00:00 – Intro 00:00:48 – Mindmap Overview 00:07:14 – Morning Session Transcript (Sussmann Trial Day 6) 00:19:17 – Witness Bill Priestap (Direct Examination) 00:43:03 – Witness Bill Priestap (Cross-Examination) 01:13:36 – Witness Bill Priestap (Redirect Examination) 01:15:24 – Witness Ryan Gaynor (Direct Examination) 02:01:35 – Witness Ryan Gaynor (Cross-Examination) 02:18:14 – Conclusion 02:18:33 – Superchats & Locals Community #Sussmann #Durham #HillaryforPrison

Allison Sands (Credit: public domain)

“FBI agents probing since-debunked claims of a secret back channel between Donald Trump and a Russian bank believed that the allegations had originated with the Department of Justice — when in fact they came from Hillary Clinton campaign attorney Michael Sussmann, who had shopped them to the bureau’s then-general counsel days earlier.

In the latest revelation to emerge from Sussmann’s trial in DC federal court on a count of lying to the FBI, special counsel John Durham’s prosecutors revealed that investigators had received an electronic communication citing a referral from the DOJ “on or about” Sept. 19, 2016, the same day Sussmann met with James Baker, then the FBI’s top lawyer.

The document, a record of the investigation being opened by agents Curtis Heide and Allison Sands and dated Sept. 23, 2016, did not mention Sussmann as the source of the allegations.

“In that referral, the DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE provided the FBI with a white paper that was produced by an anonymous third party,” the communication said, before adding: “According to the white paper, a U.S.-based server that is owned by the TRUMP ORGANIZATION has been communicating with the Russian-based ALFA BANK organization in Moscow, Russia.”

The document was circulated to several top FBI officials — including Peter Strzok, who oversaw the probe of Clinton’s email server as well as the Trump-Russia investigation, and was famously fired from the bureau in 2018 after the emergence of text messages he sent to his colleague and mistress Lisa Page in which he vowed to help “stop” Trump from winning the White House.” (Read more: New York Post, 5/23/2022)  (Archive)

Timeline editor’s note: Perhaps this timeline entry explains why the investigation suddenly moved to Chicago:
September 23, 2016 – The Crossfire Hurricane team knows by this date that Steele is running an “influence” operation and coordinating with the Clinton campaign

(Credit: The Epoch Times)

“Today in the Michael Sussmann trial, we received additional information regarding the FBI leadership’s involvement in the opening – and execution – of the Alfa Bank/Trump investigation. This included FBI Headquarters not approving an FBI agent’s repeated requests to interview the sources of the Alfa Bank “materials.”

But first, we’ll start with the examination of Trisha Anderson.

Anderson is currently the Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the Office of Legal Counsel. Back in 2016, she was an FBI deputy general counsel and reported directly to then-FBI general counsel James Baker.

The purpose of her testimony was to prove-up her notes from a September 19, 2016 meeting she had with Baker, where Baker discussed his meeting with Michael Sussmann. (The notebook was necessary because Anderson didn’t recall the meeting itself.)

Anderson stated she knew of Sussmann prior to September 2016 but denied knowing he was an attorney for the DNC. In response, she was presented with an interesting e-mail discussing an FBI meeting with Sussmann, the DNC CEO, Shawn Henry of Crowdstrike, and another FBI official (Cyber Division’s James Trainor) to take place on June 16, 2016:

For reference, that meeting took place two days after the DNC announced on June 14, 2016, that it had been a victim of Russian hacking and over a month before the DCCC said it had been hacked by the Russians. (Read more: Techno Fog, 5/24/2022)  (Archive)

(…) Back in September 2016, FBI Special Agent Curtis Heide was assigned to the Alfa Bank “investigation in a co-case-agent capacity.” His trainee, FBI Agent Allison Sands, was the lead investigator on the case. The case came from FBI Headquarters in DC – specifically from Joe Pientka. While Heide understood the Alfa Bank allegations came from an “anonymous source,” Heide never learned the identity of that source:

The Alfa Bank opening communication drafted by Heide said it was opened as a “Full Field Investigation.” He was “ordered” to open the investigation by FBI headquarters:

Pientka made clear that the opening of the investigation was demanded by the FBI’s 7th Floor – including Director Comey – at the behest of Bill Priestap.

This is the type of investigation, as Heide said, that “employs all of our resources.” As Agent Heide explained:

“In order to open a full field investigation, we would need specific and articulable facts that a threat to U.S. national security has occurred or there’s been a violation of federal law.”

This is in contrast to lower investigative levels – those for which the Alfa Bank allegations would be more appropriate – which “allows limited investigative techniques to see if an allegation or an investigation is warranted.”

As to some of the Alfa Bank allegations brought by Sussmann?

Q: Now, Agent Heide, what, if anything, did you find regarding these allegations and the purported findings in this white paper?

Heide: We were not able to substantiate any of the allegations in the white paper.

The FBI’s Cyber Division also discounted the Sussmann white paper:

Heide: The cyber division “were also unable to substantiate any of the allegations in the white paper, and they deemed that the information provided was not in accordance with how the Russians would conduct cyber activities.”

In fact, Agent Pientka (whom we have long-criticized) relayed the Cyber Division’s conclusions to Heide, stating:

Relatively early on in the investigation – on September 26, 2016 – Agent Heide sent a message to Pientka, requesting an interview of the source of the Alfa Bank white papers. By that time, Heide knew the white paper was bunk. He received no response from Pientka. He repeated this request on October 3, 2016. Agent Heide’s requests were rebuffed by his liaison at FBI headquarters:

Regarding Heide’s background – he supported “the initial efforts of Crossfire Hurricane” and was involved in the George Papadopoulos case. He said he is currently under an administrative investigation by the FBI for intentionally withholding classified information in a Carter Page FISA warrant.

When asked about the details of his involvement in the FISA applications, Heide said he “didn’t author any of the affidavits or any of the materials related to the applications in question.” (Read more: Techno Fog, 5/24/2022)  (Archive)

Day 7 of the Michael Sussman trial continues with the Defense shifting blame to FBI agents who they claim failed to properly investigate the case.

Timecodes: 00:00:00 – Intro 00:00:25 – Mindmap Overview 00:03:03 – Early Superchats 00:03:44 – Afternoon Session Transcript (Sussmann Trial Day 6) 00:04:04 – Witness Ryan Gaynor (Cross-Examination Continued) 00:29:18 – Witness Ryan Gaynor (Redirect Examination) 00:29:30 – Witness Allison Sands (Direct Examination) 00:58:50 – Witness Allison Sands (Cross-Examination) 01:12:49 – Morning Session Transcript (Sussmann Trial Day 7) 01:13:51 – Mindmap Update 01:16:12 – Witness Trisha Anderson (Direct Examination) 01:22:52 – Witness Trisha Anderson (Cross-Examination) 01:32:02 – Witness Trisha Anderson (Redirect Examination) 01:34:26 – Witness Curtis Heide (Direct Examination) 01:54:11 – Witness Curtis Heide (Cross-Examination) 02:17:48 – Recap & Conclusion 02:19:54 – Superchats & Locals Community #Sussmann #Durham #FBI

(…) Novick was a former business partner of Rodney Joffe at BitVoyant, a company that focused on private sector cybersecurity. He reported directly to a board on which Rodney Joffe was a member. In August of 2016, Joffe gave Novick a task to dig up data “related to Donald Trump and Russia”:

Jared Novick (Credit: PRNewsFoto/BitVoyant)

Who did Joffe target? According to Novick:

Rodney tasked me, and I received a PDF document. And in that PDF document, there were, you know, a handful — five, seven names — of individuals, their home addresses, if they had a spouse, their spouse name and companies related to their spouse, their personal email addresses. So everything about the document was — it was very personal.

This list included Carter Page, Sergei Millian, and Richard Burt. The name of this project? They called it “Crimson Rhino.” Novick stated he complied with Joffe’s request and “cast a large net” on these individuals using “a 90-day history of data.”

On cross-examination, counsel for Sussmann attempted to play-up Joffe’s qualifications and reputation. Novick had this response:

Q: Are you aware of the respect that Mr. Joffe had in the government communities in 2016?

Novick: It’s an interesting question because I do know some government agencies were suspect of Rodney.

(Read more: Techno Fog, 5/24/2022)  (Archive)

FBI Chicago Office (Credit: public domain)

“More FBI agents took the stand at the Sussmann trial and confirmed they were led astray from the very start of their investigation into claims of Russia collusion with former President Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign.

The link between the Hillary Clinton campaign and the Russia collusion narrative got clearer on day seven of the trial. Taking the limelight in the courtroom was a file titled ‘Crimson Rhino.’ This file was reportedly the basis for the investigation into the 2016 campaign and was provided to former top FBI lawyer James Baker from Sussmann.

Its origins come from tech executive Rodney Joffe who was tied to the Hillary Clinton campaign and was a confidential human source for the FBI. He ordered client Jared Novick who ran a data analysis firm to do research on several people tied to then-candidate Trump. He also said he felt uncomfortable doing the work because he knew it was opposition research for a political campaign.

Meanwhile, a mid-level FBI agent from the Chicago field office Kurt Hydie took the stand. Hydie reportedly wrote a memo that formally kicked off his office’s investigation. He admitted to writing a typographical error when he said the information came from the Department of Justice, not Sussmann. That caused confusion within the FBI where officers thought they were doing research for the federal government not a political actor.

“That created a lot of confusion,” Hydie said. “May not have had otherwise.” (Read more: OneAmericaNewsNetwork, 5/25/2022)  (Archive)

(…) Then there’s the testimony regarding another FBI confidential human source. According to today’s transcripts, another person provided information to the FBI regarding the Alfa Bank allegations:

Who is this CHS? Someone with media connections (or someone in the media) close to the Joffe researchers with a political interest in the Alfa Bank allegations.

The significance of this is two-fold. First, we have another source that needs to be identified. A source that is seemingly close to the Joffe “researchers” with politics that likely lean left.

Second, not interviewing sources – and not providing information of the sources to the investigating agents – is part of Sussmann’s defense. Agent Heide admitted they didn’t interview Dagon. During their case in chief, and during closing, Sussmann’s attorneys will argue that it was the FBI, and not Sussmann, who prevented inquiry into Sussmann’s sources.

Edit: Last thoughts about the latest CHS. “He” was close with the Alfa Bank researchers. He had an agenda. He was interviewed by the Washington Post. He spoke with Hope Hicks. He seems to be in the media.

Is the CHS David Corn? A discussion:  (Read more: Techno Fog, 5/24/2022)  (Archive)

Between FY 2012 and FY 2018 the FBI spent an average of $42 million annually in payments to its CHSs. As of May 2019, nearly 20 percent of the FBI’s CHS base met its definition of a long-term CHS. As we conducted our audit, of particular concern was the FBI’s management of these long-term CHSs. The FBI Did Not Comply with the AG Guidelines and Faces Ongoing Challenges in Overseeing Long-Term CHSs. (Credit: DOJOIG)

Tom Grasso (Credit: public domain)

“Grasso, a witness for Sussmann, was a Special Agent with the FBI whose “primary responsibility involved investigating cyber crimes.” He was part of a unit detailed to the National Cyber Forensics and Training Alliance (NCFTA) in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The NCFTA, as Grasso explained, “is a nonprofit entity where nonprofit entity where private sector and law enforcement can come together to collaborate on cyber crime matters; and the FBI unit that I was a part of was detailed to be the FBI component of that project.”

Grasso met Rodney Joffe through the NCFTA. I’ll let Grasso explain the connection:

Q. Do you know a gentleman named Rodney Joffe?

Grasso: I did.

Q. How do you know him?

Grasso: Rodney Joffe is a private sector partner and a friend of mine who I initially met in — somewhere between 2005 and 2010, as I recall.

Q. Did he, from time to time, provide you information or interact with you in assisting on the investigation of FBI investigations?

Grasso: Yes, sir, on a regular basis.

In fact, Grasso had nominated Joffe and others for an FBI award for cyber crime investigation back in 2013 relating to “Butterfly Botnet” (malware described to have reached about four million infected computers).

Overall, Joffe and Agent Grasso had a good personal and professional relationship. And Joffe exploited that relationship to further the Alfa Bank hoax.

In early October 2016 (on or before 10/2/16), Joffe called Agent Grasso and provided some information on the purported ties between the Alfa Bank/Trump Organization. Joffe further informed Agent Grasso that there was an ongoing investigation on this matter – something Agent Grasso had been unaware of up until that point. According to Grasso:

Q. How, if you recall, did Mr. Joffe provide this information to you?

Grasso: I recall that he provided the information to me verbally over the phone.

…

Q. And when he provided the information to you, without getting into great detail, what did he describe the information as relating to?

Grasso: As I recall, he described the information relating to communications between the Trump Campaign and some entity in Russia.

Q. And coming out of your conversation with Mr. Joffe, did you understand that there was any ongoing investigation into those issues?

Grasso: My recollection is that at the time he advised me that there was an open FBI investigation on the matter.

After that conversation, Agent Grasso sent this e-mail to the FBI Agents handling the Alfa Bank investigation:

Agent Grasso took this information from Joffe despite knowing that Joffe was a confidential human source (CHS) with the FBI – and despite the fact that Joffe didn’t go through his handler to relay this information.

(Read more: Techno Fog, 5/25/2022)  (Archive)

“We’ll start with some important questions posed by Special Counsel DeFilippis on Joffe’s background.

Tom Grasso (Credit: public domain)

Q. And so Mr. Joffe worked on a number of investigations involving foreign cyber threats; is that right?

Grasso: I would say all a matter of cyber threats, yes.

Q. Okay. So does that include nation state threats? Would he be, you know, working with the Bureau on nation state threats?

Grasso: I believe so, yes.

Q. And so that includes some of the big cyber threat countries, like Russia?

Grasso: Yes. At the time Russia was one of our top threats in the FBI for cyber crime.

…

Q: And so Mr. Joffe would work on Russian-related cyber matters?

Grasso: I believe so. He — I don’t think he was specifically tasked with doing that, but I’m sure the work that he did touched on matters having to do with Russia due to the prevalence of cyber crime activity that comes out of Russia.

There’s our confirmation that Joffe worked on “Russian-related cyber matters.” This line of questioning suggests (but doesn’t outright prove) that Joffe may have had some type of involvement in the biggest cyber security matter of 2016: the “Russian” hack of the DNC.

Of course, these questions could have been the Special Counsel trying to discredit Joffe’s claim (see below) that he wanted to remain anonymous because he was relaying risky information.

Anyway, assuming Joffe was involved in the Trump/Russia investigation, then we are presented with some important questions. Did Joffe inform the FBI’s understanding of the DNC/DCCC hacks? If so, what did Joffe contribute?

Then there’s Joffe’s close relationship with Sussmann and his support for the Clinton Campaign. Ask whether the Alfa Bank hoax was the first time Joffe colluded with Michael Sussmann. After all, it was Sussmann who “scrubbed” the CrowdStrike report that attributed the DNC hack to Russia. As Aaron Mate explained in this crucial article:

According to the Senate Intelligence Committee, CrowdStrike delivered a draft report to the FBI on Aug. 31, 2016 that an unidentified FBI official described as “heavily redacted.” James Trainor, then-assistant director of the FBI’s Cyber Division, told the committee that he was “frustrated” with the CrowdStrike report and “doubted its completeness” because “outside counsel” – i.e. Sussmann – “had reviewed it.” According to Trainor, the DNC’s cooperation was “moderate” overall and “slow and laborious in many respects.” Trainor singled out the fact that Perkins Coie – and specifically, Sussmann – “scrubbed” the CrowdStrike information before it was delivered to the FBI, resulting in a “stripped-down version” that was “not optimal.” (Emphasis ours.)

The DOJ and FBI essentially allowed Sussmann “to decide what it could and could not see in CrowdStrike’s reports on Russian hacking.” Did Joffe have a role in that?

Consider something else. What if Crowdstrike was a patsy, there to unknowingly reach false conclusions of a “Russian hack” based on information provided to them, in part, by Rodney Joffe?

Back to Agent Grasso’s testimony. Here he explains Joffe’s demands that Grasso not disclose his identity:

Q. In the case of the Alfa-Bank-related information that you just described, Mr. Joffe specifically asked you not to disclose his identity to other people in the Bureau; is that right?

A. That is correct, yes.

Q. He didn’t want you to tell even the people at the FBI you were talking to that this was coming from Rodney Joffe, right?

A. Yes, that is correct. He wanted his identity protected, yes.

Grasso paraphrased (on redirect) Joffe’s reasoning to stay anonymous: “This is very sensitive information. People’s safety could be at risk.”

And here is Grasso testifying to the significance of Joffe’s motivations in reaching out:

Grasso explained that these omissions were material because the motivation of a source’s political agenda is relevant to the type of cases they “can open.” (Read more: Techno Fog, 5/25/2022)  (Archive)

The Michael Sussman defense team RESTS after their final character witnesses are called to the stand. Judge Cooper reads the jury instructions in preparation for closing arguments on the final day of trial.

Timecodes: 00:00:00 – Intro 00:00:50 – Mindmap Overview 00:08:28 – Afternoon Session Transcript (Sussmann Trial Day 8) 00:12:24 – Defense Witness Brandon Charnov (Direct Examination) 00:29:19 – Defense Witness Brandon Charnov (Cross-Examination) 00:41:06 – Defense Character Witness Jimma Elliott-Stevens (Direct Examination) 00:46:26 – Defense Character Witness Jimma Elliott-Stevens (Cross-Examination) 00:48:35 – Defense Character Witness Marty Stansell-Gamm (Direct Examination) 00:53:12 – Defense Character Witness Marty Stansell-Gamm (Cross-Examination) 00:53:42 – Conclusion for Sussmann Trial Day 8 Afternoon Session 00:56:04 – Morning Session Transcript (Sussmann Trial Day 9) 00:57:06 – Judge Cooper Asked Sussmann Whether To Testify or Not 00:59:43 – Discussion of Preliminary Issues 01:04:52 – Judge Cooper Reads Jury Instructions 01:30:07 – Recap & Conclusion 01:32:05 – Superchats & Locals Community #Sussmann #Durham #Trump

(Credit: Amazon)

“Bill Barr, former U.S. attorney general and author of the new book, “One Damn Thing After Another: Memoirs of an Attorney General,” says that the Russian collusion allegations leveled against former President Donald Trump by Democrats were a “seditious” attempt to undermine his presidency and a “grave injustice.”

Barr made those comments on an upcoming episode of BlazeTV host Glenn Beck’s podcast, where he explained why he joined the Trump administration and eventually appointed special prosecutor John Durham to investigate the origins of the FBI’s Trump-Russia probe.

“I thought we were heading into a constitutional crisis. I think whatever you think of Trump, the fact is that the whole Russiagate thing was a grave injustice. It appears to be a dirty political trick that was used first to hobble him and then potentially to drive him from office,” Barr told Beck.

“I believe it is seditious,” he added, clarifying that whether that could be proved in court as a crime is another issue.

“It was a gross injustice, and it hurt the United States in many ways, including what we’re seeing in Ukraine these days. It distorted our foreign policy, and so forth,” Barr said.

(…)Former Attorney General Barr, who served under President Donald Trump, believes Durham has made progress in his investigation and that more damning information may come out soon.

Barr said that Durham has “dug very deep” into the origins of the FBI’s investigation into disproven claims that then-candidate Trump was colluding with Russia to interfere with the 2016 election and has uncovered “good information.”

“I think the question all along … has been that this was a campaign-dirty-trick to get the government to investigate allegations — scurrilous allegations — about Donald Trump and then leak that right before the election,” Barr said.

“And so that raises two questions: Was the Clinton campaign developing this false information and feeding it in for that purpose? And what was the FBI’s role on this?”

“It tells me that he [has] dug very deep and he has developed some good information and he thinks he can make a criminal case here,” Barr said. (Read more: The Blaze, 5/26/2022)  (Archive)

Link: Sussmann Trial Exhibits

(…) on May 31, Grassley sent the first of four letters to FBI Director Wray and AG Garland.

Grassley leveled a very serious allegation, noting that “while serving in a highly sensitive role that includes threshold decision-making over which Federal public corruption matters are opened for investigation,” the Assistant Special Agent in Charge at the Washington Field Office, Timothy Thibault, violated federal regulations and Department guidelines designed to prevent political bias from infecting FBI matters. Grassley told Wray and Garland that actions by Thibault undermine “both the FBI and DOJ because, at minimum, it creates the perception of unequal application of the law.”

(Page 2 of 4, Grassley letter, 5/31/2022)

(Read more: The Epoch Times, 8/20/2022)  (Archive)

“Prior to the FBI’s raid Monday on former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate, a string of whistleblower reports alleged that senior officials at the FBI exhibited a pattern of bias in their handling of politically sensitive investigations and also reclassified cases without justification to substantiate the White House’s public narratives on crime and extremism.

Assistant Special Agent in Charge Timothy Thibault discusses the sentencing of Julian Velasquez who distributed fentanyl resulting in a woman’s death. (Credit: FBI Washington Field Office/Twitter)

Beginning in late May, Iowa Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley called attention to then-Washington Field Office Assistant Special Agent in Charge Timothy Thibault over political bias concerns. Thibault expressed support for several “highly partisan” opinion articles on LinkedIn and made a series of politically charged social media posts, according to Grassley, who referred Thibault to the Office of Special Counsel to address the federal agent’s potential violations of the Hatch Act, which bars government officials from partisan political activity.

Concerns surrounding Thibault escalated in July, as whistleblowers came forward claiming Thibault’s partisan persuasion directly impacted his work at the bureau. While seeking approval from FBI Director Christopher Wray and Attorney General Merrick Garland to open an investigation into Trump’s 2020 presidential campaign, Thibault withheld from them that his predicating evidence was based in “substantial part” on information from a “left-aligned organization,” according to Grassley’s office.

In a separate instance, whistleblowers claim Thibault worked to falsely discredit evidence against President Joe Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, and prevent the bureau from investigating him.

Richard Pilger leaves the DOJ’s election crimes branch in November 2020 after Barr authorizes a fraud investigation. He stayed with the DOJ in a non-supervisory post. (Credit: public domain)

“Whistleblowers have told my office that the FBI maintains many sources that have provided extensive information on Hunter Biden,” Grassley said in August. “That information allegedly involves potential criminal activity such as money laundering. According to allegations, the underlying information was verified and verifiable. However, instead of green-lighting investigative activity, the FBI shut it down.”

Grassley also pointed to Robert [Richard] Pilger of the Election Crimes Branch, who he alleges was of vital aid to Thibault in his efforts to open the investigation into Trump. Former Principal Associate Deputy Attorney General Richard Donoghue, the Iowa Republican noted, testified that “Pilger’s conduct frustrated the department’s ability to properly operate the Election Crimes Branch.”

Thibault, Grassley confirmed, was reassigned to an unspecified posting prior to the bureau securing a warrant to raid Trump’s estate. Sources briefed on the raid confirmed to Just the News that the agents came from the Washington Field Office, in which Thibault was serving until just days prior.

In late July, whistleblower reports emerged that bureau supervisors were pressuring agents to reclassify cases under the label of “domestic violent extremism” (DVE) without substantive justification in order to support White House narratives.” (Read more: JusttheNews, 8/11/2022)  (Archive)

“There is very little that surprises me, but this is completely stunning. An FBI whistleblower came forth to inform Rep Jim Jordan and Rep Matt Gaetz that the FBI maintains a workspace inside the law firm of Perkins Coie. {Direct Rumble Link}

In response to a letter sent by Rep. Matt Gaetz and Jim Jordan, Perkins Coie, the legal arm of the DNC and Hillary Clinton, admitted they have been operating an FBI workspace in their Washington D.C. office since 2012. Pay attention to that date, it matters. WATCH:

This is a huge development. Essentially, what is being admitted in this claim is that a portal existed into FBI databases within the law firm that represents democrats. This means access to FBI database searches exists inside the office of the DNC and Clinton legal group. Think about the ramifications here.

CTH[Conservative Treehouse] has long claimed there was some kind of direct portal link between the Clinton campaign team and the FBI databases. There were too many trails of extracted non-minimized research evidence in the hands of the Clinton team that CTH could not trace to a transferring FBI official. If Perkins Coie operated a portal in their office that allowed them to conduct search queries of American citizens, then everything would make sense. That access portal is exactly what is being claimed and admitted in this report.

The start date of 2012 is important for several reasons, not the least of which is FISA presiding Judge Rosemary Collyer criticizing the scale and scope of unlawful FBI database access going back to exactly 2012. Keep in mind a FISA-702 search, is simply an unlawful FBI warrantless electronic search of an American (“702” represents the American citizen) into the central database -maintained by the NSA- that contains all electronic data and communication.

I have been in the deep hole of the FISA-702 database search query violations for so long I don’t even need a flashlight.

The report from Matt Gaetz about Perkins Coie access to FBI databases, is in direct alignment with Rosemary Collyer’s prior report on FBI abuses of the database, 702 violations. Notice the dates and scope Judge Collyer references [Source Link].

Non-compliant queries since 2012.

85% of the FBI and contractor searches are unlawful.

Many of those searches involved the use of the “same identifiers over different data ranges.”  Put in plain terms, the same people were continually being tracked, searched and surveilled by querying the FBI database over time.

The non-compliant searches go back to 2012.  The same date mentioned for the FBI portal to begin operating inside the Perkins Coie office.

This specific footnote is a key.  Note the phrase: “([redacted] access to FBI systems was the subject of an interagency memorandum of understanding entered into [redacted])”, this sentence has the potential to expose an internal decision; withheld from congress and the FISA court by the Obama administration; that outlines a process for access and distribution of surveillance data.

Note: “no notice of this practice was given to the FISC until 2016“, which is important.

♦Summary: The FISA court identified and quantified tens of thousands of search queries of the NSA/FBI database using the FISA-702(16)(17) system. The database was repeatedly used by persons with contractor access who unlawfully searched and extracted the raw results without redacting the information and shared it with an unknown number of entities.

The outlined process certainly points toward a political spying and surveillance operation.  When the DOJ use of the IRS for political information on their opposition became problematic, the Obama administration needed another tool.  It was in 2012 when they switched to using the FBI databases for targeted search queries.

This information from Jim Jordan and Matt Gaetz has the potential to be extremely explosive.

It will be interesting to see how the domestic intelligence community media (NYT, Politico, WaPo – in that order) respond to this Matt Gaetz report.

I wrote about these suspicions in-depth throughout 2017, 2018 and eventually summarized in 2019:

SEE HERE

(Conservative Treehouse, 5/31/2022)  (Archive)

Documents released during Michael Sussmann’s federal trial show the FBI solicited advice from Hillary Clinton’s lawyer on a press release describing the intelligence agency’s awareness of the Democratic National Committee hack in 2016.

James Trainor (Credit: public domain)

The original press release sent over to Sussmann by Jim Trainor, the assistant director of the FBI’s Cyber Division, noted that the FBI was aware of “a possible cyber intrusion involving the DCCC,” or the Democratic National Campaign Committee, via “recent media reporting.”

“Michael – our press office is once again getting a ton of calls on the DCCC matter. A draft response is provided below. Wanted to get your thoughts on this prior to sending out,” Trainor wrote.

In his reply, Sussmann asked the FBI to change the first line of the press release to reflect the DNC’s messaging on the hack. He explained that he preferred a more definitive statement that made clear “the FBI is aware of the cyber intrusion involving the DCCC that has been reported in the media.”

Email, 7/29/2016

Trainor accepted the suggestions with minor protest and agreed to send out Sussmann’s manipulated version of the press release soon.

“Mike – I am fine with the below suggestions. We try to really limit what we see and not acknowledging too much but the below edits are fine and we will send out,” Trainor wrote. (Read more: The Federalist, 5/31/2022)  (Archive)

“The acquittal is no surprise. This is a DC jury, after all. In the Roger Stone case, for example, we documented how a juror lied to get on the panel. (That judge didn’t care.) Making matters worse, the Sussmann judge wrongly allowed a woman to remain on the jury, despite the fact that her daughter and Sussmann’s are on the same high school crew team. One can’t help but think that juror had her own daughter’s interests in mind – the cohesion of the crew team – when she reached a decision.

D.C. Wards – Jury Pool

After the verdict was announced, the jury’s forewoman held court before the media and expressed her displeasure that the Special Counsel prosecute a false statement case:

“There are bigger things that affect the nation than a possible lie to the FBI.”

On the facts, there was more than sufficient evidence to prove Sussmann’s guilt. Sussmann lied to then-FBI general counsel James Baker in order to get a meeting to pass the Alfa Bank hoax materials to the FBI. Sussmann lied again during the meeting – stating he was not there on behalf of a client – in order to get the FBI to open an investigation into the Trump Organization’s purported ties with Alfa Bank. Later, during testimony to Congress, Sussmann admitted he met with Baker on behalf of a client. Billing records proved he had been working on the Alfa Bank project on behalf of the Clinton Campaign.

(…) That’s not to say the public hasn’t benefited from the trial. The information disclosed during the trial was important to understand the broader Clinton/Fusion GPS/Perkins Coie effort to poison the public, the press, and the FBI with their Trump/Russia lies. This included:

• Data from the Executive Office of the President of the United States, including data from the Transition period, was exploited by Sussmann and Rodney Joffe and then passed to the CIA.
• Rodney Joffe was a longtime Confidential Human Source (CHS) – and generally a resource – for the FBI. Joffe worked with the FBI on cyber threats from countries like Russia. From former FBI Agent Grasso: “I’m sure the work that [Joffe] did touched on matters having to do with Russia.”
• Joffe went to great lengths to make sure the Alfa Bank information he provided to the FBI did not go through his official FBI handler.

• The decision to open the investigation came from FBI Leadership. According to one FBI Agent, “People on the 7th floor to include Director are fired up about this server.”
• Perkins Coie partner Marc Elias provided updates on the Fusion GPS “research” to the Clinton Campaign.
• After reviewing the evidence, the FBI leaned “towards this being a false server not attributed to the trump organization.”

An unbelievable confirmation of the shoddy FBI investigation into the Russian “hacking” of our election. As of October 13, 2016, the FBI did not have the Crowdstrike images relating to the purported DNC/DCCC hack. Message from FBI agent via their internal messaging system: “really, I just want images of what crowdstrike has.”

• And – Hillary Clinton herself approved of the strategy to disseminate the Alfa Bank allegations to the media. Per Robby Mook:

Q: Mr. Mook, before the break you had testified that there was a conversation in which you told Ms. Clinton about the proposed plan to provide the Alfa-Bank allegations to the media; is that correct?

A: Correct.

Q: And what was her response?

A: All I remember is that she agreed with the decision.

Then there are the trial exhibits, which The Epoch Times has posted here. As Aaron Maté observed, Sussmann edited an FBI press release on the DNC hacking because the FBI’s proposed statement “undermines” the DNC hacking narrative:

Sussmann trial exhibits have been released. (https://t.co/UeyF71U1to ) Includes some Crowdstrike-FBI-DNC exchanges on the alleged DNC hack.

Here Sussmann edits an FBI press release because the original wording “undermines” the DNC’s hacking narrative: https://t.co/UQJnjHvELJ pic.twitter.com/nNrxo6T6t2

— Aaron Maté (@aaronjmate) May 31, 2022

(Read more: Techno Fog, 5/31/2022)  (Archive)