“Theranos CEO Elizabeth Holmes was convicted of fraud on Monday, only after she managed to convince figures from across the political spectrum that her company would revolutionize blood testing.
Holmes, who claimed that her biotechnology firm would create cheaper tests that used less blood, was convicted of four counts of fraud. The jury deadlocked on three counts, and Holmes was found not guilty of four others. She had denied all charges, with her lawyers arguing that her “mistakes are not crimes.”
In addition to lying to investors, Holmes impressed upon many political luminaries, including then-Vice President Joe Biden, the virtues of Theranos.
“This is inspiration. It is amazing to me, Elizabeth, what you’ve been able to do. What’s most impressive to me is you’re not only making these lab tests more accessible … empowering people whether they live in the barrio or a mansion, putting them in a position to help take control of their own health,” Biden told Holmes at a 2015 meeting at Theranos’ headquarters when he was vice president.
A special conversation on “The Future of Equality and Opportunity” with President Clinton and Founder and CEO of Theranos Elizabeth Holmes and Executive Chairman of the Alibaba Group Jack Ma, during the Closing Plenary Session of the September 2015 Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) Annual Meeting. Video
She also convinced Gen. James Mattis and former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger to sit on Theranos’ board of directors. Mattis intervened on Theranos’ behalf with the Department of Defense after a DOD official requested an investigation into the company’s potentially illegal distribution of medical technology.” (Read more: The Daily Caller/1/03/2022)(Archive)
1. Conservatives Are in The Same Category As Islamic Terrorists
(…) McCabe likened conservatives to members of the Islamic Caliphate: “I can tell you from my perspective of spending a lot of time focused on the radicalization of international terrorists and Islamic extremist and extremists of all stripes… is that this group shares many of the same characteristics of those groups that we’ve seen radicalized along entirely different ideological lines,” he said.
2. Parents at School Board Meetings Pose A ‘Threat To National Security’
“Political violence [is] not just confined to the Capitol,” McCabe asserted. “It’s going on in school boards around the country. It’s going on in local elections. It’s happening, you know, even to health-care workers.” According to this politically protected former FBI no. 2, the “political violence” occurring recently at school board meetings and during local elections is a “very diverse and challenging threat picture.”
3. McCabe Wants More Surveillance of ‘Mainstream’ Conservatives
“I’m fairly confident,” McCabe said, “[that] the FBI [and other agencies] have reallocated resources and repositioned some of their counterterrorism focus to increase their focus on right-wing extremism and domestic violent extremists. And I think that’s obviously a good idea.”
But McCabe wants more. McCabe asserted that the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and FBI need to stop merely focusing on the “fringes of the right-wing movement,” in order to “catch this threat” of the “right.”
“Are you going to catch this threat if your focus is only on the traditional, right-wing extremist, those groups that we know about, the quote-unquote, fringes of the right-wing movement?” asked McCabe. “And I think the answer to that is no.”
“It’s entirely possible that when the intelligence community and the law enforcement community looks out across this mainstream,” McCabe continued, “they didn’t assume [on January 6] that that group of people — business owners, white people from the suburbs, educated, employed — presented a threat of violence, and now we know very clearly that they do.
4. McCabe Believes No One Is Above The Law (Except Himself)
Ironically, one of McCabe’s last remarks was a proclamation of equality under the law. “Whether you are a Trump supporter or a Biden supporter, right, left, or otherwise, we should all be able to agree on the principle that no one is above the law,” stated McCabe.” (Read more: The Federalist, 1/10/2022)(Archive)
“Politico Playbook exclusively reported Wednesday that publishing giant HarperCollins is preparing to release the next investigative bombshell book by six-time New York Times bestselling author Peter Schweizer titled Red-Handed: How American Elites Get Rich Helping China Win.
Red-Handed remains under a strict embargo until its January 25 release date.
The book’s cover, which Politico obtained a copy of, features photos of President Joe Biden and Chinese Communist Party Leader Xi Jinping, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), former House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH), LeBron James, Elon Musk, Henry Kissinger, and Bill Gates. According to Politico, Red-Handed will “expose bad actors on both ends of the political spectrum and their willingness to do China’s bidding.”
Given the bestselling author’s investigative track record, the book’s subjects may have cause for concern. Peter Schweizer’s Clinton Cash sparked an FBI investigation into the Clinton Foundation. His last two books, Profiles in Corruption and Secret Empires, each hit #1 on the New York Times bestseller list and exposed how Hunter Biden and Joe Biden flew aboard Air Force Two in 2013 to China before Hunter’s firm inked a $1.5 billion deal with a subsidiary of the Chinese government’s Bank of China just 10 days after the trip.” (Read more: Breitbart, 1/12/2022)(Archive)
Pelosi Jr. gave a ringing endorsement of Asa Saint Clair’s IGObit digital token, calling it a game changer. ‘IGObit is the absolute best offering I have ever seen,’ he wrote on his website. (Credit: Paul Pelosi Jr.)
A shocking paper trail shows Nancy Pelosi’s son, Paul Pelosi Jr.’s connections to a host of fraudsters, rule-breakers and convicted criminals.
A DailyMail.com investigation can reveal that Paul, 52, was involved in five companies probed by federal agencies before, during or after his time there.
He joined the board of a biofuel company after it defrauded investors, according to an SEC ruling, and whose CEO was convicted after bribing Georgia officials.
Paul was president of an environmental investment firm that turned out to be a front for two convicted fraudsters, documents reveal.
He served as vice president of a company previously embroiled in an investigation of scam calls that targeted senior citizens.
A medical company Pelosi Jr. worked for was accused of testing drugs on people without FDA authorization, DailyMail.com can reveal.
A source close to a firm Nancy’s son worked for told DailyMail.com that Pelosi Jr. received $2.8 million of shares allegedly issued as part of a massive $164 million fraud in July 2016.
(…) The 52-year-old joined the board of a biofuel company after it defrauded investors according to an SEC ruling, and whose CEO was convicted after bribing Georgia officials.
Pelosi Jr. was president of an environmental investment firm that turned out to be a front for two convicted fraudsters.
He joined a lithium mining company and received millions of shares, allegedly issued as part of a massive $164 million fraud.
He was vice president of a company previously embroiled in an investigation of scam calls that targeted senior citizens.
He has close business ties with a man accused by the Department of Justice of running a fake UN charity that stole investors’ money.
A medical company Pelosi Jr. worked for tested drugs on people without FDA authorization, according to an FDA investigation.
Pelosi Jr. has never been accused or charged with crimes relating to these cases.
The National Archives in Washington D.C. (Credit: National Archives.gov)
(…) According to a Feb. 7statement by the National Archives (NARA), NARA arranged for the transport of 15 boxes that contained presidential records from Mar-a-Lago, “following discussions with President Trump’s representatives in 2021.” Trump stated that the discussions were “collaborative and respectful” and said it was a “great honor” to work with the National Archives.
His representatives also told the agency they would continue to look for more presidential records. Shortly thereafter, on Feb. 14, NARA claimed in a statement that “some of the Trump presidential records received by the National Archives and Records Administration included paper records that had been torn up by former President Trump.”
The very next day, Feb. 15, 2022, Sens. Grassley (R-Iowa) and Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) sent a letter to Garland stating that the DOJ has so far refused to comply with Trump’s declassification order that he issued in January 2021. The letter noted that “the Justice Department has not only failed to declassify a single page, but the Department has also failed to identify for Congress records that it knows with certainty to be covered by the declassification directive.” Grassley told Garland that the DOJ must “identify the records subject to the declassification order and, second, produce those records to Congress and the American people without improper redactions.
Three days later, in a letter sent by NARA archivist David Ferriero to the politicized House Oversight and Reform Committee, Ferriero stated that “NARA has identified items marked as classified national security information within the boxes.” Bear in mind that as president, Trump held ultimate authority on whether the documents were classified.
Also keep in mind that letter from Grassley just three days earlier, noting that the DOJ had thus far refused to comply with Trump’s declassification order. A week later, the House Oversight Committee demanded that “NARA turn over additional information, including an inventory of the boxes recovered from Mar-a-Lago and information on any classified documents, as well as documents from the Trump Administration related to the former President’s destruction of records.” (Read more: The Epoch Times, 8/19/2022)(Archive)
“Alexandra Chalupa, a Ukrainian-American who worked in the Clinton administration and was a consultant for the Democratic National Committee, is calling for Fox News host Tucker Carlson to be prosecuted for treason.
Chalupa took to social media to rant about a segment in which Carlson suggested Russian aggression toward Ukraine would be akin to China trying to interfere with Mexico.
“Imagine if Mexico fell under the direct control of China. We would see that as a threat,” Carlson explained in a segment earlier this week.
“There would be no reason for that,” he continued. “That’s how Russia views NATO control of Ukraine … and why wouldn’t they?”
The Office of Inspector General (OIG) has known about the Durham probe of Michael Sussmann for how long? And specifically, the criminal case against Sussmann revolved around the central witness, the point of contact with former FBI General Counsel, Jim Baker. Yet the OIG said nothing to John Durham about their possession of Baker’s phones until this month?
Think about what that tells us?
TechnoFog has more details about the latest court filing SEE HERE. He also notes the issue of the Durham team only recently being notified by the OIG in January:
…”There is also a curious paragraph discussing the fact that Durham, in January 2022 – learned from the DOJ Inspector General that they possessed “two FBI cellphones of the former FBI General Counsel to whom the defendant made his alleged false statement, along with forensic reports analyzing those cellphones.” Durham’s team is going through those cell phones now to analyze their contents.
And there will be more, with Durham stating, “the Government expects to receive additional information and documents in the coming weeks that may be relevant to the charged conduct.” (read more)
Techno has a great perspective and is always a great source for interpretation of the legal filings. However, I would draw attention to the obvious question about the internal policing unit of the DOJ, the Office of Inspector General, not notifying the special counsel of the evidence in their possession.
James Baker
It’s likely, from the information inside the current and previous filings, that sometime in the interviews with James Baker (a friend of the Lawfare alliance consisting of Ben Wittes, Lisa Page and Andrew McCabe), the former FBI general counsel noted he turned over his phones to the OIG, most likely as an outcome of the previous OIG investigation into the political weaponization of the FBI in the OIG FISA application investigation around Carter Page.
Baker telling Durham he gave his phones to the OIG, likely led to Durham asking DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz about them. The OIG then recently admitting they had them…. as evidence… and so, here they are.
However, on its face, the OIG not informing the Durham probe about them previously confirms what we previously outlined about how the information silos are used to contain and control information adverse to the interests of the DC system, writ large. Compartmentalization is how the corrupt enterprises of the Fourth Branch of Government, in this instance the DOJ, can bury information. It’s a feature, not a flaw.
.@LeeSmithDC says he keeps hearing people comparing the scandal to Watergate when it doesn’t compare to Watergate at all. We are talking about some of the most secure communications in government been Surveiled by political operatives. pic.twitter.com/f22h5V92vV
(…) According to Durham, Joffe and his associates manipulated that data to make it seem like Trump, and those in Trump’s world, had suspicious interactions with internet protocol (IP) addresses affiliated with a Russian mobile phone provider. They then combined those allegations with the Alfa Bank hoax materials (the subject of Sussmann’s Fall 2016 meeting with then-FBI General Counsel James Baker).
This damaging information, purporting to demonstrate at least circumstantial evidence of Trump/Russia collusion, was presented on February 9, 2017 to what Durham describes as U.S. Government “Agency-2.”
That agency was the CIA. We know for sure that Sussmann met with the CIA General Counsel. We learned in January 2022 that, if Sussmann is to be believed, there were two other CIA employees at that meeting.
In other words, a Clinton supporting contractor (Joffe) obtained sensitive information (perhaps unlawfully) about the Office of the President of the United States (Trump), manipulated the information, passed it to a DNC/Clinton lawyer (Sussmann), who then delivered it to the CIA.
All on American soil.
This is important because the CIA is generally prohibited from conducting domestic operations. The FBI explains:
“The CIA collects information only regarding foreign countries and their citizens. Unlike the FBI, it is prohibited from collecting information regarding ‘U.S. Persons,’ a term that includes U.S. citizens, resident aliens, legal immigrants, and U.S. corporations, regardless of where they are located.”
In the CIA’s own words:
“The FBI is responsible for coordination of clandestine collection of foreign intelligence through human sources or human-enabled means and counterintelligence activities inside the United States.”
Yet when it came to Trump, here was the CIA doing what it is prohibited: “collecting information regarding U.S. persons” inside the United States.2 (See also the CIA’s bulk surveillance program.)
A top CIA official answered the call of a DNC lawyer who alleged that these suspicious internet “lookups” proved “that Trump and/or his associates were using supposedly rare, Russian-made wireless phones in the vicinity of the White House and other locations.” Accusations that were baseless, according to Durham.
In other words, the secret police was more than willing to accept politically damaging information against the President. I’m curious what they did with it. It seems naive to think the information stayed at the CIA. I bet it was passed onto the FBI or DOJ, who may have used it to further the Trump/Russia investigation.” (Read more: Techno Fog/The Reactionary, 2/15/2022)(Archive)
Today, Special Counsel John Durham provided a “discovery Update” to the court in the Michael Sussmann case. In this filing, available here, he disclosed that his team has obtained a tremendous amount of information ranging from a variety of sources – including Perkins Coie, the Hillary Clinton Campaign, and former DNC/Clinton lawyer Mark Elias.
(…) Now, to the evidence. Durham and his team have secured grand jury testimony from the following individuals:
Former Perkins Coie partner, and DNC/Hillary Clinton lawyer Marc Elias.
Former FBI General Counsel James Baker
Current CIA employees
Durham and his team have completed interviews of the following individuals:
Former FBI General Counsel James Baker
More than 24 other current and former FBI employees.
Current and former employees of the CIA and DARPA.
12 Employees of the “internet companies” referenced in the Sussmann indictment.
The former chairman of DNC/Clinton law firm Perkins Coie.
A former employee of the Clinton campaign.
Current and former employees of Georgia Tech (involved in the Alfa Hoax).
An employee of “Tech Executive-1” – aka Rodney Joffe, a Sussmann client who assisted with the Alfa Bank hoax.
Still, there is more. Durham has obtained records/documents from the following entities:
The Hillary Clinton Campaign
Perkins Coie
Hillary for America
Fusion GPS
A PR Firm that advised Perkins Coie regarding public statements about Sussmann’s meeting with James Baker.
Phone logs for numerous current and former FBI employees.
“a classified memorandum and related reports of interviews pertaining to a criminal investigation previously conducted by the U.S. Department of Justice regarding a potential leak of classified information”
He also has secured nearly 400 e-mails between the FBI and Perkins Coie from January 2016 through June 2017.
While we expected some grand jury testimony, the fact that Mark Elias, the DNC/Clinton lawyer, was before a grand jury is certainly newsworthy.
And it leads us to believe that Durham is focused on something more substantial than the false Alfa Bank allegations – perhaps the inception of it all: the claim of Russian hacking. As we have said before, consider the possibility that evidence of “Russian hacking” was placed by the DNC, Perkins Coie, et al. for Crowdstrike to conveniently “find.” (Read more: Techno Fog, 1/25/2022)(Archive)
On July 28, 2016, CIA director John Brennan briefed Obama on an “intelligence bombshell,” Information that the corporate media claimed was “drawn from sourcing deep inside the Russian government”. According to media reports describing the briefing, Vladimir Putin had approved a campaign to “defeat or at least damage” Hillary Clinton and help elect her opponent, Donald Trump.
The media used quotes from former intelligence officials breathlessly describing Obama “as deeply concerned” noting that Obama wanted as much information as fast as possible.”
In truth, Brennan’s briefing was the exact opposite from what the media has reported for the last five years. What Brennan actually briefed Obama on was information indicating that Hillary Clinton had approved a plan to tie Trump to Russian election interference “as a means of distracting the public from her use of a private email server.”
A new filing from special counsel John Durham has raised major national security concerns. The filing, made in connection with his indictment of Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann, reveals that Rodney Joffe, a tech executive who was working with Sussmann, had exploited his access to internet traffic at the White House, as well as Trump Tower and Trump’s Central Park apartment building.
This raises an important question: How was Joffe, a private individual who has been implicated in mail order scams in the past, able to gain security clearances to access highly sensitive data—including information on the president’s internet activities?
But that’s not the only national security threat exposed by Durham. Biden’s national security adviser Jake Sullivan appears to have been privy to this plan. Sullivan famously pushed Joffe’s data to allege Trump-Russia collusion in October 2016. And he kept doing it well into Trump’s presidency. (The Epoch Times, 2/17/2022)
“As indictments and new court filings indicate that Special Counsel John Durham is investigating Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign for feeding false reports to the FBI to incriminate Donald Trump and his advisers as Kremlin agents, Clinton’s role in the burgeoning scandal remains elusive. What did she know and when did she know it?
Top officials involved in her campaign have repeatedly claimed, some under oath, that they and the candidate were unaware of the foundation of their disinformation campaign: the 35-page collection of now debunked claims of Trump/Russia collusion known as the Steele dossier. Even though her campaign helped pay for the dossier, they claim she only read it after BuzzFeed News published it in 2017.
But court documents, behind-the-scenes video footage and recently surfaced evidence reveal that Clinton and her top campaign advisers were much more involved in the more than $1 million operation to dredge up dirt on Trump and Russia than they have let on. The evidence suggests that the Trump-Russia conspiracy theory sprang from a multi-pronged effort within the Clinton campaign, which manufactured many of the false claims, then fed them to friendly media and law enforcement officials. Clinton herself was at the center of these efforts, using her personal Twitter account and presidential debates to echo the false claims of Steele and others that Trump was in cahoots with the Russians.
A largely overlooked moment in the campaign film “Hillary,” when the candidate told running mate Tim Kaine of “scratching hard” to expose Donald Trump’s “weird connections” to Russia. (Credit: Hillary)
Although Clinton has not been pressed by major media on her role in Russiagate, a short scene in the 2020 documentary “Hillary” suggests she was aware of the effort. It shows Clinton speaking to her running mate, Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine, and his wife, Anne, in hushed tones about Trump and Russia in a back room before a campaign event in early October 2016. Clinton expressed concerns over Trump’s “weird connections” to Russia and its president, Vladimir Putin. She informed Kaine that she and her aides were “scratching hard” to expose them, a project Kaine seemed to be hearing about for the first time.
“I don’t say this lightly,” Clinton whispered, pausing to look over her shoulder, “[but Trump’s] agenda is other people’s agenda.”
“We’re scratching hard, trying to figure it out,” she continued. “He is the vehicle, the vessel for all these other people.”
The two then discussed “all these weird connections” between the Trump campaign and Russia. Kaine brought up former Trump Campaign Manager Paul Manafort, and Clinton expressed suspicion about Trump’s then-national security adviser, ret. Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, “who is a paid tool for Russian television.”
Added Clinton: “This is what scares me … the way that Putin has taken over the political apparatus, or is trying to—.” At that point, a media handler interrupted them over some staging issues, and they stopped discussing Trump and Russia.
Both Manafort and Flynn had been cited in dossier reports submitted to the Clinton campaign before the two Democratic nominees had their October 2016 conversation. The dossier falsely accused Manafort, Flynn and other Trump advisers of participating in a Kremlin conspiracy to steal the election for Trump.
Christopher Steele suggested to the FBI in July 2016 that Hillary Clinton had been briefed on his reports. (Credit: The Associated Press)
Dossier author Christopher Steele himself has suggested Clinton was briefed on his reports. On July 5, 2016 — the same day the FBI publicly exonerated Clinton in her email scandal — Steele handed off the first installments of the dossier to an FBI agent overseas who had handled him previously as an informant. In their London meeting, Steele noted that Clinton was aware of his reporting, according to contemporaneous notes Steele took of their conversation.
“The notes reflect that Steele told [his FBI handler Michael Gaeta] that Steele was aware that ‘Democratic Party associates’ were paying for [his] research; the ‘ultimate client’ was the leadership of the Clinton presidential campaign; and ‘the candidate’ was aware of Steele’s reporting,” Justice Department watchdog Michael Horowitz wrote in his 2019 report examining the FBI’s use of the dossier to justify spying on Trump campaign adviser Carter Page.
Later that same month, during the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia, the CIA picked up Russian chatter about a Clinton foreign policy adviser who was trying to develop allegations to “vilify” Trump. The intercepts said Clinton herself had approved a “plan” to “stir up a scandal” against Trump by tying him to Putin. According to handwritten notes, then-CIA chief John Brennan warned President Obama that Moscow had intercepted information about the “alleged approval by Hillary Clinton on July 26, 2016, of a proposal from one of her foreign policy advisers to vilify Donald Trump.”
At the convention, Clinton foreign policy adviser Jake Sullivan drove a golf cart from one TV-network news tent in the parking lot to another, pitching producers, anchors, correspondents and even some NBC network executives a story that Trump and his advisers were in bed with Putin and possibly conspiring with Russian intelligence to steal the election. He also visited CNN and MSNBC, as well as Fox News, to spin the Clinton campaign’s unfounded theories. Sullivan even sat down with CNN honcho Jeff Zucker to outline the opposition research they had gathered on Trump and Russia.
Jake Sullivan: Promoted collusion — but denied under oath knowing details of the dossier project. (Credit: The Associated Press)
Sullivan’s title was misleading. He was far more than a foreign policy adviser to Clinton. His portfolio included campaign strategy.
“Hillary told Sullivan she wanted him to take over [her campaign],” journalists Amie Parnes and Jonathan Allen reported in their 2017 bestseller, “Shattered: Inside Hillary’s Doomed Campaign.” “You’re going to be my traffic cop and my rabbi, she told Sullivan, adding that he would be her de facto chief strategist.”
Sullivan was included in “every aspect of her campaign strategy,” they wrote, because “no one on the official campaign staff understood Hillary’s thought process as well as Sullivan.”
Now serving in the White House as President Biden’s national security adviser, Sullivan has denied under oath knowing details about the dossier project.
Clinton Campaign Manager Robby Mook (with Director of Communications Jennifer Palmieri, rear) went in front of cameras to echo essentially what Steele had reported back to the campaign. (Credit: The Associated Press)
Sullivan spread the anti-Trump rumors behind the scenes while Clinton Campaign Manager Robby Mook went in front of the cameras to echo essentially what Steele, a former British intelligence officer, had reported back to the campaign.
“Experts are telling us that Russian state actors broke into the DNC, stole these emails, and other experts are now saying the Russians are releasing these emails for the purpose of actually helping Donald Trump,” Mook told CNN’s Jake Tapper at the convention. He made the same allegations on ABC News’ “This Week,” anchored by George Stephanopoulos, who served as White House communication director during Bill Clinton’s presidency..
Hillary Clinton campaign Communications Director Jennifer Palmieri has acknowledged that they were all bent on casting a “cloud” of suspicion over Trump and seeding doubt about his loyalties by suggesting “the possibility of collusion between Trump’s allies and Russian intelligence.”
“We were on a mission to get the press to focus on the prospect that Russia had not only hacked and stolen emails from the Democratic National Committee, but that it had done so to help Donald Trump and hurt Hillary Clinton,” Palmieri stated in a 2017Washington Postcolumn. “We wanted to raise the alarm.”
It’s not known if their media blitz was coordinated with Glenn Simpson, the Clinton campaign’s opposition-research contractor who hired Steele for $168,000. But Simpson also attended the convention in Philadelphia, and at the same time Clinton’s top people were making the TV media rounds, Simpson and his Fusion GPS co-founder, Peter Fritsch, were meeting with the New York Times and other major print media outlets to pitch Russia “collusion” stories, focusing primarily on Manafort. Bad publicity from the planted stories would later pressure Trump to dump Manafort as his campaign manager.
That same week, Simpson worked with ABC News correspondent Brian Ross on a since-debunked story framing Trump supporter Sergei Millian as a Russian spy. Simpson also told Ross that Trump was involved in shady business deals in Moscow. Simpson set up Ross’ interview with Millian through ABC producer Matthew Mosk, an old Simpson friend.
Then in September 2016, ABC’s “Good Morning America,” which is co-hosted by Stephanopoulos, aired parts of the Millian report. Later that day, Hillary Clinton tweeted out a campaign video incorporating heavily edited quotes from Millian and suggesting they were more evidence Trump was “an unwitting agent of the Russian Federation.” Above the video she posted on Sept. 22, Clinton personally tweeted: “The man who could be your next president may be deeply indebted to another country. Do you trust him to run ours?”
In effect, Clinton broadcast to her millions of followers a story her campaign had helped manufacture through a paid contractor.
Igor Danchenko: Clinton amplified his dossier falsehood about Sergei Millian as a key source. (Credit: The Associated Press)
Durham’s ongoing investigation has found that core parts of the dossier were fabricated and falsely attributed to Millian as their source, including the foundational claim of a “well-developed conspiracy of cooperation” between Russia and Trump. Durham reported that Steele’s main collector of information – onetime Brookings Institution analyst Igor Danchenko – never even spoke with Millian, as he had claimed, but simply made up the source of the most explosive information in the dossier.
Sergei Millian: Danchenko never even spoke with him, Durham charges. (Credit: sergeimillian.com)
Durham recently indicted Danchenko for lying to the FBI about Millian.
The day after Clinton’s false tweet about Millian and Trump, her campaign released a statement by senior national spokesman Glen Caplin touting a “new bombshell report” by Yahoo News that revealed the FBI was investigating “Trump’s foreign policy adviser” for suspected links to the Kremlin.
“It’s chilling to learn that U.S. intelligence officials are conducting a probe into suspected meetings between Trump’s foreign policy adviser Carter Page and members of Putin’s inner circle while in Moscow,” according to the statement, which attached the Sept. 23, 2016, Yahoo article in full and noted the report came on the heels of ABC’s story about Millian.
“Just one day after we learned about Trump’s hundreds of millions of dollars in undisclosed Russian business interests,” Caplin’s statement continued, “this report suggests Page met with a sanctioned top Russian official to discuss the possibility of ending U.S. sanctions against Russia under a Trump presidency – an action that could directly enrich both Trump and Page while undermining American interests.”
“We’ve never seen anything like this in American politics,” the Clinton campaign statement added with alarm. “Every day seems to cast new doubts on what’s truly driving Donald Trump’s decision-making.”
But the Yahoo story about Page’s nefarious Kremlin meetings was apocryphal. Its main source was Steele, whose identity was hidden in the story. Yahoo reporter Michael Isikoff had interviewed Steele in a room at a Washington inn booked by Simpson. The FBI nonetheless cited the article to support its applications to a secret federal court for authority to spy on Page, claiming it corroborated the dossier’s allegations, even though they were one and the same.
Here again, Clinton’s team hyped as a “bombshell” Trump-Russia revelation a media report that it helped craft from opposition research it commissioned and from FBI interest it generated. All of this was hidden from voters.
The Clinton campaign planted the allegation of a “secret hotline” to Putin through a Russia-based bank. (Credit: alfabank.com)
It was also in September that then-Clinton campaign attorney Michael Sussmann planted at FBI headquarters the manufactured allegation that Trump had set up a “secret hotline” to Putin through Russia-based Alfa Bank. Steele had filed a campaign report about the bank’s ties to Putin around the same time.
Michael Sussmann: This Clinton lawyer connected Trump with Alfa Bank, and the candidate echoed the charge with a tweet that went viral. perkinscoie.com
Durham last year indicted Sussmann for lying to the FBI, detailing how the lawyer and Simpson had collaborated with a team of anti-Trump, pro-Clinton computer researchers to draft a technical report for the FBI and media allegedly connecting Trump to Alfa Bank through email servers. Simpson, in turn, worked with Slate reporter Franklin Foer to craft a story propagating the allegation, even reviewing his piece in advance of publication.
Foer’s story broke on Oct. 31, 2016. That same day, Sullivan hyped the story on Twitter, claiming in a written campaign statement that Trump and the Russians were operating a “secret hotline” through Alfa Bank and speculating “federal authorities” would be investigating “this direct connection between Trump and Russia.” He portrayed the discovery as the work of independent experts — “computer scientists” — without disclosing their connections to the campaign.
“This could be the most direct link yet between Donald Trump and Moscow,” Sullivan proclaimed.
‘October Surprise’ That Wasn’t
Clinton teed up that statement in an Oct. 31tweet of her own, which quickly went viral. She warned voters: “Computer scientists have apparently uncovered a covert server linking the Trump Organization to a Russian-based bank.”
October 31, 2016/Twitter
Also that day, Clinton tweeted, “It’s time for Trump to answer serious questions about his ties to Russia,” while attaching a meme that read: “Donald Trump has a secret server. It was set up to communicate privately with a Putin-tied Russian bank called Alfa Bank.”
At the same time that Simpson was working Slate, he leaked to a friend at the New York Times that the FBI had evidence of the Trump-Alfa link, providing the Times and other friendly media outlets a serious news hook to publish the unfounded rumors on the eve of the November election.
The Alfa smear was meant as an “October surprise” that would rock the Trump campaign and take media focus off the probe of Clinton’s emails, which then-FBI Director James Comey had been pressured by a New York agent to revive in the final week of the campaign. Clinton’s team had even “prepared a video promoting the Trump-Alfa Bank server connection and was poised to make an all-out push through social media,” according to Isikoff and David Corn in their book, “Russian Roulette.” But “that plan was canned,” they wrote because the Oct. 31Times story noted that the FBI had not been able to corroborate the claims of a cyber-link. The skepticism cooled the media firestorm the campaign had hoped for.
“We had been waiting for the Alfa Bank story to come out,” Clinton Campaign Chairman John Podesta told Isikoff and Corn. “Then — boom! — it gets smacked down.”
In congressional testimony, Podesta has largely claimed ignorance about the campaign’s opposition-research efforts.
Marc Elias: A focus of Durham, he briefed Clinton campaign leaders about the Alfa smear, emails show. (Credit: The Associated Press)
In Durham’s indictment of Sussmann for lying to the FBI about his work for the Clinton campaign while feeding them the Alfa Bank story, prosecutors revealed that Sussmann’s partner Marc Elias kept Clinton campaign bigwigs in the loop about the project to manufacture a Trump-Russian bank conspiracy, which the FBI months later completely debunked. Emails obtained by Durham’s investigators show the lawyer had briefed top Clinton campaign officials Sullivan, Palmieri and Mook about the Alfa smear in September 2016. Elias, the campaign’s general counsel, engaged with “individuals acting on behalf of the Clinton campaign to share information about the Russian bank data,” the indictment stated.
Sullivan, who now serves as President Biden’s national security adviser, maintained in December 2017 congressional testimony he didn’t even know that the politically prominent Elias worked for Perkins Coie, a well-known Democratic law firm representing the Clinton campaign. Major media stories from 2016, however, routinely identified Elias as “general counsel for the Clinton campaign” and a “partner at Perkins Coie.”
“To be honest with you, Marc wears a tremendous number of hats, so I wasn’t sure who he was representing,” Sullivan testified. “I sort of thought he was, you know, just talking to us as, you know, a fellow traveler in this – in this campaign effort.”
Veteran FBI investigators doubt Sullivan or his boss were in the dark about the campaign-funded work of Elias, Sussmann, Simpson or Steele and other campaign operations designed to make Trump look compromised by a foreign adversary.
“Durham is telling us that this Alfa Bank hoax – and probably related matters – were Clinton campaign ops at the very highest level,” former FBI counterintelligence agent and lawyer Mark Wauck noted. “How credible is it to suppose that Hillary herself wasn’t in the know?”
Durham’s investigators have been questioning Elias under subpoena. A new court filing in the Sussmann case reveals that Elias has given testimony before a criminal grand jury impaneled by Durham in Washington, D.C.
Grand jury testimony is sealed and it’s not known what Elias told prosecutors. But In 2017, he testified in a closed-door session of Congress that Mook was his campaign contact for opposition-research projects, including the dossier. “I consulted with Robby Mook, who was campaign manager,” he said, noting that Mook handled budget matters and signed off on opposition-research expenses billed by Perkins Coie, which totaled more than $1.2 million.
While Mook has not been questioned under oath on the Hill, he told CNN: “I didn’t know that we were paying the contractor that created that document.”
“What I’ve known [about the dossier] is what I’ve read in the press,” he claimed. Mook said he doesn’t recall seeing the dossier memos during the campaign. “I just can’t attribute to what piece of information, you know, came to us at one time or where it came from, frankly. You know, as campaign manager, there’s a lot going on.”
Mook added that he wasn’t sure who was gathering the information for the dossier: “I don’t know the answer to that. … I wish we paid more attention to it on the campaign.”
Elias Met Simpson Often
In his testimony, Elias said he met with Simpson and other Fusion GPS researchers at least 20 times and Steele at least once during the campaign. He said he would receive written reports from them and direct them to find certain information. He, in turn, would travel each week to Clinton campaign headquarters in Brooklyn, N.Y., to report what he had learned about Trump and Russia.
Glenn Simpson: Clinton lawyer Elias said he met with him and other Fusion GPS researchers at least 20 times. (Credit: The Associated Press)
However, Elias insisted he left his interlocutors in the dark about the sources of that information, for which the campaign was paying him in excess of $1 million. He also insisted he didn’t tell his campaign contacts about his meetings with Steele or Simpson, despite billing the campaign for such consultations, and never shared the dossier reports or other materials they generated with those Clinton officials. Elias even maintained that he hired Fusion GPS on his own without consulting with Mook or the campaign. “I was the gatekeeper,” he said, between the research contractors and the campaign.
According to “Russian Roulette,” however, Elias shared the findings of Steele’s memos with at least Mook. “Elias would at times brief Mook on their contents,” Isikoff and Corn wrote.
Podesta has testified that he, too, had no idea Steele and Fusion GPS were on the campaign’s payroll and didn’t read the dossier until BuzzFeed posted it online after the election.
Under oath, Podesta denied speaking with Clinton about the dossier even after the election: “I don’t know that I’ve ever discussed the dossier with Mrs. Clinton.” He also swore Clinton never talked to him about opposition research, in general, or who the campaign might hire to conduct it.
The campaign’s in-house opposition research team, led by chief researcher Christina Reynolds, was under the direction of Palmieri, the head of communications who is close to Clinton.
Brian Fallon, ex-campaign spokesman: “She may have known [about the dossier and its financing before the election], but the degree of exactly what she knew is beyond my knowledge.” (Credit: CBS)
Former Bill Clinton political strategist Doug Schoen said it stretches credulity to suggest that top officials in the Clinton camp, including the candidate herself, weren’t fully aware of the research their campaign attorney was billing them for.
“With more than 380 payments from the Clinton campaign and the DNC being made to Perkins Coie, it is seemingly impossible that the candidate herself would not have direct knowledge of the purpose of those payments or any earmarks being made, especially those for Fusion GPS,” Schoen said.
Quoting unnamed Clinton surrogates, both the New York Times and CNN have reported that the candidate was unaware of the dossier prior to BuzzFeed publishing it two months after the 2016 election. Former Clinton campaign spokesman Brian Fallon told CNN in a separate interview she may not have been totally out of the loop, however. “She may have known [about the dossier and its financing before the election],” he said, “but the degree of exactly what she knew is beyond my knowledge.”
A senior congressional investigator who insisted on anonymity said the denials are hard to believe and described them as an effort to insulate Clinton from a major undertaking of her campaign that has proved scandalous, if not criminal. “The biggest lie is Hillary didn’t know about any of this oppo stuff even though she tweeted about it!” he said.
Walled off from her campaign’s oppo research? She seemed to cite dossier falsehoods in the debates. (Credit: The Associated Press)
Clinton also appeared to cite dossier disinformation in the presidential debates, casting further doubt on claims she was walled off from such opposition research. In the final debate, for example, Clinton accused Trump of being Putin’s “puppet” and accepting his “help” in sabotaging her campaign, drawing conclusions similar to ones made in the dossier. She claimed Trump did what the dossier falsely claimed he did — conspiring with the Russian government to hack her campaign and steal emails — though she allegedly never read Steele’s reports.
“You encouraged espionage against our people,” Clinton said on Oct. 19, 2016.
Durham Inching Closer
With each new indictment and court filing, Clinton inches closer to the center of the special prosecutor’s investigation, now in its third year.
Durham indicated in a recently filed court document that he is actively investigating the Clinton campaign and seeks to question its top officials. His office declined to say whether it intended to question Clinton herself.
John Durham: His indictments make clear that the Clinton campaign’s influence on the contents of the dossier was much deeper than previously known. (Credit: The Associated Press)
Durham’s recent indictments of Sussmann and subcontractor Danchenko implicate key campaign figures and make clear that the Clinton campaign’s influence on the contents of the dossier was much deeper than previously known.
For instance, Durham found that a longtime Clinton insider and campaign adviser — Charles Dolan — was a key source for the dossier and most likely originated the false “pee tape” rumor involving Trump and Moscow prostitutes. It seems likely that he acted as an intermediary between the campaign and Steele’s primary sub-source, Danchenko, with whom he communicated. In 2016, Dolan “actively campaigned and participated in calls and events as a volunteer on behalf of Hillary Clinton,” according to the Danchenko indictment.
In other words, the Clinton campaign not only funded the Russia dirt on Trump but provided some of the actual sourcing for it. Campaign operatives, in turn, laundered the dirt through the FBI and into the mainstream media to damage Trump.
In a related filing in the Danchenko case, Durham noted that his “areas of inquiry” include investigating “the extent to which the Clinton campaign and/or its representatives directed, solicited or controlled the defendant’s [Danchenko’s] activities” surrounding the dossier. He also indicated prosecutors want to find out whether the campaign knew Danchenko and Steele were funneling false information to the FBI, and intend to summon “multiple former employees of the campaign” as trial or grand jury witnesses.
In the Sussmann case, Durham’s agents have already questioned one “former employee of the Clinton campaign” and subpoenaed Clinton campaign records, according to a new document filed by Durham earlier this week.
Sources familiar with his probe say Durham ultimately is investigating the Clinton campaign for, among other things, alleged conspiracy to defraud the FBI, the Justice Department and the Pentagon’s research arm, which provided funding and sensitive Internet logs to Clinton operatives who helped fabricate the Alfa Bank hoax.
Danchenko and the Clinton campaign, including Podesta and other officials, happen to share the same D.C. law firm – Schertler & Onorato – which gives the appearance that the Clinton campaign and the main source of the dossier have entered into a joint defense. Durham warned the court that the arrangement poses a conflict of interest.
Podesta’s attorney, Bob Trout, did not respond to requests for comment. Trout also represents other ex-campaign officials who recently retained him in matters before Durham.
Clinton’s lawyer, David Kendall, who practices at the Washington-based firm Williams & Connolly, did not reply to requests for comment.
J.D. Gordon, who held a position roughly equivalent to Sullivan’s on the 2016 Trump campaign, said in an interview that he hopes Durham adds Sullivan and other Clinton aides to his criminal investigation, “if he hasn’t already.”
He suspects Sullivan was “the Russiagate hoax mastermind” and hopes that he and other members of Clinton’s 2016 team — as well as the candidate herself — are subpoenaed for testimony and document production just as he and other Trump advisers were targeted by Special Counsel Robert Mueller, based almost entirely on rumors started by the Clinton machine. He called the Clinton-funded smears “depraved” and “nationally destabilizing.”
“In addition to outright surveillance via the fraudulent FISA warrant against Carter Page, many of us were hit with federal and congressional subpoenas, subjected to grueling Senate and House investigations, special counsel interrogations and resulting harsh media spotlight,” he said. “I appeared before the Senate Intelligence Committee, Senate Judiciary Committee, House Intelligence Committee and produced requested documents to the House Judiciary Committee. Three times I was summoned before the special counsel, the first of which in August 2017 was apparently leaked to the Washington Post.”
Gordon is not alone in his desire to see Clinton held to account. Among those Americans aware of the Durham probe, fully 60% think the special counsel should question Clinton about her role in the dossier and other campaign foul play, according to a recent national poll by TechnoMetrica Institute of Policy and Politics. Broken down by political affiliation, 80% of Republicans, 44% of Democrats and 74% of independent voters agree that Clinton should be interviewed by investigators.
What happened more than five years ago may have renewed relevance: Some Democratic strategists speculate that Clinton is eyeing another run at the White House. As Vice President Kamala Harris’ popularity wanes and her shot at becoming the first female president slips, they say Clinton may see an opening.
“I will never be out of the game of politics,” Clinton told ABC’s “Good Morning America” in October.
This and all other original articles created by RealClearInvestigations may be republished for free with attribution.
[Timeline editor’s note – A member of our team noted an even earlier date tying Podesta to Russia, Russia, Russia:
On 12/21/15, Podesta emails with Brent Budowsky, contributor to “The Hill” and “The Huffington Post”, Budowsky suggests to John in a manner which seems to show it is part of an ongoing conversation between the two that the “best approach is to slaughter Donald for his bromance with Putin.”
Mind you, the Wikileaks drops and “Russia Russia Russia” were still some seven months away.
Going back even earlier we have the “Pied Piper” email of 4/7/15 from Podesta to the DNC outlining the campaign’s plans for how to deal with any GOP candidate in general, and specific “weak points” to attack in specific potential candidates.
Their intent from the beginning was to make any candidate seem soooo far to the right that they would be a) easy to smear, and that b) Hillary would appear closer the the “middle” and thus more palatable to more voters. The Pied Piper would lead the “rats” astray for them. Of course with the help of smears.
Ted Cruz, Ben Carson, and Donald Trump were their top three most likely, but Podesta expressed the intent would be the same for any candidate nominated.
They intended from the beginning to color any candidate as weak with minorities. We know now that would have meant them calling ANY candidate a racist.
These are two of the most important drops for providing the background to all that was to come.
I’m sure they had a “dirt file” on every candidate with which to attempt to smear them. But they got Trump and went with the Russia angle, just as we see suggested almost a year before by Budowsky to Podesta.
Joe Biden and Viktor Shokin (Credit: public domain)
(…) During former President Donald Trump’s first impeachment trial two years ago, House Democrats alleged that Ukrainian Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin was fired in March 2016 because State officials were widely displeased with his anti-corruption efforts and not because Shokin’s office was investigating the Ukrainian gas firm that had given then-Vice President Biden’s son Hunter a lucrative job.
But the memos obtained by Just the News and the Southeastern Legal Foundation under a Freedom of Information Act request show senior State Department officials — including then-Secretary of State John Kerry — were sending the opposite message to Shokin the summer before his firing.
“We have been impressed with the ambitious reform and anti-corruption agenda of your government,” then-Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs Victoria Nuland personally wrote Shokin in an official letter dated June 9, 2015 that was delivered to the prosecutor two days later by then-U.S. Ambassador Geoffrey Pyatt.
Nuland, now President Biden’s undersecretary of state, wrote that “Secretary Kerry asked me to reply on his behalf” to let Shokin know he enjoyed the full support of the United States as he set out to fight endemic corruption in the former Soviet republic.
“The ongoing reform of your office, law enforcement, and the judiciary will enable you to investigate and prosecute corruption and other crimes in an effective, fair, and transparent manner,” Nuland added. “The United States fully supports your government’s efforts to fight corruption and other crimes in an effective, fair and transparent manner.” File
The letter stands out, according to Republican congressional investigators and Trump’s former impeachment defense lawyers, because it was sent just six months before Joe Biden began his pressure campaign to oust Shokin in December 2015 and appears to conflict with testimony given to Congress.
They also told Just the News they have no record the memo was produced to Trump’s impeachment defense team or to a Senate investigation that concluded the Bidens’ business dealings in Ukraine created a conflict of interest that undercut U.S. anti-corruption efforts. (Read more: Just the News, 2/01/2022)(Archive)
(…) A document uncovered in a court case in D.C. with Fusion GPS shows that the company was working on nearly every piece of information eventually used by the Mueller gang to take down President Trump. (Link to court documents.)
The below documents were provided to the courts in the above case where the defendants were suing Fusion GPS for libel.
This second document provides similar data along with the dollar values of their projects totaling more than $1 million.
We learned from the inventory of Fusion GPS projects that they were involved with Crowdstrike who was first reported as the experts claiming Russia had stolen the DNC’s emails back in 2016. This lie was kept in place by the Mueller gang for years as the excuse to look into the Trump – Russia collusion.
Fusion GPS was involved in the Alfa Bank story that turned out to be a lie, the Carter Page story that was a lie since Page was working for the CIA, the Paul Manafort story, and the Papadopoulos story. All of these stories and individuals were used by the DOJ and the Mueller gang as a means to harass and attempt to have President Trump removed from office. Every one.
“On Friday, Special Counsel John Durham filed a motion relating to a defense firm’s potential conflict of interest in the Michael Sussmann case. The conflict itself is certainly intriguing, with Sussmann’s lawyers at Latham & Watkins LLP (Latham) having represented potential witnesses in the case, including Perkins Coie, former Perkins Coie (and Clinton Campaign general counsel) Marc Elias, the Hillary Clinton Campaign, and Hillary for America.
The issue that made more noise, however, was Durham’s disclosure that Rodney Joffe – a contractor with deep ties to the Clintons, and what appears to be a deep hatred for Trump – had exploited Executive Office of the President of the United States data he obtained from a “sensitive arrangement” with the U.S. Government to damage President Trump. Here is our initial post on the topic.
And here is the talented Lee Smith providing a great explanation on Tucker:
.@LeeSmithDC says he keeps hearing people comparing the scandal to Watergate when it doesn’t compare to Watergate at all. We are talking about some of the most secure communications in government been Surveiled by political operatives. pic.twitter.com/f22h5V92vV
Yet the data from the Executive Office of the President wasn’t all that Joffe had obtained. He also collected domain name system (DNS) internet traffic pertaining to a healthcare provider; Trump Tower; and Trump’s Central Park West apartment building.
Yesterday, February 14, Sussmann’s attorney’s disputed the Durham filing – to an extent. They said Sussmann provided the CIA with Executive Office of the President data from “when Barack Obama was president.”
(…) According to Durham, Joffe and his associates manipulated that data to make it seem like Trump, and those in Trump’s world, had suspicious interactions with internet protocol (IP) addresses affiliated with a Russian mobile phone provider. They then combined those allegations with the Alfa Bank hoax materials (the subject of Sussmann’s Fall 2016 meeting with then-FBI General Counsel James Baker).
This damaging information, purporting to demonstrate at least circumstantial evidence of Trump/Russia collusion, was presented on February 9, 2017 to what Durham describes as U.S. Government “Agency-2.”
That agency was the CIA. We know for sure that Sussmann met with the CIA General Counsel. We learned in January 2022 that, if Sussmann is to be believed, there were two other CIA employees at that meeting.
In other words, a Clinton supporting contractor (Joffe) obtained sensitive information (perhaps unlawfully) about the Office of the President of the United States (Trump), manipulated the information, passed it to a DNC/Clinton lawyer (Sussmann), who then delivered it to the CIA.” (Read more: Techno Fog/Substack, 2/15/2022)(Archive)
“The Department of Justice released a new version of the Mueller report Friday afternoon that reveals for the first time that former special counsel Robert Mueller considered charging Donald Trump Jr. with a misdemeanor “computer intrusion” crime for accessing an anti-Trump website using a password he obtained from WikiLeaks.
The new version of the report on Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election also said that Mueller declined, citing insufficient evidence, to charge the political operative Roger Stone with crimes related to the hacking of Democratic National Committee computers and email accounts. And the report “did not establish” that the Trump campaign’s then-director of national security, JD Gordon, was acting as an agent of Russia when he arranged for changes to the Republican platform during the 2016 convention.
The new version of the Mueller report contains nearly a dozen new unredacted passages and was released in response to a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed by BuzzFeed News in 2019. The lawsuit sought portions of the report that would reveal the identities of people Mueller considered charging and whose names were originally redacted. A lower court ruled against BuzzFeed News, which appealed to the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit last year. Today’s release marks the third timeBuzzFeed News has forced the Justice Department to unredact portions of the 448-page report.
To put this in context, Joffe is the tech executive who claims to have been offered a top job in a Hillary Clinton administration. He funneled the info from his spying operation on Trump to Michael Sussmann, Clinton’s campaign lawyer. pic.twitter.com/rGOiGLZgPf
“Hillary Clinton is ramping up her public appearances ahead of the 2022 midterm elections as President Joe Biden’s popularity continues to plummet, even among Democratic voters.
Next week, for example, the twice-failed presidential candidate is expected to speak at the New York State Democratic Party Convention. Clinton, who used to command public speaking fees of more than $200,000 per hour, will address party leaders at the Sheraton Hotel in Times Square, according to CNBC.
Next month, Hillary will celebrate International Women’s Day by hosting a live virtual event with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.) and “other special guests to be announced.” She also recently touted some new merchandise available for purchase on the website of her political action committee, Onward Together.
For just $30, Hillary fans can pre-order a cool “dad hat” with the words “But Her Emails” printed on it, a reference to the catchphrase that was briefly popular among left-wing social media users circa 2016. (Read more: Washington Free Beacon, 2/11/2022)(Archive)
(…) When I wrote about the Durham motion to investigate potential conflicts of interest between Michael Sussmann and his attorney, the law firm of Latham & Watkins, I focused on the core point, which was that Hillary’s campaign, acting through the Perkins Coie law firm, spied on Trump. Bongino, though, had a few more subtle points to make. You can watch his video here, of course, but here are the two main takeaways:
First, I missed something very important in Durham’s motion. Here’s what Durham wrote at paragraph 5: “The Government’s evidence at trial will also establish that among the Internet data Tech Executive-1 and his associates exploited was domain name system (DNS) Internet traffic pertaining to …”
What Bongino caught is that Durham wrote “among the Internet data … was domain name system … Internet traffic.” That strongly implies that DNS information, which simply means sites accessed, isn’t the only information involved. It’s possible that Durham can show that there are other internet data that the Hillary camp exploited, things such as emails or shared documents.
Kathryn Ruemmler hugs Obama following a Supreme Court victory. (Credit: public domain)
Second, Bongino thinks the real bombshell in this is that Durham is warning Sussmann that Latham & Watkins is a very dangerous law firm to have representing him. The reason is that one of the top Latham & Watkins attorneys is a gal named Kathryn Ruemmler or, as Bongino calls her, “The Fixer.” He points out that Ruemmler has her finger in every single corrupt pie baked during the Obama administration.
Before moving to Latham & Watkins, Ruemmler was Obama’s White House counsel and ran interference for him. But before that, she worked on the Enron case with Andrew Weissmann, the man who really ran the Mueller “investigation.”
After leaving the White House, Ruemmler represented George Nader, a convicted pedophile who set up meetings between Trump people and representatives of the United Arab Emirates. He eventually pleaded guilty to having helped the UAE put millions of dollars illegally into Hillary’s 2016 presidential campaign. Ruemmler also represented Susan Rice. Rice was the one who sent a memo to self on her last day in the White House assuring posterity that, when the Obama administration was spying on people, it was doing everything “by the book.”
Bongino believes that both Obama and, probably, Biden knew about the spying. Ruemmler’s job, as always, will be to keep Obama clean. As a power partner at Latham & Watkins, she can be expected to force the “Sacrifice of Sussmann,” if need be. (Read more: American Thinker, 2/16/2022)(Archive)
“A Ukrainian former diplomat who exposed corrupt Hillary Clinton and Hunter Biden networks, and who warned Americans about a Russian agent of influence, is now on what appears to be an assassination list.
After working for years with the Obama White House and a Clinton-aligned lobbying firm working for the Burisma gas company, Andrii Telizhenko became a source for Senate Republicans in 2019-2020. He helped expose some of Hunter Biden’s corrupt dealings in Ukraine and their dangers to American national security policy.
Telizhenko had been one of many witnesses who provided evidence to joint Senate committee investigation of Hunter Biden, the Burisma gas company, and corruption impacting US government policy.
Telizhenko’s revelations prompted Senate Democrats to accuse him of being a Russian disinformation agent, and ultimately for partisan bureaucrats to trick the Trump Administration into sanctioning him as a Russian asset in the last days before Biden took office. Two of Telizhenko’s accusers, Senators Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) and Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) pushed the Russian disinformation in the discredited Steele Dossier.
Telizhenko, left, enters a meeting with then-Senator Bob Corker, center; and at right, President Obama’s ambassador to Ukraine, Geoffrey Pyatt, just weeks after the ouster of Yanukovych. (Credit: public domain)
Now that wrongful partisan action was used to put Telizhenko on what many Ukrainians consider a kill list.
The list appears on a website that Ukrainian ultranationalists use to dox and track people they consider pro-Russian. Ukrainians understand it to be a kill list in the event of armed conflict with Russia.
(…) Telizhenko fell afoul of Democrat partisans in the US Treasury and State Department bureaucracies after he began exposing Hillary Clinton’s corrupt networks relating to Ukraine, and to Hunter Biden and the Ukrainian gas company.
He said he learned of the networks between 2013 and 2019 while serving as a Ukrainian diplomat, working with the Obama White House and the office of then-vice president Joe Biden, and State Department; and working for a Clinton-affiliated lobbying group called Blue Star Strategies. The lobby shop had a contract with Burisma while he was a contractor there.
Telizhenko was one of many witnesses who helped a joint investigation by the Senate Homeland Security Committee and Finance Committee, chaired at the time by Senators Ron Johnson (R-WI) and Chuck Grassley (R-IA). Democrat defense of then-candidate Joe Biden caused the Republicans under Johnson and Grassley to issue their own staff report, which discussed Telizhenko’s testimony and email and WhatsApp messages he produced as evidence.
Democrats were fine with Telizhenko until he exposed Hunter Biden. Then they called him a Russian agent.
“The Obama administration and the Democrat lobby shop Blue Star Strategies had consistent and extensive contact with Andrii Telizhenko over a period of years,” the Johnson-Grassley report said.
Telizhenko told me that his involvement with the Obama administration and Hillary Clinton’s team began in 2013, during the Revolution to overthrow the pro-Putin regime of Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych in 2014. He said he was coordinator of international relations for the Maidan movement and worked with the US Embassy in Kyiv between 2010-2014 to remove Yanukovych and his government.
“Yet despite these well-documented contacts with Democratic officials, Democrats have attempted to impugn this investigation for having received some Blue Star-related records from him. … Democrats have claimed that Telizhenko is involved in a Russian disinformation campaign,” according to the senators’ staff report.
“In doing so, they conveniently have ignored their own long history of meeting with Telizhenko and his year-long for a Democrat lobby shop. If Democrats are concerned that Telizhenko presents any risk of advancing disinformation, it is notable that the Ranking Members [Democrat Senators Gary Peters (D-MI) and Ron Wyden (D-OR)] have not expressed any curiosity about his work with the Obama administration or Blue Star Strategies.” (Read more: Center for Security Policy, 2/14/2022)(Archive)
“Ericsson’s corrupt conduct involved high-level executives and spanned 17 years and at least five countries, all in a misguided effort to increase profits,”
This next part is rich…
Ericsson “agreed to the imposition of an independent compliance monitor.”
Investigation or Coverup?
The $1B in total charges include a criminal penalty of more than $520 million, plus $540 million to be paid to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in a related matter.
– SDNY
– SEC
– IRS
– Law Enforcement authorities in Sweden…
The SEC to Ericsson on September 29th, 2010…
“As you know, Cuba, Iran, Sudan, and Syria are countries that are identified by the U.S. Department of State as state sponsors of terrorism, and are subject to U.S. economic sanctions and export controls.”
In 2009-10, Ericsson was in hot water w Hillary Clinton’s State Department for trading with an enemy state in Iran.
“We are not going to broaden sanctions on Iran to include Technologies like Telecom.
We’re going to rely and expect companies like Ericsson to police themselves.”
NOV 28, 2010
The US diplomatic cables leak, widely known as Cablegate part of a series known as PlusD.DEC 1, 2010
Amazon kicks WikiLeaks off of their servers.DEC 2, 2010
INTERPOL Office in Gothenburg, Sweden issues fresh arrest warrant for @wikileaks founder Julian Assange
DEC 3, 2010
US blocks access to WikiLeaks for federal workersThe Clinton Foundation’s outpost in Stockholm, Sweden received nearly 270 million Swedish crowns, or $30 million, since it was established in 2011, while Clinton was still secretary of state.wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/0…
Joe Biden: “Julian Assange is a high tech terrorist”
Julian Assange is a hero and he needs our support now more than ever…
Oct 21, 2011
Barack Obama announces total withdrawal of US troops from IraqOn this occasion there would be no redrawing of lines in the sand… Obama had to “keep his promises”.President says ‘America’s war in Iraq will be over’
ISIS faded into obscurity for several years after the surge of U.S. troops to Iraq in 2007.
It began to reemerge in 2011. Over the next few years, it took advantage of growing instability in Iraq & Syria to carry out attacks & bolster its ranks.
With Ericsson’s help of course!
April 23, 2012
Executive Order — Blocking the Property and Suspending Entry into the United States of Certain Persons with Respect to Grave Human Rights Abuses by the Governments of Iran and Syria via Information TechnologyEricsson avoids sanctions…
The Government knew what Ericsson was up to and they chose to ignore it or defer action.
AND THE FCC DID NOT INCLUDE NATIONAL SECURITY REQUIREMENTS in the initial bid process?!
“Evidence emerged several months ago that Telcordia had improperly used a small number of foreign nationals, including one Chinese citizen, to do computer coding for early work on the system after Telcordia was given preliminary approval for the job.”
Also working on Neustar’s behalf is Hogan Lovells, Inc.
See my notes on that star studded cast of misfits…
The Clinton Email investigation started in the EDNY where Telcordia is… Then was moved to the SDNY.
So how corrupt is the SDNY?
SDNY – Weiner evidence collection
SDNY – Clinton Foundation Investigation
SDNY – Epstein evidence collection
SDNY – Ghislaine Maxwell Case
SDNY – Trump Tax Returns
SDNY – SEC v Ripple LabsObama made the appointment of Allison Nathan upon the recommendation of sen. Chuck Schumer
IJIC Leak from February icij.org/investigations…From a few days ago…”Iran seeks tech in Sweden for nuclear weapons”
So Ericsson supports Terrorism and controls our Numbers Portability Contract…
Pretty alarming…
Find out how we plan to use this information to hold people in positions of power accountable through PLVS VLTRA Action Reports through the links below:
There’s a lot more connections to Joffe and Sussman that I’ll be revealing in the coming days…
We have a lot of work to do, please consider joining us through plvsvltra.org.
(More from footnote 259) The Supervisory Intel Analyst told us that he factored the Alfa Bank/Trump server allegations into his assessment of Steele’s (dossier) reporting.” NOTE: always pays to read the footnotes
(Timeline editor’s note: Page 119 in the IG FISA report is blank, so we’re curious if it was released or leaked to Ms. Herridge. Also, oddly, Ms. Herridge works for CBS News and there are no available reports about this story on their website. It’s also suggested that Ms. Herridge has been tweeting about additional notes regarding Durham’s latest filing and Page 119 could part of that.)
Elias, best known for his funding of British ex-spy Christopher Steele’s discredited anti-Trump dossier while he served as Clinton’s 2016 campaign general counsel, appears to be representing the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation through his recently formed Elias Law Group. BLM’s national organization repeatedly lists the Elias firm as one of its addresses and states in its short-year 2020 Form 990 that its books were now in the care of the Elias Law Group.
Additionally, Minyon Moore, a longtime top ally of both Bill and Hillary Clinton, is now listed as part of BLM’s board of directors in the charity’s filings.
It’s not clear when BLM’s relationships with Elias Law Group and Moore began.
Black Lives Matter filed a charitable organization registration statement earlier this month with the New Mexico attorney general’s office, listing addresses for BLM in Arizona and Oakland, California, but says BLM’s “other address” is “c/o [courtesy of] Elias Law Group” in Washington, D.C.
BLM also filed an annual registration renewal fee report with the California attorney general this month, with the filing saying multiple times that one of its addresses was “c/o Elias Law Group.” The filing also states BLM’s “books are in the care of … the organization” that is “located at … c/o Elias Law Group.”
“The latest filing’s addition of partisan lawyer Marc Elias confirms the group is more political than charitable,” Scott Walter, the president of the Capital Research Center, a conservative investigative nonprofit group, told the Washington Examiner. “But it also suggests that finally some left-wing heavyweights have begun to deal with the embarrassing mess made by a major activist group the institutional Left has failed to, pardon the term, police.” (Read more: Washington Examiner, 2/16/2022)(Archive)
Rosie Memos shares a clue:
Why would BLM need Marc Elias to represent them? He’s a Democrat party elections lawyer🧐 Oh that’s right BLM was a cover to fund DNC.
cc: @TheLastRefuge2https://t.co/O1eaAZhkTb
“Special Counsel John Durham on Thursday said that there is “no basis” to “strike” any part of his recent filing, despite a motion from Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann to do so.
Durham pushed back against claims that his office “intentionally sought to politicize” the case, and instead, defended the “additional factual detail” he included, which he argued is “central to proving” Sussmann’s “alleged criminal conduct.”
(Credit: Fox News)
Sussmann’s legal team on Tuesday filed a motion demanding that the court “strike” portions of Durham’s Feb. 11 filing, including the section titled “Factual Background,” claiming the sections would “taint” the jury pool.
Durham, in a new filing Thursday night, urged the court to “deny the defendant’s motion.”
“As an initial matter, defense counsel has presumed the Government’s bad faith and asserts the Special Counsel’s Office intentionally sought to politicize this case, inflame media coverage, and taint the jury pool,” Durham’s filing states.
“That is simply not true,” Durham states, noting that his Feb. 11 filing “included two paragraphs of limited additional factual detail in its Motion for valid and straightforward reasons.”
“First, those paragraphs reflect conduct that is intertwined with, and part of, events that are central to proving the defendant’s alleged criminal conduct,” Durham wrote.
“Second, the Government included these paragraphs to apprise the Court of the factual basis for one of the potential conflicts described in the Government’s Motion, namely, that a member of the defense team was working for the Executive Office of the President of the United States (“EOP”) during relevant events that involved the EOP,” Durham wrote.
Durham added: “If third parties or members of the media have overstated, understated, or otherwise misinterpreted facts contained in the Government’s Motion, that does not in any way undermine the valid reasons for the Government’s inclusion of this information.”
“In light of the above, there is no basis to strike any portion of the Government’s Motion,” Durham wrote, adding that the government intends to file motions in which it will “further discuss these and other pertinent facts to explain why they constitute relevant and admissible evidence at trial.” (Read more: Fox News, 2/17/2022)(Archive)
Techno Fog writes:
Here’s why Sussmann is likely to fail.
Sussmann was trading on his name – former DOJ lawyer, purported cybersecurity expert – to convince the FBI to open an investigation.
He knew his reputation was material to what the FBI would do with the (false) Alfa Bank info.
Long before FBI computer contractor and Clinton operative Rodney L. Joffe allegedly trolled Internet traffic for dirt on President Trump, he mined direct-marketing contact lists for the names and addresses of unwitting Americans to target in a promotional scam involving a grandfather clock.
Rodney Joffe: Back in the 1980s, this anti-Trump computer contractor had a mail-order racket that enticed millions — and landed him in trouble. (Credit: LinkedIn)
Not just any clock, mind you, but a “world famous Bentley IX” model, according to postcards his companies mailed out to millions of people in the late 1980s claiming they’d won the clock in a contest they never entered. There was just one hitch: the lucky winners had to send $69.19 in shipping fees to redeem their supposedly five-foot mahogany prize.
Tens of thousands of folks forked over the fees, only to discover the grandfather clock that arrived was nothing as advertised. It was really just a table-top version made of particle board and plastic and worth less than $10. Some assembly was required.
The scheme generated thousands of complaints, sparking federal and state investigations. Joffe and his then-California partner, Linda M. Carella, were eyed by federal postal authorities and several state attorneys general for allegedly operating a multi-state mail-order scheme. Joffe settled several state lawsuits by agreeing to refund hundreds of thousands of dollars mainly to elderly victims, according to several published reports at the time.
Joffe and his attorney did not respond to requests for comment. But in a phone interview, Carella told RealClearInvestigations that Joffe ran the operation. “I was just the secretary, the receptionist,” Carella, 76, said from her home in Florida, where she is now retired. She did say she picked up the returned postcards and checks from mailboxes.
Carella said she quit after the investigation: “I said I don’t want anything more to do with this … I have not seen Rodney since then.” But Joffe pressed on with his direct-mail marketing business before packing up for Arizona a few years later. Federal and state tax lien records reveal Joffe — who also sent out mailers for skin care and other beauty products — owed more than $110,000 in back taxes on his property in Los Angeles in 1995.
A 1988 consumer article in the St. Joseph (Mo.) News-Press citing Joffe’s role in the alleged grandfather clock scam.
Joffe’s checkered past now has national security ramifications after the South African-born computer expert was outed as a key player in Special Counsel John Durham’s ongoing Russiagate probe. To date he has not been charged with a crime. But in a September indictment of former Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann, and a court filing last week, Durham has suggested that Joffe (identified as “Tech Executive-1”) was at the center of an effort to monitor President Trump’s communications and then share the information with Clinton associates.
Former prosecutor and assistant FBI director Chris Swecker said the credibility issues that cropped up from Joffe’s early career raise questions about how he managed to pass an FBI personal background check and obtain the government’s highest security clearances, although he noted that such background checks were often ridiculed in the bureau as “a joke.” In addition, the federal mail-order probe involving Joffe’s companies might not have raised serious red flags since the case was opened decades earlier and was settled without any charges or judgments against Joffe.
The FBI declined comment.
Another part of the answer as to why Joffe’s past remained buried may involve how successfully he appears to have reinvented himself during the 1990s.
He relocated then to Phoenix from Los Angeles and changed the name of his mass-marketing firm American Computer Group to “Whitehat Data Services.” Instead of targeting consumers, he developed a reputation as a cyber-security expert and, ironically, a champion of consumers battling abusive direct-marketers and spammers.
Perhaps it was a sign of his redemption. But Joffe soon joined the board of PlasmaNet Inc., a marketing network that until recently operated FreeLotto.com, an online sweepstakes game. PlasmaNet has had to pay millions of dollars in fines for deceptive advertising. Echoing the grandfather clock scam, PlasmaNet led consumers to believe they won free prizes when in fact they had to pay $14.99 a month to claim them. RCI has learned that FreeLotto.com was a customer of UltraDNS, an Internet resolution company founded by Joffe. Business incorporation records show Joffe remains a PlasmaNet director.
A decade later, Joffe moved to Washington, where he eventually landed lucrative security-related contracts with the FBI and Pentagon requiring top secret clearance.
In 2006, Joffe joined Neustar Inc., a Beltway computer contractor that, among other things, secures and maintains Internet servers for federal agencies, including the White House. This high-level position gave the alleged former grandfather clock wheedler access to a proprietary archive of Internet traffic records – both public and nonpublic – known as “DNS logs.” These logs reveal the back-and-forth pinging that computers and cellphones generate when they communicate with Internet servers, including ones transmitting emails.
It also put him in the same orbit with political VIPs. Joffe started advising not only FBI brass but White House officials, including President Obama, on cybersecurity matters. By 2016, his access to proprietary internet logs became of interest to operatives for the Hillary Clinton campaign, who appear to have offered him a plum job in a Clinton presidency for help on an opposition-research project against Donald Trump. (Shortly after Clinton’s loss to Trump in November 2016, Joffe said in an email: “I was tentatively offered the top [cybersecurity] job by the Democrats when it looked like they’d win. I definitely would not take the job under Trump.”)
One of those operatives was ex-Clinton attorney Sussmann, indicted by Durham last fall in connection with allegations of lying about his work on the project for the campaign.
In the indictment and recent court filings that widen the case, Durham accused Joffe of exploiting Neustar’s nonpublic data to monitor Trump’s Internet activities even after the 2016 election – through early 2017. He shared the sensitive information with Sussmann, who in turn gave it to the CIA. The prosecutor said Joffe mined data from Trump Tower, Trump’s Central Park West apartment building and even the Executive Office of the President “for the purpose of gathering derogatory information about Donald Trump.”
According to court papers, Joffe cherry-picked data to create a “narrative” that Trump was secretly communicating with the Kremlin as part of the Clinton campaign’s effort to make the GOP nominee look like he was compromised by Russia, a foreign adversary. Before the election, Joffe led a team of computer researchers vying for a major Pentagon contract to link Trump to Russian Alfa Bank through private DNS logs. He handed off their findings to Sussmann who fed the data to the FBI to drive an investigation and bad press against Trump.
“The data was highly manipulated,” said Robert Graham of Atlanta-based Errata Security, an independent cyber forensics expert who examined the logs and debunked the link at the time. He suspects Joffe and his biased crew set out to invent a connection between Trump and Russia.
“A link between Trump and Alfa Bank wasn’t something they accidentally found, it was one of the many thousands of links they looked for,” he added. “The purpose was to smear Trump.”
Though Graham as a Clinton supporter shares Joffe’s disdain for Trump, he said the suspicious server data were easily explained as innocent spam traffic. Graham noted that Trump didn’t even have control over the domain in question: trump-email.com. It was created by a hotel marketing firm that inserted Trump’s name in the domain.
“Hints of a Trump-Alfa connection have always been the dishonesty of those who collected the data,” Graham said.
Manos Antonakakis: Joffe’s lead researcher said in an email that “the only thing that drives us is that we just don’t like [Trump].” (Credit: gatech.edu)
Even though Joffe encouraged Sussmann to present the server data to the FBI as possible evidence of foreign espionage, he privately confessed to his reseachers in an August 2016 email obtained by Durham that the host for the trump-email.com domain “is a legitimate valid [marketing] company” – Boca Raton, Fla.-based Cendyn. “We can ignore it,” Joffe said, “together with others that seem to be part of the marketing world.” He urged his team to keep searching for data that would “give the base of a very useful narrative.”
In previous statements, lawyers for Joffe and the researchers he recruited have said they had no political ax to grind but were monitoring Trump to track a credible national security threat related to Russia. But Joffe’s lead researcher – Manos Antonakakis of the Georgia Institute of Technology – revealed in one email obtained by Durham that “the only thing that drives us is that we just don’t like [Trump].” Other emails, released this week by Judicial Watch through a Freedom of Information Act request, show that Antonakakis believed even the most salacious – and debunked – rumors in the Clinton-commissioned Steele dossier.
Recent court filings indicate Durham and his prosecutors aren’t buying their “concerned patriot” defense. Some see a crime in exploiting high-security government contracts for political purposes.
“In my opinion, Joffe is someone who should be indicted and probably will be,” former FBI official Swecker said in an RCI interview.
“As I see it,” Swecker explained, “Joffe, who worked for Neustar at the time, had a contract with either the Executive Office of the President or the [presidential] transition team, and he used information gleaned from his contractual relationship to provide that private information to the Clinton campaign. Depending on the actual facts on the ground, it could constitute mail or wire fraud, and if it were an actual government contract, perhaps fraud against the government – that is, the Executive Office of the President.”
Added Swecker: “There could be other criminal statutes [invoked] as well” — including conspiracy — “but to me, the key issue is his contractual relationship. He also engaged researchers at Georgia Tech who were working on a government contract and being paid by the U.S. government.”
In a public statement, a spokesman for Joffe argued that the then-Neustar executive had authority to mine the White House data: “Under the terms of the contract, the data could be accessed to identify and analyze any security breaches or threats,” including concerns about Russian interference in the election.
Joffe Internet Firms in Durham’s Sights
While not charged with a crime, Joffe, despite being subpoenaed, does not appear to be actively cooperating with Durham’s investigation. He does not show up on a discovery document recently filed by Durham listing people interviewed by investigators or the grand jury. Asked if Joffe has received a target letter, his attorney Steven Tyrrell did not answer. On Twitter, Joffe has removed all his tweets dating back to 2014.
Sources told RCI that Durham’s office is looking closely at Washington-based Neustar – which Joffe left in September following Sussmann’s indictment – and two Internet firms Joffe operated while still working there: Packet Forensics and Vostrom Ventures, both of which are controlled by Vostrom Holdings Inc. and also have offices in the greater Washington area.
Durham’s investigators have interviewed several current and former employees at all three companies, and obtained thousands of pages of subpoenaed documents from them, recent court filings reveal. In September 2016, Sussmann billed Neustar for “communications regarding confidential project,” a reference to Joffe’s mission to find a “secret hotline” between Trump and the Kremlin via Alfa Bank’s servers. That Sussmann billed Neustar for this work suggests a level of involvement by the company that has not been explained.
A month earlier, Joffe had tasked employees at his two small Internet startups to search for any Internet data (including private DNS holdings) reflecting potential connections or communications between Trump or his associates and Russia. Joffe emailed them a five-page dossier – the “Trump Associates List” – to guide their queries. As RCI first reported, the list included highly personal information on Trump campaign advisers Michael Flynn, Paul Manafort, George Papadopoulos and Carter Page. Steve Bannon appears to have been added to the list later as another target, the emails released by Judicial Watch reveal.
Packet Forensics reportedly landed a recent Pentagon contract to manage a large chunk of Internet domains owned by the military. The bid was awarded the day Joe Biden was inaugurated president. The massive cyberspace will allow Joffe’s firm to set up dedicated digital infrastructure, including servers and software, to comb through private Internet traffic for the purported purpose of monitoring suspicious activity.
Joffe’s company also sells wiretapping equipment that allows federal authorities to spy on private web-browsing through fake Internet security certificates, instead of real ones that websites employ to verify secure connections. Once installed, Packet’s device lets agents see an individual’s online transactions without obtaining a warrant.
Over the past decade, Packet Forensics has landed almost $40 million in federal contracts, according to publicly disclosed contract information. Joffe’s firm counts the FBI and the Pentagon’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, among its customers. The contracts generally involve cybersecurity. Joffe monitors the computers of government officials for threats, including as it turns out, even investigators in the office of Justice Department watchdog Michael Horowitz, recent court filings reveal.
State incorporation records show that Joffe has created more than two dozen startups across 20 states, some of which have no employees, revenue or even offices.
‘Friends in High Places’
Joffe’s second-act success in government seems rooted in a simple fact: “He has friends in high places,” proferred a career Justice Department official. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, pointed out that Joffe personally advised President Obama on cybersecurity and other issues, and was also close to former FBI Director James Comey.
Secret Service entrance logs reveal Joffe visited the White House several times during the Obama administration. And in 2013, Comey gave Joffe an award recognizing his work helping agents investigate a cybersecurity case. Sources told RCI that Joffe has also worked as an FBI informant on various cybersecurity cases opened by the bureau over roughly the past 15 years.
Sussmann’s attorneys have pointed to that acclaim to explain why Sussmann trusted the findings from Joffe he shared with the FBI. “Far from being a stranger to the FBI, [Joffe] was someone with whom the FBI had a long-standing professional relationship of trust and who was one of the world’s leading experts regarding the kinds of information that Mr. Sussmann provided to the FBI,” Sussmann’s lead defense lawyer Sean Berkowitz of Latham & Watkins said in a court filing last year.
A recent court paper filed by Durham in the Sussmann case suggests he may be looking into Joffe’s relationship with the FBI. The document, which discloses information to Sussmann’s lawyers as part of the discovery process, reveals that a criminal grand jury in D.C. has obtained “approximately 226 emails from within the FBI’s holding involving a company founded by [Joffe].” Durham does not identify the company, but sources told RCI it is Packet Forensics. The 226 emails were generated in 2016 alone. All told, the FBI has a total of approximately 17,000 emails that reference Joffe’s company – and those are just from a search of the bureau’s unclassified files.
Durham said that his investigators are “also conducting other searches and communicating with other government agencies regarding [Joffe’s] companies.”
The 67-year-old Joffe is commonly described as an award-winning and highly respected computer expert. But colleagues say he is more of an operator.
Graham said he’s “a quite average” computer programmer and network analyst. “He’s more of an executive than an operations guy.”
In a 2015 promotional video by Neustar, Joffe disclosed that his real gift is recruiting other experts, making phone calls to people in high places, and providing the resources needed for projects.
“I’m not the smart guy in the room. I’m really the dumb guy that carries the bags – but fortunately in those bags, I have a lot of money,” Joffe said with a grin. “So my role has really been carrying the bags of money to help whenever I can when folks in the [cyber-security] community want things. I’m really happy to be able to do that kind of thing.”
“So those are the things I really do,” he added. “I’m not really good at actually understanding spam and finding that. I’m not any of those things. I couldn’t have an intelligent conversation about the techniques and methods used.” (RealClearInvestigations, 2/17/2022)(Archive)
(This and all other original articles created by RealClearInvestigations may be republished for free with attribution.)
“The official who triggered the federal probe into former President Donald Trump’s handling of classified documents opted against doing the same concerning Hillary Clinton’s email scandal.
David Ferriero, who served as the director of the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) from November 2009 until he retired this past April, said in a February letter to House Oversight Committee leadership that his staff had started communicating with the Department of Justice (DOJ) earlier this year.
President Barack Obama receives a leather-bound 2009 edition of the ‘Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States’ from David S. Ferriero, Archivist of the United States, center, in the Oval Office, Feb. 25, 2011. Joining them are staff from the Office of the Federal Register and National Archives and Records Administration. (Credit: Pete Souza/White House)
In January, Trump returned 15 boxes of documents from his time in office to NARA after the agency notified him the material belonged to the federal government.
“Because NARA identified classified information in the boxes, NARA staff has been in communication with the Department of Justice,” Ferriero wrote in his Feb. 18 letter.
(…) However, Ferriero said he took a different approach in 2015 when Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Neb., who at the time chaired the Senate Judiciary Committee, asked whether NARA had notified the DOJ about its investigation into the deletion of Clinton’s emails during her time as secretary of state.
“The Federal Records Act requires that when a deletion occurs, the head of the agency in question must notify the Archivist, and with the help of the Archivist, initiate an action through the Attorney General for the recovery of those records,” Grassley wrote on Sept. 4, 2015.
“Will you now request the Attorney General initiate an action for recovery for the 15 missing emails and potentially other federal records that may have been deleted by Secretary Clinton.”
In response, Ferriero said NARA didn’t believe it was necessary to notify the DOJ about the missing emails.
“In light of the ongoing activities, reviews, inquiries, and litigation described above, in which the Department of Justice reportedly is actively involved, we do not believe that it is appropriate or necessary at this time for NARA to request that the Attorney General initiate an action,” he wrote to Grassley.
Ferriero’s letter included a timeline of events that showed NARA first learned of Clinton’s emails in March 2015, several months before the DOJ reportedly began its review of Clinton’s handling of potentially classified national security information. NARA never notified the DOJ about its own review into Clinton’s email usage, according to the timeline.” (Read more: Fox News, 8/11/2022) (Archive)
“As first reported by Tracy Beanz of UncoverDC and Adam Carter of The Washington Pundit, some stunning details were included in Lt. Gen. Michael T. Flynn’s (Ret.) recent complaint with the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) seeking $50 million for “unjustifiable, outrageous, and malicious prosecution.”
(Credit: Gen. Flynn’s Feb. 24, 2022, OMB Complaint)
(…) Attached to the OMB complaint was a summary of the allegations of the political targeting and the weaponization of the power of the United States federal government by the FBI, DOJ, Obama administration officials (some held over into the Trump administration), up to and including President Barack Obama, and then-Vice President Joe Biden themselves—to “get Flynn” at all costs. A detail that seemed to escape the notice of many was the revelations that the FBI had obtained surveillance warrants from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISA Court or “FISC”) in order to spy on Gen. Flynn’s electronic communications as part of the now-discredited Trump-Russia Collusion Investigation.
(Credit: Gen. Flynn’s Feb. 24, 2022, OMB Complaint)
The day after the news broke, Tracy Beanz discussed the impact of the FISA warrants on the Dark To Lightpodcast with Michael Opelka. The ramifications for Gen. Flynn are apparent. During the time the FISA warrant(s) were issued—as well retroactively back six months—the FBI would have unfettered access to any of Gen. Flynn’s electronic communications without his knowledge or need to notify him after the fact. Independent journalist Harold Finch pointed out that due to the FISA “Three Hop Rule,” the FBI would also have free rein to surveil the electronic communications of anyone Gen. Flynn messaged and anybody those individuals messaged. This potentially included all the members of the Trump campaign and transition team, including President Trump himself. Additionally, Flynn family members, business associates, government contacts, advisors, even journalists, and their sources who Gen. Flynn may have interacted with, and many others could potentially be surveilled due to the FISA Three Hop Rule.
Another revelation in the filing should raise the antennas of those who have followed Spygate closely. The OMB complaint specifically accuses FBI Special Agent Joseph “Joe” Pientka of having “made multiple false statements to the [FISC] in order to secure surveillance warrants.” For those unaware, Joseph Pientka was the other FBI agent in the room besides Peter Strzok during the infamous Jan. 24, 2017, meeting with Gen. Flynn in the White House. This meeting was the basis for the charges of Making False Statements to Federal Investigators brought by the Mueller Special Counsel Office (SCO) as part of the Russia collusion hoax. (Read more: UncoverDC, 5/24/2022)(Archive)
Michael Flynn and new attorney, Sidney Powell. (Credit: Alex Wroblewski/Getty Images)
“Former Trump national security adviser, retired general alleges “malicious prosecution,” “political motivation” and “abuse of process” by FBI, DOJ, the Obama White House and Special Counsel Robert Mueller.
In a prelude to a formal lawsuit, former Trump National Security Advisor Michael Flynn has quietly filed a $50 million claim against the FBI and Justice Department for “malicious prosecution” related to the now-discredited Russia collusion investigation.
The notification, known as a Form 95 Civil Claim, obtained by Just the News, was filed Feb. 22. It names the DOJ, FBI, U.S. Attorney’s Office in Washington D.C., Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s office and the Executive Office of the President as potential defendants and alleges former President Barack Obama and the FBI had a vendetta against him that biased their actions.
“Of all of President Trump’s appointees, the Obama White House hated Flynn the most,” the filing noted as it laid out a long list of irregularities in his case it said proved political interference inside the FBI.
Beginning in July 2016, “the FBI began to express disdain for candidate Donald J. Trump and began to consider ways in which it could hamper Donald Trump as candidate or as President, were he to win the 2016 election,” the filing alleges.
“As part of these efforts, the FBI began to target Flynn,” it claims. “Flynn was no stranger to the FBI and its leadership, many of whom considered Flynn to be a personal enemy of the FBI and the success of their own FBI careers.”
Flynn, according to the form, is seeking “compensatory damages including but not limited to lost past and future earnings/revenue, emotional distress, lost opportunity to be President’s National Security Advisor, significant restraints of personal liberty, attorney fees/expenses and court costs in defending against malicious prosecution, abuse of process, false arrest.”
In a supplemental filing accompanying the notification, Flynn and his lawyer Jesse Binnall make a detailed claim that there was a “political motivation” behind the prosecution of the former Trump adviser on a charge of lying to the FBI.
Flynn, a three-star Army general who served as director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, initially pled guilty to the charge and agreed to cooperate with Mueller’s probe, then requested to withdraw his plea when belated exculpatory evidence emerged showing the FBI did not believe he had lied to agents, who actually tried to shut down the case but were overruled by superiors. Flynn was eventually pardoned after DOJ lawyers asked that his charges be dismissed.
Binnall said Flynn is prepared to sue if DOJ rejects the claim.
“For years government bureaucrats and left-wing agitators believed they could attack General Flynn with impunity. No more,” he said. “If you wrongfully attack an American hero, then you should be held to account.
Facebook banned the Ukrainian far-right group, Azov Battalion, over ‘Hate Speech’ in 2019, (Photo credit: Radio Free Europe)
“Facebook will temporarily allow its billions of users to praise the Azov Battalion, a Ukrainian neo-Nazi military unit previously banned from being freely discussed under the company’s Dangerous Individuals and Organizations policy, The Intercept has learned.
The policy shift, made this week, is pegged to the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine and preceding military escalations. The Azov Battalion, which functions as an armed wing of the broader Ukrainian white nationalist Azov movement, began as a volunteer anti-Russia militia before formally joining the Ukrainian National Guard in 2014; the regiment is known for its hardcore right-wing ultranationalism and the neo-Nazi ideology pervasive among its members. Though it has in recent years downplayed its neo-Nazi sympathies, the group’s affinities are not subtle: Azov soldiers march and train wearing uniforms bearing icons of the Third Reich; its leadership has reportedly courted American alt-right and neo-Nazi elements; and in 2010, the battalion’s first commander and a former Ukrainian parliamentarian, Andriy Biletsky, stated that Ukraine’s national purpose was to “lead the white races of the world in a final crusade … against Semite-led Untermenschen [subhumans].” With Russian forces reportedly moving rapidly against targets throughout Ukraine, Facebook’s blunt, list-based approach to moderation puts the company in a bind: What happens when a group you’ve deemed too dangerous to freely discuss is defending its country against a full-scale assault?
Neo-Nazi leader Arsen Avakov was Ukraine’s Minister of Internal Affairs from 2014-2021 and that included control of their National Guard. (Photo: Radio Free Europe)
According to internal policy materials reviewed by The Intercept, Facebook will “allow praise of the Azov Battalion when explicitly and exclusively praising their role in defending Ukraine OR their role as part of the Ukraine’s National Guard.” Internally published examples of speech that Facebook now deems acceptable include “Azov movement volunteers are real heroes, they are a much needed support to our national guard”; “We are under attack. Azov has been courageously defending our town for the last 6 hours”; and “I think Azov is playing a patriotic role during this crisis.”
The materials stipulate that Azov still can’t use Facebook platforms for recruiting purposes or for publishing its own statements and that the regiment’s uniforms and banners will remain as banned hate symbol imagery, even while Azov soldiers may fight wearing and displaying them. In a tacit acknowledgment of the group’s ideology, the memo provides two examples of posts that would not be allowed under the new policy: “Goebbels, the Fuhrer and Azov, all are great models for national sacrifices and heroism” and “Well done Azov for protecting Ukraine and it’s white nationalist heritage.” (Read more: The Intercept, 2/24/2022)(Archive)
(Timeline editor’s note: According to recent statements by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, extreme right, white supremacist militias are considered the number one threat to America’s national security. So it’s odd they are now to be accepted and cheered for their continuous attacks on the Russia friendly citizens in Ukraine since 2014.)
We have to make sure that within our own country, we are calling out people giving aid and comfort to Putin and siding with autocrats against the global cause of democracy. pic.twitter.com/6R11vmtkKP
There are 25+ US-funded biolabs in Ukraine, which if breached, would release and spread deadly pathogens to the world. We must take action now to prevent disaster. US/Russia/Ukraine/NATO/UN/EU must implement a ceasefire now around these labs until they’re secured and pathogens destroyed.
“Margot Cleveland has obtained an email that appears to confirm that SC John Durham is actively investigating at least some aspects of the DNC ‘hack’ that was a central part of the “Russia meddled” hoax. Margot’s account is here:
The email in question is from one of the Georgia Tech researchers who helped Raymond Joffe and Michael Sussmann cook up the Alfa Bank hoax—Manos Antonakakis. Antonakakis’ email appears to be an attempt at covering his behind with administrators at Georgia Tech, as he is being called before Durham’s grand jury. Of note is the fact that the emails and the grand jury subpoena that Antonakakis received date back to July 2021. That means that the question that Antonakakis was asked before the grand jury, and which implies that Durham is investigating the DNC ‘hack’, derives from [an] investigation that Durham’s team conducted before that date. In other words, Durham has been on this aspect of the case for quite some time.
Chaouki Abdallah became Executive Vice President for Research at the Georgia Institute of Technology in September 2018. (Credit: public domain)
It seems that DARPA—the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, which is an R&D agency—was involved in investigating the DNC hack. DARPA asked Antonakakis to lend his expertise. This is the question that one of Durham’s prosecutor’s posed to Antonakakis:
“Do you believe that DARPA should be instructing you to investigate the origins of a hacker (Guccifer_2.0) that hacked a political entity (DNC)?”
Margot examines Antonakakis’ semi-hysterical response in some detail at the link (above). Make of it what you will. The important points are twofold—first, that Durham is clearly interested in the DNC ‘hack’ and has been for quite a while, and second, that DARPA—an R&D agency—was involved and was using an expert who would become deeply involved in the Russia Hoax. As for the first point, it’s perfectly logical that Durham should be examining this part of the Russia Hoax, since it was a key part of the Russia – Trump collusion and meddling narrative that the overall Russia Hoax conspiracy was pushing on the American public.
Annie Jacobson writes in her book of the original logo created for the Total Information Project and calls it “The Pentagon’s Brain: An Uncensored History of DARPA.” – The Atlantic
Unfortunately, we can’t be sure what the status of Durham’s investigation into this matter is. Here is Margot’s summary:
Why was the assistant special counsel investigating the investigation of the DNC hacking?
Something caused the special counsel’s office to discover that DARPA had tasked Antonakakis with investigating the DNC hack. And something caused the special counsel’s office to question the Georgia Tech researcher about that project.
The public storyline until now had been that CrowdStrike, the cybersecurity firm Sussmann hired in April 2016, had concluded Russians had hacked the DNC server, and that the FBI, which never examined the server, concurred in that conclusion. Intelligence agencies and former Special Counsel Robert Mueller likewise concluded that Russian agents were behind the DNC hack, but with little public details provided.
It now appears that DARPA had some role in that assessment, or rather Antonakakis did on behalf of DARPA, which leads to a whole host of other questions, including whether DARPA had access to the DNC server and data and, if so, from whom did the DOD’s research arm get that access? Was it Sussmann?
Most intriguingly, why is Special Counsel Durham concerned with the DARPA connection and the DNC hack or hacker in the first place?
The real person who was the benefactor to, and the boss of, Vice President Joe Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, at the Ukrainian gas company Burisma Holdings, was not the CEO of Burisma Holdings, Mykola Zlochevsky.
Shortly after the Obama Administration’s Ukrainian coup, on March 2, 2014, Kolomoysky, who supported Yanukovych’s overthrow, was appointed the governor of Dnepropetrovsk, Ukraine. Hunter Biden, with no experience in the industry or region, would join Kolomoysky’s Burisma Holdings two months later, on May 12, 2014.
A 2012study of Burisma Holdings done in Ukraine by the AntiCorruption Action Centre (ANTAC), an investigative nonprofit co-funded by American billionaire George Soros and the U.S. State Department, found the valid owner of Burisma Holdings was none other than Ukrainian billionaire-oligarch Ihor Kolomoysky.
The study, funded to dig up the corruption of Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych, found that Ihor Kolomoysky “managed to seize the largest reserves of natural gas in Ukraine.”
Burisma Holdings changed owners in 2011 when it was taken over by an off-shore Cyprus enterprise called Brociti Investments Ltd, and subsequently, moved addresses under the same roof as Ukrnaftoburinnya and Esko-Pivnich, two Ukrainian gas companies which happened to be also owned by Kolomoysky through off-shore entities in the British Virgin Islands.
Oleh Kanivets, who worked as CEO of Ukrnaftoburinnya, confirmed Kolomoysky as the owner of Burisma Holding in the 2012 report saying, “The Privat Group is the immediate owner. This company was founded by Mykola Zlochevsky some time ago, but he later sold his shares to the Privat Group.”
In other words, Hunter Biden’s boss and benefactor at Burisma Holdings is the same Ukrainian billionaire-oligarch who also claimed the position of boss and benefactor over Volodymyr Zelensky before he became Ukraine’s president.
Kolmoysky, who currently holds a net worth of $1.8 billion, making him the 1750th richest person in the world, owns holdings in metal, petroleum, and the media sector, where he has had a long history with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
For years, Zelensky’s company produced shows for Kolmoysky’s TV network, 1+1 Media Group, one of the largest media conglomerates in Ukraine. Zelensky achieved national fame, portraying a president on a hit television sitcom called Servant of the People, which was broadcasted on a channel owned by Kolmoysky.
In 2019, Kolmoysky’s media channels significantly boosted Zelensky’s presidential campaign, while Kolmoysky even provided security, lawyers, and vehicles for Zelensky during his campaign. Kolmoysky’s bodyguard and lawyer accompanied Zelensky on the campaign trail as Zelensky was chauffeured around in a Range Rover owned by one of Kolmoysky’s companies.
The Pandora Papers showed that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and his TV production partners were beneficiaries of a web of offshore firms created in 2012, the same year Zelensky’s production company entered into a deal with Kolomoysky’s media group, which allegedly received $41 million in funds from Kolomoysky’s Privatbank.
Zelensky’s political rival, President Petro Poroshenko, commented on their connection during the campaign trail, “Fate intended to put me together with Kolomoyskiy’s puppet in the second round of the elections.”
After Zelensky’s victory, Kolomoysky, who had spent the last few years living between Israel and Switzerland, returned to Ukraine to keep up his relationship with the new president, nominating over 30 lawmakers to Zelensky’s newly established party and maintaining influence with many of them in parliament.
(…) They are the supposed nonpartisan group of top spies looking out for the best interest of the nation.
But the 51 former “intelligence” officials who cast doubt on The Post’s Hunter Biden laptop stories in a public letter really were just desperate to get Joe Biden elected president. And more than a year later, even after their Deep State sabotage has been shown again and again to be a lie, they refuse to own up to how they undermined an election.
The officials, including CNN pundit and professional fabricator James Clapper — a man who was nearly charged for perjury for lying to Congress — signed a letter saying that the laptop “has the classic earmarks of a Russian information operation.”
What proof did they have? By their own admission, none. “We do not know if the emails . . . are genuine or not,” the letter said. They’re just “suspicious.” Why? Because they hurt Biden’s campaign, that’s evidence enough.
Keep in mind this was written Oct. 19, 2020, five days after The Post published its first story. Neither Joe Biden nor Hunter Biden had denied the story, they simply deflected questions.
I have reviewed House Judiciary Committee’s transcribed interview with Matthew Graves, US Attorney for the District of Columbia.
A few observations related to Hunter Biden inquiry:
* It is obvious that Graves and his team signaled to David Weiss they would not participate in the prosecution of Hunter Biden.
*Just one example of Graves’ flailing word salad related to a 10-minute conversation he had with David Weiss in late Feb, early March 2022: “As I recall the conversation, my question is–was: ‘What do you need?’ And my attitude was (emphasis added) ‘Of course we’re going to provide it to you.’ So, you know, how he heard it, what he expected, and the long litany of things one could need in returning, I don’t know, but I could just say my immediate response ‘What do you need’ I was trying to signal we will give you whatever you need logistically.” SURE.
*For the next three weeks, according to Graves, his top deputies analyzed the matter including whether DOJ could pursuade a DC jury to convict Hunter Biden. Following a March 19, 2022 meeting with his team, Graves said his office “conveyed to Delaware that we wouldn’t be looking to add our own prosecutor to the case.”
*Graves refused to name the officials involved.
*Graves did not read the underlying evidence against Hunter Biden including the lengthy report prepared by DOJ Tax Division detailing Hunter Biden’s tax crimes in 2014 and 2015 which included omitting income from Burisma.
*Graves never followed up directly with Weiss.
*Despite claims he offered assistance with grand jury process, Graves also admitted that at that time, the federal courthouse in DC was very busy with grand jury proceedings–yes because his office was charging and prosecuting Capitol protesters.
*His office at the time also was investigating Trump associates (and beginning stage of full blown investigation into Trump himself) for January 6.
*Graves, appointed by Biden, repeatedly played dumb when asked about conflict of interest and whether he should’ve recused from considering the case. “There was no conflict of interest and no reason” to seek ethics guidance from DOJ. “A family member of the administration? I don’t see it as necessarily a conflict of interest or perception of a conflict of interest.”
*IRONICALLY Graves confirmed he was a top official in US Atty-DC Fraud and Public Corruption section beginning in 2015–as Hunter Biden raked in millions from hostile regimes including China and Russia. (Special Counsel Jack Smith also ignored the Bidens as head of DOJ’s Public Integrity Unit btw 2010 and early 2015.)
*Graves attempted on numerous occasions to discredit the whistleblowers in the case except he never read the transcripts. He accused whistleblowers of relying on hearsay while admitting he’s only read media accounts of their accusations.
I’ll have more on this related to Graves’ laughable claims about his handling of Jan 6 cases. But Graves is just another partisan operative disguised as a federal prosecutor. He protected the Bidens by thwarting Weiss’ inquiry to prosecute in the proper venue–which Graves should have pursued WITHOUT Weiss’ request.
And his testimony is just one more reason why House GOP should strip federal funding for US Atty for DC office.
William Barr (Credit: Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg News)
Former Attorney General William Barr argued the effort by dozens of former intelligence officials to cast doubt on the Hunter Biden laptop revelations by baselessly suggesting Russia involvement “probably affected the outcome” of the 2020 presidential race.
The 51 former spy officials who signed a letter suggesting Russia was involved with the laptop saga are now largely silent about why they weighed in on the story weeks before the election. Despite offering no proof, President Joe Biden’s2020 campaign, along with many in the media, dismissed the October 2020 laptop story as being part of a Russian disinformation operation, with Biden citing the letter in a debate with then-President Donald Trump, which Barr critiqued.
Conservative radio show host Hugh Hewitt asked Barr on Tuesday about four “interventions” in presidential elections and which was most “material” to the outcome. Hewitt’s examples were Iran-Contra prosecutor Lawrence Walsh issuing an indictment against former Reagan Defense Secretary Caspar Willard Weinberger just four days before the election between then-President George H.W. Bush and future President Bill Clinton in 1992, debate moderator Candy Crowley inserting herself on President Barack Obama’s side during a debate with then-candidate Mitt Romney, Russian influence efforts in the 2016 race between Trump and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and Facebook and Twitter censoring stories about the laptop just before the 2020 election.
“Well, the ones that stick with me are Walsh and the laptop — the intelligence officials suggesting that it was Russian disinformation in order to essentially keep a cork in it until after the election,” Barr replied. “I do think that that, given how close the election was, you know, I think that that probably affected the outcome, or at least there is a very distinct probability of that. The same, I think, with Walsh.”
Joe Biden called the laptop story “garbage” and part of a “Russian plan” and cited the letter. He was referring to a Politicoreport about the letter in an article titled “Hunter Biden story is Russian disinfo, dozens of former intel officials say.” The title was misleading because the letter never directly called the laptop Russian “disinformation.” The laptop “has all the classic earmarks of a Russian information operation,” the officials claimed, but they admitted that “we do not have evidence of Russian involvement.” But the letter also referred to “our view that the Russians are involved in the Hunter Biden email issue.”
A recent report from the New York Times said emails from the laptop were authentic, which multiple other outlets had previously concluded. The Justice Department is reportedly investigating Hunter Biden for foreign lobbying violations related to his overseas business dealings, in addition to scrutinizing his taxes.
Barr had expounded on all of this on Monday, criticizing the president’s falsehoods and the decision by former intelligence officials to influence the race.
“I was very disturbed during the debate when candidate Biden lied to the American people about the laptop,” Barr said on America Reports on Fox News. “He was squarely confronted with the laptop, and he suggested that it was Russian disinformation and pointed to the letter written by intelligence people that was baseless, which he knew was a lie. And I was shocked by that.” (Read more: Washington Examiner, 3/22/2022)(Archive)
Trump and Clinton during a 2016 election debate. (Credit: Rick Wilking/Reuters)
“President Donald Trump has sued failed Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton and others for falsely accusing him of colluding with Russia during the 2016 presidential election:
“Acting in concert, the Defendants maliciously conspired to weave a false narrative that their Republican opponent, Donald J. Trump, was colluding with a hostile foreign sovereignty,” the former president alleged in a lawsuit filed in federal court in Florida.
Trump, who beat Democratic nominee Clinton in the 2016 presidential election, alleges “racketeering” and a “conspiracy to commit injurious falsehood,” among other claims.
The other RICO defendants include names you will recognize: James Comey, Christopher Steele, Peter Strzok, Lisa Page, and Andrew McCabe.
In the lawsuit, Trump is seeking compensatory and punitive damages. Trump said he was “forced to incur expenses in an amount to be determined at trial, but known to be in excess of twenty-four million dollars ($24,000,000) and continuing to accrue, in the form of defense costs, legal fees, and related expenses.”
The counts include:
RICO
RICO Conspiracy
Injurious Falsehood
Conspiracy to Commit Injurious Falsehood
Malicious Prosecution
Conspiracy to Commit Malicious Prosecution
Computer Fraud and Abuse Act
Theft of Trade Secrets
Stored Communications Act
Agency
Respondeat Superior/Vicarious Liability
The lawsuit alleges the RICO defendants “conspired with each other” and they “knowingly agreed, conspired and acted in concert for the express purpose of injuring the Plaintiff’s political career and/or impeding his ability to effectively govern through a pattern of racketeering activity.”
VP Joe Biden poses with his son, Army Capt. Beau Biden at Camp Victory on the outskirts of Baghdad, Iraq on July 4, 2009. (Credit: AP)
The Beau Biden Foundation for the Protection of Children raked in $3.9 million in 2020, but spent only a fraction of that on its purported mission to help kids, The Post has learned.
The Delaware-based charity, which was started in honor of President Biden’s late son, got an infusion of $1.8 million from the Biden Foundation before that group shut down in 2020, according to the charities’ latest tax filings. The Biden Foundation was started by Joe Biden and his wife, Jill Biden, to champion “progress and prosperity for American families.”
The Beau Biden charity also took in $225,000 from entities tied to a top political donor and bundler to President Biden.
Despite the $2 million-plus windfall, the organization put only $544,961 in 2020 toward its stated purpose of protecting children from abuse, according to tax filings.
The charity spent a total of $932,865 that year, with a large chunk of it going to the six-figure salaries of Biden cronies who held executive jobs at the non-profit.
Patricia Dailey Lewis, who served as Delaware deputy attorney general under late AG Beau Biden, runs the non-profit and was paid $150,660 in 2020, including a $3,500 bonus.
Joshua Alcorn, a longtime Democratic operative and consultant on both Beau Biden’s and Joe Biden’s political campaigns, served as COO and was paid $131,437. He has since stepped down.
CharityWatch, a watchdog group, says that its top-rated nonprofits generally spend at least 75 percent of their budgets on programs. In this charity’s case, just 58 percent of its spending went to its cause.
“A 58 percent program ratio does not reflect a high level of financial efficiency,” said Laurie Styron, the executive director of CharityWatch.
Biden’s troubled son, Hunter, served on the board of the Beau Biden charity in 2020 during the time The Postrevealed the discovery of his infamous laptop, a device plastered with a sticker from the foundation. Biden’s daughter, Ashley, and Beau’s widow, Hallie Biden, were also on the board.
Hallie Biden is the only family member still on the board, which includes former FBI director Louis Freeh.
The group said that following Joe Biden’s 2021 inauguration, it wouldn’t take money from lobbyists or foreign donors and would release names of its major contributors on its website in a bid to increase transparency.
But the organization refused to provide a copy of its 2020 tax filing to The Post in early March. It later said the document was available on the Guidestar website. (Read more: New York Post, 3/26/2022)(Archive)
Hillary Clinton makes a stop at DNC Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman-Schultz’s campaign office on August 9, 2016. (Credit: Joe Raedle/Getty Images)
“The Federal Election Commission has fined the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign for lying about the funding of the infamous, and discredited, Russian “dossier” used in a smear attempt against Donald Trump weeks before he shocked the world with his 2016 presidential victory.
The election agency said that Clinton and the DNC violated strict rules on describing expenditures of payments funneled to the opposition research firm Fusion GPS through their law firm.
A combined $1,024,407.97 was paid by the treasurers of the DNC and Clinton campaign to law firm Perkins Coie for Fusion GPS’s information, and the party and campaign hid the reason, claiming it was for legal services, not opposition research.
Instead, the DNC’s $849,407.97 and the Clinton campaign’s $175,000 covered Fusion GPS’s opposition research on the dossier, a basis for the so-called “Russia hoax” that dogged Trump’s first term.
The memo said that the Clinton campaign and DNC argued that they were correct in describing their payment as for “legal advice and services” because it was Perkins Coie that hired Fusion GPS. But the agency said the law is clear and was violated.
It added that neither the campaign nor the party conceded to lying but won’t contest the finding. “Solely for the purpose of settling this matter expeditiously and to avoid further legal costs, respondent[s] does not concede, but will not further contest the commission’s finding of probable cause to proceed” with the probe, said the FEC.
The FEC, in a memo to the Coolidge Reagan Foundation, which filed its complaint over three years ago, said it fined Clinton’s treasurer $8,000 and the DNC’s treasurer $105,000.
The memo, shared with Secrets, is to be made public in a month.
Dan Backer, who brought the complaint on behalf of the foundation, which focuses on free speech and the First Amendment, told Secrets, “This may well be the first time that Hillary Clinton — one of the most evidently corrupt politicians in American history — has actually been held legally accountable, and I’m proud to have forced the FEC to do their job for once. The Coolidge Reagan Foundation proved that with pluck and grit, Americans who stand with integrity can stand up to the Clinton machine and other corrupt political elites.” (Read more: Washington Examiner, 3/30/2022)(Archive)
“Florida Representative Matt Gaetz entered into the US House Judiciary Committee records the contents of Hunter Biden’s laptop as well as a receipt from Mac’s Computer Repair, where the laptop had been dropped off, that evidenced the FBI taking possession of the laptop in December of 2019.
“Still, the FBI Cyber Assistant Director testified that after three years in possession of the Laptop, no assessment had been made,” a release from Gaetz’s office states.
Gaetz pressed FBI Assistant Director for the Cyber Division Bryan Vorndran in a Tuesday committee meeting on whether the laptop created cyber vulnerabilities for the country.
Vorndran stated that he does not know the current location of the laptop, or whether outside actors like Russia were using the laptop’s contents to compromise the First Family. He also stated that the reason he was appearing before the committee that day was not to discuss the laptop, but rather the FBI cyber program. (Read more: The Post Millennial, 3/29/2022)(Archive)
Hillary Clinton attends the “Suffs” Broadway opening night performance at the Music Box Theatre on Thursday, April 18, 2024, in New York. (Credit: Evan Agostini/Invision/AP)
A progressive group founded by former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton cut a large check recently to a climate change activist hub financing organizations behind disruptive anti-oil protests, bringing the total cash transfers to at least $500,000, records show.
Onward Together, which Clinton launched after losing the 2016 election, says it’s “committed to lifting up emerging organizations and leaders who are fighting for our shared progressive values and defending our democracy.” That pledge apparently includes funding Climate Emergency Fund, a charity backing groups leading demonstrations to bring awareness to climate change by vandalizing fine art, blocking major roads, gluing themselves to sports cars, and engaging in other extremist forms of protest.
Between April 2022 and March 2023, the nonprofit advocacy arm of Onward Together granted $200,000 to Climate Emergency Fund, according to Onward Together’s tax forms filed in 2024.
CEF, which during the preceding fiscal year received $300,000 from the Clinton-tied group, is based in Beverly Hills and props up activists at groups like Just Stop Oil that, in 2022, splattered tomato soup on a Vincent Van Gogh painting at London’s National Gallery estimated to be worth $84 million. In March 2024, activists for Declare Emergency, which along with Just Stop Oil is part of a coalition primarily funded by CEF called A22 Network, were charged with vandalizing the display of the U.S. Constitution at the National Archives.
Moreover, CEF funds the Washington, D.C.-based Climate Defiance, the activists of which have also been arrested for unorthodox protests. This upcoming Tuesday, Climate Defiance will host an event in the district for its one-year “birthday” alongside progressive Reps. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA) and Ro Khanna (D-CA), according to an event invitation.
“Anyone who cares about public safety and preventing vandalism should be deeply concerned that money connected to Hillary Clinton is propping up these radicalized eco activists,” said Daniel Turner, founder and executive director of the Power the Future energy advocacy group. (Read more: Washington Examiner, 5/03/2024)(Archive)
(…) Notes (produced by Durham) taken by Assistant FBI Director Bill Priestap and former FBI Deputy General Counsel Trisha Anderson – taken in their conversation with Baker after his Sussmann meeting – help corroborate Baker’s recollection of Sussmann’s lies:
Bill Priestap (Credit: Jacquelyn Martin/AP)
In this filing, Sussmann seeks to preclude the use of these notes, arguing they are hearsay not subject to an exception. (It also confirms that Priestap has testified before a grand jury – something we posited back in January.) Durham disagrees and argues they are admissible, and Durham likely wins this dispute.
Sussmann also asks the Court to order the Special Counsel to give Rodney Joffe immunity for his testimony – or have the case dismissed.
Of course, Joffe (Tech Executive-1 in the Sussmann indictment) is the Sussmann client who helped lead the effort to manufacture the Alfa Bank/Trump hoax. Sussmann maintains that Joffe would “offer critical exculpatory testimony on behalf of Mr. Sussmann” – but cannot because Durham is “manufacturing incredible claims of continuing criminal liability for Mr. Joffe that are forcing Mr. Joffe to assert his Fifth Amendment right.”
Trisha Anderson (Credit: public domain)
That’s a long way of saying that Joffe faces real (and perhaps imminent) criminal exposure. Let’s talk about that for a moment. The bad news for Joffe is good reading for us.
The April 1, 2022 letter from Joffe’s attorney to Sussmann’s attorney. In this letter (available here – with my highlights), Joffe’s counsel confirmed that Joffe “remains a subject” of the Special Counsel’s investigation. According to Andrew DeFilippis (from the Office of the Special Counsel), Joffe’s “status in the investigation was sufficient to establish a good faith basis to invoke the privilege against self-incrimination.”
To this statement, Joffe’s attorney responded that the statute of limitations had run since the events described in the Sussmann indictment. The Special Counsel disagreed, stating that “certain fraud statutes have longer than a five-year limitations period,” and the Russian Yota phone-related allegations (given to the CIA in February 2017) “percolated through various branches of the government and around the private sector after that date, in various forms.”
Sussmann’s attorney argues that Joffe would provide favorable testimony, including:
Sussmann and Joffe agreed that the information should be conveyed to the FBI and the CIA to help the government.
The information was conveyed to the FBI to provide a heads-up that newspaper outlets were going to publish a story about links between Alfa Bank and the Trump Organization.
The researchers and Mr. Joffe himself held a good faith belief in the analysis that was shared with the FBI, and Mr. Sussmann accordingly and reasonably believed the data and analysis were accurate.
The luxury yacht ‘Tango’, owned by Russian billionaire Viktor Vekselberg. (Credit: ADN America)
“Spanish law enforcement today executed a Spanish court order freezing the Motor Yacht (M/Y) Tango (the Tango), a 255-foot luxury yacht owned by sanctioned Russian oligarch Viktor Vekselberg. Spanish authorities acted pursuant to a request from the U.S. Department of Justice for assistance following the issuance of a seizure warrant, filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, which alleged that the Tango was subject to forfeiture based on violation of U.S. bank fraud, money laundering, and sanction statutes.
According to documents filed in this case, the U.S. investigation alleges that Vekselberg bought the Tango in 2011 and has owned it continuously since that time. It further alleges that Vekselberg used shell companies to obfuscate his interest in the Tango to avoid bank oversight into U.S. dollar transactions related thereto. Additionally, after Vekselberg was sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury Department on April 6, 2018, the warrant alleges that Vekselberg and those working on his behalf continued to make U.S. dollar payments through U.S. banks for the support and maintenance of the Tango and its owners, including a payment for a December 2020 stay at a luxury water villa resort in the Maldives and mooring fees for the yacht. Vekselberg had an interest in these payments and therefore a license was required from the Treasury Department, which was not obtained.
“Today marks our taskforce’s first seizure of an asset belonging to a sanctioned individual with close ties to the Russian regime. It will not be the last.” said Attorney General Merrick B. Garland. “Together, with our international partners, we will do everything possible to hold accountable any individual whose criminal acts enable the Russian government to continue its unjust war.”
“Today’s action makes clear that corrupt Russian oligarchs cannot evade sanctions to live a life of luxury as innocent Ukrainians are suffering,” said Deputy Attorney General Lisa O. Monaco. “Today the Department of Justice delivers on our commitment to hold accountable those whose criminal activity strengthens the Russian government as it continues to wage its unjust war in Ukraine. That commitment is one we are not finished honoring.” (The Department of Justice, 4/4/2022) (Archive)
Dan Bongino reminds us of the history between Vekselberg and the Clintons.
Bongino mentions this article by Diane West:
Hillary’s Hypersonic Missile Gap
“Starting in May 2010, The Washington Examinerreported, drawing on emails obtained by Citizens United, “Clinton Foundation staff pushed Hillary Clinton’s State Department to approve a meeting between Bill Clinton and a powerful Russian oligarch as her agency lined up investors for a project under his purview.”
His name was Viktor Vekselberg of Renova (a Clinton Foundation donor) and the project under his purview was the Skolkovo Innovation Center, which is being built near Moscow. The following month, Bill Clinton would receive $500,000 for a speech in Moscow from Renaissance Capital, a Russian investment bank with ties to the Kremlin, a Clinton Foundation donor, a Skolkovo executive, and which talked up Uranium One, whose sale the Clinton State Department would approve, and whose executives together contributed $145 million to the Clinton Foundation.
This shocking set of emails that the Examinerreported on shows the nexus of Bill and Hillary Clinton’s foundation, Hillary Clinton’s State Department, Bill Clinton, Russian oligarch Vekselberg, and Skolkovo, “Russia’s Silicon Valley,” the Putin project to transfer Western technology to Russia that was championed and driven by Mrs. Clinton — and, what do you know, 17 out of 28 tech companies that hitched up with Skolkovo also contributed to the Clinton Foundation? What a coincidence. Meanwhile, Barack Obama’s support for Russian WTO membership made the whole global flow so much easier.
No wonder Herd Media, the Uniparty Congress and FBI Director James Comey never noticed a thing. Oh, except that Putin “hated” Hillary Clinton, “wanted to do her harm,” as Comey told Congress this week. Grrr. Maybe hypersonic technology wasn’t enough. But I’m getting ahead of the story.
Let’s pick up with an Army report on Skolkovo written in 2012 (released in 2013) to assess “the implications … for U.S. policymakers.”
Although military activities are not an official cluster of activity, the Skolkovo Foundation has, in fact, been involved in defense-related activities since December 2011, when it approved the first weapons-related project—the development of a hypersonic cruise missile engine. The project is a response to the U.S. Department of Defense’s Advanced Hypersonic Weapon, part of the Prompt Global Strike program.
Fast forward to November 2016, shortly after Donald Trump was elected president when the US Air Force released a report on — no way — the Russian and Chinese hypersonic missile threat to the United States.
The United States is vulnerable to future attack by hypersonic missiles from China and Russia and is falling behind in the technology race to develop both defensive and offensive high-speed maneuvering arms, according to a new Air Force study.
“The People’s Republic of China and the Russian Federation are already flight-testing high-speed maneuvering weapons (HSMWs) that may endanger both forward deployed U.S. forces and even the continental United States itself,” an executive summary of the report says.
“These weapons appear to operate in regimes of speed and altitude, with maneuverability that could frustrate existing missile defense constructs and weapon capabilities.”
In a functioning democratic republic, the executive branch decisions and procedures and corruption that led to this defense cataclysm would actually alarm security officials, lawmakers, and even arouse media curiosity, if nothing else. But Skolkovo, the money, the corruption, the treachery, the danger, inspire no reaction at all.
Not even this plain, shocking language, from the Army, circa 2012:
Skolkovo is an ambitious enterprise, aiming to promote technology transfer generally, by inbound direct investment, and occasionally, through selected acquisitions. As such, Skolkovo is arguably an overt alternative to clandestine industrial espionage—with the additional distinction that it can achieve such a transfer on a much larger scale and more efficiently.
Hillary Clinton, her State Department, the Clinton Foundation, Bill Clinton did much to make Skolkovo possible — did much to activate what was, according to the Army report, “arguably” a massive “clandestine industrial espionage” operation. Not that any of this is in the past. This plain-sight-“research”-cum-collusion with the Russian government goes on, and goes on unchecked — and despite the Obama administration’s supposedly hard-as-nails, cold-as-ice, tough-on-Russia finish.” (Read more: The Daily Caller, 3/21/2017)(Archive)
The Alfa Gang – Left to Right: Andrew Sullivan, Hillary Clinton, John Durham, Michael Sussmann, Mark Elias
“Special Counsel John Durham is revealing new smoking gun evidence, a text message that shows a Clinton campaign lawyer lied to the FBI, while putting the courts on notice he is prepared to show the effort to smear Donald Trump with now-disproven Russia collusion allegations was a “conspiracy.”
In a bombshell court filing late Monday night, Durham for the first time suggested Hillary Clinton’s campaign, her researchers and others formed a “joint venture or conspiracy” for the purpose of weaving the collusion story to harm Trump’s election chances and then the start of his presidency.
“These parties acted as ‘joint venturer[s]’ and therefore should be ‘considered as co-conspirator[s],'” he wrote.
Durham also revealed he has unearthed a text message showing Hillary Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann falsely told the FBI he was not working on behalf of any client when he delivered now discredited anti-Trump research in the lead-up to the 2016 election. In fact, he was working for the Clinton campaign and another client, prosecutors say.
The existence of the text message between Sussmann and then-FBI General Counsel James Baker was revealed in a court filing late Monday night by Durham’s team. Prosecutors said they intend to show Sussmann gave a false story to the FBI but then told the truth about working on behalf of the Clinton campaign when he later testified to Congress.
“Jim – it’s Michael Sussmann. I have something time-sensitive (and sensitive) I need to discuss,” Sussmann texted Baker on Sept. 18, 2016, according to the new court filing. “Do you have availibilty for a short meeting tomorrow? I’m coming on my own – not on behalf of a client or company – want to help the Bureau. Thanks.”
Prosecutors said the text message will become essential evidence at trial to show Sussmann lied to the FBI.
“The defendant lied in that meeting, falsely stating to the General Counsel that he was not providing the allegations to the FBI on behalf of any client,” Durham’s motion said. “In fact, the defendant had assembled and conveyed the allegations to the FBI on behalf of at least two specific clients, including (i) a technology executive (“Tech Executive-1”) at a U.S.-based Internet company (“Internet Company-1”), and (ii) the Clinton Campaign.” (Read more: JustTheNews, 4/05/2022)(Archive)(Court Transcript, 4/04/2022)
Stefan Halper (l), Svetlana Lokhova (c) and Lt. General Michael Flynn (Credit: public domain)
“A federal appeals court has breathed new life into a lawsuit brought by a London-based academic against one of the FBI’s confidential informants during the Russia collusion probe, litigation that is likely to focus new attention on the quality of evidence that led the bureau to investigate former President Donald Trump and his cohorts during the 2016 election.
Judge Leoni Brinkema (Credit: public domain)
There has been a flurry of new legal activity this month in Svetlana Lokhova’s lawsuit in federal court in Virginia against former FBI confidential human source Stefan Halper since the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals concluded U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema abused her authority in dismissing the lawsuit a year ago.
“We conclude that the court could not have properly concluded that Lokhova’s complaint … had absolutely no chance of success,” the appeals court ruled in April in a unanimous 3-0 decision that reversed Brinkema’s dismissal of the case and her order of a penalty against Lokhova for filing an allegedly frivolous lawsuit.
“We conclude that the district court abused its discretion in finding Lokhova’s complaint frivolous and concluding on that basis that its filing violated Rule 11,” the appeals court ruled. “The judgment of the district court — as reflected in its orders of May 5, 2021, and July 9, 2021 — is therefore reversed and the case remanded for further proceedings.”
The decision revives a years-long dispute between Lokhova, a Russian-born, London-based academic, and Halper, a Cambridge academic who served as one of the two primary confidential human sources, along with former MI6 agent Christopher Steele, in the FBI’s now-discredited Crossfire Hurricane investigation of alleged collusion between Trump and the Kremlin.” (Read more: JusttheNews, 6/28/2022) (Archive)
(Timeline editor’s note: We are thrilled to learn Ms. Lokhova’s defamation lawsuit will move forward and share in her new hope for justice. Her story has always stuck in our craw, knowing how crudely a handful of men plotted against her, and until now, seemed to have gotten away with their crimes. We admire Ms. Lokhova’s grit and determination to defend her honor and restore her damaged reputation by these unsavory men.)
John Durham says in new court filing that Clinton campaign, DNC and Fusion GPS are withholding documents pertinent to Sussmann case by citing a dubious attorney-client privilege claim.
Top lawmakers in US Congress hosted Mamuka Mamulashvili, an infamous Georgian Legion warlord who has boasted of authorizing field executions of captive Russian soldiers in Ukraine.
Georgian Legion warlord Mamuka Mamulashvili (center) visits Rep. Eliot Engel in 2017. (Credit: public domain)
Having taken up arms against Russia for a fifth time, Georgian Legion commander Mamuka Mamulashvili has bragged on video about his unit carrying out field executions of captured Russian soldiers in Ukraine.
While Western media pundits howled about images of dead bodies in the city of Bucha, echoing Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenksy’s accusation that Russia is guilty of “genocide,” they have largely overlooked the apparent admission of atrocities by an avowed ally of the United States who was welcomed on Capitol Hill by senior lawmakers overseeing congressional foreign policy committees.
Having fought in four wars against Russia, and despite allegations that he played a leading role in the massacre of 49 protesters in Kiev’s Maidan Square in 2014, Mamulashvili has taken multiple trips to the United States, where he received a warm welcome from members of Congress, the New York Police Department, and Ukrainian diaspora community.
In an interview this April, Mamulashvili, was asked about a video showing Russian fighters who had been extrajudicially executed in Dmitrovka, a town just five miles from Bucha. Mamulashvili was candid about his unit’s take-no-prisoners tactics, though he has denied involvement in the specific crimes depicted.
“We will not take Russian soldiers, as well as Kadyrovites [Chechnyan fighters]; in any case, we will not take prisoners, not a single person will be captured,” Mamulashvili said, implying that his fighters execute POWs.
The warlord’s battle dress shirt was emblazoned with a patch reading, “Mama says I’m special.”
Mamuka Mamulashvili, commander of the “Georgian National Legion” in Ukraine: “Yes, we tie their hands and feet sometimes. I speak for the Georgian Legion, we will never take Russian soldiers prisoner. Not a single one of them will be taken prisoner.” pic.twitter.com/4GM9nHsOMo
— Russians With Attitude (@RWApodcast) April 6, 2022
“Yes, we tie their hands and feet sometimes. I speak for the Georgian Legion, we will never take Russian soldiers prisoner. Not a single one of them will be taken prisoner,” Mamulashvili emphasized
Executions of enemy combatants are considered war crimes under the Geneva Convention.
Ukrainian and Georgian Legion fighters celebrate after executing captive Russian soldiers on video. (Credit: public domain)
Western governments continue to block a Russian request for a United Nations investigation into alleged massacres in Bucha, where scores of corpses were photographed following the Russian withdrawal from the city, some with hands bound and shot execution style – as Mamulashvili described doing to prisoners.
While the events in Bucha have become a source of outrage and heated contention, a clear case of war crimes by Ukrainian forces which took place just five miles down the road on March 30 as Russian troops withdrew has received a more muted response despite coverage by the New York Times.
The macabre footage shows Russian paratroopers dead or bleeding out in the road, some with their hands clearly bound — reportedly the handiwork of the Georgian Legion. (Read more: The Grayzone, 4/08/2022)(Archive)
“Long before it professed no prior knowledge of the raid on Donald Trump’s estate, the Biden White House worked directly with the Justice Department and National Archives to instigate the criminal probe into alleged mishandling of documents, allowing the FBI to review evidence retrieved from Mar-a-Lago this spring and eliminating the 45th president’s claims to executive privilege, according to contemporaneous government documents reviewed by Just the News.
The memos show then-White House Deputy Counsel Jonathan Su was engaged in conversations with the FBI, DOJ and National Archives as early as April, shortly after 15 boxes of classified and other materials were voluntarily returned to the federal historical agency from Trump’s Florida home.
By May, Su conveyed to the Archives that President Joe Biden would not object to waiving his predecessor’s claims to executive privilege, a decision that opened the door for DOJ to get a grand jury to issue a subpoena compelling Trump to turn over any remaining materials he possessed from his presidency.
The machinations are summarized in several memos and emails exchanged between the various agencies in spring 2022, months before the FBI took the added unprecedented step of raiding Trump’s Florida compound with a court-issued search warrant.
Debra Steidel Wall assumes the office of acting Archivist of the United States on May 1, 2022. (Credit: Wikipedia)
The most complete summary was contained in a lengthy letter dated May 10 that acting National Archivist Debra Steidel Wall sent Trump’s lawyers summarizing the White House’s involvement.
“On April 11, 2022, the White House Counsel’s Office — affirming a request from the Department of Justice supported by an FBI letterhead memorandum — formally transmitted a request that NARA provide the FBI access to the 15 boxes for its review within seven days, with the possibility that the FBI might request copies of specific documents following its review of the boxes,” Wall wrote Trump defense attorney Evan Corcoran.
That letter revealed Biden empowered the National Archives and Records Administration to waive any claims to executive privilege that Trump might assert to block DOJ from gaining access to the documents.
“The Counsel to the President has informed me that, in light of the particular circumstances presented here, President Biden defers to my determination, in consultation with the Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Counsel, [Christopher H. Schroeder] regarding whether or not I should uphold the former President’s purported ‘protective assertion of executive privilege,'” Wall wrote. “… I have therefore decided not to honor the former President’s ‘protective’ claim of privilege.”
The memos provide the most definitive evidence to date of the current White House’s effort to facilitate a criminal probe of the man Joe Biden beat in the 2020 election and may face again as a challenger in 2024. That involvement included eliminating one of the legal defenses Trump might use to fight the FBI over access to his documents.” (Read more: JusttheNews, 8/22/2022)(Archive)
THE DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY is quietly broadening its efforts to curb speech it considers dangerous, an investigation by The Intercept has found. Years of internal DHS memos, emails, and documents — obtained via leaks and an ongoing lawsuit, as well as public documents — illustrate an expansive effort by the agency to influence tech platforms.
The work, much of which remains unknown to the American public, came into clearer view earlier this year when DHS announced a new “Disinformation Governance Board”: a panel designed to police misinformation (false information spread unintentionally), disinformation (false information spread intentionally), and malinformation (factual information shared, typically out of context, with harmful intent) that allegedly threatens U.S. interests. While the board was widely ridiculed, immediately scaled back, and then shut down within a few months, other initiatives are underway as DHS pivots to monitoring social media now that its original mandate — the war on terror — has been wound down.
Behind closed doors, and through pressure on private platforms, the U.S. government has used its power to try to shape online discourse. According to meeting minutes and other records appended to a lawsuit filed by Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt, a Republican who is also running for Senate, discussions have ranged from the scale and scope of government intervention in online discourse to the mechanics of streamlining takedown requests for false or intentionally misleading information.
Matt Masterson (Credit: Stanford University)
“Platforms have got to get comfortable with gov’t. It’s really interesting how hesitant they remain,” Microsoft executive Matt Masterson, a former DHS official, texted Jen Easterly, a DHS director, in February.
In a Marchmeeting, Laura Dehmlow, an FBI official, warned that the threat of subversive information on social media could undermine support for the U.S. government. Dehmlow, according to notes of the discussion attended by senior executives from Twitter and JPMorgan Chase, stressed that “we need a media infrastructure that is held accountable.”
FBI Foreign Influence Task Force Chief Laura Dehmlow is tied to the Twitter decision to suppress the New York Post Hunter Biden laptop story. (Credit: TCB conference)
“We do not coordinate with other entities when making content moderation decisions, and we independently evaluate content in line with the Twitter Rules,” a spokesperson for Twitter wrote in a statement to The Intercept.
There is also a formalized process for government officials to directly flag content on Facebook or Instagram and request that it be throttled or suppressed through a special Facebook portal that requires a government or law enforcement email to use. At the time of writing, the “content request system” at facebook.com/xtakedowns/login is still live. DHS and Meta, the parent company of Facebook, did not respond to a request for comment. The FBI declined to comment.
DHS’s mission to fight disinformation, stemming from concerns around Russian influence in the 2016 presidential election, began taking shape during the 2020 election and over efforts to shape discussions around vaccine policy during the coronavirus pandemic. Documents collected by The Intercept from a variety of sources, including current officials and publicly available reports, reveal the evolution of more active measures by DHS.
According to a draft copy of DHS’s Quadrennial Homeland Security Review, DHS’s capstone report outlining the department’s strategy and priorities in the coming years, the department plans to target “inaccurate information” on a wide range of topics, including “the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic and the efficacy of COVID-19 vaccines, racial justice, U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, and the nature of U.S. support to Ukraine.”
“The challenge is particularly acute in marginalized communities,” the report states, “which are often the targets of false or misleading information, such as false information on voting procedures targeting people of color.”
The inclusion of the 2021 U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan is particularly noteworthy, given that House Republicans, should they take the majority in the midterms, have vowed to investigate. “This makes Benghazi look like a much smaller issue,” said Rep. Mike Johnson, R-La., a member of the Armed Services Committee, adding that finding answers “will be a top priority.”
How disinformation is defined by the government has not been clearly articulated, and the inherently subjective nature of what constitutes disinformation provides a broad opening for DHS officials to make politically motivated determinations about what constitutes dangerous speech. (Read more: The Intercept, 10/31/2022)(Archive)
Hillary Clinton uses her power and connections to gaslight the American public with Russiagate only to then lose the 2016 presidential election. (Credit: clipping from video of Clinton concession speech, Nov 2016)
“Five associates of Hillary Clinton and her presidential campaign are invoking their Fifth Amendment rights and refusing to cooperate with Special Counsel John H. Durham, according to a filing in federal court revealed later Friday in Washington, DC.
The revelation emerged in a motion filed by Durham to oppose the efforts of defendant Michael Sussmann and the Clinton campaign to withhold some documents from evidence by asserting attorney-client privilege.
(…) In the filing, Durham noted that while one witness, identified as “Researcher-2,” was granted immunity from prosecution in exchange for testimony, “at least five other witnesses who conducted work relating to the Russian Bank-1 allegations invoked (or indicated their intent to invoke) their right against self-incrimination.”
Legal scholar Jonathan Turley noted in a commentary on the filing:
Durham is now moving to give immunity to a key witness while revealing that the claims made by the Clinton campaign were viewed by the CIA as “not technically plausible” and “user created.” He also revealed that at least five of the former Clinton campaign contractors/researchers have invoked the Fifth Amendment and refused to cooperate in fear that they might incriminate themselves in criminal conduct.
Turley also noted that Durham’s filing “also detailed how the false Russian collusion claims related to Alfa Bank involved Clinton General Counsel Marc Elias and Christopher Steele.” (Read more: Breitbart, 4/18/2022)(Archive)
Rodney Joffe, John Durham, and Michael Sussmann (Credit: public domain)
“Newly released CIA memoranda suggest the tech gurus behind the Alfa Bank hoax also tracked Donald Trump’s movements to devise another collusion conspiracy theory. While smaller in scale than other aspects of Spygate, the Yotaphone hoax represents an equally serious scandal because it involved both the mining of proprietary information and sensitive data from the Executive Office of the President (EOP) and the apparent surveillance of Trump’s physical movements.
( ) …two months ago, as part of the government’s “Motion to Inquire Into Potential Conflicts of Interest,” Durham’s team revealed for the first time that when Sussmann met with the CIA in early 2017, he provided agents with internet data beyond the Alfa Bank conspiracy theory. This data, Sussmann claimed, “demonstrated that Trump and/or his associates were using supposedly rare, Russian-made wireless phones in the vicinity of the White House and other locations.”
The “supposedly rare, Russian-made wireless phones” were “Yotaphones.” Following Durham’s filing of the conflicts of interest motion, it appeared Sussmann bore responsibility for peddling a second conspiracy theory to the CIA. But the details contained in the government’s motion proved insufficient to understand the Yotaphone angle to Spygate. That all changed on Friday, when the special counsel filed two CIA memoranda memorializing what Sussmann said about the Yotaphones and the data Joffe and his tech experts had compiled.
The first memorandum, dated January 31, 2017, summarized what Sussmann told a former CIA employee in hopes of scoring a meeting with the CIA. Sussmann said his client “had some interesting information about the presence and activity of a unique Russian-made phone around President Trump.” Sussmann claimed the activity started in April 2016 when Trump was working out of the Trump Tower on its Wi-Fi network. That phone was also used on the “Wi-Fi at Trump’s apartment at Grand Central Park West,” according to Sussmann.
The memorandum then noted that “when Trump traveled to Michigan to interview a cabinet secretary, the phone appeared with Trump in Michigan.” The unnamed cabinet secretary apparently refers to Trump’s education secretary Betsy DeVos, whose husband Richard DeVos was chairman of the Michigan-based Spectrum Health in 2016.
According to the notes, Sussmann also told his contact that “the phone was never noticed in two places at once” and was seen “only around the President’s movement.” The memo noted that once, when Trump was not in Trump Tower, the phone was active on the Trump Tower WiFi network. Then, “in December 2016, the phone disappeared from Trump Tower Wi Fi network and surfaced on [the Executive Office Building] network,” the memorandum said, with Sussmann claiming it was the same Yotaphone and that it “surfaced” at the Executive Office Building after Trump moved to the White House.
The Yotaphone is rare, Sussmann told his contact, with only about a dozen or so present in the United States, and Russian government officials often receive a high-end version of the phone as a gift. According to Sussmann, the Yotaphone connected to Trump made a number of WiFi calls to Moscow and St. Petersburg from April 2016 until February 2017.
(…) During Sussmann’s February 9, 2017 meeting with the CIA, the memorandum notes that Sussmann provided the agency thumb drives with separate data files for the Yotaphone by the location of the “domain name system” or DNS lookups, including one for Trump’s Central Park apartment, one for the EOP, one for Spectrum Health Care, and one for the Trump Tower. That data, Sussmann told the CIA agents, related to DNS information, “indicat[ed] that a Russian-made Yota-phone had been seen by [Sussmann’s contacts] connecting to the WiFi from the Trump Tower in New York, as well as a from a location in Michigan, at the same time that then-candidate Trump was believed to be at these locations.”
(…) The data included in those files, however, reflected but a segment of the DNS lookups by the Yotaphones. The special counsel discovered that fact when it obtained more complete DNS data from a company that assisted Joffe in assembling the Yotaphone allegations. For instance, the more complete data assembled by Joffe and his associates showed the DNS lookups involving the EOP began at least as early as 2014, but Sussmann omitted that detail when providing the material to the CIA.
That Joffe and his associates had assembled more complete DNS data related to the Yotaphones than that provided to the CIA—data that disproves the Trump-Russia collusion theory—is a huge scandal: Those allegations indicate an intent to deceive by omission.” (Read more: The Federalist, 4/20/2022)(Archive)
“The Democratic cybersecurity lawyer charged with concealing his work for the Clinton campaign from the FBI doesn’t want special counsel John Durham to be able to use Hillary Clinton’s tweet touting the Trump-Russia collusion claims he was pushing as evidence at trial.
(…) Durham told the federal court last week he wanted an October 2016 tweet from the Clinton campaign promoting the Alfa-Bank claims to be admitted as evidence at the May trial.
The special counsel argued the tweet is not inadmissible hearsay “because it is not being offered for its truth” — emphasizing that the prosecutors actually believe its claims were false. Durham said he instead wanted to present the tweet to “show the existence of the defendant’s attorney-client relationship with the Clinton Campaign, which is directly relevant to the false statement charge.”
On Halloween 2016, Clinton tweeted, “Donald Trump has a secret server … It was set up to communicate privately with a Putin-tied Russian bank.”
The FBI, CIA, special counsel Robert Mueller, a bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee investigation, and Durham’s team have all cast doubt on or shot down the Alfa-Bank claims.
Sussmann’s lawyers argued the Clinton tweet sharing Sullivan’s statement and touting the story, which originally appeared in Slate, should be considered “inadmissible” for two “fundamental” reasons.
The defense attorneys said, “First, contrary to the Special Counsel’s misleading statement of the law, the Tweet is hearsay and it is plainly being offered for the truth: so that the Special Counsel can argue that the Campaign’s plan all along was to make a public statement about ‘federal authorities’ looking into the ‘direct connection between Trump and Russia.’ Second, the Tweet — which Mr. Sussmann did not author, issue, authorize, or even know about — is irrelevant, prejudicial, and would only confuse and distract the jury from the single false statement charge it must decide.”
Sussman’s lawyers wrote, “The Tweet, which was posted on October 31, 2016, does not reveal anything about Mr. Sussmann’s state of mind over a month earlier when he purportedly made the alleged false statement.”
“There is no evidence that Mr. Sussmann’s meeting with Mr. Baker had anything to do with the Clinton Campaign’s broader media strategy.”
But Durham wrote, “In the months prior to the publication of these articles, the defendant had communicated with the media and provided them with the Russian Bank-1 data and allegations” and had kept Clinton campaign general counsel Marc Elias “apprised of his efforts” while Elias “communicated with the Clinton Campaign’s leadership about potential media coverage of these issues.
The special counsel says the evidence at trial would show that beginning in late July and early August 2016, Sussmann, Joffe, and “agents of the Clinton campaign” were “assembling and disseminating the Russian Bank-1 allegations and other derogatory information about Trump and his associates to the media and the U.S. government.” The special counsel said evidence will “establish that these efforts amounted to a joint venture.” (Read more: Washington Examiner, 4/19/2022)(Archive)
“CTH begins every outline of the ongoing Durham investigation with the following disclaimer: How is John Durham going to reveal everything that is possible about the deep state Trump targeting operation, and simultaneously handle the involvement of Robert Mueller, Andrew Weissmann, and the Special Counsel team who were specifically appointed to cover it up?
Thanks to a more detailed filing by John Durham last night {pdf here, h/t Techno}, we can now see the guardrails, rules, and general direction the prosecution is taking.
In essence, the underlying Trump-Russia conspiracy theory material from the Clinton campaign, via Rodney Joffe to Michael Sussmann, was fabricated – likely for a dual purpose:
(A) to cover up and make excuses for the stunningly embarrassing, potentially unlawful and politically terrible April 2016 DNC email leaks, which showed the DNC Club internally working to secure the nomination for Hillary Clinton, while trying to destroy her primary opponent, Bernie Sanders.
and
(B) to create the political Russia narrative against Trump, to be deployed later in the general election.
Within the general direction Durham is following, the FBI was duped by a purposeful and manipulative intent from the Clinton campaign. Meanwhile, the CIA [Agency-2] did not buy into the technological evidence saying it was not “technically plausible” and was “user-created and not machine/tool generated.”
For a complete breakdown of the legal filings and what they mean on a detailed level –
The prosecutorial approach by John Durham positions all of the corruption outside the institutions of government, thereby protecting them.
The bad guys, the corrupt lawbreakers, are the people directly connected to the Clinton Campaign and all of the political and legal agents in/around the Clinton political machine.
As the prosecutorial narrative is unfolding, the institutions of government were victims of the horrible, terrible activity by the Clinton outsiders.
Pay no attention to the aligned politics and weaponization of the White House, DOJ, DOJ-NSD, FBI main, FBI-CoIntel, CIA, Senate Intelligence Committee, or memberships therein. The entire apparatus of the most robust, capable, excellent, and diligent intelligence apparatus in the history of all mankind, along with all the oversight mechanisms that exist to support that apparatus, was duped by Hillary Clinton’s team.
That’s John Durham’s investigative thesis, and the court filings show he’s sticking to it.”
Trump Fulton County prosecutor, Nathan Wade (Credit: Campbell and Wade)
Georgia prosecutors working for Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis secretly met with January 6 Committee investigators in April 2022 before a special grand jury was convened to investigate Trump’s effort to challenge the 2020 election results in the state of Georgia.
Recall that it was reported in early May 2022 that Fani Willis convened a special grand jury to investigate Trump.
According to Politico, Fani Willis’s prosecutors secretly met with January 6 Committee investigators to review evidence.
“Committee staff quietly met with lawyers and agents working for Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis in mid-April 2022, just as she prepared to convene a special grand jury investigation. In the previously unreported meeting, the Jan. 6 committee aides let the district attorney’s team review — but not keep — a limited set of evidence they had gathered.” Politicoreported.
“Over the next few months, committee staff also had a series of phone calls with Willis’ team. They answered the prosecutors’ questions and shared insight on matters like Trump’s false electors gambit and his efforts to pressure Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger. Both of those ploys ultimately featured prominently in the criminal charges that Willis brought against Trump and his allies last summer.” Politico reported.
Let me make something very clear. When they say the J6 “committee staff” coordinated with Fani Willis, that committee staff is a person, Mary McCord. https://t.co/1Okg83wc6npic.twitter.com/JtfG9dRx5Y
In December 2023, House Judiciary Republicans unearthed a December 17, 2021 letter between Fani Willis and January 6 Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson.
Durham provided to the Court two sets of notes related to Sussmann’s representations to the CIA. The first was from Sussmann’s January 31, 2017 contacts with a CIA employee where Sussmann discussed wanting to provide to the CIA data on “the presence and activity of a unique Russian made phone around President Trump.” It was said that this secret activity started in April 2016 and continued after Trump’s “move to the White House.”
Sussmann alleged the Russian phone (YotaPhone) was always close to Trump (“only around the President’s Movements”), surfacing at his Trump Tower Network in April 2016 and being used through Wi-Fi at Trump’s Grand Central West apartment. The phone even “appeared with Trump in Michigan” when he was interviewing a Cabinet Secretary.
At a minimum, this confirms what we reported nearly two months ago: that the Trump transition data was passed to the CIA. Yet it’s also more than that. The CIA was provided with data all the way back from April 2016.
Why does April 2016 matter? Because Russia was alleged to have hacked “the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and DNC networks in April 2016.” Recall that “Crowdstrike was contacted on April 30, 2016 to respond to a suspected breach” of the DNC.
(…) The CIA Notes Part 2: Sussmann’s February 9, 2017 meeting with the CIA
That January 31, 2017 conference was used to schedule the February 9, 2017 meeting with the CIA. At that meeting, Sussmann repeated his allegations that a “Russian-made Yota-phone” had been seen at Trump properties and had traveled with Trump to Michigan. He further alleged that “In December 2016, the Yota-phone was seen connecting to WIFI from the Executive Office of the President (the White House).”
(…) The CIA reviewed the Trump/YotaPhone data (and the Alfa Bank data) in early 2017. The fact that the CIA accepted this data on President Trump is its own scandal. In any event, the CIA’s findings are significant, as they concluded that the data was not “technically plausible” and was “user created and not machine/tool generated.”
On Feb. 9, 2017, Sussman met with CIA officers—where he also made false statements, according to the new filings.
A memorandum introduced by the special counsel’s team and penned by a CIA official said that Sussman provided documents and thumb drives that he claimed contained data related to potential Russian activities linked with Trump.
Sussman “advised that he was not representing a particular client,” according to the notes. Instead, he said he was conveying information from “contacts” who he believed “were acting in good faith and out of a sense of loyalty to the USG,” or U.S. government.
That contradicts how Sussman told a former CIA employee, who was said to have helped set up the February meeting, that he “represents a client who does not want to be known,” according to notes of the meeting taken by the former employee.
It also contradicts testimony Sussman delivered to the House Intelligence Committee. Under oath, Sussman said (pdf) he received the information “from a client of mine.”
Sussman said he learned of the information by the summer of 2016 but only came forward months later because President Barack Obama ordered an intelligence review of possible Russian interference in elections.
“This information seemed to fall roughly within that, and so I thought that might be—or my client thought that that might be something that was relevant for those that were gathering information regarding foreign-based actors,” Sussman said. (Read more: Zero Hedge, 4/16/2022)(Archive)
In 2012, Obama told Medvedev in Russia to tell Putin that he would be more flexible after the election.
In a debate with Romney, he laughed at Romney for remarking how dangerous Putin and Russia were, saying the ’80s called and wanted their foreign policy back:
Former President Barack Obama said Russian President Vladimir Putin has always been a threat on the world stage. He described him as ruthless against his own people and others.
“He has always been somebody who’s wrapped up in this twisted, distorted sense of grievance and ethnic nationalism. That part of Putin, I think has always been there,” Obama told Al Roker on NBC’s “Today.”
Last week, Obama lied through his teeth when he said he had been tough on Russia after they invaded Crimea. He said he had to drag Europe in to be tough.
“The battle over documents and e-mails in the Michael Sussmann case just got hotter.
Back in August 2017, Fusion GPS co-founder Glenn Simpson testified to the Senate Judiciary Committee, explaining how his firm was retained to gather “lots of facts about Donald Trump.” He admitted that Fusion GPS met with reporters leading up to the 2016 election to spread opposition research against then-candidate Trump.
The context of Perkins Coie’s retention of Fusion GPS was further explained in a book co-authored by Simpson and Fusion GPS co-founder Peter Fritsch. They documented an April 20, 2016 meeting with Mark Elias (Perkins Coie partner and counsel for the DNC/Clinton Campaign), where Elias requested their services for opposition research:
Now the stories have changed.
Fusion GPS is no longer an opposition research firm, and they weren’t hired to dig-up dirt against Trump. Instead, they would have you believe, after the phony dossier and the Alfa Bank hoax, that Fusion GPS was retained to provide legal advice to the Hillary Clinton Campaign. Remarkable.
Background
On April 6, Durham filed this motion to compel in the Michael Sussmann case, requesting the court require the production of “emails and attachments between and among” Perkins Coie, Rodney Joffe, and Fusion GPS. These emails and documents, according to Durham, “appear or involve or relate to” Fusion GPS’s provision of research and media services to Hillary for America, the DNC, and Perkins Coie. (Some documents had been produced pursuant to grand jury subpoenas dating back to the 2021.)
“Hillary Clinton asked a federal court Wednesday to throw out a lawsuit from former President Donald Trump that accuses her and the Democratic National Committee of conspiring against him to smear his 2016 campaign.
Clinton’s attorneys said Trump’s $24 million lawsuit that claims an “unthinkable plot” to “cripple” his bid for the presidency and paint his campaign as colluding with Russia had no legal basis, according to a motion filed in US District Court for the Southern District of Florida.
“Whatever the utility of Plaintiff’s Complaint as a fundraising tool, a press release, or a list of political grievances, it has no merit as a lawsuit and should be dismissed with prejudice,” the 22-page court filing said.
In a 108-page complaint filed last month, Trump claimed Clinton and others orchestrated a plan to manufacture the Russia scandal to ruin his candidacy in 2016 when he was running as a Republican candidate against Clinton.
Clinton, the former Secretary of State and first lady, worked with others as the then-Democratic nominee for president to allegedly falsify evidence to spark federal investigations in a ploy he called “so outrageous, subversive and incendiary that even the events of Watergate pale in comparison,” Trump’s suit says.” (Read more: New York Post, 4/20/2022)(Archive)
“Over the last 24 hours, former President Barack Obama and twice-failed presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton have come out against free speech – calling for big tech to go further to censor views they disagree with.
On Thursday, Obama told an audience at Stanford University that tech companies are “turbo-charging some of humanity’s worst impulses,” adding “One of the biggest reasons for the weakening of democracy is the profound change that’s taken place in how we communicate and consume information.”
He then said that people are ‘dying because of disinformation.’
Obama goes on psychotic rant, claims people are dying because of “misinformation”. pic.twitter.com/uHBeKpT7rI
Obama’s ‘misinformation’ shtick was largely a repeat of a speech he gave two weeks ago in Chicago, when he claimed “You have to fight to provide people [with] the information they need to be free and self-governing.” In other words, government-approved narratives.
As The Federalist noted, however, Obama “Spied on the Donald Trump campaign with a secret court warrant backed by the Hillary Clinton campaign-funded Christopher Steele dossier which, in an ironic twist, was the product of Russian disinformation. Democrats used this disinformation to repeatedly smear President Trump and undermine the integrity of the 2016 election.”
Hillary Clinton joined the fray on Thursday, tweeting “For too long, tech platforms have amplified disinformation and extremism with no accountability,” and called on “our transatlantic allies to push the Digital Services Act,” aimed at regulating online platforms.
Of course, Hillary Clinton funded the Russian disinfo dossier that Obama’s administration used against Trump, and the former British spy that was paid to fabricate it pushed it to major news outlets which peddled the misinformation as long as they could squeeze blood from that stone.
FISA Court rubber stamps FBI warrant applications to spy on Americans. (Credit: River City Reader)
The FBI repeatedly misused a surveillance tool in searching for foreign intelligence to use in cases pertaining to the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection and 2020 racial justice protests, according to an April 2022 court order publicly released Friday.
The order, which was released by the U.S. Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, is significantly redacted but reveals thousands of violations of Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which allows the federal government to collect communications between certain targeted foreign individuals outside the U.S.
The court has legal oversight of the U.S. government’s espionage activities.
FBI officials said the violations came before corrective measures the agency took starting in summer 2021 and continuing into last year.
(…) The Office of the Director of National Intelligence released the report Friday to promote transparency, but members of Congress originally received the order last year.
The FBI’s program maintains a database of intelligence that U.S. agencies can search, but the FBI must have a foreign intelligence purpose or be looking for evidence of a crime to conduct a search.
The order shows the FBI turned to the database to look into someone it believed was present at the Capitol during the Jan. 6, 2021, attack, an inquiry that did not have any “analytical, investigative or evidentiary” purpose.
An analyst conducted 13 searches of people who were suspected of participating in the riot to see whether they had any foreign ties, but the Justice Department later determined that it did not meet the standard required for a search. (Read more: The Hill, 5/19/2023)(Archive)
This problem existed eight years ago and any ‘corrective measure’ the court took to safeguard our First and Fourth Amendment rights, hasn’t worked.
(…) The FISA court found that the government had been engaging in a long pattern of significant abuses that were revealed to the court by then-National Security Agency Director Adm. Mike Rogers.
“On October 24, 2016, the government orally apprised the Court of significant non-compliance with the NSA’s minimization procedures involving queries of data acquired under Section 702 using U.S. person identifiers. The full scope of non-compliant querying practices had not been previously disclosed to the Court,” the FISC ruling read.
The court noted the government’s failure to previously notify the court of these issues, referring to the government’s actions as exhibiting an institutional “lack of candor” while emphasizing that “this is a very serious Fourth Amendment issue.”
( ) …an email obtained by The Federalist indicates Georgia Tech researchers drafted a series of white papers for DARPA, including on the “DNC attack attribution,” and on what they called a “Mueller List” of “domains and indicators related” to DNC hackers.
The email dated July 23, 2021 followed Durham dropping a second subpoena on Georgia Tech for more documents related to its investigation of the Alfa Bank hoax and other related issues. (More on that subpoena below). In that email, a lawyer representing David Dagon, the second Georgia Tech researcher involved in the Alfa Bank hoax who also worked on the DARPA Enhanced Attribution program, shared a list of “documents/data sources” Dagon believed would be responsive to the subpoena of Georgia Tech documents.
Listed under the heading of “DARPA whitepapers” were four documents, including “Whitepaper on DNC attack attribution”; Analysis of attacks of EOP (Executive Office of the President) networks”; “Whitepaper for DOJ on APT-29 related hackers, crypto coin transactions, and analysis that includes Yota-related domains”; and “‘Mueller List’—list of domains and indicator related to APT-28.”
Of these DARPA whitepapers, the first and fourth both relate to the DNC hack, with the final paper also connecting to the Mueller investigation. APT-28 is the more formal name for the Russian intelligence group of hackers known colloquially as Fancy Bear. As part of his investigation, Mueller charged 12 Russian intelligence agents allegedly working as Fancy Bear with crimes related to the DNC hack.
This email represents the latest evidence suggesting Georgia Tech and DARPA assisted in the DNC hack investigation and Mueller’s investigation, notwithstanding DARPA’s strident denials.” (Read more: The Federalist, 4/22/2022)(Archive)
The Coolidge Reagan Foundation logo. (Credit: public domain)
(…) After the Hillary for America and the DNC’s motions to intervene hit the Sussmann docket, The Coolidge Reagan Foundation penned a three-page letter to Durham and Assistant Special Counsel Jonathan Algor. That letter alerted the special counsel’s office to key facts about the FEC’s recent decision to fine the political groups in relation to a complaint the foundation had filed with the FEC. That complaint charged Hillary for America and the DNC with using the “law firm, Perkins Coie, to hire and funnel over $1 million to ‘outside research firms’ such as Fusion GPS ‘to perform potentially sensitive, controversial, or politically embarrassing’ opposition research into Donald Trump.”
The FEC complaint, filed in 2018, alleged that “the research was not ‘for the purpose of assisting Perkins Coie in providing legal advice,’” but to further the “political and campaign-related goals” of the organizations. The foundation also claimed in its FEC complaint that because the work was not “for the purpose of providing legal advice or assisting with impending or potential litigation, it was not covered by attorney-client, work-product, or other privileges.”
Significantly, as the foundation noted in its April 22, 2022 letter to the special counsel’s office, the FEC had “found probable cause to believe” the political organizations had misreported the purpose of certain disbursements. The FEC reached that conclusion based on a memorandum prepared by the FEC’s Office of General Counsel, but under controlling regulations that memorandum “will not be made public for another week,” the letter explained.
Foundation counsel Dan Backer added that while the memorandum is not yet public, the special counsel’s office would likely be able to obtain it directly from the FEC. That memorandum also will provide Durham’s team further details on the FEC’s investigation and fact-finding that may be useful to the special counsel in the Sussmann litigation, noted the letter.
In Friday’s letter, Backer also highlighted Hillary for America and the DNC’s commitment in their settlement agreement with the FEC to “not further contest the Commission’s finding of probable cause to believe” that the political organizations had “falsely reported their payments through Perkins Coie to Fusion GPS as being for legal services.” In contrast, in the Sussmann case, Hillary for America and the DNC “ are nevertheless asserting materials generated by Fusion GPS and provided to Perkins Coie are protected by attorney-client privilege and work-product doctrine,” the letter stressed.
“The Government should not permit HFA and the DNC to adopt conflicting positions in different proceedings, depending on the federal agency against which they are litigating,” the foundation’s letter concluded, suggesting the trial court may find those breaches of the settlement agreement “material in ruling on any privilege claims.” (Read more: The Federalist, 4/25/2022)(Archive)
Peter Fritsch (l) and Glenn Simpson, founders of Fusion GPS, join Meet The Press on November 24, 2019, for an exclusive interview to discuss their work on the Steele Dossier. (Credit: Meet the Press/YouTube)
“The FBI decision to spy on a former Trump campaign adviser hinged on an unsubstantiated rumor from a Clinton campaign-paid dossier that the Washington Post’s Moscow sources had quickly shot down as “bullshit” and “impossible,” according to emails disclosed last week to a D.C. court hearing the criminal case of a Clinton lawyer accused of lying to the FBI.
Though the FBI presumably had access to better sources than the newspaper, agents did little to verify the rumor that Trump foreign policy adviser Carter Page had secretly met with sanctioned Kremlin officials in Moscow. Instead, the bureau pounced on the dossier report the day it received it, immediately plugging the rumor into an application under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to wiretap Page as a suspected Russian agent.
The allegation, peddled to both the press and FBI in the summer of 2016 by Fusion GPS, an opposition research firm hired by Hillary Clinton’s campaign to dig up dirt on Trump during the presidential race, proved to be the linchpin in winning approval for the 2016 warrant, which was renewed three times in 2017 – even though the FBI learned there were serious holes in the story and had failed to independently corroborate it.
The revelations of early media skepticism about the Trump-Russia narrative before journalists embraced it are included in a 62-page batch of emails between Fusion and prominent Beltway reporters released by Special Counsel John Durham, who is scouring the FBI’s investigation of the Trump campaign for evidence of abuse and criminal wrongdoing.
The documents suggest that some journalists, as keen as they were to report dirt on Trump, were nevertheless more cautious than FBI investigators about embracing hearsay information served up by Clinton agents. (The FBI declined comment.) The new material also offers a look at the lengths to which those working on Clinton’s behalf went in order to seed the government with unverified rumors about Trump and Russia that amounted to a disinformation campaign. Among those targeted were powerful Democratic members of Congress, including House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, who proved to be a willing collaborator.
Trump as ‘Manchurian Candidate’
The story of high-level Kremlin meetings didn’t ring true with some in the press, who checked with sources in Moscow and pushed back on Fusion GPS. But journalists’ interest in the story remained high during the campaign.
In an interview, Page said he was flooded with calls during the summer of 2016 from Washington journalists, including veteran reporters from the Washington Post, the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. He said Fusion had misled them into believing they were working on the story of their lifetimes – that a real-life “Manchurian candidate,” or Russian sleeper agent, was running for president.
“Each news outlet kept calling me,” he said. “One by one.”
Page said he strenuously denied the accusations.
“It was B.S.,” he said. “I tried to warn them.”
“As eager as journalists may have been to make Trump appear to be a Kremlin operative, some were skeptical about what Fusion was telling them about Page. Among those were now former Wall Street Journal foreign affairs correspondent Jay Solomon, who used “Manchurian candidate” in a July 2016 email exchange with Fusion, expressing his doubt.
“Everyone wants shit on this,” insisted Fusion co-founder Peter Fritsch, a former Journal reporter himself, in an attempt to coax his old colleague Solomon into covering the story.
Fritsch then outlined the rumors Fusion had just received from Christopher Steele, a former British intelligence officer his firm had hired to help tie Trump to Russia as part of its contract with the Clinton campaign. Those rumors, contained in a series of memos known as the Steele dossier, were shared with the FBI, including “Intelligence Report 94” dated July 19, 2016. It claimed that during a July 2016 trip to Moscow, Page attended a “secret meeting” with Putin crony Igor Sechin to discuss lifting Ukraine-related sanctions against Russia. The dossier also alleged that Page met with Kremlin official Igor Divyekin to share compromising information about Clinton with the Trump campaign.
An ‘Easy Scoop,’ Said GPS
“The easy scoop waiting for confirmation: that dude carter page met with igor sechin when he went to moscow earlier this month,” Fritsch stated in a July 26, 2016, email pitching the story to Solomon. “sechin discussed energy deals and possible lifting of sanctions on himself et al. he also met with a senior kremlin official called divyekin, who told page they have good kompromat on hillary and offered to help. he also warned page they have good kompromat on the donald.” (“Kompromat” is compromising information typically used in blackmail.)
Rep. Adam Schiff: A Fusion GPS-recommended source for a skeptical journalist. (Credit: Scott Applewhite)
Added Fritsch, referring in part to the mass leak of Democratic emails by WikiLeaks before the 2016 Democratic National Convention in late July: “needless to say, a senior trump advisor meeting with a former kgb official close to putin, who is on a treasury sanctions list, days before the republican convention and a big russian-backed wikileak would be huge news.”
Indeed it would be – if it were true. “Thanks for this,” Solomon said. “Will run down.”
But later that day, Solomon reported back that “Page is neither confirming nor denying,” so Fritsch suggested he “call adam schiff or difi,” referring to the then-ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee and Sen. Dianne Feinstein, a top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee. It is not clear what information Fritsch expected the two Democrats to provide. (Schiff would later read the same raw dossier rumors about Page into the congressional record during a public hearing about Trump’s alleged Russian ties.)
Tom Hamburger (Credit: Twitter/@thamburger)
Three days later, Fusion’s attempts to plant their rumor in influential media outlets hit more resistance. Another Journal alumnus, Tom Hamburger, said he was “getting kick back” while trying to confirm the rumor for the Washington Post, where he worked on the paper’s national desk.
“That Page met with Sechin or Ivanov. ‘Its [sic] bullshit. Impossible,’ said one of our Moscow sources,” Hamburger reported back to Fusion co-founder Glenn Simpson, who also previously worked for the Journal. (The rumor included Sergei Ivanov, a top Putin aide.) The Post’s Moscow bureau chief at the time was David Filipov. Hamburger added that another reporter he knew “doesn’t like this story” and was passing on it.
“No worries, I don’t expect lots of people to believe it,” Simpson replied. “It is, indeed, hard to believe.”
As Fusion was pushing the rumors to reporters that July, its subcontractor Steele was pushing them to FBI agents, who received copies of his dossier earlier in the month. Steele also briefed a top Justice Department official, Bruce Ohr, on the Carter Page rumors on July 30 during a breakfast at the Mayflower Hotel in D.C., and asked Ohr to relay them to FBI brass. The next day, the FBI officially opened its Crossfire Hurricane investigation targeting Trump advisers – though the bureau says this decision was based on a tip it had received from an Australian diplomat.
For his part, Hamburger still pursued the story, asking for documents on Page later that month; and Fusion recycled the false rumor in an internal report, separate from the Steele dossier, which it emailed to Hamburger and another Post reporter in September.
President Obama’s appearance at the New Economic School in Moscow, 2009, brought none of the suspicions that Carter Page created years later. (Credit: Euractiv/YouTube)
The report, which Fritsch claimed that “one of our [research] associates wrote,” went beyond even the dossier. It asserted that Page’s July 8 speech at the New Economic School in Moscow (where President Obama had also once spoken) was “concocted to give Page a public explanation for his trip to Moscow, which sources say included secret meetings with top Kremlin officials, where the American presidential campaign and U.S. sanctions against Russia were both discussed.”
Fritsch did not say who the Fusion “sources” were. But around the same time, he and Simpson brought Steele to Washington to brief journalists from the Post, the New York Times, CNN, and Yahoo News on Page in a private room at the Tabard Inn, a hotel-bar long a favorite of Washington scribes.
Glen Caplin (Credit: Twitter)
Fusion had finally found a media outlet to take the bait it had been chumming out to reporters for months. After meeting with Steele for about an hour, Yahoo News’ Michael Isikoff ran with the rumors in a September 23 online article, which the FBI then used to corroborate the dossier in its initial October 2016 FISA application, even though the supposed corroboration was redundant: Steele and his dossier were Isikoff’s source for the story. (Isikoff, who did not respond to requests for comment, would later write in a 2018 book he co-authored, “Russian Roulette,” that the rumors about Page were just “pillow talk.”)
The Clinton campaign jumped on what it called Isikoff’s “bombshell report” and heavily promoted it on social media. Clinton campaign official Glen Caplin issued a statement republishing the Yahoo piece in full and proclaiming: “It’s chilling to learn that U.S. intelligence officials are conducting a probe into suspected meetings between Trump’s foreign policy adviser Carter Page and members of Putin’s inner circle while in Moscow … [T]his report suggests Page met with a sanctioned top Russian official to discuss the possibility of ending U.S. sanctions against Russia under a Trump presidency – an action that could directly enrich both Trump and Page while undermining American interests.”
Added Caplin: “This is serious business and voters deserve the facts before election day.”
But the media never reported the real facts behind the story – that it was all based on Clinton campaign opposition research – which allowed the rumors to survive without any real scrutiny for years.
Sergei Millian: He wasn’t the source of the Trump sex-tape story, and the Washington Post had to retract. (Credit: Twitter)
The Washington Post eventually stopped paying attention to the red flags surrounding the dossier. The newspaper seized on other rumors Fusion fed reporters from the Clinton-paid document.
Hamburger, for one, later bit on a tip that the source for the most explosive allegations in the dossier was a Trump supporter with Kremlin ties. He reported in 2017 that Sergei Millian was behind the claim that Russian President Vladimir Putin had compromising sex tapes of Trump and that he and Trump were engaged in a “well-developed conspiracy” to steal the 2016 election.
However, the Post had to retract his stories after Special Counsel John Durham last year disclosed that Millian was fabricated as a source. The prosecutor indicted Steele’s “primary subsource,” Igor Danchenko, for lying to the FBI when he told agents that Millian was a source for the dossier. Millian had nothing to do with the dossier, as RCIreported. Danchenko, who awaits trial, apparently made it all up.
Hamburger did not respond to repeated requests for comment.
‘Pushed It Over’ the Line
Carter Page, who is suing the former corporate parent of Yahoo News for defamation, suggested anti-Trump bias blinded the media to glaring problems with the dossier. But even more alarming, he said, is how FBI leaders, whose text messages reveal that they shared the media’s hatred for Trump, were even more reckless in gunning for him. Page said it’s outrageous that, at least initially, the press seemed to have “higher ethical standards” than FBI headquarters.
On Sept. 19, 2016, the FBI’s Crossfire Hurricane team formally received Steele’s dossier Report 94 alleging Page’s secret Kremlin meetings, according to Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz, who detailed the FBI’s handling of the rumors in a 2019report. That same day, the team began discussions with department lawyers “to consider Steele’s reporting as part of a FISA application targeting Carter Page.”
Brian Auten, FBI supervisor: The Steele dossier’s bogus “Report 94,” alleging secret Page-Russia meetings, helped make the case for spying on him. (Credit: Twitter)
In an email to attorneys, FBI Supervisory Intelligence Analyst Brian Auten forwarded an excerpt from Steele’s report and asked, “Does this put us at least *that* much closer to a full FISA on [Carter Page]?” The FBI agent handling the case said the rumors from Steele “supplied missing information in terms of what Page may have been doing during his July 2016 visit to Moscow.”
The attorneys thought it was a “close call” when they first discussed a FISA targeting Page in early August, Horowitz relayed in his report, but the Steele reporting in September “pushed it over” the line in terms of establishing probable cause.
In the run-up to the FBI securing approval for the FISA request in late October 2016, the bureau tasked an undercover informant, Stefan Halper, to question Page about the alleged meetings with Kremlin officials. Halper struck out. In a conversation Halper recorded surreptitiously, Page not only denied huddling with Sechin and Divyekin but said he had never even heard of Divyekin. The FBI decided not to include these inconvenient facts in its FISA warrant application, an omission the Justice Department’s inspector general found striking.
“The application did not contain these denials even though the application relied upon the allegations in Report 94 that Page had secret meetings with both Sechin and Divyekin,” the Horowitz report noted.
It wasn’t the only exculpatory evidence the FBI left out of its FISA applications. It also omitted information it possessed showing that Page, who had once worked in Moscow as a Merrill Lynch investment banker, had earlier assisted the FBI in catching a Russian spy, as RealClearInvestigations first reported. The former Navy lieutenant also previously helped the CIA monitor Russia, something an FBI attorney deliberately hid from the FISA court. (The lawyer, Kevin Clinesmith, was recently convicted of charges related to his doctoring of a government email documenting Page’s role as a CIA source.)
In early 2017, as the FBI was preparing to reapply for wiretaps on Page, Steele’s primary subsource Danchenko told Auten and other FBI officials that he had made it clear to Steele that he had only heard a rumor that such clandestine meetings might take place but not that they actually occurred as Steele wrote in his dossier. The FBI nonetheless omitted from subsequent FISA renewal applications the revelation of Danchenko backing away from the critical piece of information supporting probable cause and admitting it was merely hearsay.
In the end, “The FBI was unable to determine whether a meeting between Sechin and Page took place,” Horowitz wrote in his report.
Page said it’s “chilling” that the nation’s most powerful police force could act so cavalierly, disregarding basic investigative procedures like verifying tips and rumors before obtaining wiretaps on a U.S. citizen.
Worse, he said, is how the FBI misled the secret FISA court. In a 2020 review of the applications, the powerful court determined that at least two of the surveillance warrants were invalid and therefore illegal. Page is now suing both the FBI and Justice Department for $75 million for violating his constitutional rights. (RealClearInvestigations, 5/4/2022)(Archive)
This and all other original articles created by RealClearInvestigations may be republished for free with attribution. (These terms do not apply to outside articles linked on the site.)
“Special Counsel John Durham just filed this motion in response to the efforts of Hillary for America, Fusion GPS, et al. to keep secret (by use of the attorney-client and work product privileges) communications involving Fusion GPS. You can read it here.
Durham states the “purported privilege holders who have intervened do so in a case in which the defendant has denied representing any client when he brought the Russian Bank-1 allegations to the FBI.” The privilege controversy thus entraps Sussmann to a certain extent, seemingly precluding his denial that he was working on behalf of a client. Brilliant.
Additionally, Durham casts doubt on the declaration of Marc Elias that Fusion GPS was retained to provide “legal advice.” Here he makes a key point:
”…if rendering such advice was truly the intended purpose of Fusion GPS’s retention, one would also expect the investigative firm to seek permission and/or guidance from [Hillary for America] or its counsel before sharing such derogatory materials with the media or otherwise placing them into the public domain.”
(Credit: New York Post)
In support of that point, Durham states he is in possession of “hundreds of emails in which Fusion GPS employees shared raw, unverified, and uncorroborated information – including their own draft research and work product – with reporters.” (He even filed them under seal with the court.) These include:
Emails with Slate’s Franklin Foer from May 14, 2016 in which Fusion GPS conveys information on a Trump advisor and Alfa Bank.
July 26, 2016 e-mails from Fusion GPS to the Wall Street Journal communicating allegations from Christopher Steele stating “a Trump advisor meeting with a former KGB official close to Putin … would be huge news.”
July 29 and July 31, 2016 emails with a reporter (Washington Post’s Tom Hamburger) concerning Carter Page’s investments and meetings with Russians – of which the reporter said “Its bullshit.”
July 27, 2016 e-mails between an ABC News reporter (Matthew Mosk) and Fusion GPS concerning Sergei Millian. Fusion GPS responded with a “comprehensive report” regarding Millian.
Fusion GPS communications with NY Times reporters pushing more dirt on Millian.
This e-mail from a Fusion GPS co-founder to the New York Times – dated October 31, 2016 – pushing the Alfa Bank allegations and stating the US Government is investigating. (Timeline editor’s note: this date is also the first time Hillary and Podesta tweet about Trump Russia collusion.)
Here are e-mails between Franklin Foer and Fusion GPS, in which they discuss going after Carter Page in May 2016.
As Durham makes clear, no lawyers are copied in these e-mails and this doesn’t have anything to do with legal advice. And even if there were some type of privilege or work product, it was waived when Fusion GPS distributed the info to the press.” (Read more: Techno Fog/Substack, 4/25/2022)(Archive)
(…) And here is Fusion GPS telling a WSJ reporter to call Adam Schiff or Diane Feinstein about Carter Page. This is solid evidence that Fusion GPS, by July 26, 2016, had briefed Schiff and Feinstein (and their staffers – including Daniel Jones, a person of interest in the Durham investigation) about their Trump/Russia “research.” (Techno Fog, 4/25/2022)(Archive)
(…) The Fusion GPS witness who will testify is the “tech maven” referenced in their e-mails with the New York Times. This appears to be confirmation that Laura Seago will be the Fusion GPS employee to testify.
Here’s more on the Fusion Witness and her knowledge of what went down leading up to the 2016 election:
(…) The Sussmann indictment mentions “non-public Internet data” that was exploited by Joffe, et al, for the purposes of their political hit-job. This information was provided to Georgia Tech as part of a prospective contract with DARPA to “identify the perpetrators of malicious cyber-attacks and protect U.S. national security.” (More details here.) After the indictment, it was revealed that Durham’s team has interviewed former DARPA employees.
Based on this information, we hinted that “there might be charges relating to the misuse of classified government data from DARPA.”
We now have confirmation that this contract included classified information.
Take a look at this e-mail (obtained by Twitter sleuth UndeadFOIA) where Andrew DeFilippis, who is part of Special Counsel Durham’s team, states that “DARPA has no objections to Georgia Tech’s provision of any records or information (both classified and unclassified) to our team and to the grand jury.”
Evelyn Farkas was forced to admit under oath before Congress that despite what she claimed on MSNBC, she never had evidence of Trump-Russia collusion. (Credit: MSNBC)
“The McCain Institute at Arizona State University (ASU) and ASU President Michael M. Crow are proud to announce Dr. Evelyn Farkas has been named the McCain Institute’s new executive director. Dr. Farkas will begin her new position at the Washington, D.C.-based McCain Institute on May 2, 2022.
“I am humbled and grateful to ASU and to the McCain Institute Board of Trustees for this opportunity. American leadership and a commitment to furthering human rights and democracy in the spirit of Senator John McCain is needed now more than ever, and I am excited to get to work alongside the McCain Institute’s talented and determined staff,” said Dr. Evelyn Farkas. “This is a critical time in our country’s history that calls on us to be unequivocal about the differences between democracy and autocracy. I look forward to helping advance character-driven leadership around the world.”
Dr. Farkas brings decades of American foreign policymaking to the McCain Institute. A member of the Council on Foreign Relations, she previously served as deputy assistant secretary of defense for Russia, Ukraine and Eurasia, and executive director of the congressional Commission on the Prevention of WMD Proliferation and Terrorism, among many other senior national security positions in the U.S. government.
“We’re proud to welcome Evelyn Farkas to the McCain Institute and to Arizona State University,” said ASU President Michael M. Crow. “Her area of expertise could not be more appropriate for this moment in time and the possibilities for this new chapter of the McCain Institute at ASU are truly exciting.” (Read more: The McCain Institute, 4/26/2022)(Archive)
( ) …there was a pre-trial hearing in the Michael Sussmann case relating to various evidentiary issues. For the uninitiated, Sussmann a former Perkins Coie partner, and former attorney for the DNC/Clinton Campaign (and Rodney Joffe), has been charged by Special Counsel John Durham with providing false statements to then-FBI General Counsel James Baker in the fall of 2016. Here is more background on his indictment.
We have the full transcript of yesterday’s hearing. Here are some of the most notable disclosures:
More info on the investigation into Rodney Joffe.
(…) Rodney Joffe’s exposure and 18 U.S.C. 1031. The Special Counsel was understandably hesitant to get too deep into what they have on Rodney Joffe. However, when Sussmann’s attorneys brought up the fact that Joffe couldn’t be charged due to the 5-year statute of limitations, the Special Counsel responded that “certain statutes of limitations are longer than five years.”
The court asked for an example, and the Special Counsel referenced 18 U.S.C. 1031, “which involves defrauding the government in connection with procurement and contract matters.” This has to do with the Georgia Tech/DARPA contract. In the Special Counsel’s own words:
Laura Seago from Fusion GPS will (likely) testify at trial. We previously reported that Seago was identified as the “tech maven” the government expected to call at trial. At this hearing was the first time we saw Seago’s name explicitly mentioned as the Fusion GPS witness.
Christopher Steele will not be a witness. Sussmann’s lawyer informed the court that the Special Counsel stated on April 26 that Steele is “out of the country and isn’t likely to be a witness.”
In fact, Steele is not cooperating with the Special Counsel.
Finally, this statement from the Special Counsel relating to how “the VIPs, meaning Perkins Coie and the [Clinton] campaign” wanted the “Internet data” to be pulled for purposes of digging up information to damage Trump.
EU’s Internal Market Commissioner Thierry Breton and Elon Musk (Credit: Zero Hedge)
“We have been discussing how Democratic leaders like Hillary Clinton called on foreign companies to pass censorship laws to prevent Elon Musk from restoring free speech protections on Twitter. The EU has responded aggressively to warn Musk not to allow greater free speech or face crippling fines and even potential criminal enforcement. After years of using censorship by surrogates in social media companies, Democratic leaders seem to have rediscovered good old-fashioned state censorship.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D., Mass.) declared Musk’s pledge to restore free speech values on social media as threatening Democracy itself. She has promised that “there are going to be rules” to block such changes. She is not alone. Former President Obama has declared “regulation has to be part of the answer” to disinformation.
For her part, Hillary Clinton is looking to Europe to fill the vacuum and called upon her European counterparts to pass a massive censorship law to “bolster global democracy before it’s too late.”
(…) EU censors have assured Democratic leaders that they will not allow free speech to break out on Twitter regardless of the wishes of its owner and customers.
One of the most anti-free speech figures in the West, EU’s Internal Market Commissioner Thierry Breton has been raising the alarm that Twitter users might be able to read uncensored material or hear unauthorized views.
Breton himself threatened that Twitter must “fly by [the European Union’s] rules” in censoring views deemed misleading or harmful by EU bureaucrats. Breton has been moving publicly to warn Musk not to try to reintroduce protections that go beyond the tolerance of the EU for free speech. Musk is planning to meet with the EU censors and has conceded that he may not be able resist such mandatory censorship rules.
April 2022 – (…) As is often the case, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton stripped away any niceties or nuance. Clinton called for the European Union to pass the Digital Services Act (DSA), a measure widely denounced by free speech advocates as a massive censorship measure. Clinton warned that governments need to act now because “for too long, tech platforms have amplified disinformation and extremism with no accountability. The EU is poised to do something about it.”
Clinton’s call for censoring disinformation was breathtakingly hypocritical. President Obama was briefed by his CIA Director John Brennan on “alleged approval by Hillary Clinton on July 26, 2016, of a proposal from one of her foreign policy advisors to vilify Donald Trump by stirring up a scandal claiming interference by Russian security services.” The intelligence suggested it was “a means of distracting the public from her use of a private email server.”
Given that history, it would be easy to dismiss Clinton’s calls as almost comically self-serving. However, the 27-nation EU just did what she demanded. It gave preliminary approval to the act, which would subject companies to censorship standards at the risk of punitive financial or even criminal measures.
If implemented, it might not matter if Musk seeks to restore free speech values at Twitter. Figures like Clinton are now going to the EU to effectively force companies to continue to censor users.
Faced with liability across Europe, the companies could be forced to base their policies on the lowest common denominator for free speech.
Countries like Germany and France have spent decades criminalizing speech and imposing speech controls on their populations. That is why the premise of the DSA is so menacing.
European Commission Executive Vice President Margrethe Vestager was ecstatic in declaring that it is “not a slogan anymore, that what is illegal offline should also be seen and dealt with as illegal online. Now it is a real thing. Democracy’s back.”
“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.”
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/0ClLdqncB8pic.twitter.com/JtFrb4mecG
“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
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
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
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.’”
“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.
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:
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.
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)
“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
Timecodes: 00:00:00 – Intro 00:01:25 – Durham & Sussmann Clip 00:02:00 – PM Transcript from yesterday 00:06:40 – Mindmap Update 00:12:03 – Court Transcript (Sussmann Trial Day 2) 00:13:01 – Preliminary Discussions 00:26:33 – Judge Intro 00:30:02 – Government Prosecutor’s Opening Argument 00:57:22 – Defense Team’s Opening Argument 01:25:33 – Witnesses on Mindmap 01:26:40 – Witness 1: David Martin (FBI Special Agent) 01:43:57 – Witness 2: Scott Hellman (FBI Special Agent) 02:11:08 – Quick Recap & Conclusion #Durham#Sussmann#HillaryClinton
“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.
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…
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.
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
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
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
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
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.
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
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 beforeSummer 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.
“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.
On a cross-examination, Sussmann’s lawyers noted that it was Gaynor alone claiming the investigation was “close-hold,” suggesting it was he himself who was withholding Sussmann’s identity from the field agents.
Gaynor responded by saying he thought the field agents would be biased against Sussmann if he disclosed to them his DNC ties.
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
“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)
“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.
(…) 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.
“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.
(…) 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.
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)
“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.
“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. Askwhether 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
“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)
(…) 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.”
“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:
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.”
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.”
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.
“Two months before his Florida home was raided by the FBI, former President Donald Trump secretly received a grand jury subpoena for classified documents belonging to the National Archives, and voluntarily cooperated by turning over responsive evidence, surrendering security surveillance footage and allowing federal agents and a senior Justice Department lawyer to tour his private storage locker, according to a half dozen people familiar with the incident.
Assistant Attorney General for DOJ National Security Division Matthew Olsen, seen from a video monitor before a Senate Judiciary Committee virtual hearing on domestic terrorism, Jan. 11, 2022. (Credit: VOA)
While the cooperation was mostly arranged by his lawyers, Trump personally surprised the DOJ National Security Division prosecutor and three FBI agents who came to his Mar-a-Lago compound on June 3, greeting them as they came to pick up a small number of documents compliant with the subpoena, the sources told Just the News, speaking only on condition of anonymity because the visit was covered by grand jury secrecy.
The subpoena requested any remaining documents Trump possessed with any classification markings, even if they involved photos of foreign leaders, correspondence or mementos from his presidency.
Secret Service agents were also present and facilitated the visit, officials said.
Trump signaled his full cooperation, telling the agents and prosecutor, “Look, whatever you need let us know,” according to two eyewitnesses. The federal team was surprised by the president’s invitation and asked for an immediate favor: to see the 6-foot-by-10-foot storage locker where his clothes, shoes, documents and mementos from his presidency were stored at the compound.
Given Trump’s instruction, the president’s lawyers complied and allowed the search by the FBI before the entourage left cordially. Five days later, DOJ officials sent a letter to Trump’s lawyers asking them to secure the storage locker with more than the lock they had seen. The Secret Service installed a more robust security lock to comply.
Around the same time, the Trump Organization, which owns Mar-a-Lago, received a request for surveillance video footage covering the locker and volunteered the footage to federal authorities, sources disclosed.
The disclosure Wednesday to Just the News raised immediate new questions in legal and congressional circles about the necessity for the subsequent raid, including whether the judge who approved the warrant knew of the earlier cooperation.” (Read more: Just The News, 8/11/2022)(Archive)
“Multiple former FBI officials are coming forward with information suggesting the bureau is “purging” employees with conservative viewpoints, according to House Judiciary Committee Republicans.
Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH), the ranking member of the panel, sent a letter to Director Christopher Wray on Tuesday outlining new allegations that relate to the Jan. 6 Capitol riot.
“In one such example, the FBI targeted and suspended the security clearance of a retired war servicemember who had disclosed personal views that the FBI was not being entirely forthcoming about the events of January 6. The FBI questioned the whistleblower’s allegiance to the United States despite the fact that the whistleblower honorably served in the United States military for several years — including deployments in Kuwait and Iraq — valiantly earning multiple military commendation medals,” a press release for the letter states.
“In addition, another whistleblower, who has since left the FBI, has informed us that faced retaliation for criticizing the FBI in an anonymous survey circulated by the [REDACTED] to employees following January 6. The FBI allegedly escalated an adverse personnel action against this employee after [REDACTED] commented on the survey, which sought feedback about the [REDACTED] actions ‘during the recent crisis/command post’ event. The employee, too, was never disciplined or reprimanded until after [REDACTED] criticized the FBI,” the letter reads.
The names of the former officials do not appear, as the letter features several redactions, but Jordan stressed multiple “whistleblowers have called it a ‘purge’ of FBI employees holding conservative views.” He reminded Wray that “whistleblower disclosures to Congress are protected by law and that we will not tolerate any effort to retaliate against whistleblowers for their disclosures.”
Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler (D-NY) and Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz were sent a copy.
Jordan also said a prior letter, sent May 6, details allegations of the FBI suspending the security clearances of bureau employees for their participation in protected First Amendment activity, and he claimed the FBI failed to respond or provide a requested briefing. (Read more: Washington Examiner, 6/07/2022)(Archive)
The Department of Justice (DOJ) intervened on behalf of Delaware U.S. Attorney David Weiss to respond to congressional inquiries related to its probe into the Biden family business, emails unearthed from a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit show.
The collaboration raises questions about if Weiss’ responses to congressional investigators were under the direction of the DOJ and if Weiss and the DOJ colluded to mislead Congress.
Did the DOJ’s Office of Legislative Affairs respond to Sens. Chuck Grassley and Ron Johnson’s May 9, 2022, letter seeking information concerning the Hunter Biden investigation? Weiss posed that question to one of his lead assistant U.S. attorneys, Shannon Hanson.
“Not to my knowledge,” Hanson replied, followed soon after with a second email noting that Joe Gaeta, the then-deputy assistant attorney general in the Office of Legislative Affairs, was working on a response. And although Grassley and Johnson had addressed their May 9, 2022, inquiry solely to Weiss, DOJ’s Office of Legislative Affairs would intercede on his behalf, responding in a letter dated June 9, 2022, that the DOJ would not respond to the questions posed.
The following month, Grassley and Johnson dispatched another letter requesting information related to the Hunter Biden investigation, addressing this letter to Weiss, as well as Attorney General Merrick Garland and FBI Director Christopher Wray. Again, the Office of Legal Counsel intervened, telling Weiss’s office in an email reviewed by The Federalist that it would “take the lead on drafting a response” to Grassley and Johnson’s letter.
CNN’s “The Lead” interviews CNN Senior Legal Analyst Elie Honig. (Credit: video clipping/Breitbart)
“It is standard procedure for congressional inquiries to be routed through the agency’s legislative affairs shop,” Kash Patel, a former federal public defender and House Intelligence Committee aide, told Breitbart News.
“What is not standard,” Patel continued, is for the DOJ to create “conspiratorial schemes concocted to subvert valid constitutional oversight and stonewall documentation production.”
“It also shows how Republicans allow themselves to be dominated by DOJ’s criminal conduct by flailing about with another strongly worded letter,” Patel added. “Impeach them for breaking the law, or stop complaining when you get punched in the face.”
Weiss told House investigators on June 7 that he had “ultimate authority” in whether to charge Hunter Biden with potential wrongdoing.
However, FOIA emails show that while Attorney General Merrick Garland claimed Weiss was the sole authority to bring charges against Hunter Biden, Garland was also controlling the flow of responses back to House investigators. (Read more: Breitbart, 8/28/2023)(Archive)
General John Allen commanded forces in Afghanistan from 2011 to 2013. (Credit: Michael Reynolds/EPA)
“General John R. Allen has stepped down as president of the Brookings Institution after he was accused of lying and obstructing an FBI probe connected to an illegal lobbying campaign for Qatar.
The retired four-star Marine, who became Brookings president in 2017, said in his resignation letter that he leaves the research institute with a “heavy heart,” according to Responsible Statecraft.
“I know it is best for all concerned in this moment,” he said in his resignation letter that was obtained and posted by the online magazine of the Quincy Institute, which advocates for diplomacy and military restraint.
Previously, a Treasury spokesperson said the department provides SARs “in a manner that enables robust oversight.” @CBS_News asked Treasury to respond to republican allegations it is continuing to “thwart congressional oversight.”
Clipping from Congressman James Comer’s letter to Janet Yellen.
“Kentucky congressman James Comer (R) joined “Fox & Friends First” Thursday to address his efforts to obtain suspicious foreign business transactions on Hunter Biden and slams the White House and Democrats for refusing to release the information.
JAMES COMER: To put this into perspective, a suspicious activity report was put into place when George Bush was president after September 11th to try to catch money laundering into terrorist cells in the United States. A suspicious activity report is a very serious banking violation. Hunter Biden and Joe Biden’s brother, Jim, have had over 150 suspicious activity reports when Bush was president and through Obama, Clinton, Bush, any member of Congress could request from Treasury a list of suspicious activity reports in their congressional districts and in their states. When Joe Biden became president and this is before it became public knowledge that Hunter had these suspicious activity reports, he, in the dark of night, changed it to where Congress could no longer access that from Treasury. Now, we have formally requested the suspicious activity report on Hunter Biden and the White House will not allow us to have it unless the Democrats sign on to the request.
“A top FBI official repeatedly violated bureau policy by hobnobbing with journalists while overseeing the controversial investigation into Donald Trump’s suspected ties to Russia — and then retired before he could be interviewed by ethics probers, a newly released Justice Department report revealed.
Michael Steinbach “had numerous unauthorized contacts with the media” that began when he was the bureau’s assistant counterterrorism director and continued after he was named executive assistant director of its National Security Bureau in February 2016, according to the heavily redacted DOJ Inspector General report obtained by The Post through a freedom of information act request.
The “hundreds of contacts” included “soliciting” an unidentified reporter for a $300 ticket to the 2016 White House Correspondents’ Association gala after earlier getting invited by a different reporter to the 2015 Radio and Television Correspondents’ Association dinner.
“Lots of [redacted] reporters here. May have to branch out!” Steinbach wrote to the unidentified reporter in a text message on the night of the 2015 dinner.
“Absolutely not!!! But curious to know who you’ve met so far?” the reporter responded, adding: “well they will never be as good as me! and don’t you get the big head! ;)”
“But they are promising the WH Correspondents dinner,” Steinbach responded.
The following year, Steinbach attended the White House Correspondents’ dinner and a reception party as a guest of a reporter — and boasted about it in a text to an unidentified CNN reporter.
“I put you on the map and now you’re cheating on me with [redacted],” the CNN reporter wrote in a text message to Steinbach.
“I kept waiting for my invite from you,” Steinbach responded.
After the $300-a-ticket event, Steinbach sent an email to a reporter with the subject “Great Night” that included a photo of an unidentified person standing with the journalist in front of the White House Correspondents’ Association banner.
“Thanks for hanging out with us last night [redacted] and I had a great time. And also thank you for giving us a lift. That was nice. I know it has been [sic] very busy year but when it slows down and as the weather gets nicer, we would love to grab [sic] or drinks with you and [redacted] either in the city somewhere or at our house,” the email read, in part.
In addition to the dinners, Steinbach had numerous lunches with journalists in Washington from 2014 to 2017, including at restaurants Asia Nine, Del Frisco’s Double Eagle Steakhouse, Elephant & Castle and Oyamel Cocina Mexicana.
“The OIG notes that it was unable to determine who paid for the drinks or meals during these social engagements,” the report states.
(…) The report notes the watchdog concluded that Steinbach violated federal regulations and FBI protocol and its findings would be delivered to the FBI.
“It seems like every few weeks we’re reminded of why Twitter, Facebook, Democrats and the media worked so hard to keep the Hunter Biden laptop out of the news before the 2020 election.
The latest example is an audio file that’s rather revealing.
Hunter Biden recorded himself boasting that his father will adopt political positions at his command, footage obtained from a copy of his abandoned laptop shows.
“He’ll talk about anything that I want him to, that he believes in,” Biden said in reference to his father, Joe Biden, in the Dec. 3, 2018, recording. “If I say it’s important to me, then he will work a way in which to make it a part of his platform. My dad respects me more than he respects anyone in the world, and I know that to be certain, so it’s not going to be about whether it affects his politics.”
“All those fears you think that I have of people not liking me or that I don’t love myself … I don’t fear that. You know why I don’t fear that? Because the man I most admire in the world, that god to me, thinks I’m a god,” Hunter Biden added in the 77-minute recording, which was taped about five months before Joe Biden launched his successful 2020 presidential campaign in late April 2019. “And my brother did, too. And the three of us, it was literally — I had the support to know I can do anything.”
The president’s son even mused about his cocaine addiction:
The conversation was taped at a house in Plum Island, Massachusetts, amid the throes of Hunter Biden’s addiction to crack cocaine.
“Have you ever thought about this: Maybe this is the greatest thing that f***ing ever happened to me,” Hunter Biden mused to Horan about his addiction to the Schedule II narcotic. “Maybe this is literally the continuation and the continuum of what is going to be the thing that makes me the person that my father believes I am.”
LISTEN: Hunter Biden says his father, Joe, will “talk about anything that I want him to”
“If I say it’s important to me, then he will work a way in which to make it a part of his platform” pic.twitter.com/2ZyKVCnvYq
Source video: President Donald J. Trump delivers remarks in Nashville, Tennessee, on Friday, June 17, 2022. He comments about the ongoing RICO lawsuit filed against Hillary Clinton and others.
“Twice-failed presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton on Friday said Trump supporters are a “clear and present danger to American democracy.” Clinton responded to a judge who lashed out at Trump supporters during Thursday’s January 6 show trial.
“Donald Trump and his allies and supporters are a clear and present danger to American democracy,” former circuit judge (George H. W. Bush appointee) Michael Luttig said to the J-6 panel. WATCH:
Conservative Judge Michael Luttig:
“Donald Trump and his allies and supporters are a clear and present danger to American democracy.” pic.twitter.com/xSs6JMxvIR
Hillary Clinton agreed with the former federal judge. Hillary Clinton went from calling Trump supporters a “basket of deplorables” to a “clear and present danger” in a matter of just a few years. “Louder, for those in the back: Donald Trump, his allies, and supporters are a clear and present danger to American democracy.” Hillary Clinton said in a tweet on Friday.
Louder, for those in the back:
Donald Trump, his allies, and supporters are a clear and present danger to American democracy. https://t.co/Q8mmCQM45C
(…) Judge Luttig never notes that the president specifically said to the crowd to go and “peacefully and patriotically make your voices heard.”
In fact, not only did that part of the president’s speech not make Judge Luttig’s statement, it was, as Ohio’s Republican Congressman Jim Jordan has noted, also edited out of the committee’s video of that event. Imagine that. (The American Spectator, 6/16/2022)
Clipping of a New York Times article published May 29, 2016.
(…) In an interview with the Financial Times (paywall), Clinton was asked if she has considered another possible run for president in 2024, to which she shut down saying, “out of the question,” adding “first of all, I expect Biden to run. He certainly intends to run. It would be very disruptive to challenge that.”
(…) Clinton continued to say she believes President Trump will run again, claiming only if he thought it would benefit him financially.
Describing herself as the “most investigated innocent person in America,” Clinton portrayed herself as a victim, calling out Republicans for painting her as a “murderer or a child trafficker.”
Clinton called the thought of a Republican president “frightening,” adding “we are standing on the precipice of losing our democracy, and everything that everybody else cares about then goes out the window.” (Read more: Town Hall, 6/18/2022)(Archive)
Trump and Clinton during a 2016 election debate. (Credit: Rick Wilking/Reuters)
(…) On June 21, 2022, Trump filed an amended RICO suit against Clinton and a large number of other DNC-related individuals who were involved in the RussiaGate hoax.
The new suit, at 193 pages in length, was significantly more robust and detailed than Trump’s original March 24RICO suit and included additional defendants. On the very same day, Kash Patel, a former Trump administration official who’s worked diligently to get Trump’s declassified documents released, announced on a podcast that he was officially a representative for Trump at the National Archives. Patel said it was his intention to “identify every single document that they blocked from being declassified.” Patel stated that he “would start putting that information out next week.”
[A sample of the many appearances Patel has made about the declassified documents.]
The following day, June 22, Magistrate Bruce Reinhart suddenly recused himself from Trump’s suit against Clinton & Company. Just 44 days later, after his unexpected recusal from Trump’s RICO case against Clinton, Reinhart personally signed the search warrant to raid Mar-a-Lago. (Read more: The Epoch Times, 8/19/2022)(Archive)
Twitter has been on a recruitment drive of late, hiring a host of former feds and spies. Studying a number of employment and recruitment websites, MintPress has ascertained that the social media giant has, in recent years, recruited dozens of individuals from the national security state to work in the fields of security, trust, safety, and content.
Chief amongst these is the Federal Bureau of Investigations. The FBI is generally known as a domestic security and intelligence force. However, it has recently expanded its remit into cyberspace. “The FBI’s investigative authority is the broadest of all federal law enforcement agencies,” the “About” section of its website informs readers. “The FBI has divided its investigations into a number of programs, such as domestic and international terrorism, foreign counterintelligence [and] cyber crime,” it adds.
For example, in 2019, Dawn Burton (the former director of Washington operations for Lockheed Martin) was poached from her job as senior innovation advisor to the director at the FBI to become senior director of strategy and operations for legal, public policy, trust and safety at Twitter. The following year, Karen Walsh went straight from 21 years at the bureau to become director of corporate resilience at the silicon valley giant. Twitter’s deputy general counsel and vice president of legal, Jim Baker, also spent four years at the FBI between 2014 and 2018, where his resumé notes he rose to the role of senior strategic advisor.
Mark Jaroszewski (Credit: FBI Event Flyer, May 2018)
Meanwhile, Mark Jaroszewski ended his 21-year posting as a supervisory special agent in the Bay Area to take up a position at Twitter, rising to become director of corporate security and risk. And Douglas Turner spent 14 years as a senior special agent and SWAT Team leader before being recruited to serve in Twitter’s corporate and executive security services. Previously, Turner had also spent seven years as a secret service special agent with the Department of Homeland Security.
When asked to comment by MintPress, former FBI agent and whistleblower Coleen Rowley said that she was “not surprised at all” to see FBI agents now working for the very tech companies the agency polices, stating that there now exists a “revolving door” between the FBI and the areas they are trying to regulate. This created a serious conflict of interests in her mind, as many agents have one eye on post-retirement jobs. “The truth is that at the FBI 50% of all the normal conversations that people had were about how you were going to make money after retirement,” she said.
Many former FBI officials hold influential roles within Twitter. For instance, in 2020, Matthew W. left a 15-year career as an intelligence program manager at the FBI to take up the post of senior director of product trust at Twitter. Patrick G., a 23-year FBI supervisory special agent, is now head of corporate security. And Twitter’s director of insider risk and security investigations, Bruce A., was headhunted from his role as a supervisory special agent at the bureau. His resumé notes that at the FBI he held “[v]arious intelligence and law enforcement roles in the US, Africa, Europe, and the Middle East” and was a “human intelligence and counterintelligence regional specialist.” (On employment sites such as LinkedIn, many users choose not to reveal their full names.)
Meanwhile, between 2007 and 2021Jeff Carlton built up a distinguished career in the United States Marine Corps, rising to become a senior intelligence analyst. Between 2014 and 2017, his LinkedIn profile notes, he worked for both the CIA and FBI, authored dozens of official reports, some of which were read by President Barack Obama. Carlton describes his role as a “problem-solver” and claims to have worked in many “dynamic, high-pressure environments” such as Iraq and Korea. In May 2021, he left official service to become a senior program manager at Twitter, responsible for dealing with the company’s “highest-profile trust and safety escalations.”
Head of Twitter’s Strategic Response Team, Jeff Carlton, who worked for CIA & FBI, deleted his LinkedIn quickly in response to #TwitterFiles. Before deleting, he changed his name to an alias to make him harder to find.
Other former FBI staff are employed by Twitter, such as Cherrelle Y. as a policy domain specialist and Laura D. as a senior analyst in global risk intelligence.
Many of those listed above were active in the FBI’s public outreach programs, a practice sold as a community trust-building initiative. According to Rowley, however, these also function as “ways for officials to meet the important people that would give them jobs after retirement.” “It basically inserts a huge conflict of interest,” she told MintPress. “It warps and perverts the criminal investigative work that agents do when they are still working as agents because they anticipate getting lucrative jobs after retiring or leaving the FBI.”
Rowley – who in 2002 was named, along with two other whistleblowers, as Time magazine’s Person of the Year – was skeptical that there was anything seriously nefarious about the hiring of so many FBI agents, suggesting that Twitter could be using them as sources of information and intelligence. She stated:
Retired agents often maintained good relationships and networks with current agents. So they can call up their old buddy and find out stuff… There were certainly instances of retired agents for example trying to find out if there was an investigation of so and so. And if you are working for a company, that company is going to like that influence.”
Rowley also suggested that hiring people from various three-letter agencies gave them a credibility boost. “These [tech] companies are using the mythical aura of the FBI. They can point to somebody and say ‘oh, you can trust us; our CEO or CFO is FBI,’” she explained.
Twitter certainly has endorsed the FBI as a credible actor, allowing the organization to play a part in regulating the global dissemination of information on its platform. In September 2020, it put out a statement thanking the federal agency. “We wish to express our gratitude to the FBI’s Foreign Influence Task Force for their close collaboration and continued support of our work to protect the public conversation at this critical time,” the statement read.
One month later, the company announced that the FBI was feeding it intelligence and that it was complying with their requests for deletion of accounts. “Based on intel provided by the FBI, last night we removed approximately 130 accounts that appeared to originate in Iran. They were attempting to disrupt the public conversation during the first 2020 U.S. Presidential Debate,” Twitter’s safety team wrote.
Yet the evidence they supplied of this supposed threat to American democracy was notably weak. All four of the messages from this Iranian operation that Twitter itself shared showed that none of them garnered any likes or retweets whatsoever, meaning that essentially nobody saw them. This was, in other words, a completely routine cleanup operation of insignificant troll accounts. Yet the announcement allowed Twitter to present the FBI as on the side of democracy and place the idea into the public psyche that the election was under threat from foreign actors.
Iran has been a favorite Twitter target in the past. In 2009, at the behest of the US government, it postponed routine maintenance of the site, which would have required taking it offline. This was because an anti-government protest movement in Tehran was using the app to communicate and the US did not want the demonstrations’ regime-change potential to be stymied.
A CARNIVAL OF SPOOKS
The FBI is far from the only state security agency filling Twitter’s ranks. Shortly after leaving a 10-year career as a CIA analyst, Michael Scott Robinson was hired to become a senior policy manager for site integrity, trust and safety.
The California-based app has also recruited heavily from the Atlantic Council, a NATO cutout organization that serves as the military alliance’s think tank. The council is sponsored by NATO, led by senior NATO generals and regularly plays out regime-change scenarios in enemy states, such as China.
The Atlantic Council has been associated with many of the most egregious fake news plants of the last few years. It published a series of lurid reports alleging that virtually every political group in Europe challenging the status quo – from the Labour Party under Jeremy Corbyn and UKIP in Great Britain to PODEMOS and Vox in Spain and Syriza and Golden Dawn in Greece – were all secretly “the Kremlin’s Trojan Horses.” Atlantic Council employee Michael Weiss was also very likely the creator of the shadowy organization PropOrNot, a group that anonymously published a list of fake-news websites that regularly peddled Kremlin disinformation. Included in this list was virtually every anti-war alternative media outlet one could think of – from MintPress to Truthout, TruthDig and The Black Agenda Report. Also included were pro-Trump websites like The Drudge Report, and liberatarian ventures like Antiwar.com and The Ron Paul Institute.
PropOrNot’s list was immediately heralded in the corporate press, and was the basis for a wholescale algorithm shift at Google and other big tech platforms, a shift that saw traffic to alternative media sites crash overnight, never to recover. Thus, the allegation of a huge (Russian) state-sponsored attempt to influence the media was itself an intelligence op by the U.S. national security state.
In 2020, Kanishk Karan left his job as a research associate at the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensics Research (DFR) Lab to join Twitter as information integrity and safety specialist – essentially helping to control what Twitter sees as legitimate information and nefarious disinformation. Another DFR Lab graduate turned Twitter employee is Daniel Weimert, who is now a senior public policy associate for Russia – a key target of the Atlantic Council. Meanwhile, Sarah Oh is simultaneously an Atlantic Council DFR Lab non-resident senior fellow and a Twitter advisor, her social media bio noting she works on “high risk trust and safety issues.”
In 2019, Twitter also hired Greg Andersen straight from NATO to work on cybercrime policy. There is sparse information on what Andersen did at NATO, but, alarmingly, his own LinkedIn profile stated simply that he worked on “psychological operations” for the military alliance. After MintPresshighlighted this fact in an article in April, he removed all mention of “psychological operations” from his profile, claiming now to have merely worked as a NATO “researcher.” Andersen left Twitter in the summer of last year to work as a product policy manager for the popular video platform TikTok.
Twitter also directly employs active army officers. In 2019, Gordon Macmillan, the head of editorial for the entire Europe, Middle East and Africa region was revealed to be an officer in the British Army’s notorious 77th Brigade – a unit dedicated to online warfare and psychological operations. This bombshell news was steadfastly ignored across the media.
POSITIONS OF POWER AND CONTROL
With nearly 400 million global users, there is no doubt that Twitter has grown to become a platform large and influential enough to necessitate extensive security measures, as actors of all stripes attempt to use the service to influence public opinion and political actions. There is also no doubt that there is a limited pool of people qualified in these sorts of fields.
Few are even acknowledging that there is anything wrong with moving from big government to big tech, as if the US national security state and the fourth estate are allies, rather than adversaries.
But recruiting largely from the US national security state fundamentally undermines claims Twitter makes about its neutrality. The US government is the source of some of the largest and most extensive influence operations in the world. As far back as 2011, The Guardian reported on the existence of a massive, worldwide US military online influence campaign in which it had designed software that allowed its personnel to “secretly manipulate social media sites by using fake online personas to influence internet conversations and spread pro-American propaganda.” The program boasts that the background of these personas is so convincing that psychological operations soldiers can be sure to work “without fear of being discovered by sophisticated adversaries.” Yet Twitter appears to be recruiting from the source of the problem.
These former national security state officials are not being employed in politically neutral departments such as sales or customer service, but in security, trust and content, meaning that some hold considerable sway over what messages and information are promoted, and what is suppressed, demoted or deleted.
It could be said that poachers-turned-gamekeepers often play a crucial role in safety and protection, as they know how bad actors think and operate. But there exists little evidence that any of these national security state operatives have changed their stances. Twitter is not hiring whistleblowers or dissidents. It appears, then, that some of these people are essentially doing the same job they were doing before, but now in the private sector. And few are even acknowledging that there is anything wrong with moving from big government to big tech, as if the US national security state and the fourth estate are allies, rather than adversaries.
That Twitter is already working so closely with the FBI and other agencies makes it easy for them to recruit from the federal pool. As Rowley said, “over a period of time these people will be totally in sync with the mindset of Twitter and other social media platforms. So from the company’s standpoint, they are not hiring somebody new. They already know this person. They know where they stand on things.”
IS THERE A PROBLEM?
Some might ask “What is the problem with Twitter actively recruiting from the FBI, CIA and other three-letter agencies?” They, after all, are experts in studying online disinformation and propaganda. One is optical. If a Russian-owned social media app’s trust, security and content moderation was run by former KGB or FSB agents and still insisted it was a politically neutral platform, the entire world would laugh.
The huge influx of security state personnel into Twitter’s decision-making ranks means that the company will start to view every problem in the same manner as the US government does – and act accordingly.
But apart from this, the huge influx of security state personnel into Twitter’s decision-making ranks means that the company will start to view every problem in the same manner as the US government does – and act accordingly. “In terms of their outlooks on the world and on the question of misinformation and internet security, you couldn’t get a better field of professionals who are almost inherently going to be more in tune with the government’s perspective,” Rowley said.
Thus, when policing the platform for disinformation and influence campaigns, the former FBI and CIA agents and Atlantic Council fellows only ever seem to find them emanating from enemy states and never from the US government itself. This is because their backgrounds and outlooks condition them to consider Washington to be a unique force for good.
This one-sided view of disinformation can be seen by studying the reports Twitter has published on state-linked information operations. The entire list of countries it has identified as engaging in these campaigns are as follows: Russia (in 7 reports), Iran (in 5 reports), China (4 reports), Saudi Arabia (4 reports), Venezuela (3 reports), Egypt (2 reports), Cuba, Serbia, Bangladesh, the UAE, Ecuador, Ghana, Nigeria, Honduras, Indonesia, Turkey, Thailand, Armenia, Spain, Tanzania, Mexico and Uganda.
One cannot help noticing that this list correlates quite closely to a hit list of US government adversaries. All countries carry out disinfo campaigns to a certain extent. But these “former” spooks and feds are unlikely to point the finger at their former colleagues or sister organizations or investigate their operations.
THE COLD (CYBER)WAR
Twitter has mirrored US hostility towards states like Russia, China, Iran and Cuba, attempting to suppress the reach and influence of their state media by adding warning messages to the tweets of journalists and accounts affiliated with those governments. “State-affiliated media is defined as outlets where the state exercises control over editorial content through financial resources, direct or indirect political pressures, and/or control over production and distribution,” it noted.
In a rather bizarre addendum, it explained that it would not be doing the same to state-affiliated media or personalities from other countries, least of all the US “State-financed media organizations with editorial independence, like the BBC in the U.K. or NPR in the US for example, are not defined as state-affiliated media for the purposes of this policy,” it wrote. It did not explain how it decided that Cuban, Russian, Chinese or Iranian journalists did not have editorial independence, but British and American ones did – this was taken for granted. The effect of the action has been a throttling of ideas and narratives from enemy states and an amplification of those coming from Western state media.
As the US ramps up tensions with Beijing, so too has Twitter aggressively shut down pro-China voices on its platform. In 2020, it banned 170,000 accounts it said were “spreading geopolitical narratives favorable to the Communist Party of China,” such as praising its handling of the Covid-19 pandemic or expressing opposition to the Hong Kong protests, both of which are majority views in China. Importantly, the Silicon Valley company did not claim that these accounts were controlled by the government; merely sharing these opinions was grounds enough for deletion.
The group behind Twitter’s decision to ban those Chinese accounts was the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI), a deeply controversial think tank funded by the Pentagon, the State Department and a host of weapons manufacturers. ASPI has constantly peddled conspiracy theories about China and called for ramping up tensions with the Asian nation.
Perhaps most notable, however, was Twitter’s announcement last year that it was deleting dozens of accounts for the new violation of “undermining faith in the NATO alliance.” The statement was widely ridiculed online by users. But few noted that the decision was based upon a partnership with the a counter-disinformation think tank filled with former spooks and state officials and headed by an individual who is on the advisory board of NATO’s Collective Cybersecurity Center of Excellence. That Twitter is working so closely with organizations that are clearly intelligence industry catspaws should concern all users.
NOT JUST TWITTER
While some might be alarmed that Twitter is cultivating such an intimate relationship with the FBI and other groups belonging to the secret state, it is perhaps unfair to single it out, as many social media platforms are doing the same. Facebook, for example, has entered into a formal partnership with the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensics Research Lab, whereby the latter holds significant influence over 2.9 billion users’ news feeds, helping to decide what content to promote and what content to suppress. The NATO cutout organization now serves as Facebook’s “eyes and ears,” according to a Facebook press release. Anti-war and anti-establishment voices across the world have reported massive drops in traffic on the platform.
One of media’s primary functions is to serve as a fourth estate; a force that works to hold the government and its agencies to account. Yet instead of doing that, increasingly it is collaborating with them.
The social media giant also hired former NATO Press Secretary Ben Nimmo to be its head of intelligence. Nimmo subsequently used his power to attempt to swing the election in Nicaragua away from the leftist Sandinista Party and towards the far-right, pro-US candidate, deleting hundreds of left-wing voices in the week of the election, claiming they were engaging in “inauthentic behavior.” When these individuals (including some well-known personalities) poured onto Twitter, recording video messages proving they were not bots, Twitter deleted those accounts too, in what one commentator called a Silicon Valley “double tap strike.”
An April MintPressstudy revealed how TikTok, too, has been filling its organization with alumni of the Atlantic Council, NATO, the CIA and the State Department. As with Twitter, these new TikTok employees largely work in highly politically sensitive fields such as trust, safety, security and content moderation, meaning these state operatives hold influence over the direction of the company and what content is promoted and what is demoted.
Likewise, in 2017, content aggregation site Reddit plucked Jessica Ashooh from the Atlantic Council’s Middle East Strategy Task Force to become its new director of policy, despite the fact that she had few relevant qualifications or experience in the field.
In corporate media too, we have seen a widespread infiltration of former security officials into the upper echelons of news organizations. So normalized is the penetration of the national security state into the media that is supposed to be holding it to account, that few reacted in 2015 when Dawn Scalici left her job as national intelligence manager for the Western hemisphere at the Director of National Intelligence to become the global business director of international news conglomerate Thomson Reuters. Scalici, a 33-year CIA veteran who had worked her way up to become a director in the organization, was open about what her role was. In a blog post on the Reuters website, she wrote that she was there to “meet the disparate needs of the US Government” – a statement that is at odds with even the most basic journalistic concepts of impartiality and holding the powerful to account.
Meanwhile, cable news outlets routinely employ a wide range of “former” agents and mandarins as trusted personalities and experts. These include former CIA Directors John Brennan (NBC, MSNBC) and Michael Hayden (CNN), ex-Director of National Intelligence James Clapper (CNN), and former Homeland Security Advisor Frances Townsend (CBS). And news for so many Americans comes delivered through ex-CIA interns like Anderson Cooper (CNN), CIA-applicants like Tucker Carlson (Fox), or by Mika Brzezinski (MSNBC), the daughter of a powerful national security advisor. The FBI has its own former agents on TV as well, with talking heads such as James Gagliano (Fox), Asha Rangappa (CNN) and Frank Figliuzzi (NBC, MSNBC) becoming household names. In short, then, the national security state once used to infiltrate the media. Today, however, the national security state is the media.
Social media holds enormous influence in today’s society. While this article is not alleging that anyone mentioned is a bad actor or does not genuinely care about the spread of disinformation, it is highlighting a glaring conflict of interest. Through its agencies, the US government regularly plants fake news and false information. Therefore, social media hiring individuals straight from the FBI, CIA, NATO and other groups to work on regulating disinformation is a fundamentally flawed practice. One of media’s primary functions is to serve as a fourth estate; a force that works to hold the government and its agencies to account. Yet instead of doing that, increasingly it is collaborating with them. Such are these increasing interlocking connections that it is becoming increasingly difficult to see where big government ends and big media begins.
From @Kash: “This means Durham filed a bunch of classified documents, that [are] being declassified, and will unveil at trial. Gangster move, what I used to do to put down terrorists”…
Date: 06/23/22
US v Danchanko
Document 54
Notes: Protective Order Granted in US v Danchenko
First off, hats off to the legend @UndeadFoia for gaining access to unredacted copies of the invoices paid by Georgia Tech. We hope you move over to Truth Social soon, but thanks for holding down on that other platform. He did some incredible work to obtain this source documentation via a FOIA request.
Second, @ProfMJCleveland had an absolutely hilarious observation and reaction to the newly released documents…
Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, is demanding answers from Attorney General Merrick Garland on the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) repeated failure to prosecute employees after they are caught making materially false statements during internal investigations. In at least a dozen cases, Grassley lays out instances where the DOJ Office of Inspector General (OIG) made criminal referrals against DOJ employees, but DOJ never took legal action – despite the same charges being frequently prosecuted when they are made against the American public.
One of the cases occurred recently when DOJ refused to prosecute two Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) agents in the Larry Nassar case, after it was discovered that these agents made several false statements.
“The supervisory agent was fired by the FBI for ‘violating the FBI’s policies by making false statements and failing to properly document complaints by the accusers.’ Yet, despite a criminal referral from the OIG, the DOJ refused to prosecute the two agents for the same crime that they routinely prosecute hundreds of American people for each year,” Grassley wrote.
Matthew Graves was confirmed by the United States Senate on October 28, 2021, and sworn in on November 5, 2021, as the United States Attorney for the District of Columbia. (Credit: public domain)
Grassley then dives into 12 cases where DOJ has not held its own employees to the same standard that they would apply to all other Americans. In one case, the OIG substantiated allegations that an employee received $350,000 in excess worker’s compensation payments because they did not accurately report their outside earnings. In another, the OIG substantiated allegations that the employee made false statements during a mortgage fraud investigation. In all cases, the United States Attorney’s Office (USAO) declined to prosecute.
“Laws are meant to deter criminal activity, but when DOJ does not enforce those laws but rather shields their employees from consequences, it has the opposite effect. It creates a sense of entitlement and signals that DOJ employees are beyond reproach. DOJ employees should be held to a higher standard for making materially false statements to the OIG, not a lower one. DOJ must hold itself to the highest possible standard or else it risks losing the credibility and trust of the American people,” Grassley continued.
Grassley concludes by demanding answers to several questions, including a full list of how many DOJ employees have been prosecuted for making false statements in the last five years and how many criminal referrals have been made by the OIG in that time frame. He also asks DOJ for a more detailed explanation behind their decision not to prosecute the FBI agents involved in the Nassar investigation.
“Hillary’s attorney Marc Elias was handed another defeat from the Supreme Court. The court agreed with the Congressional district lines drawn by Louisiana Republicans for the upcoming election.
(…) Recently, Elias was reportedly receiving “rebukes from judges, prosecutors, and even fellow Democrats”. Elias’s aggressive stance on elections was praised by Democrats but when he was tied to actions with the Russia collusion scandal he was shunned.
(Credit: Gateway Pundit)
(Credit: Gateway Pundit)
(…) The Supreme Court ruled Tuesday to restore Republican-drawn lines in Louisiana ahead of the midterms as Democrats pushed to create a second black-majority district. The court issued an order that restored a congressional voting map that a federal judge said, disenfranchised black voters. Justices Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan would have denied the application for stay.
“Judge Nathan has sentenced Ghislaine Maxwell to 20 years in prison. “A sentence of 240 months is sufficient and no graver than necessary.”
The sentence is less than the 30-50 years prosecutors asked for, but more than the 6 year sentence the defense thought was appropriate.
While preparing to deliver the sentence, Nathan said that “Ms Maxwell directly and repeatedly and over the course of many years participated in a horrific scheme” to traffic and abuse girls, and that “Ms Maxwell worked with Epstein to select young victims who were vulnerable.
As such, a “substantial sentence” is warranted, which – if not released early, means Maxwell will be 80 years old when she gets out.
And somehow not a single Epstein client was named…
Judge Alison J Nathan said on Tuesday that Ghislaine Maxwell’s criminal activity was “extensive,” and that she’s enhancing her sentence due to the fact that she was at least 10 years older than her victims, and exercised “undue influence” on them.” (Read more: Zero Hedge, 6/28/2022)(Archive)
“Nuland” gets 16 hits. Including this interesting 7/27/16 email from “William Nuland” (who?) about the DNC hack. And another interesting Oct 2016 email exchange with Strobe Talbott. https://t.co/hLy1bFt5L1pic.twitter.com/kdsFEasoRE
(Note: FoiaFan did searches for several people and linked to results on Twitter. Also, William Nuland is Victoria Nuland’s half-brother. @Larry_Beech comments, “William Peterson Nuland. Victoria’s 20 year younger half brother, who worked for secureworks, prior VeriSign, possibly involved with Facebook too.”)
(1/19) Clinton Foundation Whistleblowers
Doyle, Moynihan v IRS (United States Tax Court)
After a 3+ month hiatus from this platform, I welcome relaunching this account given that our case has been partially unsealed and can now be publicly tracked: https://t.co/Io1HwdH2xY
— Clinton Foundation Whistleblowers (@CFWBers) July 3, 2022
(3/19) the IRS request for Summary Judgment (dismissal). MAJOR!!
April 22, 2021: Judge orders case remanded to IRS “for investigation and development of the record to
determine whether IRS/CI (Criminal Investigation) proceeded with an investigation.” Recall that our WB Submission
— Clinton Foundation Whistleblowers (@CFWBers) July 3, 2022
(5/19) We made our initial public appearance when we testified to the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee on December 13, 2018: https://t.co/1S3JtcNpJf
— Clinton Foundation Whistleblowers (@CFWBers) July 3, 2022
(7/19) to US Tax Court in March 2019; appeal accepted by USTC Aug 28, 2019; case ongoing; many and especially legal sleuths in the audience can learn much from simply reviewing the Docket Record alone.
— Clinton Foundation Whistleblowers (@CFWBers) July 3, 2022
(9/19) 4. Private Foundations including/especially the Gates Foundation are subject to tax on their CF donations under IRS Code for Donors’ Responsibilities.
Documented Evidence includes: All CF Financials (tax returns, audits, annual reports, income statements); Contracts with
— Clinton Foundation Whistleblowers (@CFWBers) July 3, 2022
(11/19) inc the CFO; Email exchanges between CF execs and foreign government officials; reviews of US State Department emails; Reviews of State Dept/USAID ‘In Country Plans; Reviews of Geneva-based NGOs Global Fund, UNITAID . . and MORE!!
— Clinton Foundation Whistleblowers (@CFWBers) July 3, 2022
(13/19) He formerly worked for Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA). He testified to Congress on the financing of Global Terrorism after the 9/11 tragedy: https://t.co/XETidB4zMh
I worked on Wall Street for nearly 25 years and have done extensive work over the last 15 years in re
— Clinton Foundation Whistleblowers (@CFWBers) July 3, 2022
(15/19) and wrote a book, In Bed with Wall Street, for which I humbly inform you I was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize.
In short, we have decades of experience in pursuing and making cases of this sort. We have other claims of similar nature. We are registered Independents.
— Clinton Foundation Whistleblowers (@CFWBers) July 3, 2022
(17/19) who share messages similar to this recently received communication: “Every damn day there’s a new report of corruption, lack of accountability and so on. Nothing f’king ever comes of it. Soooo many people have given up the fight. They drew a box. And in that box is family
— Clinton Foundation Whistleblowers (@CFWBers) July 3, 2022
(19/19) Additional Info/Requests:
-Primary Reason: TRACK OUR CASE at the USTC link.
-FBH in our header? “Financial Bounty Hunters” along with CF Whistleblowers;
Pls Follow Us; Share this thread;
I prefer NOT getting into our leaving Twitter this past March. THANK YOU!!
LD
— Clinton Foundation Whistleblowers (@CFWBers) July 3, 2022
Nate Cain bravely blew the whistle on Hillary Clinton and her foundation while working as a contractor for the FBI. He’s still working in the field of cybersecurity and offers new insights into Benghazi, Hillary Clinton’s illegal gun-running in Africa and the Middle East; personal knowledge and evidence of the 2020 election fraud, and Bill Barr participating in a cover-up; many, many other topics we have been chronicling.
We include tags reflecting some of the people and topics that are discussed.
“Richard Grenell was closely linked to the globalist Humpty Dumpty Institute during his time working at the Bush Administration’s US Mission to the United Nations. A non-profit tied to a laundry list of uni-party establishment members, the Humpty Dumpty Institute has been led by Mark Epstein, the brother of notorious child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein. The organization has close ties to the Chinese Communist Party and the Taihe Institute, a think tank that is directly led by high-ranking CCP officials.
(…) Before he was a purported member of the America First movement, Richard Grenell spent years working for the administration of President George W. Bush, serving at a high level in the US Mission to the United Nations from 2001 to 2008. During that time, Grenell worked in a number of globalist “policy making” roles related to the UN’s notorious “peacekeeping” operations as well as the Global War on Terror.
According to photographs and logs detailing the Humpty Dumpty Institute’s (HDI) relationship with the US Mission to the UN, Grenell was deeply tied to the globalist, Epstein-led non-profit during his time in the Bush Administration and appeared as a speaker at HDI’s “Staff Delegation to the United Nations” at least twice, in 2005.
Mark Epstein (Credit: Shaun Mader/Patrick McMullan via Getty Images)
In June of that year, Grenell joined a group of “senior US diplomats, high-level UN officials, and spokesmen from a number of UN agencies and departments,” to address HDI’s 15th Staff Delegation to the United Nations. According to an HDI webpage memorializing the event, “the intent of this program was to give congressional spokesmen an opportunity to view first-hand the inner workings of the UN while providing them with a network of capable counterparts throughout the UN system.” According to the webpage profiling HDI’s delegation, Grenell addressed the group as part of a “breakfast briefing,” offering a “description of his own background and specific duties.” Grenell, the HDI’s summary goes on to explain, urged attendees to work through him while dealing with both the US Mission to the UN and the UN as a whole.
Grenell “emphasized his intermediary role between the US Congress, the US Mission, and the United Nations, and urged future dialogue through his office,” HDI’s webpage reads.
Attendees at the 15th Delegation included the staff members of several uni-party Congressmen and Senators, including Rebecca Kutler, who at the time was Press Secretary to far-left California Rep. Adam Schiff. HDI leadership was also present at the event. Also present were members of Senator John Cornyn and Rep. James Clyburn’s respective staffs.
Among Grenell’s fellow speakers was American UN Ambassador Anne Patterson. Patterson went on to serve in a number of capacities in the Bush and Obama Administrations, including as Obama’s Ambassador to Egypt, where she was closely tied to the terror-connected Muslim Brotherhood, which itself is designated as a terror group by a number of Muslim nations and others.
A few months later, in October of 2005, Grenell joined HDI and several big names within globalism once more for yet another Staff Delegation, this time marking the event’s 16th incarnation. As part of the delegation, congressional offices had the “unprecedented opportunity to meet with senior decision-makers at the US Mission and at the United Nations to discuss issues critical to the US-UN relationship behind closed doors.”
HDI’s 16th Staff Delegation to the United Nations included then-Senator Barack Obama staffer Samantha Power. Power, who went on to serve in the Obama Administration at the UN and in other roles, is a key figure in globalist foreign policy-making circles. During Obama’s presidency, she was at the forefront of calling for America to employ the type of disastrous “humanitarian intervention” used in Libya and other troubled nations. Currently, Power sits as Joe Biden’s Administrator of the United States Agency for International Development.
Photographs posted by HDI online of the delegation events show Grenell playing a key role and sitting alongside senior HDI members. In one photo attributed by HDI to their 15th Delegation, Grenell himself can be seen in attendance.
Richard Grenell, seen at the left of the photo, sitting back from the table, alongside HDI President Ralph Cwerman. (Credit: Humpty Dumpty Institute)
In another, a portion of what appears to be his place tag is visible, displaying “Ric Gre,” and what appears to be a portion of the word “spokesman” in the photograph.
Seated next to Grenell and his place at the table are big pharma executive Debra DeShong and Humpty Dumpty Institute President Ralph Cwerman. Also pictured is Muslim Brotherhood-tied Ambassador Anne Patterson. (Credit: Humpty Dumpty Institute)
(…) According to public records, it appears HDI has not made its filings available since fiscal year 2018, when Mark Epstein was still listed as a Director and financier. Epstein’s name was recently been removed from the website’s board of directors, however, through an internet archive, National File has discovered that Epstein was listed on the site as recently as December 20, 2020. It is unclear if Epstein is still involved in HDI.
Interestingly, it appears that Meadows was the only Republican member of Congress to have served on the board during this period. In 2018, Meadows was the sole Republican listed alongside 28 Democrat Representatives, including Reps. Adam Schiff, Maxine Waters, Sheila Jackson-Lee, Al Green, Bennie Thompson, Jim Himes, Frederica Wilson, Hank Johnson, and others.
Timeline note: According to the Humpty Dumpty Institute website, its current mission is the following:
HDI engages critical stakeholders through its programs with the U.S. Congress and the United Nations, including organizing visits of Congressional delegations overseas and to the U.N., and through its engagement with business and cultural leaders around the world .
HDI collaborates with partner organizations to engage young people on global issues e.g. HDI’s annual United Nations Boot Camp bringing students from around the world to the United Nations.
HDI supports cultural diplomacy. HDI has worked with U.S. embassies and international cultural organizations worldwide to engage people through music, arts, and sports e.g. its training program for young filmmakers from crisis countries in partnership with the UCLA’s School of Theater, Film and Television.
HDI conceives, develops and facilitates humanitarian programs with partners, e.g. supporting the removal of landmines and unexploded bombs in Sri Lanka, distribution of footwear to vulnerable communities in Vietnam, support for mobile medical vehicles in Lesotho.
HDI’s 50th U.S. Congressional program To the United Nations (December 2015) HDI Chairman Al Khalafalla (far left) with Members of Congress (left to right) Bennie Thompson (D-MS), Steve Cohen (D-TN), Janice Schakowsky (D-IL), Suzanne Bonamici (D-OR), Raul Grijalva (D-AZ), Marc Pocan (D-WI), Charlie Rangel (D-NY)
“Special counsel John Durham requested a federal court to issue 30 subpoenas for testimony in the trial against Igor Danchenko, British ex-spy Christopher Steele’s alleged main source for his discredited dossier.
The FBI secretly recorded their interviews with Danchenko.
Danchenko was charged with five counts of making false statements to the FBI, which Durham says he made about the information he provided to Steele for the dossier. His trial is scheduled for October. The DOJ’s watchdog said FBI interviews with Danchenko “raised significant questions about the reliability of the Steele election reporting” and concluded Danchenko “contradicted the allegations of a ‘well-developed conspiracy’ in” Steele’s dossier. He has pleaded not guilty.
Durham’s brief court filing on Wednesday requested the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia to issue “thirty subpoenas” for an “appearance before said Court at Alexandria, Virginia,” starting on Oct. 11 “to testify on behalf of the United States.” The potential witnesses are not named, but a copy of the blank subpoena reads that “YOU ARE COMMANDED to appear.” (Read more: Washington Examiner, 7/14/2022)(Archive)
“A former CIA software engineer who leaked the so-called “Vault 7” tools was convicted Wednesday of causing the largest theft of classified information in the history of the agency.
Joshua Schulte, who has been sitting behind bars without bail since 2018 and chose to defend himself at trial, told the jury that the CIA and FBI made him a scapegoat for the 2017WikiLeaks release of up to 34 terabytes of information.
Joshua Schulte (Credit: Zero Hedge)
Separately, Schulte awaits trial on possession of child pornography and transport charges, which he has pleaded not guilty to, according to Military.com.
As part of his defense, Schulte claimed he was singled out because “hundreds of people had access to (the information),” adding “Hundreds of people could have stolen it.”
“The government’s case is riddled with reasonable doubt,” he said. “There’s simply no motive here.”
Assistant U.S. Attorney David Denton countered that there was plenty of proof that Schulte pilfered a sensitive backup computer file.
“He’s the one who broke into that system,” Denton said. “He’s the one who took that backup, the backup he sent to WikiLeaks.”
The prosecutor also encouraged jurors to consider evidence of an attempted cover-up, including a list of chores Schulte drew up that had an entry reading, “Delete suspicious emails.”
“This is someone who’s hiding the things that he’s done wrong,” Denton said.
Once the jury got the case, Furman complimented Schulte on his closing argument. -Military.com
The judge complimented Schulte on his defense, saying “that was impressively done.”
In March of 2020, the trial of former CIA computer engineer Joshua Schulte ended in a hung jury on eight counts, including illegal gathering and transmission of national defense information, according to the New York Times.
As we noted two years ago, according to a 2017 report created by the CIA’s WikiLeaks Task Force and released in June 2020, there were major security lapses at the CIA’s Center for Cyber Intelligence (CCI), which made cyber weapons – including tools to crack into smartphones, hijack smart TVs, or make it look like a foreign adversary hacked someone.
“In a press to meet the growing and critical mission needs, CCI had prioritized building cyber weapons at the expense of securing their own systems,” reads the report. “Day-to-day security practices had become woefully lax.”
“CCI focused on building cyber weapons and neglected to also prepare mitigation packages if those tools were exposed. These shortcomings were emblematic of a culture that evolved over years that too often prioritized creativity and collaboration at the expense of security,” the report continues.
The leak marked the largest data breach in the CIA’s history and included information on hacking tools used by the agency to break into smartphones and other internet-connected devices.
The task force noted that due to failures to address vulnerabilities in IT systems, if WikiLeaks had not published the stolen information, the CIA “might still be unaware of the loss — as would be true for the vast majority of data on Agency mission systems.”
In a letter to Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe on Tuesday, Wyden criticized the intelligence community for its “widespread cybersecurity problems.” –The Hill
The Vault 7 release – a series of 24 documents which began to publish on March 7, 2017 – reveals that the CIA has a giant arsenal of tools to use against adversaries, including the ability to “spoof” its malware to appear as though it was created by a foreign intelligence agency, as well as the ability to take control of Samsung Smart TV’s and surveil a target using a “Fake Off” mode in which they appear to be powered down while eavesdropping. (Read more: Zero Hedge, 7/13/2022)(Archive)
Hillary and Chelsea Clinton are coming out with their own docuseries on Apple TV+ based on their book The Book of Gutsy Women that will feature talks with ‘trailblazing women’ like Kim Kardashian and Megan Thee Stallion.
The eight-part docuseries series will debut September 9 on Apple’s streaming platform.
Hillary posted an image in a red convertible with her daughter in the driver’s seat as they two looked back for an image previewing the upcoming series.
‘We’ve got a premiere date! ‘Gutsy,’ our new eight-episode documentary series, will premiere on @appletvplus on September 9,’ Clinton posted on Instagram Thursday morning.
(…) The Clinton sphere is getting a good bit of Hollywood treatment recently, with Hillary’s longtime aide Huma Abedin getting a television adaptation of her memoir.
Episodes will include talks with reality TV star Kim Kardashian (pictured left on July 13 in New York City) and rapper Megan Thee Stallion (pictured right performing in London on July 8)
(…) In a motion put forth by Juan Gonzalez, the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Florida, it was requested that “the United States shall be substituted as the party defendant.” In other words, the DOJ wanted to “substitute itself as the defendant for James Comey, Andrew McCabe, Peter Strzok, Lisa Page, and Kevin Clinesmith.”
The motion claimed that Trump’s RICO claims were “based upon conduct within the scope of these former FBI employees’ employment with the government,” and stated that “the United States is the sole and exclusive defendant for those claims.” The motion also requested that if the substitution was accepted, “the Court should dismiss the United States for lack of subject matter jurisdiction.”
The motion noted that since Trump had not exhausted his administrative remedies, the Court lacked subject matter jurisdiction and should therefore dismiss the case after substituting the United States as the defendant. The DOJ was maneuvering to place itself into Trump’s RICO suit—and then have Trump’s suit dismissed. This tactic was actually successful—at least in part.
Judge Donald M. Middlebrooks (Credit: public domain)
On July 22, trial judge Donald Middlebrooks granted the motion to substitute, replacing Comey, McCabe, Strzok, Page, and Clinesmith with the United States as defendant.
Middlebrooks cited the Westfall Act, which “accords federal employees absolute immunity from common-law tort claims arising out of acts they undertake in the course of their official duties.” Middlebrook deferred ruling on dismissal and noted that Trump was entitled to “litigate the question of whether the employees were acting within the scope of their employment when the challenged conduct occurred.”
The DOJ had successfully inserted itself into Trump’s RICO suit, bringing with it all the legal weight and firepower held by the U.S. government. It’s worth noting that the information previously declassified by Trump is directly relevant to his suit. And the DOJ, which has stalled its release, is now in the official legal position of fighting against its release in court. (Read more: The Epoch Times, 8/19/2022)(Archive)
On Aug. 4, Trump filed in opposition to Judge Middlebrook’s ruling to substitute the United States—in other words, the DOJ—for Comey, McCabe, Strzok, Page, and Clinesmith. Trump also filed in opposition to Clinton’s earlier motion to dismiss the entirety of the RICO complaint against her and her fellow defendants, which included the DNC, and familiar names such as lawyers Marc Elias and Michael Sussmann, Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), former journalist Glenn Simpson, former DOJ official Bruce Ohr, and his wife, Nellie Ohr. (Epoch Times)
(…) Grassley sent a second letter to Wray and Garland on July 18. Grassley told both men that allegations by a number of “highly credible whistleblowers” have prompted “fundamental questions about whether the Justice Department and FBI are properly fulfilling their combined law enforcement mission with impartiality and without fraud, abuse, and gross mismanagement.”
“Several FBI whistleblowers say that the agency’s probe into Hunter Biden was internally sabotaged during the 2020 election in order to derail the investigation after agents wrongfully deemed verified evidence as “disinformation” to ignore.
According to Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA), agents investigating Hunter “opened an assessment which was used by an FBI headquarters team to improperly discredit negative Hunter Biden information as disinformation and caused investigative activity to cease,” adding that his office received “a significant number of protected communications from highly credible whistleblowers” regarding the investigation.
Grassley added that “verified and verifiable derogatory information on Hunter Biden was falsely labeled as disinformation,” according to the Washington Examiner.
Brian Auten (Credit: Twitter)
Timothy Thibault (Credit: public domain)
FBI supervisory intelligence agent Brian Auten opened in August 2020 the assessment that was later used by the agency, according to the disclosures. One of the whistleblowers claimed the FBI assistant special agent in charge of the Washington field office, Timothy Thibault, shut down a line of inquiry into Hunter Biden in October 2020 despite some of the details being known to be true at the time.
A whistleblower also said Thibault “ordered closed” an “avenue of additional derogatory Hunter Biden reporting,” according to Grassley, even though “all of the reporting was either verified or verifiable via criminal search warrants.” The senator said Thibault “ordered the matter closed without providing a valid reason as required” and that FBI officials “subsequently attempted to improperly mark the matter in FBI systems so that it could not be opened in the future,” according to the disclosures.
The whistleblowers say investigators from FBI headquarters were “in communication with FBI agents responsible for the Hunter Biden information targeted by Mr. Auten’s assessment,” and that their findings on whether the claims were in fact disinformation were placed “in a restricted access sub-file” in September 2020, according to Grassley, who added that the disclosures “appear to indicate that there was a scheme in place among certain FBI officials to undermine derogatory information connected to Hunter Biden by falsely suggesting it was disinformation.”
Grassley summarized the new allegations in a Monday letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland and FBI Director Christopher Wray.
Document requests on pages 3 and 4, Grassley Letter, 7/25/2022
The Examiner notes that FBI agent Auten was involved in the Trump-Russia investigation, including interviewing Christopher Steele’s primary source, Igor Danchenko.
According to Grassley, the “volume and consistency” of the allegations regarding the handling of the Hunter Biden probe “substantiate their credibility.”
The assessment by Auten in August 2020 was opened the same month Grassley and Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) received a briefing from the FBI “that purportedly related to our Biden investigation and a briefing for which the contents were later leaked in order to paint the investigation in a false light,” Grassley said. The senator said Senate Democrats asked for a briefing in July 2020 “from the very same FBI HQ team that discredited the derogatory Hunter Biden information.”
The FBI inquiry into Hunter Biden reportedly began as a tax investigation, then expanded into a scrutiny of potential money-laundering and foreign lobbying; the DOJ has declined to hand over investigative details. -Washington Examiner
Thibault, the FBI agent who allegedly quashed the Hunter probe, may have violated the Hatch act in 2020 after making posts on social media that were critical of then-president Donald Trump and former AG William Barr.
“This scandal is no longer just about the Biden family; it’s about every member of the law enforcement and intelligence communities who put our country at risk by failing to do their jobs.
FBI whistleblowers claim that agents opened a sham investigation into Hunter Biden to brand reliable and verifiable derogatory evidence as “disinformation,” according to an explosive news release issued yesterday by Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa.
If true, beyond exposing the FBI’s role in running cover for the Biden family, the whistleblowers’ claims prove significant for a second reason: By failing to thoroughly vet the evidence in its possession related to Hunter Biden — which included the hard drive for the MacBook Hunter had abandoned at a repair shop — the intelligence community ignored a momentous national security threat, namely that the Russians potentially possessed a second Hunter Biden laptop.”
( ) …on July 25, Grassley issued a press release containing letters to Wray and Garland, stating that information Grassley had received “involves concerns about the FBI’s receipt and use of derogatory information relating to Hunter Biden, and the FBI’s false portrayal of acquired evidence as disinformation,” referring to the son of President Joe Biden. Grassley said that “if these allegations are true and accurate, the Justice Department and FBI are—and have been—institutionally corrupted to their very core.” (Read more: The Epoch Times, 8/19/2022)(Archive)
Executive Assistant Director of FBI Counterterrorism Division Jill Sanborn testifies before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs/Rules and Administration hearing in March 2021. (Credit: Shawn Thew/Getty Images)
“New whistleblower information reveals that FBI officials are pressuring agents to reclassify cases as “domestic violent extremism” (DVE) despite lacking the criteria to meet such a classification. Whistleblower disclosures have also detailed the agency’s effort to exaggerate DVE data to satisfy the Bureau’s leadership.
One whistleblower explained that because agents are not finding enough DVE cases, they are encouraged and incentivized to change designations even though there is minimal, circumstantial evidence to support the reclassification.
Another whistleblower—with experience in high-profile domestic terrorism investigations—stated that a field office Counterterrorism Assistant Special Agent in Charge and the FBI’s Director of the Counterterrorism Division [Jill Sanborn] have forced agents to recategorize cases as DVE to hit performance metrics manufactured by the Bureau itself.
According to whistleblowers, the FBI uses these metrics to dispense awards and determine promotions. Every whistleblower has called it an environment of “pressure” within the FBI.” (Read more: Breaking911, 7/27/2022)(Archive)
Jill Sanborn was promoted to Executive Assistant Director of the National Security Branch in May 2021, and didn’t have answers for the Senate on January 11, 2022 about the January 6th protest.
Sen. Ted Cruz: “Did any FBI agents or confidential informants actively participate in the events of January 6th? Yes or no?”
Judge Amos Louis Mazzanti III and Seth Rich (Credit: Dallas Morning News/public domain)
(…) Attorney Ty Clevenger is still trying to get at the government’s [unredacted] records regarding Seth Rich and it is still almost impossible. Clevenger’s efforts have helped uncover records to date but because of the FBI’s dishonesty to date with the FOIA requests on Rich, Clevenger wanted to observe the FBI’s review in this case.
This ruling from the Seth Rich FOIA case is disappointing. Judge Mazzant denied Clevenger’s request for in camera review of the documents withheld by the FBI, but he has not yet ruled on the motions for summary judgment, so he could yet order the FBI to search in other places such as email systems. He also took some swipes at the FBI:
It is alarming that in two cases involving substantially similar FOIA requests, the Government can locate zero relevant documents in one, but over 20,000 potentially relevant pages in the other. Moreover, when Congress created FOIA, “it did not intend for production to take years.” Huddleston, 2021 WL 327510, at *3 (citing Hayden v. DOJ, 413 F. Supp 1285, 1289 (D.D.C. 1976)). Yet, here, the Government has spent over two years processing and reviewing records in an attempt to respond to Huddleston’s requests. And despite that amount of time, the Government maintains that the process is “still ongoing.” Even so, while the Court certainly finds the Government’s handling of Clevenger’s and Huddleston’s FOIA requests concerning,
Huddleston’s arguments are insufficient to suggest bad faith for the purpose of determining whether in camera review of all relevant documents is necessary.
A senior Justice Department official recently flagged by a U.S. senator in an FBI whistleblower probe into alleged politicization of prosecutions played a key role in the Lois Lerner IRS scandal a decade ago in which conservative Tea Party groups were improperly targeted for scrutiny, government emails and congressional evidence shows.
Richard Pilger (Credit: public domain)
Richard Pilger, the current chief of the DOJ Elections Crime Branch of the department’s Public Integrity Section, engaged in discussions in 2010 and 2013 with Lerner and other IRS officials about ways to pursue criminal prosecutions of conservative nonprofits, the records show.
The discussion led the FBI, with Pilger’s direct help, to obtain and review 1.1 million pages of documents from conservative groups and even ponder charging the groups with making false statements on their IRS applications as nonprofits because they had engaged in political speech activities, according to congressional investigators.
The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, chaired then by Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), concluded in 2014 that Pilger’s discussions were part of a larger effort by the Obama administration to criminalize political speech by conservative groups that opposed the administration’s agenda.
“These documents suggest that the Department actively considered prosecuting non-profit groups for their political activities,” the final report concluded. “The Department went so far as to meet with the IRS about the investigation and to gather a 1.1 million-page database of information as potential evidentiary material. Even more astounding, the Department considered prosecuting non-profit groups for actions that are legal for 501(c)(4) groups under federal tax law — that is, for engaging in political speech.”
The committee made public emails showing that in spring 2013 Pilger and Lerner discussed an idea Pilger had heard raised by a Democrat in Congress of bringing false statement cases against the conservative groups for the ways they filled out their IRS applications as 501c3 and 501c4 nonprofits.
“I got a call today from Richard Pilger, Director Election Crimes Branch at DOJ,” Lerner wrote IRS colleagues in a May 8, 2013 email obtained by congressional investigators and Just the News. “I know him from contacts from my days there. He wanted to know who at IRS the DOJ folks could talk to about Sen. [Sheldon] Whitehouse idea at the hearing that DOJ could piece together false statement cases about applicants who ‘lied’ on their 1024s — saying they weren’t planning on doing political activity, and then turning around and making large visible political expenditures.
“DOJ is feeling like it needs to respond, but want to talk to the right folks at IRS to see whether there are impediments from our side and what, if any damage, this may do to IRS programs.”
The emails were first brought to light by a lawsuit a decade ago by Judicial Watch.
A DOJ spokesperson did not immediately respond to a call Thursday seeking comment on behalf of Pilger.
But in an interview with congressional investigators in 2014, Pilger revealed he actually began discussing strategies with Lerner for pursuing the conservative nonprofits for prosecution back in the fall of 2010, a few months after the Supreme Court opened up political spending through its landmark Citizens United ruling, the final report stated.
Pilger sent an email in October 2010 asking for a “good IRS contact re criminal tax enforcement against tax-exempt organizations,” the emails show.
Nancy Marks, an IRS criminal investigator, wrote an email back identifying a contact Pilger’s team could use, but she also cautioned that there was no evidence of criminality known to the agency.” (Read more: JusttheNews, 7/31/2022) (Archive)
FBI Director Christopher Wray refused to comment during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Thursday when Ted Cruz asked about reports that the special agent accused of orchestrating the entrapment of a group accused of trying to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer during the 2020 election has been promoted since then and now runs the FBI’s Washington D.C. field office, including the January 6 case.
Wray admits to Ted Cruz that the FBI special agent in charge of the Detroit field office during the Whitmer kidnapping debacle is now in charge of the DC field office during the J6 investigation. pic.twitter.com/DUsXbBX0Vt
“I can tell you that that case, as I understand it, is now pending a retrial,” Wray said about the group of mentally-ill Michigan men accused of planning to kidnap Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer during the first year of Covid, right before the 2020 election.
Cruz said: “So the guy in charge got a promotion and is now in charge of the January 6 investigation? … That is astonishing.”
“That doesn’t sound right to me,” the FBI director said, before clarifying that it was right.
SEN. TED CRUZ: [The Whitmer kidnapping case] ended up a debacle, where the four people who went to trial — two were acquitted, two received mistrials. None of them were convicted on even a single charge, and the basis of the defense was entrapment. That the paid [informants] for the FBI suggested and had incited the conduct.
How many FBI agents were disciplined or reprimanded after that disastrous case and the misconduct that led to every defendant being acquitted or having a mistrial on every charge?
CHRISTOPHER WRAY, FBI: I can’t comment on any personnel matter. I can tell you that that case, as I understand it, is now pending a retrial.
CRUZ: The special agent in charge of that case has now been sent to the Washington D.C. office, and now leads the investigation regarding January 6. Is that correct?
And by the way, I will point out that the lead investigator… are you aware he was apparently fired for allegedly beating his wife after coming home from a swingers’ party, and he had made multiple derogatory political posts about President Trump, showing political bias. Are you aware of that?
WRAY: I am aware of, I think, the incident you are describing. An action that was taken about it… To clarify on the first part of your question, Mr. D’Antuono was the special agent in charge of the [Detroit field office] and is now the assistant director in charge of the Washington field office. I thought you were asking about the agent who was responsible–
CRUZ: So the guy in charge got a promotion and is now in charge of the January 6 investigation?
WRAY: The guy in charge of the whole Detroit field office is now in charge of the whole Washington field office.
FBI Washington Field Office ADIC, Steven D’Antuono: “Even if you’ve left D.C., agents from our local field offices will be knocking on your door if we find out that you were part of the criminal activity at the Capitol.” pic.twitter.com/1O7xCrv9UW
SWEDISH TELECOM GIANT LM ERICSSON & ITS U.S. DIVISION ERICSSON INC. SUED BY 862 AMERICANS FOR ALLEGED PROTECTION MONEY PAYMENTS TO AQ, AQ-IN-IRAQ & ISLAMIC STATE
Plaintiffs are 862 Americans, comprised of 286 GOLD STAR FAMILIES, including numerous former hostages and families… pic.twitter.com/awRKzjZ4Qq
SWEDISH TELECOM GIANT LM ERICSSON & ITS U.S. DIVISION ERICSSON INC. SUED BY 862 AMERICANS FOR ALLEGED PROTECTION MONEY PAYMENTS TO AQ, AQ-IN-IRAQ & ISLAMIC STATE
Plaintiffs are 862 Americans, comprised of 286 GOLD STAR FAMILIES, including numerous former hostages and families of hostages, and dozens of severely injured service members.
Each Plaintiff was injured, or is the loved one of someone who was killed or injured, during attacks committed by Islamic State, al-Qaeda, al-Qaeda-in-Iraq, or a proxy acting at their direction, in Iraq, Afghanistan, Turkey, and Syria from 2005 through 2021.
Plaintiffs say Ericsson KNOWINGLY supported a terrorist campaign that attacked, killed, and wounded thousands of Americans in Iraq, Afghanistan, Turkey, and Syria, including Plaintiffs, by aiding the terrorists through Ericsson’s regular protection money payments to terrorists, Ericsson’s intentional obstruction of United States counterterrorism policy, and Ericsson’s deliberate facilitation of the terrorists’ use of Afghanistan’s cellular networks as a weapon.
“Plaintiffs say while Americans were risking their lives between 2005 and 2021 to help rebuild places like Iraq, Afghanistan, and Syria, LM Ericsson, Ericsson AB, Ericsson Inc., Ekholm, and Ibrahim facilitated illicit Iraq-related and Afghanistan related transactions that they knew terrorists such as ISIS and al-Qaeda used to finance attacks against Americans in Iraq, Afghanistan, Turkey, and Syria,” said Ryan Sparacino, the Founding Partner of Sparacino PLLC. “As alleged, even though the terrorists openly proclaimed their desire for protection money and other assistance to help prosecute their campaign to kill Americans in the Middle East and the U.S. government publicly opposed illicit transactions that flowed protection money to terrorists, Ericsson defied the United States – and its obligations under the Anti-Terrorism Act – in pursuit of profit.”
Mr. Sparacino continued: “Plaintiffs allege that when Islamic State overran Mosul in 2014, responsible businesses suspended operations to avoid funding ISIS, but Ericsson calculated that pulling back was ‘premature.’ Instead, the Complaint details that Ericsson’s cold calculation was that paying terrorists protection money to ensure safe passage through Iraq would be better for its business. As we will show in court, Ericsson continued its long-standing practice as a corporate criminal on a global crime spree where ‘money talks’ regardless of what the law demanded.”
Indeed, Plaintiffs say that Ericsson explicitly chose illegal options over legal alternatives while knowing that their money was flowing to terrorists. For example, when Ericsson was presented with a ‘Speedway’ (unlawful) and a ‘legal way’ (lawful), Plaintiffs allege Ericsson chose the low road.
“Plaintiffs allege it was Ericsson that made that choice, but it was Plaintiffs who suffered the consequences,” Sparacino said.
The filing of today’s Anti-Terrorism Act Complaint against Ericsson followed an extensive investigation (which continues today) that started after Ericsson’s Iraq-related disclosures in February 2022, including extensive time spent investigating the terrorist campaigns in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Syria and how al-Qaeda, al-Qaeda-in-Iraq, and Islamic State funded themselves through illicit corporate deals with companies like Ericsson.
Sparacino PLLC is the same firm that currently represents more than 1,200 American clients who recently secured a comprehensive Anti-Terrorism Act victory in the United States Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit in a separate Anti-Terrorism Act matter (that is also about how corruption in Iraq financed terrorism) against Johnson & Johnson, Pfizer, GE Healthcare, AstraZeneca, and Roche, captioned Atchley et al. v. AstraZeneca UK Ltd., et al., Case 1:17-cv-02136 (D.D.C.). Sparacino serves as lead investigative counsel in both the Schmitz and Atchley cases, following a similar investigative approach in each.
Magistrate Judge Bruce E. Reinhart (Credit: public domain)
“The Florida federal magistrate judge who signed off on a search warrant authorizing the FBI raid of former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort donated to Barack Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign — months after he left the local US Attorney’s office to rep employees of convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein who had received immunity in the long-running sex-trafficking investigation of the financier.
Sources tell The Post that Judge Bruce Reinhart approved the warrant that enabled federal agents to converge on the palatial South Florida estate on Monday in what Trump called an “unannounced raid on my home.”
Reinhart was elevated to magistrate judge in March 2018 after 10 years in private practice. That November, the Miami Herald reported that he had represented several of Epstein’s employees — including, by Reinhart’s own admission to the outlet, Epstein’s pilots; his scheduler, Sarah Kellen; and Nadia Marcinkova, who Epstein once reportedly described as his “Yugoslavian sex slave.”
Kellen and Marcinkova were among Epstein’s lieutenants who were granted immunity as part of a controversial 2007 deal with federal prosecutors that allowed the pervert to plead guilty to state charges rather than federal crimes. Epstein wound up serving just 13 months in county jail and was granted work release.
According to the Herald, which cited court documents, Reinhart resigned from the South Florida US Attorney’s Office effective on New Year’s Day 2008 and went to work for Epstein’s cohorts the following day.
Epstein, who was found dead in August 2019 of an apparent suicide in the Manhattan Correctional Center while awaiting trial on federal sex-trafficking charges, had hired a stable of high-powered lawyers for his defense in the late 2000s, including former independent counsel Kenneth Starr.
Ten months after starting work for Epstein’s co-conspirators, according to Federal Election Commission records, Reinhart gave $1,000 directly to the Obama campaign and another $1,000 to its fundraising arm, the Obama Victory Fund. Though the records show the judge made mostly small-dollar donations to his law firm’s political action committee in subsequent years, Reinhart also donated $500 to Jeb Bush’s 2016 presidential campaign in November 2015.
Reinhart was later named in a civil lawsuit by two of Epstein’s victims that accused him of violating Justice Department policies by switching sides in the middle of the Epstein investigation, suggesting he had spilled inside information about the probe to build favor with the notorious defendant, the Herald reported in 2018. (Read more: New York Post, 8/09/22)(Archive)
President Joe Biden’s administration was involved in the raid of former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence through a “special access request,” according to documents obtained from the National Archives by America First Legal.
On August 8, 2022, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) raided Mar-a-Lago on the grounds of retrieving alleged classified documents. According to the establishment media, Biden administration officials were “stunned” to hear of the unprecedented action. The Archives also claimed that it had “not been involved in the DOJ investigation.”
But documents show the FBI obtained access to the records through a “special access request” from the Biden White House on behalf of the DOJ, contradicting what the Archives told Congress, America First Legal revealed Monday:
Notably, despite the Archives’ claim that it had “not been involved in the DOJ investigation,” the documents show that the Archives’ official responsible for administering all access requests for Presidential records, John Laster, was involved in preparing the 15 boxes for FBI review as late as August 23, 2022:
On October 25, 2022, Acting Archivist Wall wrote to then-Ranking Members James Comer and Jim Jordan, claiming “NARA received the 15 boxes from President Trump on January 18, 2022, and then discovered that they contained classified national security information. Shortly after the discovery, NARA consulted with its Office of Inspector General (OIG), which operates independently of NARA. As DOJ has disclosed publicly in court filings, NARA’s OIG subsequently referred the matter to DOJ on February 9, 2022.”
If the OIG acted independently in making a referral to the FBI, then Mr. Laster would not have involved himself in the FBI’s review of the 15 boxes in his capacity as the Director of the White House Liaison Division “responsible for all access requests for Presidential records.” Similarly, the FBI affidavit before the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida that provided the probable cause for the issuance of a search warrant against Mar-a-Lago on August 8, 2022, stated, “[on February 9, 2022] the Special Agent in Charge of NARA’s Office of the Inspector General sent the NARA Referral via email to DOJ.” However, the evidence is that the Biden White House and the Department of Justice coordinated to obtain the Trump records, and perhaps create a pretext for a law enforcement raid, by way of a “special access request.”
“The special access statute authorizes special access requests to an incumbent president only when the records in question are needed for ‘the conduct of current business’ of the White House,” America First Legal explained. “Providing documents to the DOJ for purposes of a criminal investigation is not the ‘current business’ of the White House.”
Reed D. Rubinstein, senior counselor and director of oversight and investigations, released a statement ripping the White House’s reported role in the FBI raid of Trump’s home.
“The evidence further suggests that Biden officials in the Executive Office of the President and the Department of Justice unlawfully abused their power and then lied about it to the American people,” he said. “This government, it seems, acknowledges no limits on its power to harass, intimidate, and silence its political opponents.” (Read more: Breitbart, 4/10/2023)(Archive)
“The FBI raided Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida and broke into a safe in his palatial home, the former president said Monday.
Trump said in a message on his social media forum Truth Social that his home had been “raided, and occupied” and was “currently under siege.”
FBI agents were reportedly searching for classified documents that Trump allegedly brought with him from the White House to Mar-a-Lago after his presidency ended — which, if true, could be a violation of federal law.
The National Archives and Records Administration said it had found classified material in 15 boxes at the residence earlier this year and alerted the FBI. The agents executed a search warrant Monday to look for additional presidential records Trump may have relocated to his Florida estate.
“Nothing like this has ever happened to a President of the United States before,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
“The search warrant for the raid on former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home on Monday suggests he is being investigated under the Espionage Act of 1917 — the same law that Hillary Clinton was suspected of violating in 2016.
Attorney General Merrick Garland admitted Thursday that he personally approved the warrant application, which seeks broad discretion to search Trump’s home based on three statutes: 18 U.S.C. section 793, on the mishandling of defense information; 18 U.S.C. section 1519, relating to the destruction of federal documents; and 18 U.S.C. section 2071, which punishes hiding, moving, or destroying federal documents. Section 793 is from the Espionage Act of 1917, passed during the First World War.
Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was suspected of violating the latter when she used an unsecured private email server in her own home to handle her communications, including emails with classified information, during her time in office.
The relevant part of section 793 punishes “gross negligence” in the handling of defense information, and failure to report the loss or destruction of that information. Clinton was accused of both; her staff even physically destroyed her mobile phones.
Then-FBI Director James Comey, who intervened in the case after then-Attorney General Loretta Lynch was caught meeting with former President Bill Clinton on the tarmac of an airport in Arizona, said that while Hillary Clinton had been “extremely careless” in her handling of classified information, she did not intend to violate the statute. The statute does not, however, include any requirement of intent, leading conservative critics to argue that Comey had been looking to exonerate her. (Read more: Breitbart, 8/12/2022)(Archive)
Twitter has suspended journalist Paul Sperry after he made several tweets about this week’s FBI raid on Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence, where they spent up to 9 hours rifling through the former president’s private office, Melania Trump’s wardrobe, and eventually took 12 boxes of material. According to the Wall Street Journal, the records included a letter from former President Barack Obama, and correspondence between Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
The boxes contained some documents subject to a federal law requiring official records to be turned over when a president leaves office as well as some material archives officials described only as “classified national security information,” prompting them to refer the matter to the Justice Department for investigation. -WSJ
Sperry, meanwhile, tweeted several hot-takes on the raid, which appear to have gotten him suspended.
In Part One we outlined the background of the modern Deep State {Go Deep}. In Part Two we outlined the specifics of how President Trump was targeted by political operatives using tools created by the DC system {Go Deep}. In Part Three we outlined how and why President Trump was blocked from releasing documents {Go Deep}. Here in Part 4, we begin to assemble the specifics of what documents likely existed in Mar-a-Lago.
It is important to remember, the presidential records act –the presented pretext for the document conflict– is not a criminal statute. An FBI raid cannot be predicated on a document conflict between the National Archives and a former president.
The DOJ-NSD warrant, and the subsequent raid on Mar-a-Lago can only be related to records the U.S. government deems “classified” and material vital to national security interests. Hence, DOJ National Security Division involvement.
In prior outlines we have exhaustively covered the details of President Trump’s desire to publicly release information about DOJ and FBI conduct in their targeting of him during the fabricated Trump-Russia claims. However, to understand the nature of the documents he may hold, we first review the declassification memo provided by President Trump to the DOJ upon his departure from office.
In broad terms there are two sets of documents that intermingle and are directly related. First, documents that highlight the activity of Hillary Clinton’s team in creating the false Trump-Russia conspiracy theory (2015/2016). Second, documents that highlight the activity of government officials targeting Donald Trump within the same timeframe (Crossfire Hurricane), that continued into 2017, 2018 and 2019 (Robert Mueller).
Think of the two sets of documents as evidence against two teams working in synergy. Team one (Clinton) was outside government. Team two (DOJ/FBI) was inside government. The documents pertain to both groups but are also divided. That helps to explain the wording of the memo above.
The documentary evidence against the outside group (Clinton et al) would also involve government documented evidence as the DOJ/FBI inside group interacted with them. Notes from interviews, materials provided, FBI 302 summaries of interviews, etc.
We can extract a lot of information on the first sets of evidence from the lawsuit filed by President Trump in March of this year, mostly against the outside actors. [LINK HERE]
The lawsuit was filed against specific persons and most of those persons were interviewed by the FBI as part of the originating investigation. Within the subjects of the lawsuit we find names and groups including:
Hillary Clinton, Hillary for America Campaign Committee, DNC, DNC Services Corp, Perkins Coie, Michael Sussmann, Marc Elias, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Charles Dolan, Jake Sullivan, John Podesta, Robby Mook, Phillipe Reines as well as Fusion GPS, Glenn Simpson, Peter Fritsch, Nellie Ohr, Bruce Ohr, Orbis Business Intelligence, Christopher Steele, Igor Danchenko, Neustar Inc., Rodney Joffe, James Comey Peter Strzok, Lisa Page, Kevin Clinesmith and Andrew McCabe.
In addition to being named in the lawsuit, many of those names were interviewed by the FBI as part of the origination of the Trump-Russia investigation, and/or part of the ongoing investigation of the Trump-Russia fabrication. Each of those interviews would carry an FD-302 report summarizing the content of the interview, the questions and answers given.
The totality of those 302 documents is a lot of evidence likely consisting of hundreds of pages.
For the government officials on the inside, in addition to 302’s (ex Bruce Ohr) there would be documents of communication between them.
Think about the full unredacted text messages between Lisa Page and Peter Strzok as an example. The DOJ publicly released over 600 pages of those text messages, and that wasn’t all of them. The text messages were also redacted, under claims of privacy and national security. We can assume any version of these text messages declassified by President Trump would not be redacted. Hence, you go back to the January 20th memo and see the notes about “privacy.”
We also know there are many pages of communication between DOJ lawyer Lisa Page and her boss in the FBI Andrew McCabe. Almost none of them were ever made public; but they exist. This internal communication is likely the type of material contained in both the “binder,” left for the DOJ to release, and the boxes at Mar-a-Lago to be used as evidence against the named defendants in the lawsuit.
Bruce Ohr has 302’s and emails relating to his involvement as a conduit between Fusion GPS and the FBI. Some of those were released in redacted form, and some of them were never released. Additionally, Nellie Ohr, Bruce’s wife, who worked at Fusion GPS invoked spousal privilege when called to testify before the House committee investigating the issues. However, it is almost certain the FBI interviewed her so there are likely 302’s on Nellie Ohr.
Chris Steele, Igor Danchenko and Rodney Joffe were also interviewed by the FBI. Those 302’s were never released. Presumably John Durham has stakeholder equity in that part of the Trump-Russia hoax, but the documentary evidence prior to January 20, 2021, that exists outside the special counsel could also be records at Mar-a-Lago.
Then we get to the big stuff…. The records and evidence in unredacted and declassified state, that would drive the DOJ-NSD to claim vital national security interests.
The NSA compliance officer notified NSA Director Admiral Mike Rogers of unauthorized use of the NSA database by FBI contractors searching U.S. citizens during the 2015/2016 presidential primary. That 2016 notification is a classified record.
The response from Mike Rogers, and the subsequent documentary evidence of what names were being searched is again a classified record. The audit logs showing who was doing the searches (which contractors, which agencies and from what offices), as noted by Director Rogers, was preserved. That is another big-time classified record.
In addition, we would have Admiral Rogers writing a mandatory oversight notification to the FISA court detailing what happened. That’s a big and comprehensive classified record, likely contained in the documents in Mar-a-Lago… and then the goldmine, the fully unredacted 99-page FISA court opinion detailing the substance of the NSA compromise by FBI officials and contractors, including the names, frequency and dates of the illegal surveillance. That is a major classified document the Deepest Deep State would want to keep hidden.
These are the types of documents within what former ODNI John Ratcliffe called “thousands of pages that were declassified by President Trump,” and given to both John Durham and Main Justice with an expectation of public release when the Durham special counsel probe concluded.
In short, President Trump declassified documents that show how the institutions within the U.S. government targeted him. However, the institutions that illegally targeted President Trump are the same institutions who control the specific evidence of their unlawful targeting.
These examples of evidence held by President Donald Trump reveals the background of how the DC surveillance state exists. THAT was/is the national security threat behind the DOJ-NSD search warrant and affidavit.
The risk to the fabric of the U.S. government is why we see lawyers and pundits so confused as they try to figure out the disproportionate response from the DOJ and FBI, toward “simple records”, held by President Trump in Mar-a-Lago. Very few people can comprehend what has been done since January 2009, and the current state of corruption as it now exists amid all of the agencies and institutions of government.
Barack Obama spent 8 years building out and refining the political surveillance state. The operators of the institutions have spent the last six years hiding the construct.
President Donald Trump declassified the material then took evidence to Mar-a-Lago. The people currently in charge of managing the corrupt system, like Merrick Garland, Lisa Monaco, Chris Wray and the Senate allies, are going bananas. From their DC perspective, Donald Trump is an existential threat.
Given the nature of their opposition, and the underlying motives for their conduct, there is almost nothing they will not do to protect themselves. However, if you peel away all the layers of lies, manipulations and corruption, what you find at the heart of their conduct is fear.
What do they fear most?…
…..THIS!
People forget, and that’s ok, but prior to the 2015 MAGA movement driven by President Donald J Trump, political rallies filled with tens-of-thousands of people were extremely rare; almost nonexistent. However, in the era of Donald J Trump the scale of the people paying attention has grown exponentially. Every speech, every event, every rally is now filled with thousands and thousands of people.
The frequency of it has made us numb to realizing just how extraordinary this is. But the people in Washington DC are well aware, and that makes President Trump even more dangerous. Combine that level of support with what they attempted in order to destroy him, and, well, now you start to put context on their effort.
The existence of Trump is a threat, but the existence of a Trump that could expose their corruption…. well, that makes him a level of threat that leads to a raid on his home in Mar-a-Lago. (Conservative Treehouse, 8/11/2022)(Archive)
(Conservative Treehouse has generously given us permission to chronicle and republish any relevant information to our timelines.)
“Yesterday, Attorney General Merrik Garland announced the DOJ had filed a motion (available here) to unseal “the search warrant and property receipt” relating to the search of former President Trump’s Mar-A-Lago estate.
Below is the search warrant and accompanying attachments, first put out by Jack Posobiec and Human Events. Huge hat tip to them.
The PDF of the unsealed search warrant and attachments is available here via Courtlistener. I’ve also posted all the pages below.
“Developing: Sources say the FBI agents and officials who were involved in the raid on former President Trump’s homework in the same Counterintelligence Division of the FBI that investigated Trump in the Russiagate hoax and are actively under criminal investigation by Special Counsel John Durham for potentially abusing their power investigating Trump in the Russian fraud and therefore have a potential conflict of interest and should have been RECUSED from participating in this supposed “espionage” investigation at Mar-a-Lago” Sperry said in a social media post on Saturday.
“… I can sum up the Trump documents very succinctly–the documents show that there was a coordinated effort by the CIA, the FBI, and DOD starting in the summer of 2015 to interfere in the 2016 election. Part of this effort involved using NSA-produced intelligence. Oliver Stone’s movie, Snowden, has a scene that accurately describes what NSA was collecting and how it could be used:
When the conspiracy started in the summer of 2015 to interfere in the 2016 election on behalf of Hillary Clinton by the leadership of the CIA, the FBI and DOD, Donald Trump was not the only target. Few believed at the time that Trump had a snowball’s chance in the raging inferno of Hell to win the nomination, much less the Presidency. There were active searches for compromising intel on all of the leading Republican candidates, including Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio, and on Bernie Sanders.
The CIA, with the knowledge of the Director of National Intelligence, worked with British counterparts starting in the summer of 2015 to collect intelligence on Republican and at least one Democrat candidate. John Brennan was probably hoping that his proactive steps to help the Hillary Clinton campaign would ensure his taking over as DNI in the new Clinton Administration. Regardless of motives, the CIA enlisted the British intelligence community to start gathering intelligence on most major Republican candidates and on Bernie Sanders. This initial phase of intelligence gathering goes beyond opposition research. The information being gathered identified the key personnel in each campaign and identified the people outside the United States receiving their calls, texts, and emails. This information was turned into intelligence reports that then were passed back to the United States intel community as “liaison reporting.” This was not put into normal classified channels. This intelligence was put into a SAP, i.e. a Special Access Program.
This initial phase of intelligence collection produced a great volume of intelligence that allowed analysts to identify key personnel and the people they were communicating with overseas. You don’t have to have access to intelligence information to understand this.
Let me give you one example of how intelligence intercepts were used to target specific individuals. Ask yourself, “how did George Papadopoulos get on the radar?” Papadopoulos was living in London and communicating with Corey Lewandowski, Trump’s campaign manager at the time. Those communications were intercepted by the UK’s GCHQ and passed, through liaison channels, to the NSA. That information was used in turn by the CIA and the FBI, working with British Intelligence, to ensnare Papadopoulos. He was offered a job, for example, at a firm tied to British Intelligence and subsequently introduced to Joseph Mifsud.
I am confident that some of the documents Trump has show that George Papadopoulos was identified as a possible target by the fall of 2015. Initially, his name was “masked.” But we now know that many people on the Trump campaign had their names “unmasked.” You cannot unmask someone unless their name is in an intelligence report.
Here is another example, we also know that Felix Sater–a longtime business associate of Donald Trump and an FBI informant since December 1998 (he was signed up by Andrew Weismann)–initiated the proposal to do a Trump Tower in Moscow. Don’t take my word for it, that’s what Robert Mueller reported:
In the late summer of 2015, the Trump Organization received a new inquiry about pursuing a Trump Tower project in Moscow. In approximately September 2015, Felix Sater . . . contacted Cohen (i.e., Michael Cohen) on behalf of I.C. Expert Investment Company (I.C. Expert), a Russian real-estate development corporation controlled by Andrei Vladimirovich Rozov. Sater had known Rozov since approximately 2007 and, in 2014, had served as an agent on behalf of Rozov during Rozov’s purchase of a building in New York City. Sater later contacted Rozov and proposed that I.C. Expert pursue a Trump Tower Moscow project in which I.C. Expert would license the name and brand from the Trump Organization but construct the building on its own. Sater worked on the deal with Rozov and another employee of I.C. Expert. (see page 69 of the Mueller Report).
Sater’s communication with Rozov were intercepted by western intelligence agencies–GCHQ and NSA. I do not know which agency put it into an intel report, but it was put into the system. The Sater FD-1023 will tell us whether or not Sater did this at the direction of the FBI or acted on his own initiative. The key point is that the “bait” to do something with the Russians came from a registered FBI informant.
By December of 2015, the Hillary Campaign decided to use the Russian angle on Donald Trump. Thanks to Wikileaks we have Campaign Manager John Podesta’s email exchange in December 2015 with Democratic operative Brent Budowsky:
“That’s good, sooner it’s clarified the better, and the stronger the better,” Budowski replies, later adding: “Best approach is to slaughter Donald for his bromance with Putin, but not go too far betting on Putin re Syria.”
By late December, the intelligence/law enforcement operation targeted Donald Trump as it became clear that he was likely to win the Republican nomination.
I believe Donald Trump is holding trump cards that irrefutably show that the CIA, the FBI and DOD were communicating in Top Secret channels about these activities and that the coordination also included foreign intelligence personnel in at least the UK and Australia.
I hope this helps you understand the desperation of the U.S. national security agencies to keep this stuff hidden. The revelations, if they come, will be devastating. (Larry Johnson/Gateway Pundit, 8/15/2022)(Archive)
“Tea Party Patriots Action has filed a federal complaint against the judge who authorized the FBI raid on President Donald J. Trump’s home.
“Judge [Bruce] Reinhart should be disciplined and removed as a federal magistrate because of his failure to meet the standards of ethical conduct and character necessary for the public to have confidence in the nonpartisan role of a judge in a matter of this extreme public interest,” asserted Jennifer Martin, CEO of Tea Party Patriots Action, in the Aug. 16 filing.
🚨 NEW: We just filed a federal complaint against Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhart, the Obama-appointed magistrate who approved the FBI raid of Mar-a-Lago.
One justification Martin provides for Reinhart’s removal is a statement the judge made on his personal Facebook page following the 2016 presidential election.
Noting that Reinhart recently recused himself from a separate case involving Trump due to a “conflict of interest,” Martin also pointed out that the judge has been accused of unethical conduct in the past.
“Judge Reinhart has a history of ethical issues,” she said, “the most noteworthy being his resignation from the US Attorney’s office in Miami on January 1, 2008, and the very next day representing as counsel for employees of the late Jeffrey Epstein, who was under investigation by that same prosecutor’s office at the time of Reinhart’s employment and departure.”
Adding that Reinhart should have recused himself when first approached by the FBI, Martin continued: “The entire episode of the unprecedented search of the former President’s home, authorized by a political appointee of President Trump’s successor, and approved by a federal magistrate who has been outspoken in his opposition to and loathing of President Trump threatens the principle of ‘equal justice under law’ and the confidence of the American people in an unbiased judiciary.” (Read more: RSBNetwork, 8/24/2022)(Archive)
“Judge ruled in 2012 that a president’s discretion to declare records “personal” is far-reaching and mostly unchallengeable.
When it comes to the National Archives, history has a funny way of repeating itself. And legal experts say a decade-old case over audio tapes that Bill Clinton once kept in his sock drawer may have significant impact over the FBI search of Melania Trump’s closet and Donald Trump’s personal office.
The case in question is titled Judicial Watch v. National Archives and Records Administration and it involved an effort by the conservative watchdog to compel the Archives to forcibly seize hours of audio recordings that Clinton made during his presidency with historian Taylor Branch.
For pop culture, the case is most memorable for the revelation that the 42nd president for a time stored the audio tapes in his sock drawer at the White House. The tapes became the focal point of a 2009 book that Branch wrote.
Sen. Chuck Grassley (Credit: Charlotte Cuthbertson/The Epoch Times)
“In an Aug. 17 letter to FBI Director Christopher Wray, Grassley demands an accounting for alleged political bias influencing high-level investigations, particularly out of the FBI’s Washington, D.C., office.
“Starting on May 31, 2022, I’ve written three letters to you regarding political bias that has infected the FBI’s Washington Field Office,” Grassley, R-Iowa, writes. “Two of those letters provided specific and credible allegations based on numerous whistleblowers that have approached my office with information that one can only conclude is indicative of a deeply rooted political infection that has spread to investigative activity into former President Trump and Hunter Biden.”
(…) Although the former head of Crossfire Hurricane, Peter Strzok, was fired after the disclosure of his vitriolic anti-Trump tweets, several members of his team remain working in the counterintelligence unit, the sources say, even though they are under active investigation by both Durham and the bureau’s disciplinary arm, the Office of Professional Responsibility. The FBI declined to respond to questions about any role they may be taking in the Mar-a-Lago case.
Brian Auten: Discredited over Carter Page spy warrants but still handling sensitive cases. (Credit: Twitter)
In addition, a key member of the Crossfire team – Supervisory Intelligence Analyst Brian Auten – has continued to be involved in politically sensitive investigations, including the ongoing federal probe of potentially incriminating content found on the abandoned laptop of President Biden’s son Hunter Biden, according to recent correspondence between the Senate Judiciary Committee and FBI Director Christopher Wray. FBI whistleblowers have alleged that Auten tried to falsely discredit derogatory evidence against Hunter Biden during the 2020 campaign by labeling it Russian “disinformation,” an assessment that caused investigative activity to cease.
Auten has been allowed to work on sensitive cases even though he has been under internal investigation since 2019 when Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz referred him for disciplinary review for his role in vetting a Hillary Clinton campaign-funded dossier used by the FBI to obtain a series of wiretap warrants to spy on former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page. Horowitz singled out Auten for cutting a number of corners in the verification process and even allowing information he knew to be incorrect slip into warrant affidavits and mislead the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act court.
In congressional testimony this month, Wray confirmed that “a number of” former Crossfire Hurricane team members are still employed at the bureau while undergoing disciplinary review. In the meantime, Wray has walled off the former Russiagate investigators only from participating in FISA wiretap applications, according to the sources.
Sen. Chuck Grassley, the ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, has asked Wray for copies of recent case files and reports generated by Auten and whether he is included among the team the FBI has assembled to determine which of the seized Trump records fall within the scope of its counterespionage investigation and which fall outside of it.
Some former FBI officials worry that Auten, a top bureau expert on Russia and nuclear warfare, will have a hand in analyzing the boxes of documents agents seized from Trump’s home on Aug. 8 to help determine if any of the alleged Top Secret material he kept there might have been compromised, potentially putting national security at risk.
“It is a disgrace that Auten is still even employed by the bureau,” said 27-year FBI veteran Michael Biasello. “I would substitute other analysts and agents.”
An examination of the bureau agents involved in the Mar-a-Lago raid reveals other connections between them and FBI officials who played key roles in advancing the Russiagate hoax.
Jay Bratt: who happens to be a Democratic National Committee donor, has been coordinating the Mar-a-Lago investigation with Alan Kohler, who heads the FBI’s counterintelligence division.
Kohler replaced Bill Priestap in that post after Priestap stepped down from the bureau amid criticism of his role in the Russiagate probe. Kohler had worked at FBI headquarters under Priestap, specializing in countering Russian intelligence threats.
Before that, he worked in London as the FBI’s liaison with British intelligence and law enforcement. The sources say Kohler was close to Stefan Halper, an academic and longtime FBI contractor whom the bureau ran as an informant in a failed effort to suborn Trump campaign officials. He also worked closely with Stephen Somma, a lead case agent in the Crossfire Hurricane probe whom Horowitz said was “primarily responsible” for some of the worst misconduct in the FISA warrant abuse scandal. Somma is a counterintelligence investigator in the FBI’s New York field office, where he has been reassigned to the China desk.
Alan Kohler: Said to be close to Russiagate informant Stefan Halper. American Security Today
In 2019, Kohler was promoted to special agent in charge of the counterintelligence division at the FBI’s Washington field Office, where he worked alongside then-assistant agent-in-charge Timothy Thibault, who was reassigned by Wray just days prior to the Mar-a-Lago raid, after whistleblowers raised questions about political bias. They asserted that Thibault, who has taken aim at Trump and Republicans on social media, worked with Auten to falsely discredit evidence of alleged money laundering and other activities against Hunter Biden and prevent agents from investigating them.
The Washington field office’s counterintelligence division is now run by Anthony Riedlinger, who previously worked at FBI headquarters as a section chief under Priestap. Some of the agents involved in the raid on Trump’s home came from that Washington field office, according to the sources and FBI case documents.
Bratt, the top counterintelligence official at Justice, traveled to Mar-a-Lago in early June and personally inspected the storage facility while interacting with both Trump and one of his lawyers. Trump allowed the three FBI agents Bratt brought with him to open boxes in the storage room and look through them. They left with some documents. After leaving, Bratt made a request to Trump’s lawyer for increased security at the facility and asked to see surveillance footage from the security cameras. The lawyer complied with the requests. Months went by before the Justice Department took the politically explosive step of sending FBI agents unannounced to Trump’s home, seizing documents, photos, and other items not just from the storage facility but from multiple rooms on the property, including the former president’s office.
Chris Swecker (Credit: (Photo by Samuel Corum/Getty Images)
Former assistant FBI director Chris Swecker said the search warrant that agents obtained is quite wide-ranging. He pointed out that it authorized the seizure of any information in any form related to “national defense information,” which he said “does not necessarily include classified material.”
“This is a huge, broad search warrant and a huge, broad investigation leveled against the former president,” Swecker said.
What’s more, he said the physical search of the former president’s residence was far more sweeping than first reported and included unsupervised snooping in several dozen bedrooms, as well as numerous storage rooms and closets, including those of the former first lady. FBI agents took numerous boxes and containers of documents and other material, including several binders of photos and even three passports held by the former president.
Although Attorney General Merrick Garland has said that the DOJ seeks to “narrowly scope any search that is undertaken,” details of the warrant reveal agents had the authority to seize entire boxes of records – including those potentially covered by attorney-client privilege and executive privilege – if just a single document inside the container were marked with a classified marking.
Agents were allowed to also seize any containers or boxes “found together with” ones containing classified papers, according to ATTACHMENT B (“Property to be seized”) of the warrant. In addition, the FBI agents were given the authority to confiscate “any government and/or presidential records created between Jan. 20, 2017, and Jan. 20, 2021,” which covers Trump’s full term in office. That meant they were able to take any item related to the Trump administration.
All told, dozens of boxes and containers were removed from Trump’s residence, very few of which actually contained classified information, the sources said.
Rachel Maddow reports Donald Trump has issued a directive to the intelligence community to cooperate with William Barr in investigating the Trump-Russia investigation and reports that David Laufman calls the directive “a grotesque abuse of the intelligence community.” (Credit: MSNBC)
According to Federal Election Commission records, Bratt has given exclusively to Democrats, including at least $800 to the Democratic National Committee. The sources said he is close to David Laufman, whom he replaced as the top counterintelligence official at Justice. An Obama donor, Laufman helped oversee the Russiagate probe, as well as the Clinton email case, which also involved classified information.
A Senate investigator told RCI that Laufman was the “mastermind” behind the strategy to dust off and “weaponize” the rarely enforced statutory relic – the Foreign Agents Registration Act – against Trump campaign officials, a novel legal move that the investigator noted is similar to the department’s current attempts to enforce the Presidential Records Act against Trump – which is a civil, not a criminal, the statute – by invoking the Espionage Act of 1917.
Laufman signed off on the wiretapping of Trump campaign adviser Carter Page, which the Department of Justice inspector general determined was conducted under false pretenses involving doctored email, suppression of exculpatory evidence, and other malfeasance.
Suddenly resurfacing as a media surrogate for the Justice Department defending the Mar-a-Lago raid, Laufman has been a key source for stories by the Washington Post, CNN, and other outlets.
On CNN, for instance, he claimed the documents seized from Trump’s storage were “particularly stunning and particularly egregious,” and their discovery “completely validates the government’s investigation” into the former president – though he quickly added, “Whether this investigation transforms into an outright criminal prosecution remains to be seen.”
Swecker said that there is strong reason to fear that the FBI’s counterintelligence division might politicize this case.
“For sure, the FBI has dug themselves into a huge hole because of how they handled the Clinton (email) case and then Crossfire Hurricane and Hunter Biden,” Swecker said. “Myself and many of my colleagues think they are treading on very thin ice here.”
“Former President Donald Trump filed a motion requesting an independent review of the documents seized from Mar-a-Lago during an FBI raid on his home earlier this month.
“Law enforcement is a shield that protects Americans. It cannot be used as a weapon for political purposes,” Trump’s motion said. “Therefore, we seek judicial assistance in the aftermath of an unprecedented and unnecessary raid on President Trump’s home at Mar-a-Lago, in Palm Beach, Florida.”
Trump’s Motion for Judicial Oversight And Additional Relief requests the court appoint a Special Master, prohibit the FBI from further review of the seized documents until the Special Master is appointed, order the government to release a more detailed property receipt, and return any item seized that was not within the search warrant’s scope.
The property receipt released shortly after the Mar-a-Lago raid only mentions nondescript items, including “Miscellaneous Top Secret Documents,” “Leatherbound box of documents,” and “Various classified/TS/SCI documents.”
Trump’s motion comes just days after he announced he would file a Fourth Amendment motion “concerning the illegal Break-In” of Mar-a-Lago.
“My rights, together with the rights of all Americans, have been violated at a level rarely seen before in our Country,” Trump said on Friday.
In a statement after Trump’s attorneys filed the motion, Trump noted the FBI wanted Mar-a-Lago staff to turn off the estate’s security cameras during the raid. Trump also noted the FBI took his passports and broke into his personal safe with a “safe cracker.”
Trump also laid to rest claims that the FBI seized any classified documents.
“We are now demanding that the Department of ‘Justice’ be instructed to immediately STOP the review of documents illegally seized from my home,” Trump said. “ALL documents have been previously declassified.”
“We are further demanding that the DOJ be forced to turn over a REAL, without ‘plants,’ inventory of my property that was taken and disclose where that property is now located,” Trump continued. “We are demanding that all items wrongfully taken from my home be IMMEDIATELY returned.”
“This Mar-a-Lago Break-In, Search, and Seizure was illegal and unconstitutional, and we are taking all actions necessary to get the documents back, which we would have given to them without the necessity of the despicable raid of my home, so that I can give them to the National Archives until they are required for the future Donald J. Trump Presidential Library and Museum.”
“I will never stop fighting for the American people, our Country, and the Rule of Law,” Trump concluded. “Make America Great Again!”
The case was assigned to Judge Aileen M. Cannon, a Trump appointee, of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida.
The case is Trump v. United States Government, No. 22-cv-81294-AMC in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida. (Breitbart, 8/22/2022) (Archive)
Judge Bruce Reinhart in a filing on Monday morning announced that formally he rejects “the Government’s argument that the present record justifies keeping the entire Affidavit under seal.”
“The Government argues that even requiring it to redact portions of the Affidavit that could not reveal agent identities or investigative sources and methods imposes an undue burden on its resources and sets a precedent that could be disruptive and burdensome in future cases,” Reinhart wrote. “I do not need to reach the question of whether, in some other case, these concerns could justify denying public access; they very well might.”
“Particularly given the intense public and historical interest in an unprecedented search of a former President’s residence, the Government has not yet shown that these administrative concerns are sufficient to justify sealing,” he added.
This is a stinging rebuke for a Biden administration that was relying on the Florida judge, who is himself an Obama donor, to provide the Department of Justice with political cover for the FBI’s “unprecedented” raid on the former president. If a law enforcement action is “unprecedented,” there is a higher probability that it was unlawful from a judicial point-of-view.
It remains to be seen how much of the search warrant affidavit will be redacted, as the judge previously gave the Department of Justice until Thursday to submit its advised redactions for the document out of argued national security concerns.
“Accordingly, it is hereby ORDERED that by the deadline, the Government shall file under seal a submission addressing possible redactions and providing any additional evidence or legal argument that the Government believes relevant to the pending Motions to Unseal,” the motion stated.” (Read more: BeckerNews, 8/22/2022)(Archive)(Reinhart Orders On Motion to Unseal)
The New York Post protested decisions by Facebook and Twitter to suppress coverage of the Biden laptop, after the social media platforms concluded the data was unverified and of questionable origin. The New York Post, 10/15/2020
“FBI whistleblowers allege that the Bureau’s leaders ordered agents not to investigate Hunter Biden’s laptop, according to a letter Wisconsin Republican Sen. Ron Johnson sent to Department of Justice Inspector General Michael Horowitz asking that he investigate the matter.
Prior to the 2020 presidential election, some of the content of a laptop belonging to President Joe Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, became public and appeared to show damaging information on the then-presidential candidate. Media outlets derided the laptop as misinformation or Russian disinformation at the time.
“After the FBI obtained the Hunter Biden laptop from the Wilmington, Del. computer shop, these whistleblowers stated that local FBI leadership told employees, ‘you will not look at that Hunter Biden laptop’ and that the FBI is ‘not going to change the outcome of the election again,”‘ the letter, which the Daily Mail obtained, reads.
“I hope you understand that the longer your office stands on the sidelines and delays investigating the FBI’s actions, the harder it will be for you to uncover the truth and hold individuals accountable for wrongdoing,” Johnson continued.
Then-FBI Director James Comey announced in 2016 that the Bureau was reopening its investigation into former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton prior to the presidential election, a move many critics said affected the race’s outcome.
“While I understand your hesitation to investigate a matter that may be related to an ongoing investigation, it is clear to me based on numerous credible whistleblower disclosures that the FBI cannot be trusted with the handling of Hunter Biden’s laptop,” Johnson further wrote.
FBI Special Agents Association logo (Credit: Twitter)
“According to FBI whistleblowers, Chris Wray personally removed concerns by rank-and-file members that the agency had become too politicized in deciding which cases to open.
FBI agents made this complaint to Senate Judiciary Committee members.
On August 25, 2022, investigative reporter Paul Sperry writes:
BREAKING: FBI Director Christopher Wray allegedly removed concerns raised by rank-and-file agents from this year’s final report by the FBI’s Special Agents Advisory Committee (SAAC) about FBI leadership becoming “too politicized” in deciding which cases to open and which investigations to pursue, FBI whistleblowers have told the Senate Judiciary Committee. The SAAC Executive Council, representing more than 10,000 agents from the bureau’s field offices, holds its meetings with the director at FBI headquarters twice a year.
“The FBI is now acting as both the propaganda arm of the Democratic Party and the paramilitary arm of the Democratic Party.
The FBI interfered in the 2016, 2018, 2020 elections–and now the 2022 election–against Trump/GOP & for Democrats.
For 6 years, the FBI has been falsifying evidence or suppressing exculpatory evidence to frame Trump targets; destroying evidence that would incriminate the bureau; lying to both the IG and Congress; spying based on fraudulent warrants; opening investigations based on false pretenses; criminally leaking classified intercepts to the media; spreading false propaganda; and conducting corrupt searches and seizures. Yet no one is in jail for any of it. Not even dirty FBI lawyer Clinesmith, who confessed to forging a wiretap document.
Biden family whistleblower announced last week that it was top FBI official Tim Thibault who buried the information he gave the bureau on the Biden family’s criminal acts.” (The Gateway Pundit, 9/07/2022)(Archive)
“During a discussion with Joe Rogan, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg was asked about the removal of content, specifically citing the example of the pre-2020 election Hunter Biden laptop story. In his response Zuckerberg says the background context is important because the FBI came to Facebook and told them Russian disinformation was about to drop, just before the New York Post article was published.
This discussion comes on the heels of an FBI whistleblower approaching the Senate Judiciary Committee with evidence the Washington DC field office was specifically working to cover up any discoveries around the Hunter Biden laptop (per Chuck Grassley). Add the Zuckerberg statement to the whistleblower claim and the resounding implication is the FBI taking advanced proactive measures to stop information they deem adverse to the interests of democrats. The issue surfaces at 05:00 of the video below. WATCH (prompted): (Conservative Treehouse, 8/25/2022)(Archive)
Tucker Carlson and Harmeet Dhillon Discuss Facebook Suppression of Hunter Biden Laptop Story
During a segment on his broadcast this evening, Fox News host Tucker Carlson interviewed Center for American Liberty founder and lawyer, Harmeet Dhillon about how Facebook censored and suppressed the Hunter Biden laptop story just before the 2020 election. {Direct Rumble Link} – WATCH: (Conservative Treehouse, 8/25/2022)(Archive)
Jimmy Dore also does an excellent job covering this story:
“Kash Patel released a statement Friday on Truth Social where he blasted the corrupt Deep State for not keeping his name redacted in the affidavit used to raid President Trump’s home.
Kash also shared some other insightful information.
Patel wrote on Truth Social that he was basically viciously attacked by the Deep State by them not redacting his name from the warrant used to raid the President’s home. Then Patel shared this:
…This cartel of corruption inside our government is so devoid of concern about national security, they could not be bothered to see the judge in person. Instead, they literally called in the raid on the home of a former President via the FBI’s best friend, Zuckerberg’s WhatsApp.
This isn’t the first time that we heard that the warrant to raid the President’s home with gun-toting FBI agents was attested to over a WhatsApp call.
The cover sheet was “[a]ttested to” by an FBI special agent “by Phone (WhatsApp),” the form reveals. Indeed, the form is titled as an “application for a warrant by telephone or other reliable electronic means.”
The criminal cover sheet document indicates, in the usual perfunctory fashion, that no other relevant matters are proceeding before other magistrate judges in other sections of the same federal district where the Mar-a-Lago-related proceeding is ongoing. Warrant applications routinely include such attestations to flag the judiciary if prosecutors are seeking search warrants from multiple magistrates.
What we didn’t know is that the FBI uses WhatsApp as their “best friend”. WhatsApp is owned by Facebook. What does Patel know about WhatsApp’s use by the FBI?
It appears the FBI uses WhatsApp to hold conversations that they can hide. Are there any other reasons for using WhatsApp?
“A Ukrainian woman posing as a member of the Rothschild banking family has been outed as a fraud after she allegedly infiltrated former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate, according to reports.
Inna Yashchyshyn, 33, lied to ritzy resort members that she was the heiress to the reputed family’s mass fortune, Anna de Rothschild, according to a probe by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
She appeared at numerous Mar-a-Lago functions mingling with the likes of Trump, South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham and others while she held the position as president of United Hearts of Mercy, founded by Florida-based Russian oligarch and former business partner Valery Tarasenko in Canada in 2015, according to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.
[A year before the FBI’s raid on Mar-a-Lago, the woman whose real name is Inna Yashchyshyn, a Russian-speaking immigrant from Ukraine, made several trips into the estate posing as a member of the famous family while making inroads with some of the former president’s key supporters. (Credit: OCCRP/Pittsburgh Post-Gazette)]
Yashchyshyn and her group dine after a golf fundraiser. She went under the fake name Anna de Rothschild. (Credit:OCCRP/Pittsburgh Post-Gazette)
After hundreds of thousands of dollars in payments to the foundation, processor Stripe Inc., suspected fraud and halted the funds for the campaign which was supposed to help families devastated by the COVI-19 pandemic.
Yashchyshyn, 33, is now the subject of several federal investigations after it was revealed she is not in fact a member of the Rothschild family. She’s additionally under investigation by Canadian authorities for alleged financial crimes.
In actuality, Yashchyshyn is the Russian-speaking daughter of an Illinois truck driver. It’s unclear when she came to the US.
She allegedly made several trips to the ex-president’s Florida estate with her fake identity to make connections with some of the nation’s biggest leaders, according to the paper.
Federal records obtained by the Post-Gazette and the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project showed Yashchyshyn had two fake passports from the US and Canada with the name “Anna de Rothschild.” A Florida driver’s license in her name listed a $13 million Miami Beach Mansion where she never lived.
Yashchyshyn formerly worked in a suburban Miami business connecting pregnant Russian women to Americans looking to adopt a child, the Post-Gazette reported.
However, her web of lies unfolded amid a legal dispute she had with her former associate, Tarasenko.
According to Tarasenko, a 44-year-old businessman raised in Moscow, she made multiple trips to Mar-a-Lago in an effort to make contacts and create new streams of business.
Photos from 2021 show the brunette hanging out with Trump, Graham and others, according to the reports.
Yashchyshyn (left) is under investigation by US and Canadian officials. (Credit: OCCRP/Pittsburgh Post-Gazette)
“It wasn’t just dropping the family name. She talked about vineyards and family estates and growing up in Monaco,” John LeFevre, a former investment banker and author, told OCCRP.
She used “her fake identity as Anna de Rothschild to gain access to and build relationships with U.S. politician[s], including but not limited to Donald Trump, Lindsey Graham, and [former Missouri Gov.] Eric Greitens,” Tarasenko said, according to an affidavit obtained by the Post-Gazette.
She said under oath that she has never used another name and has not broken any laws. She told the Post-Gazette that she had never heard of Anna de Rothschild.” (Read more: New York Post, 8/26/2022)(Archive)
(Timeline editor’s note: Please check our tag on Ukraine for more information about their meddling in the 2016/2020 presidential elections, and their involvement in Impeachment I, Russiagate, Spygate, and possibly the 2024 presidential election.)
“The redacted affidavit released Friday by the Justice Department related to the recent FBI raid on former President Trump’s Florida estate shows the agency in part made their case to return Aug. 8 by saying agents in May had already collected 184 sensitive documents from Mar-a-Lago.
This is a developing story…
“The FBI’s investigation has established that documents bearing classification markings, which appear to contain National Defense Information (NDI), were among the materials contained in the FIFTEEN BOXES and were stored at the PREMISES in an unauthorized location,” the affidavit said.
“There is probable cause to believe that additional documents that contain classified NDI or that are Presidential records subject to record retention requirements currently remain at the PREMISES,” the affidavit continued, following redactions. “There is also probable cause to believe that evidence of obstruction will be found at the PREMISES.”
Documents retrieved earlier this year from Mar-A-Lago included “184 unique documents bearing classification markings, including 67 documents marked as CONFIDENTIAL, 92 documents marked as SECRET, and 25 documents marked as TOP SECRET,” according to the affidavit. “Further, the FBI agents observed markings reflecting the following compartments/dissemination controls: HCS, FISA, ORCON, NOFORN, and SI. Based on my training and experience, I know that documents classified at these levels typically contain NDI. Several of the documents also contained what appears to be FPOTUS’s handwritten notes.”
U.S. Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhart wrote in the order, “I find that the government has met its burden of showing a compelling reason/good cause to seal portions of the affidavit,” and added that the redacted portions were needed for protecting witnesses, agents, and parties who were not charged, in addition to the strategy and scope of the probe.
The department blacked out the names of witnesses and agents to protect them and the agency’s investigation, but the document, which allowed for the warrant in the unprecedented Aug. 8 raid at Mar-a-Lago, is expected to provide at least some new details.
As expected, the judge allowed the Government to heavily redact the affidavit before it went public. In yesterday’s order, the judge found that parts of the affidavit must remain sealed because:
disclosure would reveal (1) the identities of witnesses, law enforcement agents, and uncharged parties, (2) the investigation’s strategy, direction, scope, sources, and methods, and (3) grand jury information protected by Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 6(e).
This aligns with the DOJ representations that (1) information in the affidavit “could be used to identify many, if not all” of the witnesses; (2) the affidavit would provide a “roadmap for anyone intent on obstructive the investigation.”
“Former Washington Field Office Special Agent in Charge Tim Thibault was reportedly escorted out of the Bureau’s headquarters on Friday, amid whistleblower allegations that he showed political bias in his handling of politically sensitive investigations.
The Washington Timesreported eyewitness accounts that “Mr. Thibault was seen exiting the bureau’s elevator last Friday escorted by two or three ‘headquarters-looking types.'”
Whistleblowers alleged that Thibault concealed the partisan nature of evidence from FBI Director Christopher Wray and Attorney General Merrick Garland to secure their approval to open an investigation into former President Donald Trump. That investigation culminated in the FBI’s raid on Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate earlier this month.
The public release of the affidavit that accompanied the search warrant revealed the warrant application relied heavily on information from news articles, including a CBS Miami piece titled “Moving Trucks Spotted At Mar-a-Lago” and a Breitbart News article in which former Trump adviser Kash Patel discussed the classified status of documents the bureau previously removed from the estate on behalf of the National Archives.
Iowa Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley confirmed to Just the News prior to the raid that Thibault had been removed from his post and reassigned to an unspecified position.” (JusttheNews, 8/29/2022)(Archive)
“A top FBI agent at the Washington field office reportedly resigned from his post last week after facing intense scrutiny over allegations he helped shield Hunter Biden from criminal investigations into his laptop and business dealings.
Timothy Thibault, an FBI assistant special agent in charge, was allegedly forced out after he was accused of political bias in his handling of probes involving President Biden’s son, sources told the Washington Times on Monday.
Avril Haines appears on MSNBC with Andrea Mitchell to complain about President Trump’s abuse of power after removing Brennan’s security clearance. (Credit: MSNBC screenshot)
“The U.S. intelligence community will assess the potential risk to national security of disclosure of materials recovered during the Aug. 8 search of former President Donald Trump’s Florida residence, according to a letter seen by Reuters.
The letter dated Friday from National Intelligence Director (DNI) Avril Haines to House Intelligence Committee chair Adam Schiff and Oversight Committee chair Carolyn Maloney also said the Justice Department and DNI “are working together to facilitate a classification review” of materials including those recovered during the search.
Schiff and Maloney said in a joint statement they were pleased the government was “assessing the damage caused by the improper storage of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago.” Politico reported the letter earlier.
US House Intelligence Committee chairman Adam Schiff speaks to the press with US Democratic Representative from New York Carolyn Maloney, August 15, 2022. (Credit: Nicholas Kamm/Getty Images)
The Justice Department on Friday disclosed that it was investigating Trump for removing White House records because it believed he illegally held documents including some involving intelligence-gathering and clandestine human sources – among America’s most closely held secrets.
Haines said DNI “will also lead an Intelligence Community (IC) assessment of the potential risk to national security that would result from the disclosure of the relevant documents” including those seized.
A spokesman for Trump, Taylor Budowich, accused Schiff of being reckless with U.S. intelligence and asserted Democrats had “weaponized the intel community against President Trump with selective and dishonest leaks.” (Read more: Yahoo News, 8/27/2022) (Archive)
Tucker Carlson covers my @TheGrayzoneNews report exposing the Pentagon’s invitation of multiple Ukrainian Nazis to Disney World, where comedian Jon Stewart honored a former fascist militant for his “personal example.”
Defense Department-sponsored “Warrior Games” featured liberal comedian Jon Stewart awarding a member of Ukraine’s neo-Nazi Azov Battalion at Disney World. The Pentagon refused to tell The Grayzone whether US taxpayers funded the foreign competitors’ travel.
This August, during the Department of Defense’s annual Warrior Games at Disney World in Orlando, Florida this August 19-28, liberal comedian Jon Stewart awarded a Ukrainian military veteran named Ihor Halushka the “Heart of the Team” award for “inspiring his team” with his “personal example.”
Halushka happens to have been a member of the neo-Nazi Azov Battalion, which has been armed by the US and integrated into the Ukrainian National Guard. The award-winning ultra-nationalist wore a sleeve over his left arm as he accepted the prize, presumably to cover up his tattoo of the Nazi Sonnenrad, or Black Sun.
Ihor Halushka’s Sonnenrad Black Sun tattoo is visible on his left elbow. (Credit: The Grayzone)
“Here we go… It was only a matter of time before the DOJ-NSD architects of the Trump targeting operation came out from the shadows. This is the moment long-time readers of CTH should have been waiting for. For the past five years, Mary McCord has been one of a small and select lawfare group organizing the targeting of President Trump.
Mary McCord led the support team who created the Carter Page FISA warrant using the Steele Dossier to replace the required ‘Wood’s file’. McCord was the DOJ-NSD official who traveled with DOJ Deputy AG Sally Yates to talk to former White House counsel Don McGhan which weaponized the Flynn-Kislyak call to remove Trump’s National Security Advisor.
Mary McCord was the person who organized Alexander Vindman and Eric Ciaramella to construct the first impeachment effort. Additionally, it was Mary McCord along with her former legal counsel, turned Intelligence Community Inspector General, Michael Atkinson, who changed the ICIG whistleblower rules allowing an anonymous complaint to underpin the false accusations from Ciaramella against Trump.
It was also Mary McCord who was appointed by FISA court Judge James Boasberg as an amici curia to the court, intercepting issues of false information in filings from the DOJ-NSD to the court as constructed by Kevin Clinesmith.
It was Mary McCord who then took up the lead congressional position within the impeachment construct created by Adam Schiff and Jerry Nadler, and it was Mary McCord who then joined the January 6 Committee in the committee fight to obtain President Trump’s white house records.
Mary McCord surfaces today with ABC’s George Stephanopoulos to outline what her team has currently constructed, including the specific targeting approaches her DOJ-NSD and Lawfare crew have put together.
As noted by McCord, the ‘obstruction of justice’ angle is a repeat of the threat used by the Deep State to keep the criminal conduct of the DOJ-NSD from being exposed. WATCH:
When the Carter Page FISA application was originally assembled by the FBI and DOJ, there was initial hesitancy from within the DOJ National Security Division (DOJ-NSD) about submitting the application, because it did not have enough citations in evidence (the infamous ‘Woods File’). That’s why the Steele Dossier ultimately became important. It was the Steele Dossier that provided the push, the legal cover needed for the DOJ-NSD to submit the application for a Title-1 surveillance warrant against the campaign of Donald J. Trump.
When the Carter Page title-1 search warrant application was finally assembled for submission to the FISA court, the head of the DOJ-NSD was John Carlin. Carlin quit working for the DOJ-NSD in late September 2016 just before the final application was submitted (October 21,2016).
John Carlin was replaced by Deputy Asst. Attorney General, Mary McCord.
♦ When the FISA application was finally submitted (approved by Sally Yates and James Comey), it was Mary McCord who did the actual process of filing the application and gaining the Title-1 surveillance warrant.
A few months later, February 2017, with Donald Trump now in office as President, it was Mary McCord who went with Deputy AG Sally Yates to the White House to confront White House legal counsel Don McGahn over the Michael Flynn interview with FBI agents. The surveillance of Flynn’s calls was presumably done under the auspices and legal authority of the FISA application Mary McCord previously was in charge of submitting.
♦ At the time the Carter Page application was filed (October 21, 2016), Mary McCord’s chief legal counsel inside the office was a DOJ-NSD lawyer named Michael Atkinson. In his role as the legal counsel for the DOJ-NSD, it was Atkinson’s job to review and audit all FISA applications submitted from inside the DOJ. Essentially, Atkinson was the DOJ internal compliance officer in charge of making sure all FISA applications were correctly assembled and documented.
♦ When the anonymous CIA whistleblower complaint was filed against President Trump for the issues of the Ukraine call with President Zelensky, the Intelligence Community Inspector General had to change the rules for the complaint to allow an anonymous submission. Prior to this change, all intelligence whistleblowers had to put their name on the complaint. It was this 2019 IGIC who changed the rules. Who was the Intelligence Community Inspector General? Michael Atkinson.
Yes, after she left main justice, Mary McCord took the job of working for Chairman Jerry Nadler and Chairman Adam Schiff as the chief legal advisor inside the investigation that led to the construction of articles of impeachment. As a consequence, Mary McCord received the newly permitted anonymous whistleblower complaint from her old office colleague Michael Atkinson.
♦ During his investigation of the Carter Page application, Inspector General Michael Horowitz discovered an intentional lie inside the Carter Page FISA application (directly related to the ‘Woods File’) which his team eventually tracked to FBI counterintelligence division lawyer, Kevin Clinesmith. Eventually Clinesmith was criminally charged with fabricating evidence (changed wording on an email) in order to intentionally falsify the underlying evidence in the FISA submission.
When John Durham took the Clinesmith indictment to court, the judge in the case was James Boasberg.
♦ In addition to being a DC criminal judge, James Boasberg is also a FISA court judge who signed-off on one of the renewals for the FISA application that was submitted using fraudulent evidence fabricated by Kevin Clinesmith. In essence, now the presiding judge over the FISA court, Boasberg was the FISC judge who was tricked by Clinesmith and now the criminal court judge in charge of determining Clinesmith’s legal outcome. Judge Boasberg eventually sentenced Clinesmith to 6 months probation.
As an outcome of continued FISA application fraud and wrongdoing by the FBI in their exploitation of searches of the NSA database, Presiding FISC Judge James Boasberg appointed an amici curiae advisor to the court who would monitor the DOJ-NSD submissions and ongoing FBI activities.
Who did James Boasberg select as a FISA court amicus? Mary McCord.
♦ SUMMARY: Mary McCord submitted the original false FISA application to the court using the demonstrably false Dossier. Mary McCord participated in the framing of Michael Flynn. Mary McCord worked with ICIG Michael Atkinson to create a fraudulent whistleblower complaint against President Trump; and Mary McCord used that manipulated complaint to assemble articles of impeachment on behalf of the joint House Intel and Judiciary Committee. Mary McCord then took up a defensive position inside the FISA court to protect the DOJ and FBI from sunlight upon all the aforementioned corrupt activity.
You can clearly see how Mary McCord would be a person of interest if anyone was going to start digging into corruption internally within the FBI, DOJ or DOJ-NSD. Then, as if on cue to keep the entire corrupt system protected, this happened:
November 4, 2021 – In Washington DC – “Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.) and the House Jan. 6 Select Committee has tapped Mary McCord, who once ran the Justice Department’s National Security Division, for representation in its fight to obtain former President Donald Trump’s White House records. (read more)
Mary McCord is the epitome of a person using a position to abuse the power within it.
Former Obama White House Counsel Lisa Monaco is now the Deputy Attorney General. John Carlin is back inside the DOJ-NSD as the Biden administration continued the Obama administration targeting of President Trump. Mary McCord returns back inside the House J-6 investigative committee put together to purposefully target Donald J Trump…
Now does the timing of Mary McCord surfacing publicly, immediately after the underlying search warrant used in the raid against Donald Trump, make sense?
McCord is the architect, the actual person putting lawfare strategy into lawfare ink and action, for the Trump targeting operations.” (Conservative Treehouse, 8/28/2022)(Archive)
(Credit: Lee Smith/Twitter, Mar-a-Lago/Charles Trainor Jr./Miami Herald/Tribune News Service/Getty Images)
“Columnist Lee Smith, author of The Plot Against the President: The True Story of How Congressman Devin Nunes Uncovered the Biggest Political Scandal in U.S. History, said colleagues and peers of his — whose judgment he trusts — speculate that the FBI’s raid of former President Donald Trump’s private residence at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, FL, was a search for documents related to its “Russiagate” surveillance operation of the 45th president.
“I think the best way to understand this is in the context of a six-year-long operation targeting Donald Trump, Donald Trump’s aides, and Donald Trump’s supporters,” Smith said on SiriusXM’s Breitbart News Sunday with host Joel Pollak. “I have different colleagues and people whose insight and whose wisdom I trust very much, and they believe that what the FBI was looking for were documents related to … what the FBI called the Crossfire Hurricane investigation, but what most of the rest of us know as the Russiagate operation meant to target candidate Trump, then President-elect Trump, and then President Donald J. Trump.”
Smith said the people whose speculation he was relaying “have much more insight” and “much more knowledge” about the FBI’s operations than he.
(…) “We need to remember these [are] intelligence agencies that Hillary Clinton was using to spy on the Trump campaign and to smear the Trump campaign,” he remarked. “This was in the Obama administration. There is no way that any of this happened without the White House knowing about it.”
Smith said it was “good news” that whistleblowers within the FBI and U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) provided information to Sen. Chuck Grassley’s (R-IA) office about political and partisan internal efforts to suppress information about Hunter Biden.
The existence of whistleblowers within the FBI and DOJ, Smith surmised, could lead to some restraint among the bureaucracies’ worst “anti-Trump” operatives due to fear of exposure.
He remarked, “Thanks to the whistleblowers — and to thanks to Charles Grassley’s letters — now we have anti-Trump operatives at the DOJ and the FBI worried about who they can trust. Under our circumstances at present, that’s very important, and it’s very good news, because we want them looking at each other. We want them fearful of each other. We want them suspicious.” (Read more: Breitbart, 8/28/2022)(Archive)
“A national security lawyer tapped by President Joe Biden to lead his Intelligence Advisory Board was one of 50 former intelligence officials to claim in an open letter that the October 2020 publication of Hunter Biden’s emails appeared to be part of a “Russian information operation.”
Jeremy Bash served in several roles during the Obama administration, including CIA Chief of Staff, Defense Department Chief of Staff, and House Intelligence Committee Chief Counsel. He currently serves as Managing Director of Beacon Global Strategies and as an advisor at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Bash also contributed to CNN and MSNBC during the Trump administration.
After the New York Post published emails obtained from Hunter Biden’s laptop, Bash signed onto a letter claiming that the release “hasall the classic earmarks of a Russian information operation.”
“If we are right, this is Russia trying to influence how Americans vote in this election, and we believe strongly that Americans need to be aware of this,” the officials, including former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and former CIA Director Michael Hayden wrote in the letter.
The letter writers acknowledged that they “d[id] not have evidence of Russian involvement,” and the Daily Caller News Foundation later verified the authenticity of the hard drive. Nevertheless, Twitter suspended the New York Post after it shared the story, citing its rules surrounding hacked material. Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg told podcast host Joe Rogan on Aug. 25 that the social media giant marked the story as “potential misinformation” after the FBI warned the company that Russia would seek to influence the election.
Bash doubled down on the claims in the letter during an Oct. 19, 2020, appearance on MSNBC.
“This looks like Russian intelligence, this walks like Russian intelligence, this talks like Russian intelligence,” Bash told host Nicolle Wallace. “This effort by Rudy Giuliani and the New York Post and Steve Bannon to cook up supposed dirt on Joe Biden looks like a classic Russian playbook disinformation campaign. And let’s recount exactly what happened in July 2019, when President Trump talked to Zelensky, he said, ‘talk to Rudy Giuliani. He’s my guy on trying to dig up false dirt on Joe Biden.”
And then Rudy Giuliani suddenly comes forward with these mysteriously created emails, probably hacked through a Russian intelligence operation. We have to acknowledge the fact that the president of the U.S. is supporting, is condoning, is welcoming, a Russian intelligence operation in 2020,” Bash continued. “This is collusion in plain sight.”
“The Biden Department of Justice lobbed a pre-election grenade at the presumptive 2024 presidential nominee Donald Trump in a midnight filing on Tuesday by attaching a photo of alleged ‘top secret’ documents the FBI seized at Mar-a-Lago.
The now-infamous photo is undoubtedly circulating throughout Americans’ email inboxes this morning, flooding social media channels, and is being heralded on the morning television shows. It would not be surprising if Attorney General Merrick Garland already has the photo framed and mounted and hung proudly in his office.
The ‘top secret’ documents photo, labeled ‘Attachment F’ (you can guess what the ‘F’ stands for) is indisputably provocative. The TS/SCI documents are splayed dramatically across the ornate blue carpet with white cover sheets neatly laid on top of them.
The obvious first question many people are asking about this photo is: Why are ‘top secret’ documents that are arguably so sensitive to national security that a court-appointed, independent “special master” should not be privy to them, being spread out for a publicity style photo? The attachment is not sealed, although the Department of Justice has asked for numerous redactions for the search warrant affidavit that purportedly justified the unprecedented raid on the former president.
So, why this photo? Why now? This is precisely the question that legal analyst Jonathan Turley is asking about Attachment F.
“Notably, this filing includes this picture which is being widely distributed,” Turley notes on Twitter.
“It can, however, leave an obviously misleading impression that secret documents were strewn over the floor when this appears to be the work of the FBI agents. The picture is Attachment F and the textual reference on page 13 simply says ‘Certain of the documents had colored cover sheets indicating their classification status’. It is curious that the DOJ would release this particular picture. The point is to state a fact that hardly needs an optical confirmation: the possession of documents with classified cover sheets.”
Thus arises the second question: If this is indeed a staged photo, then why the need for the box on the right-hand side? If you take a closer look, it shows a Time magazine cover that one might interpret as a veiled threat.
Let’s take a look at the actual Time magazine cover, which is from March 4, 2019.
It’s none other than Donald Trump’s 2020 presidential challengers spying on him while he is in the Oval Office. The cover story headline is “Knock, Knock…”
The Time magazine cover that is not-so-subtly displayed in the FBI’s staged photo is yet another sign that the bureau is unable to do its job in a professional and apolitical fashion. This compounds the problem of the apparent political timing of the FBI raid on August 8, which came over eighteen months into the Biden presidency, and despite the documents allegedly being an ‘urgent’ matter of national security.
The Time cover provoked a politicized response from whom we can only assume is the target audience. Business Insider didn’t miss the message.
“A photo released by the Department of Justice showing the documents found during the FBI’s Mar-a-Lago raid has also unveiled a curious discovery — a framed image of an unflattering TIME magazine cover featuring former President Donald Trump,” BI reports.
“The cover, which appeared to be placed in a gold frame, was from a March 4, 2019 edition of the publication,” the report noted. “It showed 15 of Trump’s Democratic challengers at the time — including President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris — peering into the Oval Office at a nervous-looking Trump who is seated in his chair.”
It may also be the case that the FBI was merely using the photo to leak information to the press.
“The TIME magazine cover, along with Trump’s other personal items commingled with the classified, demonstrates that he was personally handling them,” CNN commentator Asha Rangappa remarked. “Thanks for highlighting key evidence of his guilt!”
New York Times correspondent and CNN analyst Maggie Haberman also noted the Time magazine cover.
A Bloomberg reporter went further and provided a passage that he thought was relevant.
“Certain of the documents had colored cover sheets indicating their classification status,” the filing reads, referring to the photo “of certain documents and classified cover sheets recovered from a container in the ’45 office.'”
It is unclear why the DOJ felt it was necessary to attach a staged photograph that is not sealed showing “top secret” documents so sensitive that a “special master” should arguably not be privy to them.(Read more: Becker News, 8/31/2022)(Archive)
(Credit: Clipping from Jesse Watters Primetime, 8/31/2022)
“Former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe said Wednesday on FNC’s “Jesse Watters Primetime” that he did not think the Department of Justice found what it was looking for during the raid of former President Donald Trump’s Palm Beach, FL home.
“The judge would appoint the special master, and it would be an extension of the court,” Ratcliffe explained. “I do think that it’s the right thing to do. The DOJ’s position is number one. We don’t need a special master. We’ve already — we’ve already sorted everything and looked at everything. Take our word for it that it was done. As you pointed out, they had attorney-client privilege in there, so the taint team that was looking at this didn’t do their job.”
“And, you know, all of this, listen, you presided over a lot of cases,” he continued. “I was a former federal prosecutor, United States attorney. Let me tell you what this is about. Good prosecutors with good cases play it straight. They don’t need to play games. They don’t need to shop for judges, they don’t need to leak intelligence that may or may not exist. And in this case, this tells you that the government didn’t find what they were looking for. There weren’t nuclear secrets in Melania Trump’s underwear drawer, and they’re trying to justify what they’ve done. They’re not playing it straight before the American people. I think that that’s going to play out.” (Breitbart, 9/1/2022)(Archive)
“A federal judge has dismissed Carter Page’s lawsuit against the FBI and former Director James Comey alleging they improperly surveilled him under a FISA warrant.
The bureau surveilled Page under a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant in a process during which they concealed exculpatory evidence against him, DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz found in his 2019 report, per the Washington Examiner.
Judge Dabney Friedrich Stephen (Credit: Stephen J. Boitano/The Associated Press)
“Page alleges that the individual defendants violated §§ 1809(a) and 1810 both by unlawfully engaging in electronic surveillance and using or disclosing the fruits of that surveillance. … Each defendant claims that Page fails to sufficiently allege that he or she violated the statute,” Friedrich wrote. “The Court finds that the claims are not time-barred but that Page does not state a claim against any of the individual defendants.”
“Some of the defendants, such as Comey, McCabe, Strzok, and Lisa Page, allegedly approved, encouraged, and facilitated Page’s investigation and the warrant applications,” the judge continued, adding “Absent from the complaint is any claim that these four defendants participated in drafting or substantively reviewing the faulty applications themselves, let alone that they performed the FISA surveillance and acquired Page’s communications.”
“If proven, these allegations clearly demonstrate wrongdoing… but Page does not allege that any of the individual defendants, including the unknown John Doe defendants and those most responsible for the applications’ critical errors, took part in obtaining the surveillance information, either by setting up the devices or gathering or listening to Page’s communications,” the judge wrote.
“Thus, the Court cannot plausibly infer from this complaint that any of the individual defendants, known or unknown, ‘engaged in electronic surveillance,’ in violation of §§ 1809(a) and 1810.,” Friedrich wrote.” (JusttheNews, 9/1/2022)(Archive)
State contractor donated $400,000 to Gov. Katie Hobbs and AZ Democrats, and got millions more in state money
DCS over the course of the past year approved what amounts to a nearly 60% increase in the rate that Sunshine Residential Homes Inc. charges to care for a child for a day, meaning potentially millions of dollars more going to the company at taxpayers’ expense.
No other standard group home provider — there are dozens — was approved for any rate increase during Hobbs’ tenure.
After initial rejection, Sunshine’s rate increase comes after political donation. Sunshine Residential Homes in December 2022 sought a 20% rate increase, to $179 per day. DCS denied it on Feb. 6, 2023, according to records provided by the department.
Three days later, Sunshine donated $100,000 to a dark-money fund Hobbs’ campaign created…
Only recently did the company begin contributing to political campaigns in Arizona.
Two six-figure donations from Sunshine to the Arizona Democratic Party were reported when Hobbs was running for governor, totaling $200,000 in September and October 2022.
[Sunshine’s CEO] and his wife personally donated nearly the maximum amount, $5,000 each, to Hobbs’ campaign.
That’s not all the company would kick in. Another $200,000 was donated after Hobbs’ election, with half of that going directly to Hobbs’ inauguration fund through her dark money group.
[Sunshine’s Director of Programs] worked for DCS for a decade before joining Sunshine in 2022, according to his resume. Saifi donated $5,000 to Hobbs’ gubernatorial campaign the same day his boss did, state records show.
——-
*The above are excerpts from an Arizona Republic article by Stacey Barchenger. Emphasis added.
Arizona’s child welfare agency has for years sought to move vulnerable kids out of group homes and into family-like settings.
To reduce the use of group homes, and combined with budget constraints, the Arizona Department of Child Safety has denied pay increases to home operators and cut loose 16 providers during the contract renewal process.
Yet even as the state cuts back, one group home provider with close ties to Gov. Katie Hobbs has benefited beyond all others.
DCS over the course of the past year approved what amounts to a nearly 60% increase in the rate that Sunshine Residential Homes Inc. charges to care for a child for a day, meaning potentially millions of dollars more going to the company at taxpayers’ expense.
No other standard group home provider — there are dozens — was approved for a rate increase during Hobbs’ tenure. None is paid as much per day per child as Sunshine, according to DCS and state contract records reviewed by The Arizona Republic.
The private company has made the case for more money, citing financial hardships amid the COVID-19 pandemic and inflation.
Meanwhile, it also has undertaken a new six-figure spending campaign benefiting Hobbs and Democratic politics in Arizona.
The company’s CEO, Simon Kottoor, was on Hobbs’ inaugural committee, and the governor praised the organization on the campaign trail. As DCS was redoing its contracts with group homes, Hobbs and her husband attended a private event at what appears to be the Paradise Valley mansion of Sunshine’s CEO.
The small gathering was to recognize the organization’s work, according to two news organizations that documented the event last month.
“A federal judge said she would make public a more detailed list of the items the FBI took during its search last month of former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home, opening the prospect of a much fuller picture of what documents might be among the classified material seized.
U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon’s decision came during a hearing Thursday over whether to appoint an outside party to review the materials now in the Justice Department’s hands to determine whether issues of executive and lawyer-client privilege put some of it out of bounds to investigators.
After hearing arguments from both sides, she said she would issue a written order in due course on Mr. Trump’s request for that third-party review.
Attorneys for Mr. Trump argued that the federal government’s handling of the investigation had damaged public confidence in the probe’s integrity and transparency. They said the appointment of a special master to review documents would help put issues raised by the case in proper context.
“We need respectfully to lower the temperature on both sides,” said Chris Kise, a former Florida solicitor general with ties to the GOP who was added this week to the former president’s legal team.
Jay Bratt, the Justice Department’s lead attorney on the case, said Mr. Trump wasn’t entitled to the appointment of a special master because the classified and presidential records seized didn’t belong to him, but rather to the U.S.
“He is no longer the president,” said Mr. Bratt, chief of the Justice Department’s counterintelligence and export control section. “And because he is no longer the president, he had no right to take those documents.” (Read more: Wall Street Journal, 9/1/2022)(Archive)
Trump’s ‘stash of nuclear secrets’ is this summer’s Kremlin collusion conspiracy. But the latest chapter of Russiagate may end with a bang.
“The FBI raid on Mar-a-Lago feels like peak Russiagate. There’s the synchronized press hysteria, moving from one absurd end-of-America “bombshell” to the next, accompanied by dark intonations regarding secrets about to be revealed and blustering accusations of high treason. Donald Trump was said to be hoarding “nuclear documents,” which he planned to peddle for billions to the Saudis. Who’s buying the map of Fort Knox? Does Trump have access to Colonel Sanders’ secret fried chicken recipe, too?
It’s no laughing matter to the American press, or for the partisan operatives and national security bureaucrats who feed them their cues. For them, the Mar-a-Lago raid is Russiagate II: The Palm Beach Papers.
Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines’ proposed damage assessment of the documents is a remake of the January 2017 intelligence community assessment which claimed, without evidence, that Vladimir Putin wanted to put Trump in the Oval Office. The extensive redactions on the affidavit the FBI used to get a warrant to raid Trump’s home are akin to the excessive redactions on the application that the FBI showed a secret court in 2016 to get a warrant to spy on the Trump campaign. What was true for the original Russiagate holds here, too: The redactions are designed to hide not state secrets, but government corruption.
The Mar-a-Lago raid feels like Russiagate because, well, it is Russiagate: a conspiracy theory weaponized by the country’s courtier class to serve the interests of a delirious and deracinated oligarchy, spawning daily prophesies of doom fed by an endless supply of national security “leaks” asserting that the former commander-in-chief really was and is a secret Russian agent. And proof of the president’s treachery, chant the priestly keepers of the “collusion” mysteries, will soon be revealed to the public. It is their blanket justification for every past crime and every new banana republic-style abuse of power, accompanied by a drumbeat of ever more outlandish and violent threats.
Avril Haines appears on MSNBC with Andrea Mitchell to complain about President Trump’s abuse of power after removing Brennan’s security clearance. (Credit: MSNBC screenshot)
It is in this context that the FBI’s raid on Mar-a-Lago should be understood: Government records and reports from political and media operatives and bureaucrats who previously starred in Russiagate I give evidence that the FBI raided Trump’s home to seize documents exposing the crimes that the FBI and Justice Department have been committing since 2016. The fact that Russiagate shows no signs of ending anytime soon is bad news for the republic, betrayed from within by a performative elite whose ability to project power outside its gilded bubble requires a steady supply of paranoia, fear, and hysteria.
The story of the Mar-a-Lago raid begins at the end of Trump’s presidency when he declassified documents related to Russiagate. Those records contain evidence of how the FBI spied on Trump’s campaign, presidential transition team, and administration. The documents reportedly include transcripts of FBI intercepts of Trump aides, a declassified copy of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant to collect the electronic communications of Trump campaign volunteer Carter Page, and reports regarding Christopher Steele and Stefan Halper, the two main confidential human sources used by the FBI to spy on Trump’s circle.
Kash Patel (Credit: Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images)
Kash Patel, who served in a variety of Pentagon roles and as a principal deputy in the Office of the Director of National Intelligence in the Trump administration, has said that 60% of the documents related to Russiagate are already in public view. As lead investigator for the House Intelligence Committee’s probe of the FBI’s illegal investigation of the Trump campaign, Patel helped get vital Russiagate records declassified. When Trump named Patel to the ODNI post, he and acting Director Richard Grenell put more Russiagate documents before the U.S. public in 2020. Patel has told the press that what Trump declassified on Jan. 19, 2021, constitutes the remainder of the Russiagate records—which is what the FBI was apparently after.
So, are the Russiagate documents secret? With hours left in Trump’s presidency, the DOJ raised “privacy concerns” about Trump’s declassification, and White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows agreed to submit the documents for a final review. “I am returning the bulk of the binder of declassified documents to the Department of Justice,” Meadows wrote in a memo, “with the instruction that the Department must expeditiously conduct a Privacy Act review under the standards that the Department of Justice would normally apply, redact material appropriately, and release the remaining material with redactions applied.”
President Barack Obama meets with, from left: Kathryn Ruemmler, Lisa Monaco, and Susan E. Rice (Credit: Pete White House Flickr photo)
The problem, however, is that Biden’s DOJ, which was tasked with conducting that review, is staffed with key operatives who targeted Trump starting in 2016, like Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco. As Barack Obama’s Homeland Security adviser, Monaco met in the White House with Haines, then deputy national security adviser (and former deputy CIA director), and National Security Adviser Susan Rice, who is now director of Biden’s Domestic Policy Council, to push the Trump-Russia narrative. As far as Monaco and her confederates were concerned, once Meadows turned over the declassified documents, the national security establishment was in the clear: The documents would never be seen again.” (Read more: Tablet Mag, 9/2/2022)(Archive)
“The FBI seized over 50 empty folders marked “CLASSIFIED” during last month’s raid on former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate.
According to a more detailed property receipt of the seized documents, the FBI discovered 43 empty folders with classified banners in Trump’s office and several others in the former president’s storage room.
It is uncertain whether the photo the DOJ recently released that showed classified folders scattered across the floor included any of the empty folders the FBI seized. (Read more: Breitbart, 9/2/2022)(Archive)
“Hunter Biden’s former business partner Tony Bobulinski reportedly fears the recently departed former FBI agent Timothy Thibault buried the information he conveyed to the FBI about his Chinese business dealings with the Biden family.
Bobulinski, who personally met with President Joe Biden in 2017 for an hour to discuss “the Bidens’ family business plans with the Chinese,” is worried Thibault helped “bury information about his dealings with the Biden family that he gave the FBI,” the Washington Free Beaconreported Friday. Thibault was reportedly “running point” on the FBI’s inquiry into Hunter Biden and “allegedly shut down part of the investigation.
(…) Over the course of Joe Biden’s political career, he has repeatedly denied being involved in the family business. “I have never discussed with my son or my brother or anyone else anything having to do with their businesses. Period.” Yet Joe Biden called Hunter in 2018 to speak about the family’s CEFC deal. “I think you’re clear,” Joe Biden said about the deal. “And anyway if you get a chance give me a call, I love you,” the message concluded.” (Read more: Breitbart, 9/2/2022) (Archive)
“Former Trump Attorney General Bill Barr said Friday on FNC’s “America Reports” that it is “unprecedented” that former President Donald Trump had classified material at his Florida estate and he “jerked around” the Department of Justice for a year while they tried to recover the documents.
Sandra Smith asked, “Do you think this type of this raid was avoidable? Do you think a second subpoena, for example, could have been issued?”
Barr said, “I personally think for them to have taken things to the current point, they probably have pretty good evidence, but that’s speculation. And until we see that, it’s hard to say.”
He added, “Now, let me just say, I think the driver on this from the beginning was, you know, loads of classified information sitting in Mar-a-Lago. People say this was unprecedented, but it’s also unprecedented for a president to take all this classified information and put him in a country club. And how long is the government going to try to get that back? You know, they jawboned for a year. They were deceived on the voluntary actions taken. They then went and got a subpoena. They were deceived on that. They feel and the record, the facts are starting to show that they were being jerked around. And so how long, you know, how long do they wait?” (Breitbart, 9/2/2022)(Archive)
“The claim by former President Donald Trump that he declassified the documents with classified markings found at Mar-a-Lago was challenged Sept. 2 as “highly improbable” by former Attorney General William Barr.
“I can’t think of a legitimate reason why they could be taken out of the government, away from the government, if they’re classified,” who was attorney general during the Trump and George H.W. Bush administrations, said during an appearance on Fox News.
“I frankly am skeptical of this claim that ‘I declassified everything,’ because, frankly, I think it’s highly improbable and second, if in fact, he stood over scores of boxes not really knowing what was in them, and said ‘I hereby declassify everything in here,’ that would be such an abuse, and show such recklessness that it’s almost worse than taking the documents.”
Trump publicly ordered in October 2020 the “total declassification” of “any and all documents” related to the U.S. investigation into alleged Russia-Trump collusion, as well as all documents related to the use of a private email server by former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
Trump Responds
(…) Barr was known as a staunch Trump defender after becoming attorney general in 2019 but towards the end of the administration, he publicly diverged from Trump on a number of issues, including alleged election fraud.
In a statement on his Truth Social network after Barr’s comments, Trump said that the former attorney general is a Republican in name only, or a RINO, “who was so afraid of being Impeached that he became a captive to the Radical Left Democrats.”
“Barr never fought the way he should have for Election Integrity, and so much else. He started off OK as A.G., but faded fast—Didn’t have courage or stamina. People like that will never Make America Great Again!” Trump added.
Trump also said that Barr acted too slowly on the report from former special counsel Robert Mueller, which found no coordination or cooperation between Trump or his campaign and Russia, and knocked Barr for not releasing the laptop computer once owned by Hunter Biden before the 2020 election.
“The Laptop information should have been released BEFORE the Rigged Election, not after it, for the VOTERS TO SEE,” Trump said.
Barr has defended not making public the existence of a federal investigation into Hunter Biden, President Joe Biden’s son, before the election, saying that it would have affected the outcome.” (Read more: The Epoch Times, 9/3/2022)(Archive)
“We’ve been pushing Attorney General Merrick Garland for far greater transparency over the Mar-a-Lago raid, but he and FBI chief Christopher Wray owe the nation clear explanations over the Hunter Biden investigation, too.
Particularly in the wake of Timothy Thibault’s resignation from the bureau amid charges he suppressed evidence in the case and even shut down the FBI’s “laptop” investigation on spurious “Russian misinformation” grounds. He also faced an ongoing Office of Special Counsel probe of his partisan, anti-Trump social-media posts.
Top Senate Judiciary Committee Republican Charles Grassley in late July wrote Wray and Garland (following up on a May letter) citing charges by multiple FBI “highly credible whistleblowers” about the burying of “verified and verifiable” dirt on Hunter by falsely dismissing valid intelligence as “disinformation.”
The whistleblowers claim Thibault (then assistant special agent in charge of the FBI’s Washington Field Office) shut down an entire avenue of the Hunter investigation in October 2020. (Seemingly, that avenue centered on info from the infamous laptop, which the FBI first acquired in December 2019.)
Now Miranda Devine reports that Thibault that Octoberalso apparently buried the extensive testimony of whistleblower Tony Bobulinski, Hunter’s former business partner, about the Biden family’s corrupt influence-peddling.
After Bobulinksi’s initial five-hour FBI interview, he was told Thibault would be his FBI contact, yet the bureau never contacted him again. Nor was he brought before the Delaware grand jury investigating Hunter.
Incidentally, the drive to write off the laptop as “Russian disinformation” apparently began long before The Post’s first October 2020 scoops. FBI Supervisory Intelligence Analyst Brian Auten had opened an “assessment” that August; per Grassley, its result in October was that: “Verified and verifiable derogatory information on Hunter Biden was falsely labeled as disinformation.”
Jean Pierre insisted that the President was not briefed on the raid.
AP’s @ZekeJMiller: “The FBI…served a search warrant on the [Trump’]s residence…Was [he] or anyone at the WH aware of that…or has [he] been briefed in the aftermath of that…being executed?”
KJP: “No. The President was not briefed…No one at the WH was given a heads up.” pic.twitter.com/jbk4jwRQhX
District Judge Aileen Mercedes Cannon (Credit: public domain)
Earlier today, Judge Aileen Cannon granted President Trump’s request for a Special Master review of the material confiscated by the Biden DOJ during their raid on his home at Mar-a-Lago.
Judge Cannon also ‘temporarily enjoins’ or forbids the Biden regime from ‘reviewing and using the seized materials’ pending the completion of the review.
Judge Cannon takes the government to task in her order:
Andrew Weissman, the former Justice official who ran the Mueller special counsel and is now a contributor on the fake news channels, suffered a meltdown following the decision.
Sal Greco, a politically persecuted and fired NYPD officer, responded to Weissman’s temper tantrum.
After violating the civil rights of mob victims, the Enron defendants ( who’s convictions were overturned because of his misconduct ) and Paul Manafort; Andrew Weissmann ranting about “ the rule of law “ is a joke.
Andrew Weismann is in a lavender rage because an honest and courageous judge has delayed the politicized DOJ effort to destroy @realDonaldTrump while holding him to a different standard then Barrack Obama.
For the second time in his legal career, Andrew Weismann comes across a judge that actually respects the rule of law. The last time was the when his Enron convictions were overturned for his prosecutorial misconduct.
Pages from an FBI property list of items seized from former president Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate and made public by the Department of Justice. FBI agents who searched the home found empty folders marked with classified banners. The inventory reveals in general terms the contents of the 33 boxes taken during the Aug. 8 search. (Credit: Jon Elswick/AP)
“A document describing a foreign government’s military defenses, including its nuclear capabilities, was found by FBI agents who searched former president Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residenceand private club last month, according to people familiar with the matter, underscoring concerns among U.S. intelligence officials about classified material stashed in the Florida property.
Some of the seized documents detail top-secret U.S. operations so closely guarded that many senior national security officials are kept in the dark about them. Only the president, some members of his Cabinet or anear-Cabinet-level official could authorize other government officials to know details of these special-access programs, according to people familiar with the search, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe sensitive details of an ongoing investigation.
Documents about such highly classified operations require special clearances on a need-to-know basis, not just top-secret clearance. Some special-access programs can have as few as a couple dozen government personnel authorized to know of an operation’s existence. Records that deal with such programs are kept under lock and key, almost always in a secure compartmented information facility, with a designated control officer to keep careful tabs on their location.
But such documents were stored at Mar-a-Lago, with uncertain security, more than 18 months after Trump left the White House.
After months of trying, according to government court filings, the FBI has recovered more than 300 classified documents from Mar-a-Lago this year: 184 in a set of 15 boxes sent to the National Archives and Records Administration in January, 38 more handed over by a Trump lawyer to investigators in June, and more than 100 additional documents unearthed in acourt-approved search on Aug. 8.
It was in this last batch of government secrets, the people familiar with the matter said, that the information about a foreign government’s nuclear-defense readiness was found. These people did not identify the foreign government in question, say where at Mar-a-Lago the document was found or offer additional details about one of the Justice Department’s most sensitive national security investigations.
Christopher Kise, a lawyer for Trump, decried leaks about the case, which he said “continue with no respect for the process nor any regard for the real truth. This does not serve well the interests of justice.”
“Moreover, the damage to public confidence in the integrity of the system simply cannot be underestimated. The responsible course of action here would be for someone — anyone — in the Government to exercise leadership and control. The Court has provided a sensible path forward which does not include the selective leak of unverifiable and misleading information. There is no reason to deviate from that path if the goal is, as it should be, to find a rational solution to document storage issues which have needlessly spiraled out of control.”
“All of a sudden, the White House gets alerted to these billboards that show me sitting down with I thought my legs together, but the way it’s shot, it’s sort of suggestive,” Clinton added.
Some of those photos were used to sell lingerie. Clinton said the incident and the constant photography led her to switch to pantsuits, which have become a staple of the ex-first lady’s fashion.
The former secretary of State and her daughter, Chelsea Clinton, sat down with O’Donnell to promote the pair’s forthcoming Apple TV+ docuseries, “Gutsy.”
“I didn’t know that story,” Chelsea Clinton said. “I didn’t know that story. It’s by far and away the greatest revelation I had.”
Hillary Clinton said the incident in Brazil was the first of many uncomfortable experiences she had with press photographers as she increasingly became a public figure.” (Read more: The Hill, 9/5/2022) (Archive)
(Timeline editor’s note: Sorry, we couldn’t bring ourselves to search for the crotch shot photos that appeared on Brazilian billboards.)
“I can’t believe we’re still talking about this, but my emails. . .”: Hillary Clinton’s disbelief this week was shared by many critics left dumbfounded by her claim her private server contained “zero” classified documents. The expression of utter incredulity was classic Clinton — she’s selling hats reading “But her emails” for $30 a pop.
But Hillary’s denial of what was found on her server exposes something far more serious than signature hypocrisy. It reflects establishment figures’ sense of license that they can literally rewrite history with little fear of contradiction by the media.
While calling for limits on free speech over “disinformation,” Hillary has no qualms about falsely denying what published government reports detail.
“As Trump’s problems continue to mount, the right is trying to make this about me again. There’s even a ‘Clinton Standard.’ The fact is that I had zero emails that were classified,” her but-my-emails tweet continued. “Comey admitted he was wrong after he claimed I had classified emails. Trump’s own State Department, under two different Secretaries, found I had no classified emails.”
Virtually everything about that claim is breathtakingly untrue.
Let’s quickly deal with the light lifting before getting back to the “Clinton Standard.”
“Zero emails” were “classified.”
A Department of Justice inspector general report revealed “81 email chains containing approximately 193 individual emails” were “classified from the CONFIDENTIAL to TOP SECRET levels at the time.” Clinton is echoing her allies’ recent spin that there were only three documents with classification markings among 33,000 emails. It is utter nonsense.
The Clinton email scandal is a scandal because these were emails. There is no classification automatically stamped on text being typed out and sent within minutes. While attachments can have classification markings, the whole point of using secure servers is that emails are created in the moment with inevitable slips in referencing classified material.
Nevertheless, the emails had classified information, including top-secret information tied to “Special Access Programs.” Yet some allies emphasize the inspector general also noted that in some cases there was “conscious effort to avoid sending classified information, by writing around the most sensitive material.” It failed. The emails still contained classified information.
That’s why she was reckless to use her own server: Such mistakes on private servers are more vulnerable to capture by foreign intelligence services. Indeed, according to the FBI, “hostile actors gained access” to some of the information through the emails of Clinton’s associates and aides. (Read more: New York Post, 9/7/2022)(Archive)
Trump vs Clinton (Credit: Wall Street Journal graphics)
“Recently a Florida judge dismissed the lawsuit brought by President Trump against Hillary Clinton. [65-page ruling HERE] The media have enjoyed ridiculing Trump by using the words of the judge who dismissed the case. As noted by the Washington Times, “Judge Donald M. Middlebrooks, a Clinton appointee, said Mr. Trump’s filing was too lengthy, detailing events that “are implausible because they lack any specific allegations which might provide factual support for the conclusions reached.”
(…) In March 2022 President Trump filed a civil lawsuit against: Hillary Clinton, Hillary for America Campaign Committee, DNC, DNC Services Corp, Perkins Coie, Michael Sussmann, Marc Elias, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Charles Dolan, Jake Sullivan, John Podesta, Robby Mook, Phillipe Reines as well as Fusion GPS, Glenn Simpson, Peter Fritsch, Nellie Ohr, Bruce Ohr, Orbis Business Intelligence, Christopher Steele, Igor Danchenko, Neustar Inc., Rodney Joffe, James Comey Peter Strzok, Lisa Page, Kevin Clinesmith and Andrew McCabe. [108-Page Lawsuit Here]
When I was about one-third of the way through reading the lawsuit, I initially stopped and said to myself this is going to take a lot of documentary evidence to back up the claims in the assertions. Dozens of attachments would be needed and hundreds of citations to the dozens of attachments would be mandatory. Except, they were not there.
After reading further, while completely understanding the background material that was being described in the filing, I realized this wasn’t a lawsuit per se’. The 108-pages I was holding in my hands were more akin to a legal transfer mechanism from President Trump to lawyers who needed it. The filing was contingent upon a series of documents that would be needed to support the claims within it.
Whoever wrote the lawsuit had obviously reviewed the evidence to support the filing. However, the attachments and citations were missing. That was weird. That’s when I realized the purpose of the lawsuit. In hindsight, things became clear when the DOJ-NSD raided the home of Donald Trump, and suddenly the motive to confiscate the documents that would be the missing lawsuit attachments and citations surfaced.
With the manipulative, and I say intentional, “ongoing investigation” angle of the John Durham probe essentially blocking public release of declassified documents showing the efforts of all the lawsuit participants (Trump-Russia Collusion Hoax), President Trump needed a legal way to secure and more importantly share the evidence.
Think of it like the people around Trump wanting to show lawyers the evidence in the documents. However, because of the construct of the lawfare being deployed against Trump, any lawyer would need a *reason* to review the evidence. The Trump -v- Clinton et al lawsuit becomes that ‘reason.’
The “documents” (classified or not) are reviewed by lawyers in preparation for the lawsuit. This is their legal justification for reviewing the documents. In essence, the lawsuit is a transfer mechanism permitting the Trump legal team to review the evidence on behalf of their client, former President Donald Trump.
Once the formation of the lawsuit is established, the retainer and acceptance of the lawyers to represent their client cemented, the legal counsel, discussion and information within legal duties/obligations of those who represent the plaintiff (Trump) becomes an information silo. In addition to previous executive privilege established by President Trump himself; outside government there is now another silo to defend against the motives of the Lawfare crew (DOJ), the attorney-client privilege.
The lawsuit itself is the transfer mechanism permitting sharing of the documents and providing legal cover for the reviewers (lawyers). The details within the 108-page filing constitute the claims of the plaintiff in the lawsuit, which were established by the evidentiary documents later seized by the DOJ and FBI raid on Mar-a-Lago. (Read more: Conservative Treehouse, 9/11/2022)(Archive)
(…) Regardless, the feds were not happy with the result, and filed a Motion for a Partial Stay Pending Appeal with Judge Cannon. Procedurally, they have to ask the District Court for a stay before seeking a stay in the appeals court. That certainly will happen if Judge Cannon turns them down.
Specifically, the government seeks a stay to the extent the Order (1) enjoins the further review and use for criminal investigative purposes of records bearing classification markings that were recovered pursuant to a court-authorized search warrant and (2) requires the government to disclose those classified records to a special master for review. The government respectfully requests that the Court rule on this motion promptly. If the Court does not grant a stay by Thursday, September 15, the government intends to seek relief from the Eleventh Circuit….
[The motion] is limited to the Order’s directives with respect to the seized classified records1 because those aspects of the Order will cause the most immediate and serious harms to the government and the public. The classified records—a discrete set of just over 100 documents—have already been segregated from the other seized records and are being maintained separately….
Here are the grounds for the stay, the feds argued:
First, the government is likely to succeed in its appeal of the Order as it applies to classified records…. Plaintiff does not and could not assert that he owns or has any possessory interest in classified records; that he has any right to have those government records returned to him; or that he can advance any plausible claims of attorney-client privilege as to such records that would bar the government from reviewing or using them. And although this Court suggested that Plaintiff might be able to assert executive privilege as to some of the seized records, Supreme Court precedent makes clear that any possible assertion of privilege that Plaintiff might attempt to make over the classified records would be overcome by the government’s “demonstrated, specific need” for that evidence. United States v. Nixon, 418 U.S. 683, 713 (1974) (“United States v. Nixon”). Among other things, the classified records are the very subject of the government’s ongoing investigation.
Second, the government and the public would suffer irreparable harm absent a stay…. The Court thus stated that its Order was not intended to “impede the classification review and/or intelligence assessment by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (‘ODNI’).” D.E. 64 at 1-2. But the review and assessment on their own are not sufficient to address and fully mitigate any national security risks presented. The Intelligence Community’s review and assessment cannot be readily segregated from the Department of Justice’s (“DOJ”) and Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (“FBI”) activities in connection with the ongoing criminal investigation, and uncertainty regarding the bounds of the Court’s order and its implications for the activities of the FBI has caused the Intelligence Community, in consultation with DOJ, to pause temporarily this critically important work….
Third, the partial stay sought here would impose no cognizable harm on Plaintiff. It would not disturb the special master’s review of any other records, including any personal materials or records potentially subject to attorney-client privilege….
“Huge revelations pertaining to the content of the documents seized by the FBI from Mar-a-Lago. Trump made some comments to Newsmax and today Devin Nunes is saying he thinks that the docs are about Russiagate.
In a report today from Newsmax, Trump claims he kept them under Executive Privilege, to PROTECT THEM FROM BEING DESTROYED BY THE DEEP STATE.
(Credit: Newsmax/Clandestine)
“I think they thought it was something to do with the Russia, Russia, Russia hoax,”
Initially, I found this peculiar, because Trump himself confirmed some of the docs were pertaining to the Iran Deal last week when he retruthed this post from Paul Sperry.
(Credit: @paulsperry/Gettr)
But based on Trump’s most recent comments to Newsmax, the docs are about essentially EVERYTHING! Trump said that the documents in question “expose a Deep State plot” against him. Which is the reason he Declassified them, and took the docs for protection. There are reportedly “11 sets of documents” the FBI were interested in.
So what are the docs about? All of the docs about Deep State’s crimes that Trump was concerned they might destroy. That could cover a wide variety of subjects. Thus far, we know some of the docs to pertain to the Iran Deal and Russiagate/Crossfire Hurricane, but what other crimes is Trump aware of that he might want to prevent the Deep State from destroying? Uranium One? Libya? Haiti? Benghazi? 9/11? JFK Assassination?
Whatever else is in those docs, Trump is insinuating the FBI is looking to retrieve them to prevent him from showing it to the American People.
“They were afraid that things were in there — part of their scam material.”
(…) While the Left think they are closing in, Trump just confirmed the boomerang is in effect. The docs don’t implicate him, they implicate the enemy in all of their most heinous crimes, and Trump wants them public.” (Read more: Clandestine/Substack, 9/8/2022)(Archive)
Federal prosecutors in Manhattan announced sex trafficking and conspiracy charges against Jeffrey Epstein, July, 2019. (Credit: Jefferson Siegel/NYT)
“Your humble author, as promised, is involved in litigation to extract records from the federal government. It’s easy to talk about current events. The more difficult part is suing federal agencies for documentation of their wrongdoing.
(…) One development we can divulge is our effort to obtain the FBI’s records on Jeffrey Epstein. We made a simple request: hand over all FBI interviews with Epstein. We know those records are out there, as we were the first to report that Epstein had been a source for the FBI. (It was later confirmed that Epstein cooperated on a Bear Stearns investigation.)
Wait. Was pedophile Jeffrey Epstein an informant for Mueller’s FBI?
From the 5/24/18 FBI Vault release: “Epstein has also provided information to the FBI as agreed upon.”
But we’re not convinced that was the only time Epstein spoke with the FBI. There were other hints and rumors that he worked with the US government to recover stolen funds. Thus the FOIA request.
How did the FBI respond? Not by denying the existence of any records.
Instead, the FBI is hiding behind FOIA’s law enforcement exemption, stating that the production of the Epstein records would interfere with ongoing law enforcement investigations:
“The records responsive to your request are law enforcement records; there is a pending or prospective law enforcement proceeding relevant to these responsive records, and release of the information could reasonably be expected to interfere with enforcement proceedings.”
For a few months, I have been speculating there were deeper ties to the CIA or NSA for Rodney Joffe. There were a number of indications of that, which I have covered.
Today, the government produced records responsive to my FOIA. We sued the Department of Defense for records, and now we have them.
My FOIA was:
One of the first emails that stood out was sent from Rodney Joffe to Keromytis, noting:
This is confirmation that Joffe worked for the NSA in some capacity.
It’s important not to make leaps of speculation, but there are many possible implications to this. We know the NSA is a corner piece to much of the DNC hack story. Was Joffe involved? We don’t know.
As I have repeatedly reported, there has been a source who alleges Joffe played a key role in the attribution for the DNC hack. Whether that was was for the NSA or FBI (where he also has a lot of contact) or to DARPA/DHS/others, is unclear.
“House Intelligence Committee testimony identified Gary Gensler as having final approval for funding discredited dossier.
Gary Gensler, President Joe Biden’s Securities and Exchange Commissioner, had final approval authority for the Hillary Clinton campaign’s payments for the discredited Steele dossier, according to congressional testimony that is adding to concerns about conflicts of interest as the SEC investigates Donald Trump’s social media firm’s merger request.
Questions surfaced last month about the SEC’s probe of Trump’s Truth Social when RealClearInvestigations journalist Paul Sperry reported that Gensler, as SEC chairman, previously served as the Hillary Clinton campaign’s chief financial officer.
Melissa Hodgman-Strzok (Credit: The Daily Mail)
In addition, Sperry reported that SEC Associate Director of Enforcement Melissa Hodgman was married to Peter Strzok, the FBI agent who led the much-criticized Russia collusion probe and was fired in 2018 for anti-Trump texts on his official bureau phone.
The SEC declined to comment when Just the News inquired about Sperry’s report, the role if any, that Gensler and Hodgman are playing in the Truth Social investigation or whether the two SEC executives offered to recuse themselves from the inquiry.
In addition to the connections to Trump, Truth Social is run by former House Intelligence Committee chairman Devin Nunes, who played a key role in exposing Strzok’s conduct during the Russia probe, the Clinton campaign’s connections to the Steele dossier, the inaccuracies of the dossier and the FBI’s reliance on the former British spy Christopher Steele to obtain FISA warrants targeting the Trump campaign and adviser Carter Page.
In the end, Nunes’ probe exposed that the FBI ultimately determined that most of the allegations Steele placed in the dossier and shared with the agents were disproven, uncorroborated or meaningless Internet rumor and that the FBI misled the court about the reliability of the information.” (Read more JusttheNews, 9/12/2022)(Archive)
THREAD: Trump’s brief in opposition to the Motion for Stay helps frame what I see as THE key question. (Assuming there was no obstruction, which given DOJ’s leaks I think is far assumption.) 1/
3/ Presidential Records are specifically defined as follows and excludes BOTH “personal records” AND “official records of an agency.” pic.twitter.com/MOmAbxgUIH
5/ So, here’s the interesting part from today’s filing: Trump’s team argues all of the records at issue are EITHER Presidential records or personal records. But why isn’t it possible that instead they are “federal records?” Well, they can’t be logically because they would be pic.twitter.com/twqlWA2uQO
7/ The question I’ve said was key from day one was were these “copies”–they must have been unless they were Presidential or personal records. So, while at first I thought “umm, no, they could be federal records,” is wrong: The question is are they Presidential or personal.
The purposes of making Danchenko a CHS should be quite clear. The Crossfire Hurricane investigation was plagued with problems from the outset. The reasons for opening the investigation were bunk. Those problems continued as the investigation went on, with claims of Trump/Russia collusion proven unverified or outright false. (Thus the targeting of Flynn for a Logan Act violation.)
That developed into the Carter Page FISA applications, first submitted to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) in October 2016, and which relied substantially on the Steele Dossiers (aka Steele Reports). The FISA applications were renewed three times – more on that later. Each application had its own problems, from FBI lawyers lying about Carter Page to the Court being generally misled.
Realizing its own misconduct, the FBI made Danchenko a paid CHS in March 2017 – just before the third FISA warrant was submitted in April 2017. This would allow Comey’s FBI to work directly with Danchenko in support of its counter-intelligence investigation against President Trump.
Danchenko being a CHS also served another purpose: it protected the Bureau and the Mueller Special Counsel from revealing their “sources and methods.” How do you hide misconduct? Bury the witness.
The Motion in Limine
When the Steele Reports were released, the media picked up on the most salacious rumors, one that was utterly unbelievable: that Russian intelligence had a video of Trump involved with prostitutes at the Moscow Ritz-Carlton Hotel. Also known as the “pee tape.”
The allegation came from Danchenko, who attributed it to his sources – one from the Ritz-Carlton, and another being Sergei Millian. Durham will refute it, as it expects to call at trial “Bernd Kuhlen,” the then-general manager of the Ritz-Carlton, who will deny speaking with or ever meeting Danchenko “in June 2016, or at any time.”
What is Durham’s theory on Danchenko’s motive for lying about the Ritz-Carlton allegations? Because it reflects “a deliberate effort to conceal from the FBI Charles Dolan’s role as a source for the Steele Reports and to deceive the FBI regarding Millian’s role (or lack thereof).”
In support of the theory that Danchenko engaged in an “over-arching ‘plan’ to deceive the FBI” about his work for Orbis (the company that collected the information contained in the Steele Reports), Durham also plans to introduce:
Evidence that Danchenko “on multiple occasions communicated and emailed with, among others, Charles Dolan regarding his work for Steele and Orbis.”
“Evidence that proves Dolan was aware of [Danchenko’s] reporting was part of a ‘related project against Trump’ and that this work was being done on behalf of Steele and Orbis.”
Igor Danchenko appears on the Russia-language channel RTVi (U.S.-Israel) in July 2016. (Credit: Twitter/@LikesLurks)
“Today, Special Counsel John Durham moved to unseal this motion in limine in the false statements case against Igor Danchenko.
This motion provides new information on the details of Danchenko’s lies to the FBI, further information on how Special Counsel Mueller ignored Danchenko’s false statements, expected testimony from Clinton-connected executive Charles Dolan, and one crazy development.
But we’ll start with the most damning development: Danchenko was on the FBI payroll as a confidential human source (CHS) from March 2017 through October 2020.
The purposes of making Danchenko a CHS should be quite clear. The Crossfire Hurricane investigation was plagued with problems from the outset. The reasons for opening the investigation were bunk. Those problems continued as the investigation went on, with claims of Trump/Russia collusion proven unverified or outright false. (Thus the targeting of Flynn for a Logan Act violation.)
Those problems continued with the Carter Page FISA applications, first submitted to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) in October 2016, and which relied substantially on the Steele Dossiers (aka Steele Reports). The FISA applications were renewed three times – more on that later. Each application had its own problems, from FBI lawyers lying about Carter Page to the Court being generally misled.
Realizing its own misconduct, the FBI made Danchenko a paid CHS in March 2017 – just before the third FISA warrant was submitted in April 2017. This would allow Comey’s FBI to work directly with Danchenko in support of its counter-intelligence investigation against President Trump. (Read more: Techno Fog/Substack, 9/13/2022)(Archive)
(…) Then there are Danchenko’s false statements about Charles Dolan, an influential Democrat executive with ties to the Clintons. Interestingly, it was Dolan who was given a tour of the Ritz-Carlton Presidential Suite, which was the supposed location of “Trump’s alleged lurid sexual activities.”
the Government anticipates that Mr. Dolan will testify that (1) it was he and Mr. Kupka who attended a lunch with the Ritz-Carlton general manager and other hotel staff during the June 2016 Moscow trip and that [Danchenko] was not present, and (2) neither Donald Trump nor his purported sexual practices were ever discussed at that lunch. Further, the Government also anticipates that Mr. Dolan will testify that Ritz-Carlton hotel staff did, in fact, provide the aforementioned tour of the presidential suite as part of the June 2016 trip and that, again, Donald Trump and his purported sexual practices were not discussed during that tour.
What is Durham’s theory on Danchenko’s motive for lying about the Ritz-Carlton allegations? Because it reflects “a deliberate effort to conceal from the FBI Charles Dolan’s role as a source for the Steele Reports and to deceive the FBI regarding Millian’s role (or lack thereof).”
In support of the theory that Danchenko engaged in an “over-arching ‘plan’ to deceive the FBI” about his work for Orbis (the company that collected the information contained in the Steele Reports), Durham also plans to introduce:
Evidence that Danchenko “on multiple occasions communicated and emailed with, among others, Charles Dolan regarding his work for Steele and Orbis.”
“Evidence that proves Dolan was aware of [Danchenko’s] reporting was part of a ‘related project against Trump’ and that this work was being done on behalf of Steele and Orbis.”
(L–R) Former FBI agent Peter Strzok; former FBI Director James Comey; and former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe. (Credit: Getty ;Images/Illustration by Epoch Times)
(…) Perhaps the most stunning disclosure is that Danchenko was given confidential human source (CHS) status by the FBI in March 2017. Notably, this was after Danchenko had disowned the Steele dossier in a January 2017 FBI interview, having admitted that it was based on gossip and rumors. Given the admission, there was no legitimate reason to extend the protections of CHS status to Danchenko, who no longer had any bona fide value to the FBI’s investigation into alleged Trump–Russia collusion.
In fact, the FBI’s investigation ought to have ended as soon as Danchenko disclosed the true provenance of Steele’s reporting.
The FBI’s goal in giving Danchenko the highly coveted CHS status appears to have been to take Danchenko off the grid. As a CHS, Danchenko enjoyed special protections and privileges. Crucially, the FBI was able to use his status to conceal Danchenko and his disclosures from congressional inquiries, such as the investigation by then-Rep. Devin Nunes led by Kash Patel. Other inquiries, such as Freedom of Information Act requests, could similarly be stonewalled by reference to the “sources and methods” justification for concealing the identity, and even the existence, of a CHS.
The FBI had huge incentives to hide Danchenko. Although Danchenko told the FBI several lies in what Durham now describes was an attempt to reconcile what Danchenko had told Steele, the overarching message from Danchenko was that the dossier was untrue. This effectively ended any legitimate inquiry into Trump–Russia collusion. Danchenko’s disavowal also meant that the FBI’s Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrants against Trump campaign adviser Carter Page—which were issued based on the Steele dossier—were effectively invalidated.
The FBI had a legal duty to inform the FISA court about Danchenko but failed to do so. In fact, they successfully applied for two further FISA warrants against Page on the basis of the Steele dossier which they knew to be false.
Russian analyst Igor Danchenko is pursued by journalists as he departs the Albert V. Bryan U.S. Courthouse after being arraigned on November 10, 2021 in Alexandria, Virginia. (Credit: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
The timing of Danchenko’s elevation to CHS status coincided with two major developments. First, on March 20, 2017, then-FBI Director James Comey told Congress that the Trump campaign was under investigation for alleged ties to Russia. At the time, Comey knew that Danchenko had shredded the investigation’s predicate, yet he chose to forge on regardless. Second, also in March 2017, Nunes found out from a whistleblower in the intelligence community that the Trump transition team had been spied on. Nunes complained that Congress hadn’t been given that information.
As head of the House Intelligence Committee, Nunes immediately ratcheted up his own investigation into the Trump–Russia matter. That investigation would lead to the Nunes memo in February 2018. However, the Nunes memo made no mention of Danchenko or of the fact that he had disavowed the dossier. After the FBI put Danchenko on their CHS payroll, he was completely off the grid and any information about him was withheld from Congress under the “sources and methods” justification.
The FBI’s apparent scheme to bury Danchenko seems to have worked as planned. Neither Nunes nor anyone else knew about Danchenko or his disavowal of the Steele dossier until December 2019, when Justice Department (DOJ) Inspector General Michael Horowitz issued his report on the FBI’s FISA abuses. Horowitz didn’t disclose Danchenko’s name and provided very little information other than that Steele had a primary sub-source whose story differed from the one told by Steele himself.
It wasn’t until July 2020 that a group of online sleuths, including myself, were able to extrapolate Danchenko’s name from various data points in Horowitz’s report, as well as from heavily redacted interview notes published by Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.).
With the identification of Danchenko, any remaining credibility of the Steele dossier collapsed. Contrary to the FBI’s claims, Danchenko wasn’t a Russian-based source with access to Kremlin insiders. Instead, he was a Beltway insider who had spent a number of years working at the Democratic-leaning Brookings Institution, where anti-Trump impeachment witness Fiona Hill was his mentor.” (Read more: The Epoch Times, 9/14/2022)(Archive)
September 23, 2022 – Nunes: Why the FBI Paid Danchenko
A special master has been appointed to act as a firewall between the Justice Department and materials seized during an Aug. 8 raid on former President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence in Palm Beach, Florida.
In a pair of Thursday orders from federal district Judge Aileen Cannon, the DOJ’s motion to access a subset of classified records stored on the Trump property was denied, and a recently retired judge that both the DOJ and Trump’s team agreed on – recently retired Judge Raymond Dearie – will serve as special master.
Raymond has until Nov. 30, 2022 to complete his review.
Cannon struck down the DOJ’s request for a partial stay of an earlier motion on accessing the seized materials, after lawyers for the government argued that they should be able to review over 100 classified documents taken during the raid – as they are not covered by any claims of personal property or executive privilege.
That said, Cannon sided with a DOJ request for Trump to pay the full cost associated with a special master.
“If the court were willing to accept the government’s representations that select portions of the seized materials are—without exception—government property not subject to any privileges, and did not think a special master would serve a meaningful purpose, the court would have denied plaintiff’s special master request,” wrote Cannon. “The court does not find it appropriate to accept the government’s conclusions on these important and disputed issues without further review by a neutral third party in an expedited and orderly fashion.” (Zero Hedge, 9/16/2022) (Archive)
PRIMARY SUBJECTS: Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, Twitter, Biden White House, Obama White House, James Baker, Alexander Macgillivray, Vijaya Gadde
In conjunction with a client who remains confidential, EDIFY developed the nexus schematics featured in this brief that are well-evidenced and identify and connect a slate of important individuals, entities and nations respective to a wide swath of past and ongoing scandals, corruption, crime, treason and bioterrorism.
This brief serves to expand and back-fill the details of the featured graphics while providing meaning with some granularity. At the same time, it informs important ongoing matters and litigation.
The findings develop along six vectors to demonstrate how the entanglements, relationships and overlaps translate to an effective network. The network is positioned to impact important matters like COVID-19 and the Hunter Biden laptop story as just two examples and whereby Twitter’s censorship of both makes Twitter the central node.
The six vectors are: 1-Twitter, its censorship policies and the application and enforcement thereof, 2-Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati [WSGR] an international law firm with over 1,000 attorneys representing many of the world’s largest corporations, as a hub with spokes running to critically-positioned individuals that is suggestive of WSGR as an interface for political control and influence across a wide array of Big Tech and geopolitical domains, 3- Alexander Macgillivray as a WSGR product who serves in the critical position of Principal Deputy U.S. Chief Technology Officer for the Biden Administration and who served the Obama White House similarly, 4-Vijaya Gadde as a WSGR product who was installed by Macgillivray at Twitter when Macgillivray served as Twitter’s General Counsel and where Gadde went on to suspend President Donald Trump, 5-Former FBI General Counsel James Baker as a common thread through Twitter to President Trump and the FBI/DOJ FISA abuse against Trump and 6-Alison Fauci, Dr. Anthony Fauci’s daughter,as a Twitter engineer and Twitter’s overlap to and potential communication and intelligence conduit for the COVID-19 enterprise fraud construct via Anthony Fauci and his NIH interface.
In the featured nexus schematics, the six vectors above are examined with explanations and SUMMARY FINDINGS to follow:
COVER PAGE
MAJOR PLAYERS
SUMMARY INTRODUCTION: WSGR, MACGILLIVRAY
SUMMARY INTRODUCTION: BAKER
PRIMARY SUBJECT: WSGR
PRIMARY SUBJECT: MACGILLIVRAY
PRIMARY SUBJECT: BAKER
VECTOR 1: TWITTER: Twitter is the central node and the keystone to understanding. Twitter’s inherent value to the elites, political class and federal apparatus writ large is found in its ability to engage in perception management, which is a technical term more commonly referred to as “psyops” or “psychological warfare”. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5]
Twitter engages in perception management in its capacity to establish and manipulate reality by means of actively determining and shaping the content on its platform. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] Twitter consumers can receive filtered content or are prevented from receiving, seeing or having the ability to publish content altogether. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5]
The de facto censorship occurs primarily along the lines of determining and enforcing community standards, guidelines and rules for user engagement. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] The evidence is clear that the decisions here appear to fall along clearly identifiable political lines resembling two-tier justice. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5]
Content determination, algorithmic manipulation and politically motivated censorship of off-reservation messaging and political opposition are all evidenced examples of how Twitter engages in perception management or appears to do so. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5]
Two evidenced domains of Twitter’s engagement in perception management include censoring content relative to COVID-19 [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] and the Hunter Biden Laptop story. [11] [12] [13] [14] [15] [16] [17] [18] [19] [20] [21]
Problematic for the critics of Twitter as a politically aligned entity is the patterned evidence of primary subject and other individuals being directly and indirectly tied to other relevant and important individuals and entities in overlapping domains. The complexity is high and so the schematic illustrations are hugely beneficial for understanding.
These nexuses occur such that clear and identifiable alignment to strict political agendas is found on one side of the political spectrum, where censorship is rampant, but not on the other side, where content is essentially unimpeded.
Summarily, evidence and analysis positions Twitter as a gatekeeper of public information.
Evidence of Twitter’s gatekeeper designation is found threaded through Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati as an interface for directly impacting the geopolitical landscape and rising to the level of affecting significant change. [22]
The primary subject from WSGR is Alexander Macgillivray. [22] [23]
VECTOR 2: WILSON SONSINI GOODRICH & ROSATI: WSGR is a an international law firm with over 1,000 attorneys representing many of the world’s largest corporations. WSGR is a primary thread through the network being evidenced that strings directly through to the primary node, Twitter. In that light, WSGR represents Twitter in all corporate disclosures. [24] [25] [26]
In regard to Macgillivray, WSGR also previously employed Vijaya Gadde, who was subsequently installed at Twitter by Macgillivray during his tenure there as General Counsel. [27] Gadde was central to Twitter’s censoring, suspension and banishment of President Donald Trump from the platform. [28]
WSGR’s representation directly overlays COVID-19 in a very critical capacity. WSGR represents Arbutus Biopharma Corp., a Canadian company that is one of two patent holders for U.S. Patent Nos. 8,058,069 and 9,364,435, which are the two patents for the lipid nanoparticle envelope necessary to manufacture the COVID-19 mRNA “vaccines”. [29] [30] [31]
An underlying position holds that the initial phases of the COVID-19 enterprise fraud construct included the unsustainable phase of comorbidity data harvesting where other morbidities [flu/pneumo, heart disease, diabetes and pneumonia] were fraudulently curated and then propagated as COVID-19/SARS-COV-2.
The subsequent “pandemic” phase is one of the vaccinated and boosted. This phase is entirely dependent upon acquiring the patent rights to the mechanism required to deliver the mRNA payload in the injection. The mRNA injections leverage the reverse transcription process causing the recipients’ DNA to become altered to the extent that it causes the body to begin producing the known and problematic S1 spike protein on its own. Evidence indicates that infection and mortality data for COVID-19 currently represents a “pandemic” of the “vaccinated” and boosted. [32] [33] [34] [35]
If vaccine manufactures didn’t acquire rights to WSGR-represented Arbutus’ patents, there could be no “pandemic”, for there would be no delivery mechanism for the required mRNA payload. [36]
With evidence linking COVID-19 directly to China and the Wuhan Institute of Virology, WSGR may further overlay China by its representation of SolarWinds. [37] SolarWinds was directly hacked in a sprawling data breach that caused U.S. lawmakers to designate a national emergency in 2020. China is suspected of the attack and if true, accounts for the overlay. [38] [39] [40] [41]
Relative to the sale of American user Twitter data to Japan’s Tourism Board through NTT Data, a Japanese company; and as it enmeshes Silver Lake Capital, WSGR represents Twitter in its partnership with Silver Lake. [42] [43] [44] [45] [46] [47] [48]
Silver Lake connects to Ari Emanuel and positions Emanuel as a possible intermediary and conduit from the Biden/Obama cartel to the Japan Tourism Board through another possible and connected conduit/intermediary Rahm Emanuel, the current Ambassador to Japan. [49] [50] [51]
Silver Lake is linked to artificial intelligence and facial recognition companies in Sensetime and Shenzhen Sensetime Technology Co. Ltd. including Silver Lake CEO Egon Durban, who is on Twitter’s Board of Directors. Durban is also on the board at WWE, where Ari Emanuel is CEO. Silver Lake has a 20% stake in Sensetime and Shenzhen Sensetime Technology Co. Ltd.
Those companies are CCP functionaries and it is suspected that the Twitter data is being leveraged by them to develop profiles that could be used for China to target American citizens. [52] [53] [54] [55] [56] [57]
VECTOR 3: MACGILLIVRAY: Alexander Macgillivray is the primary subject linking multiple individuals, entities and events including but not limited to WSGR, Twitter, the censorship of President Trump, President Barack Obama, President Joe Biden and the Office of Science and Technology Policy and Google. [23]
WSGR employed attorney Alexander Macgillivray who links Twitter and WSGR to the Obama and Biden Administrations in critical roles, respectively: 1-Deputy U.S. Chief Technology Officer, Office of Science and Technology Policy [OSTP] and 2-Principal Deputy U.S. Chief Technology Officer, Office of Science and Technology Policy [OSTP]. [58] [59] [60] [61] [62]
Prior to serving the Obama and Biden White Houses, Macgillivray served as General Counsel to Twitter and Deputy General Counsel to Google. [63] Between the two administrative terms and according to his own blog, Macgillivray installed the CTO at the DNC and worked on election data. [70]
The sequenced thread of Macgillivray from WSGR to Obama to Twitter to Google to Biden is critical to understanding and presents as a launch point for fulsome comprehension of the full network.
Macgillivray currently serves the Biden White House OSTP as the Principal Deputy U.S. CTO. [59]
Established as a primary gatekeeper of public information, Twitter would likely require an interface with the federal government and presidential administration[s] to align Twitter with on-reservation messaging as the evidence suggests. For Twitter, this necessitates content determination, algorithmic manipulation and politically motivated censorship of off-reservation messaging, which have been widely reported. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] Evidence suggests that Macgillivray is a good candidate for that interface through the OSTP in a familiar pattern of Obama retreads serving Biden in the same or similar capacities. It will be further evidenced relative to Nicole Wong below. [64]
As noted, during his tenure as General Counsel for Twitter, Macgillivray installed Vijaya Gadde, who was unprepared and unqualified in her position according to Macillivray’s words. Gadde was central to Twitter’s censorship, suspension and banishment of President Trump from its platform. [65]
When Macgillivray exited Twitter, he only did so on official terms: ““I’ll continue to support the company and its great people by staying on as an advisor for the legal, trust & safety, corporate development and public policy teams,” said Macgillivray. “I continue to care deeply about Twitter, the folks who work at Twitter and our tremendous users, so I’ll remain close to all three.”” [66]
From a ground floor perspective and in her multiple and similar capacities, Chinese-American Nicole Wong appears to have set the course for Macgillivray’s trajectory. [67] Wong’s trajectory cycled her through Twitter, Google and the Obama and Biden administrations. [68] Wong served the Biden transition team as overlaid by the CTSO/CTO vectors. Wong joined Biden’s transition Agency Review Team to support transition efforts related to the National Security Council and the Office of Science and Technology Policy. [69]
Specifically, it is held that Wong likely returned to facilitate Macgillivray’s transition into the Principal Deputy U.S. CTO position for the Biden White House.
The argument that Wong was the “first version” of Macgillivray respective to his roles and functions identified in this report, is further evidenced by Wong’s similar background, to which she returned, respective to the CTSO/CTO vectors as overlaid by the national security domain and the current Biden Administration. It presented as the veteran ushering in the less experienced player, so to speak.
Wong’s professional entanglements also include but aren’t limited to: Perkins Coie LLP [becoming partner], Georgetown University, Berkley School of Law and the Stonebridge Albright Group. [68]
Macgillivray maintains a personal blog with many of his thoughts and opinions that are topical to matters here. [70]
VECTOR 4: GADDE: Vijaya Gadde is a primary subject, who is secondary to Macgillivray and who was installed as Twitter’s General Counsel by Macgillivray when the latter departed the company. [27] Vadde is generally regarded as unqualified and unprepared for her position respective to the scope of its duties and this made Gadde susceptible to manipulation by those surrounding her. [66] This is according to Macgillivray. [65] It occurs along the lines of Gadde appearing to be reliant on information and input from said others to fully execute her duties.
Consider, “Though Gadde doesn’t have the same bonafides as Macgillivray when it comes to first amendment stuff, she is apparently regarded well in the company and at her former firm.
In addition, from what we’ve heard, Twitter will be doing some shuffling of the legal structure as well. Its director of public policy Colin Crowell will no longer report to the General Counsel, but will report directly to CEO Dick Costolo on matters affecting Twitter and Washington.” [65]
In his Twitter departure, Macgillivray stated directly that he would continue to advise Gadde’s department lending to Macgillivray appearing as a prime interface for such manipulation of Gadde to occur. [66]
Gadde was formerly employed by WSGR like Macgillivray. [71]
Gadde was the primary subject who in the capacity of General Counsel for Twitter was central to the censorship, suspension and banishment of President Trump from Twitter’s platform altogether while likely under the influence of others, such as possibly Macgillivray. [72] [73] [74] [75]
VECTOR 5: BAKER: Former FBI General Counsel James Baker is a primary subject that threads top to bottom in varying capacities and overlaps. [76] [77] [78] Of particular interest to the matters here are his affiliation with the orchestrated and widely reported broader attacks on President Trump and Baker’s array of expertise relative to his affiliation with Twitter as Deputy General Counsel and Vice President Legal. [79]
Baker’s Twitter capacity is of particular interest relative to the broader attacks against President Trump, his supporters and specifically as it relates to First Amendment rights and the censorship of conservative content favorable to Trump and unfavorable to Democrats and Democratic candidates like Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden. Such instances are widely reported.
Baker’s acumen in law is compounded by his ties to the FBI, DOJ and Judiciary relative to Twitter and it is problematic here. Baker is uniquely positioned to be plausibly informative about potential DOJ investigations into Twitter for violations. Baker is uniquely positioned in alignment with a long list of individuals and entities that overlap in critical areas. It’s all reinforced by Baker’s spectrum of expertise: FISA, national security, intelligence policy, intelligence matters, counter intelligence matters, law enforcement, prosecution, investigation and more. [80] [81]
The initial DOJ/FBI investigation into President Trump diverged into numerous other contrived, orchestrated, planned, manufactured and executed events like rampant FISA abuse, two fraudulently predicated impeachments, the Mueller Special Counsel, the Capitol “insurrection” entrapment operation, a fraudulent pandemic and stolen 2020 election. These, too, have been widely reported.
Baker was appointed by then FBI Director James Comey, who is known as a long time Clinton confidant and fixer. Comey is intricately linked to the 2016 election and then candidate Hillary Clinton by means of the FBI’s decision not to pursue charges against Clinton for her private and unsecured email server.
The origins of the targeting of and abuses against Trump derived from Clinton’s false allegations that Trump and Russia were conspiring due to Trump’s association with Alfa Bank. [81] The ties further extend to the FISA warrant against Carter Page and so on as is well documented and reported by many. [82] [83]
Baker’s exposure overlaps cause him to be a primary thread. Beyond what is already outlined above, Baker is attached to Special Counsel John Durham by means of his involvement and testimony in the Michael Sussmann trial and the broader matters pertaining to it. [84] Also, Baker is the target of a federal investigation for leaking. [85]
Baker’s FBI and intelligence/counterintelligence experience should have made him an expert in China and yet China appeared to operate undeterred under the bureau’s nose and continues to do so.
Moreover, Baker’s position and qualifications should have positioned him to be privy to the actions of ex officio members of the HPSCI and SSCI respective to China, which would further extend to COVID-19. This would include subjects such as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, then Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer and then Senate Majority leader Mitch McConnell.
Baker’s prominent threading through to the Obama Administration, FBI and DOJ respective to his ties to Twitter, make him a candidate central to both Twitter [ongoing litigation] and the intelligence and FISA abuses against Trump.
It’s important to recall that the DOJ/FBI investigation of Candidate/President Trump initially began as an FBI COUNTERINTELLIGENCE INVESTIGATION with a lower predicating evidentiary standard than a criminal investigation. This allowed the FBI/DOJ to circumvent Trump’s full 4th Amendment protections. The Mueller/Weissmann Special Counsel team therefore appeared to inherit the Trump counterintelligence investigation and then convert into a criminal investigation.
VECTOR 6: FAUCI: The involvement of Dr. Anthony Fauci respective to COVID-19 is assumed moving forward and as resting on substantial existing evidence. Moreover, this document includes limited evidence respective to funding and as outlined.
In part, it is evidenced by the flow of federal dollars from the NIH/NIAID to the Wuhan Institute of Virology. The intermediary for the transaction, which pertained to the funding of the bioengineering of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, was Peter Daszak of EcoHealth Alliance. [86] [87]
The entire Fauci onion peels back in layers suitable for a volume of books and is to substantial and complex for this space. It is also already fully documented by this investigator in an underlying catalog of analysis and work. The assumptions made on Fauci here allow us to remain focused. Lastly, they are made along the lines of COVID-19 being entirely a construct of enterprise fraud and where Anthony Fauci is a primary subject and realistic candidate as a primary criminal defendant.
Anthony Fauci’s daughter, Alison Fauci, is of particular interest to these matters respective to her hiring as an engineer at Twitter. [88] This is suggestive of Alison Fauci potentially serving as a conduit between Twitter, its leadership and censorship practices, and the federal medical apparatus framed by HHS, NIH, NIAID, CDC, et al.
According to recent whistleblower testimony from Peiter “Mudge” Zatko, whom Twitter hired in November 2020 to enhance cybersecurity and privacy at the company, testified that Twitter engineers have essentially unfettered and virtually anonymous access permitted by weakness in oversight and security allowing them to access personal and private data from user accounts. [89] It does this to the extent that it could permit the extraction and sale of that data without notice to Twitter as permitted by the oversight and security weaknesses.
Zatko also testified that the FBI had previously warned Twitter that it had one or more foreign intelligence operatives on its payroll. Evidence indicates penetration of Twitter by India and China. [89]
Alison Fauci is a Twitter software engineer who by title, would possess the technical capabilities and access to function as outlined in the testimony.
Beyond Alison Fauci’s functionality as a conduit or intermediary for Dr. Anthony Fauci and his principals at the NIH/NIAID and up, Alison Fauci is by title technically positioned to potentially extract private Twitter user data on designated people including political opposition. Any such extracted data could be fed back upstream to the Obama, Biden cartel et al.
It’s also further evidence of a distinct pattern of nepotism threading through all of these matters where spouses and children play critical roles determined by their placement into the broader construct.
Alison Fauci was positioned to be a possible conduit of information in an intermediary fashion relative to the Anthony Fauci cohort and its preferences for Twitter’s censorship policies for reliable COVID content damaging to the COVID construct of enterprise fraud and that official narrative.
SUMMARY FINDINGS:
The six vectors provide a plausible and evidenced network as diagrammed schematically and expanded upon in this report. The evidence examined and analysis of it inform the SUMMARY FINDINGS ranging from evidenced fact to positions of a high level of confidence:
Twitter is a recognizable and identifiable as a gatekeeper of public information
Twitter operates in alignment with a strict political agenda
Twitter’s agenda alignment appears along the lines of progressive liberal and Democrat thought and policy
Twitter’s collective actions technically rise to the level of engagement in perception management
Twitter engagement in perception management includes content determination, algorithmic manipulation and apparent active censorship against off-reservation messaging [conservative content favorable to Trump]
WSGR represents Twitter in all of its corporate disclosures making WSGR integral to all things
WSGR partner Larry Sonsini is regarded as the “Godfather of Silicon Valley” [90]
WSGR employed Alexander Macgillivray, another Harvard Law product, who went on to become an apparent architect for censorship practices while serving that capacity in the Obama and Biden White Houses
WSGR has critical ties to factually inconvenient individuals and entities such as Arbutus, Moderna and the mRNA vaccines vis-a-vis Arbutus’ patent holdings on the lipid nanoparticle envelope
WSGR is involved in ongoing litigation respective to the previous point
WSGR is indirectly positioned to intersect two presidential administrations in a capacity to target a third: Obama and Biden; targeting Trump
WSGR presents as an international firm capable of directly impacting the U.S. geopolitical landscape and media content on social media platforms
Macgillivray is the primary subject threading WSGR to the Obama and Biden Administrations and Twitter according to evidence
Macgillivray’s affiliations with/as WSGR, Twitter, Harvard Law, OSTP, U.S. CTO, Google and Vijaya Gadde are problematic
Macgillivray’s highly partisan and biased positions manifesting as anti-Trump are detailed by his own admission in his own blog
Macgillivray installed another WSGR asset in Vijaya Gadde to succeed him as General Counsel
Gadde was born in India and immigrated to the U.S. at three years of age
Vijaya Gadde was unqualified and was subject to influence by others including Macgillivray in his unofficial capacity, so as to rely upon them to fully execute her duties as Twitter’s General Counsel
As such, Vijaya Gadde was central to the censorship, suspension and banishment altogether from Twitter’s platform
Gadde was central to Twitter’s censorship of the Hunter Biden laptop story
Through NTT Data, Twitter sold American user data to Japan’s Tourism Board
Long-time Barack Obama confidant Rahm Emanuel is the Ambassador to Japan
Emanuel’s brother Ari Emanuel is another Obama confidant who attaches to Silver Lake Capital
Silver Lake Capital ties to Twitter and links Twitter, Obama and both Emanuel brothers through Ari Emanuel
Silver Lake Capital ties to Chinese company Sensetime, which specializes in artificial intelligence
Egon Durban, on WWE’s board where Ari Emanuel is CEO, presents a likely bridge to full circle respective to China’s acquisition of American Twitter user data
Durban bridge consists of his 20% stake in Sensetime and Shenzhen Sensetime Technology Co. Ltd and his membership on Twitter’s Board of Directors
WSGR represents Twitter in its partnership with Silver Lake
Sensetime is affiliated with the Chinese Military Industrial Complex and the nation of China/CCP
SenseTime owns Shenzhen Sensetime Technology Co., Ltd., which specializes in Facial Recognition Techology
Shenzhen Sensetime Technology Co., Ltd. appears on the U.S. Treasury Department’s “Consolidated Sanctions List” and through ownership ties to the Chinese Military Industrial Complex and the nation of China/CCP
Twitter’s American user data sale to Japan/NTT is believed to have been funneled to China, the CCP and the Chinese Military Industrial Complex through the evidenced conduit network [as diagrammed]
Twitter also appears to have actively leveraged parts or all of the same network to suppress the Hunter Biden laptop story
The HB laptop suppression derived from the same CTSO that employed Macgillivray under Obama and employs Macgillivray now under Biden
Evidence indicates that political leadership, the intelligence community and the FBI/DOJ engaged in suppressing the HB laptop story
Megan Smith served in CTSO alongside Macgillivray in the same general capacity
CTSO overlaps Deputy U.S. CTO Nicole Wong
Wong was the legal director at Twitter and vice president and Deputy General Counsel at Google
Wong served Biden’s transition Agency Review Team to support transition efforts related to the National Security Council and the Office of Science and Technology Policy
Wong’s trajectory cycled through Twitter, Google and the Obama and Biden administrations to include Wong’s service as on the Biden transition team as overlaid by the CTSO/CTO vectors
Wong presents as the ground floor first version of the trajectory Macgillivray took indicating Wong seems to have pioneered that course for Macgillivray
Wong appears to return to the CTSO/CTO domain via her Biden transition role to facilitate the smooth and effective transition of Macgillivray into his new role as Principal Deputy General of the U.S. CTO
Wong is a fourth-generation Chinese-American born in the U.S.
Wong’s grandfather was Vice President of one of the nations first Chinese community banks threading through to the banking industry and by default the CCP and Chinese Banking
Megan Smith served in CTSO alongside Macgillivray in the same general capacity [91] [92]
Smith’s ex-spouse is journalist Kara Swisher who writes for outlets including the New York Times [the mouthpiece for the FBI/DOJ with Washington Post serving the same for the intelligence community] [93]
Swisher publicly defended Twitter’s censorship of Trump respective to the Capitol event [94]
Swisher’s insistence that Twitter doesn’t censor envelops Twitter’s suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop story
Swisher publicly admitted her bias against Trump and a “broader responsibility” to take action on it in a Vox interview
Swisher’s public admission came during an interview that included Wong [95]
WSGR and Macgillivray thread through Gadde and Smith right to Wong and Swisher as Smith’s ex-spouse
Macgillivray becomes a primary interface between Obama and Biden respective to CTSO’s scope
Central to Obama is James Baker as a career FBI employee who ascended to General Counsel
Baker’s expertise in FISA, national security, intelligence policy and intelligence matters, counterintelligence respective to the initial DOJ/FBI investigation of President Trump opening as a counterintelligence investigation later laundered into a criminal one by the Mueller/Weissmann special counsel is critical to the broader attacks on Trump, which manifested on Twitter
Baker aggravates Twitter’s culpability in these matters with his service to Twitter as Deputy General Counsel and Vice President of Legal
The aggravation is, in part, evidenced by the genesis of the Trump/Russia collusion fabrication deriving from Hillary Clinton, as approved by Obama according to John Brennan’s own notes in July 2016
The FBI/DOJ leveraged Clinton’s fraudulently stated and Obama-approved allegations to predicate an investigation into President Trump that included FISA abuse, which threads through to the U.S. Supreme Court
Baker was appointed as FBI General Counsel by long-time Clinton confidant and fixer FBI Director James Comey
Comey ties directly to the 2016 election in his decision for the FBI not to prosecute Clinton for her private email server, which China presumably accessed for top secret U.S. intelligence and SAPs
Baker is the subject of a federal criminal leak investigation
Baker was compelled to testify in the John Durham Special Counsel trial of Michael Sussmann
Baker stands to factor into the Durham trial for Russian Igor Daschenko
The network evidenced in this report indicates that an Obama-based network extending into the Biden White House has technically been engaged in perception management by leveraging Twitter as an asset
The network and its asset Twitter appeared to function as a gateway to public information leveraged to target Trump and conservatives in stifling their free speech and censoring their content while advancing the same for the other side of the political spectrum
“The district court has entered an unprecedented order enjoining the Executive Branch’s use of its own highly classified records in a criminal investigation with direct implications for national security,” the Justice Department wrote in its motion Friday.
Judge Aileen Cannon on Thursday appointed former FISA Judge Raymond Dearie to oversee the review of the documents taken by the DOJ-FBI during the Mar-a-Lago raid.
The Trump legal team and AG Merrick Garland and the corrupt DOJ came to an agreement earlier in the week on a potential candidate to serve as the special master in the Mar-a-Lago case.
#MaraLago Declassified records indicate Judge Dearie, potential Special Master, approved final FISA June 2017 for @carterwpage. NOTE: This FISA is among most problematic because it did not share intel about Page’s work for USG + failed to disclose key concerns Steele reporting. pic.twitter.com/Zm6JD56Xi2
“The “Good Information Foundation” – a project led by a top Obama aide – appears to have been caught offering social media influencers money to post false claims about President Donald Trump and January 6th on the Chinese Communist-owned platform TikTok. The attempted election disinformation campaign including outright falsehoods about the Trump campaign “paying millions” for the 2021 riot at the U.S. Capitol.
A video posted to the CCP-linked TikTok by legal influencer Preston Moore reveals the foundation’s efforts to spread disinformation about the events that transpired on January 6th, in addition to the planning and aftermath.
The group behind the nefarious, CCP-linked effort is run by former Time magazine editor, Obama White House staffer, and current MSNBC contributor Rick Stengel, who is on the record praising U.S. propaganda efforts.
#Breaking “Good Info Foundation” appears to be offering money to Viral Tiktok Lawyer to spread anti-Trump propaganda. @stengel FMR Obama SOS for Public Affairs 13-16 appears to be involved with the “Good Info Foundation” unclear if either are involved in the propaganda campaign pic.twitter.com/beeqiB0RuZ
A representative from the Good Information Foundation reached out to Moore, who has over 80,000 followers, seeking a paid collaboration on a TikTok video about January 6th. In exchange for $400, Moore would provide a 15 to 60 second video, where he’d be required to use certain terminology when referring to Trump and the events of January 6th.
(…) The Good Information Foundation is a project led by Rick Stengel, the chief executive of the National Constitution Center from 2004 to 2006 and President Obama’s Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs from 2014 to 2016.
“Stengel is an on-air analyst at MSNBC, a strategic advisor at Snap Inc., and a Distinguished Fellow at the Atlantic Council. His 2019 book, Information Wars: How we Lost the Battle Against Disinformation and What to Do About It, recounts his time in the State Department countering Russian disinformation and ISIS propaganda,” explains his bio on the foundation’s website. (Read more: The National Pulse, 9/18/2022)(Archive)
“Former President Bill Clinton said Sunday on CNN’s “Fareed Zakaria GPS” that Republicans used scare tactics to win elections.
Zakaria asked, “When you look at the midterms, do you think because of abortion and the passage of a few very important bills, could Biden break the historical pattern of the, you know, midterms going badly?”
Clinton said, “Absolutely. We could hold both these houses, but we have to say the right things. And we have to note the Republicans always close well. Why? Because they find some new way to scare the living daylights out of swing voters about something.”
He continued, “That’s what they did in 2021 — where they made Critical Race Theory sound worse than smallpox. And it wasn’t being taught in any public schools in America. But they didn’t care. They just scare people.”
Clinton added, “You still have to get those people. It’s just that there’s so many fewer because as the parties have gone more ideological and clear and somehow psychically intolerant, they pull more and more people toward the extremes. But there’s still some people hanging on there who are really trying to think and trying to understand what’s going on.”
“In this lengthy interview with John Ratcliffe and Maria Bartiromo, the former Director of National Intelligence, the man who has likely seen every document that may have eventually ended up in Mar-a-Lago, is challenging the nature of the classified status of those documents. Ratcliffe does not believe the Mar-a-Lago documents are true national security documents, but rather documents that outline fraudulent ‘sources and methods used by the DOJ/FBI in their Trump targeting operation.
Keep in mind that as the DNI during 2020, Ratcliffe saw the documents that eventually became the material President Trump declassified and left with the DOJ to release after the Durham investigation was complete. If Ratcliffe’s suspicions are correct, and there is a more valid reason to support his suspicions than oppose them, then the entire construct of the DOJ-NSD operation to retrieve those documents from Mar-a-Lago is factually one big cover-up operation.
Ratcliffe suspects the documents are essentially the DOJ and FBI work products, including interviews with ‘sources’ like Igor Danchenko, from their fabricated case against President Trump. If accurate, the objective of the DOJ/FBI would be to avoid sunlight on their political targeting operation. This viewpoint makes sense when you consider the DOJ/FBI position that no one should ever be allowed to look at those documents, including the appointed Special Master in the case, Judge Raymond Dearie. WATCH:
(…) The whistleblower says the FBI is creating a false narrative by reclassifying Jan. 6 cases as separate instances of “domestic terrorism.”
Via the House Judiciary GOP:
The FBI whistleblower described how a “manipulative” practice by the FBI overstates the “domestic violent extremism” (DVE) threat nationwide by categorizing Jan 6-related cases as originating in field offices around the country rather than “stemming from a single, black swan incident” in Washington, D.C.
#BREAKING: New whistleblower information reveals that the FBI is moving agents off of child sexual abuse investigations to instead pursue political investigations.
The whistleblower recounted being told that “child sexual abuse investigations were no longer an FBI priority.” pic.twitter.com/EBXrnVWhO6
(…) On Wednesday Miranda Devine revealed the name of the latest FBI whistleblower – Steve Friend – who exposed the FBI’s disgusting lies on tracking domestic right-wing terrorism.
Steve Friend is a SWAT Team member who has been with the FBI for 12 years. He is married and has two small children. According to Miranda Devine,
“He just could not live with his conscience after he was dragged off these very important child porn, child exploitation, and human trafficking investigations he was working on, and put on the very bogus January 6 cases he has been working on… He could see from the ground how the FBI Washington DC Field Office was manipulating these cases to try and expand and pretend the problem was bigger than it was. And he also didn’t want to participate in SWAT raids on people who were being accused of misdemeanors at worst… Steve Friend stood up and said, ‘I will not do this.’”
Tucker’s report about Steve Friend begins at 20:15:
Steve Friend was suspended, stripped of his gun and badge, and escorted out of the FBI field office after complaining about the violations.
(…) In his whistleblower complaint to DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz, obtained by The Post, Friend lays out multiple violations of FBI policy involving J6 investigations in which he was involved.
He says he was removed from active investigations into child sexual exploitation and human trafficking to work on J6 cases sent from DC. He was told “domestic terrorism was a higher priority” than child pornography. As a result, he believes his child exploitation investigations were harmed.
He also has reported his concerns about a politicized FBI to Republican members of Congress, among 20 whistleblowers from the bureau who have come forward with similar complaints.
Among Friend’s allegations:
Friend served as a SWAT team member. (Credit: Anna Friend)
The Washington, DC, field office is “manipulating” FBI case management protocol and farming out J6 cases to field offices across the country to create the false impression that right-wing domestic violence is a widespread national problem that goes far beyond the “black swan” event of Jan. 6, 2021.
As a result, he was listed as lead agent in cases he had not investigated and which his supervisor had not signed off on, in violation of FBI policy.
FBI domestic terrorism cases are being opened on innocent American citizens who were nowhere near the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, based on anonymous tips to an FBI hotline or from Facebook spying on their messages. These tips are turned into investigative tools called “guardians,” after the FBI software that collates them.
The FBI has post-facto designated a grassy area outside the Capitol as a restricted zone, when it was not restricted on Jan. 6, 2021, in order to widen the net of prosecutions.
The FBI intends to prosecute everyone even peripherally associated with J6 and another wave of J6 subjects are about to be referred to the FBI’s Daytona Beach resident agency “for investigation and arrest.”
The Jacksonville area was “inundated” with “guardian” notifications and FBI agents were dispatched to conduct surveillance and knock on people’s doors, including people who had not been in Washington, DC, on Jan. 6, 2021, or who had been to the Trump rally that day but did not go inside the Capitol.
Friend says he was punished after complaining to his bosses about being dragged into J6 investigations that were “violating citizens’ Sixth Amendment rights due to overzealous charging by the DOJ and biased jury pools in Washington, DC.”
His top-secret security clearance was suspended last week because he “entered FBI space [his office] and downloaded documents from FBI computer systems [an employee handbook and guidelines for employee disciplinary procedures] to an unauthorized removable flash drive.” (Read more: New York Post, 9/22/2022)(Archive)
Trump appointed Judge Britt Grant votes to lift the hold on Mar-a-Lago documents.
Trump appointed Judge Andrew Brasher votes to lift the hold on Mar-a-Lago documents.
The ruling from a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit amounts to an overwhelming victory for the Justice Department, clearing the way for investigators to continue scrutinizing the documents as they evaluate whether to bring criminal charges over the storage of top-secret records at Mar-a-Lago after Trump left the White House.
The court also pointedly noted that Trump had presented no evidence that he had declassified the sensitive records, as he has repeatedly maintained, and rejected the possibility that Trump could have an “individual interest in or need for” the roughly 100 documents marked as classified.
The government had argued that its investigation had been impeded by an order from U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon that temporarily barred investigators from continuing to use the documents in its probe. Cannon, a Trump appointee, had said the hold would remain in place pending a separate review by an independent arbiter she had appointed at the Trump team’s request.
The appeals panel agreed with the Justice Department’s concerns.
(…) Trump’s lawyers had argued that an independent review of the records was essential given the unprecedented nature of the investigation. The lawyers have also said the department had not yet proven that the seized documents were classified, though they have notably stopped short of asserting — as Trump repeatedly has — that the records were previously declassified.
The Trump team this week resisted providing Dearie with any information to support the idea that the records might have been declassified, signaling the issue could be part of their defense in the event of an indictment.
But the appeals court appeared to scoff at that argument.
“Plaintiff suggests that he may have declassified these documents when he was President. But the record contains no evidence that any of these records were declassified,” they wrote. “In any event, at least for these purposes, the declassification argument is a red herring because declassifying an official document would not change its content or render it personal.” (Read more: WABI5)(Archive)
(…) Memos obtained by Just the News from the Hudson West III LLC partnership that presidential son Hunter Biden operated with a prominent Chinese business executive named Gongwen Dong show the Biden family pursued at least 21 major deals in 2017 and 2018 for Chinese interests seeking U.S. energy assets, including liquified natural gas export terminals, LNG trade deals, drilling exploration firms, pipelines and other key energy assets.
Many of the deals targeted assets in the oil-rich Gulf Coast, including Louisiana, and aimed to help an energy-hungry China gain access to U.S. oil and gas, according to a summary memo of the 21 deals. Just the News found the memo on a Hunter Biden laptop turned over to the FBI in 2019 and corroborated its authenticity with a Biden business associate directly familiar with the deals and memos.
“Discussed both oil and LNG trading/exporting opportunities,” one memo sent to Hunter Biden read. “Our team was more interested in pursuing the LNG spread trading opportunities, due to the timing of upcoming winter peak usage season and the spiking natural gas price in China.”
That LNG deal and others like it never went forward, but Hunter Biden’s team chose to pivot in 2018 to other oil and gas deals, ranging from pipelines to drilling assets, the memo shows.
“Explore U.S. natural gas industry midstream investment opportunities (including natural gas pipeline projects with international and U.S.-based financial institutions),” the memo recommended as one of the 2018 opportunities.
Another goal, the memo stated: “Explore potential investment opportunities in the petrochemical and energy production space.”
The Hudson West III opportunities memo stated it was seeking to acquire interests in some drilling and exploration companies, like Noble Energy’s parent firm, that had fallen on hard times when oil and gas prices plummeted during the Trump administration. “Explore potential investment opportunity in distressed international energy company affiliates (for example, the Noble Group and affiliates),” the memo read.
The Hunter Biden-connected firm also dabbled with the notion of getting better prices by targeting minority-owned energy firms that got preferential treatment in some markets. The “model involves the support and nurturing of minority business and commodity brokers” and the benefit would be to “gain further discount and better service terms from its oil major partners,” the strategy memo stated.
(…) But there’s more… Representative Comer says he has two new whistleblowers that [who] worked with Hunter and [they] are ready to expose it all when the Republicans take control of Congress.
Rep. James Comer: I have two whistleblowers. And I am confident they are going to come through in a Republican majority when I conduct the hearings and I have the gavel for oversight. To tell us in detail what their objectives were. And these people were associated with Hunter Biden. And the ultimate goal and the Bidens knew it was for China to start taking ownership in all the different parts in the natural gas industry in the United States… They actually take control of the drillers.
“An FBIwhistleblower recently came forward to warn about the politicization at the FBI, saying that the bureau is spying on law-abiding Americans and that many of its domestic counterterrorism cases are tantamount to “entrapment.”
Kyle Seraphin, who has spent six years in the FBI, was suspended without pay and can’t seek another job without quitting or asking for permission.
“The number of guys who say, ‘I don’t agree with what’s going on here, but I’ve got three years to retire,’ it’s heartbreaking,” he told podcast host Dan Bongino in a Sept. 22 interview.
In one instance, Seraphin said he was forced to blow the whistle last year when Attorney General Merrick Garland told lawmakers that the Department of Justice wasn’t targeting parents. He first provided a member of Congress with an email that was circulated within the FBI that stated Garland ordered the usage of the PATRIOT Act against protesting parents with a tag, “EDUOFFICIALS.”
At the time, in May, Reps. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) and Mike Johnson (R-La.) asserted that the investigations involved parents who were “upset about mask mandates and state elected officials who publicly voiced opposition to vaccine mandates,” while accusing Garland of making false statements to Congress.
But of that investigation, Seraphin suggested the FBI is targeting individuals for political purposes.
“That’s when you become part of political hatchet jobs, and I didn’t sign up for that, and nobody I know signed up for that either,” he told Bongino. “That’s not what people want to get involved in.” (Read more: The Epoch Times, 9/25/2022)(Archive)
“The special master handling the Mar-a-Lago raid has given former President Donald Trump a short deadline to provide details that would bolster his claims about documents the FBI seized, a day after the Justice Department scored an appeals court win.
Judge Raymond Dearie, who was appointed special master by Judge Aileen Cannon, gave Trump’s team until Sept. 30 to submit a declaration on a number of key issues, including what appeared to be a reference to suggestions by Trump allies that some of the evidence the FBI said it had seized was somehow planted. Dearie asked Trump’s lawyers on Thursday to provide an affidavit on “a list of any specific items set forth in the Detailed Property Inventory that [Trump] asserts were not seized from the Premises on August 8, 2022.”
Dearie also told Trump’s team to list any specific items that the former president believes were described incorrectly in the FBI’s inventory list or that he believes were located somewhere different in Mar-a-Lago than where the bureau says the item was collected. The special master also asked Trump to provide a detailed list of any items that he believes were seized by the FBI but weren’t listed in the property inventory.
“This submission shall be [Trump’s] final opportunity to raise any factual dispute as to the completeness and accuracy of the Detailed Property Inventory,” the special master said.” (Read more: Washington Examiner, 9/22/2022)(Archive)
Appearing on CBS Face the Nation today, National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan proudly boasted of the $15 billion in weapons the U.S. has shipped into Ukraine while restating the official position of the Biden administration that the U.S. will never permit Russia to hold the eastern part of our proxy state.
Ukraine is to the United States as North Korea is to China. WATCH:
“Republican Rep. James Comer of Kentucky called new revelations about Hunter Biden a “national security nightmare” during a Monday evening Fox News appearance.
“Have you ever wanted to see a spy movie? You don’t even have to go to the theaters. Go to Washington, D.C., where Chinese spies just bait and hook gullible people in power. Sometimes all it takes is a honey trap. We saw it with Eric Swalwell who got caught sleeping with Fang Fang, the spy who stole his heart,” Fox News host Jesse Watters said in introducing Comer, the ranking Republican on the House Oversight Committee. “Swalwell wasn’t the only person to have a Fang Fang in D.C. Turns out Hunter Biden may have dabbled with a Chinese spy, too. Her name is JiaQi Bao.”
Watters described reports from a whistleblower that Hunter Biden sought to sell natural gas to China in 2017, with Bao reportedly telling him where the Chinese wanted to purchase the gas from.
“Nothing sounds good here. And we have confirmed a lot of what it looks like in the email with one whistleblower who is a former Hunter Biden associate,” Comer told Watters. “And Hunter was trying to negotiate a deal to sell the Chinese natural gas, but what we also learned from the whistleblower was that their ultimate goal, this Chinese company, was to buy an interest in the drillers so they could start getting their foot in the door to start taking over the infrastructure of the American energy industry. So, this is a national security concern.”
“Not only do we have proof that Hunter Biden was directly involved from it, the emails and text messages also show that Hunter was asking for office space and he needed extra keys for both Joe and Jill Biden,” Comer continued. “So this links the president to Hunter Biden’s shady business deal with China. This is just a national security nightmare and it kind of puts into perspective maybe why Joe Biden has made some terrible decisions that have been at the best interest of China at the expense of the American consumer.” (Read more: The Daily Caller, 9/26/2022)(Archive)
Senators Chuck Grassley and Ron Johnson (Credit: public domain)
“Republican senators are demanding answers on why the Russian national who served as the sub-source for the debunked anti-Trump dossier was hired by the FBI as a confidential human source and paid with U.S. taxpayer dollars throughout the bureau’s original investigation into whether the Trump campaign colluded with Russia to influence the 2016 presidential election.
Sens. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, and Ron Johnson, R-Wis., in a letter exclusively obtained by Fox News Digital and sent to Attorney General Merrick Garland, are seeking all FBI and Justice Department records related to government payments to Igor Danchenko, along with the counterintelligence concerns he posed and the bureau’s decision to rely on him as a source.
(…) Despite the FBI paying Danchenko to serve as a confidential human source during the Trump administration—and during Special Counsel, Robert Mueller’s investigation into whether members of the Trump campaign colluded with Russia to influence the 2016 presidential election—Danchenko was the subject of an FBI counterintelligence investigation from 2009 to 2011.
That FBI investigation into Danchenko focused on his contacts with suspected Russian intelligence officers and reported attempts to facilitate payments for classified information.
“The FBI, even in light of the extensive derogatory information attached to Danchenko, proceeded to pay him as a confidential human source three months later from March 2017 to October 2020 as part of Crossfire Hurricane,” Grassley and Johnson wrote to Garland. “Therefore, while we were investigating the Justice Department’s and FBI’s misconduct with respect to Crossfire Hurricane, you maintained him on the government’s payroll.”
They added: “This extraordinary fact pattern requires additional information from the Justice Department and FBI relating to why Danchenko was placed on the payroll and paid by the taxpayer to assist in the federal government’s flawed investigation into President Trump.”
Grassley and Johnson demanded all records related to government payments made to Danchenko, the counterintelligence investigation into him, and his later hiring by the FBI by Oct. 22.” (Read more: Fox News, 9/26/2022)(Archive)
It turns out Adam Kinzinger and Malcolm Nance have been promoting a guy for months who wasn’t actually a soldier and was just taking photos in front of destroyed tanks in Ukraine all along pic.twitter.com/e4UvZfSOvw
United States of America, v. Igor Danchenko
Notes: The government has filed an omnibus Motion in Limine seeking to admit three cases of uncharged conduct by Defendant Igor Y. Danchenko.
The government has filed an omnibus Motion in Limine [Doc. No. 78] (the “Motion”), seeking to admit (1) three instances of uncharged conduct by Defendant Igor Y. Danchenko: (a) evidence relating to Danchenko’s allegedly false statements regarding his sourcing of the Ritz- Carlton allegations; (b) evidence pertaining to Danchenko’s allegedly false statement about disclosing his work for Christopher Steele (“Steele”) and Orbis Business Solutions (“Orbis”); and (c) an email from Danchenko to a former employer, Cenk Sidar, supposedly encouraging Sidar to fabricate sources; (2) three emails from Sergei Millian (“Millian”) to Dmitry Zlodorev (“Zlodorev”) regarding Danchenko; (3) statements from Steele to the FBI about Danchenko’s sourcing from Millian;1 and (4) the existence of, as well as the facts and circumstances pertaining to, the FBI’s counter-intelligence investigation into Danchenko. The government also seeks to prevent Danchenko from introducing any evidence or argument regarding political bias or vindictive prosecution. The Court held a hearing on the Motion on September 29, 2022, following which it took the Motion under advisement.
At the hearing held on September 29, 2022, the government withdrew its motion to admit statements from Christopher Steele to FBI personnel from the Robert Mueller Special Counsel team on September 18 and 19, 2017. Accordingly, the Motion as to the Steele statements is DENIED as moot without prejudice.
Upon consideration of the Motion, the memoranda in support thereof and in opposition thereto, the arguments of counsel at the hearing, and for the reasons stated below, the government’s Motion is GRANTED in part and DENIED in part. (FightWithKash, 10/5/2022)(Archive)
Judge Anthony J. Trenga (Credit: American Law Institute)
“The judge presiding over the case against Igor Danchenko, a source for British ex-spy Christopher Steele’s discredited dossier on former President Donald Trump, ruled he won’t dismiss the indictment but expressed skepticism about some of the false statements charges brought by special counsel John Durham.
“The motion is denied,” the judge ruled during the Alexandria court hearing. However, the judge said he would revisit his ruling after Durham’s team had presented its full case during the October trial. Trenga, a George W. Bush appointee who has sat on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, added that “I think it’s an extremely close call, particularly with count one” related to longtime Hillary Clinton ally Chuck Dolan.”
The judge said he “has to conclude at this point” that he couldn’t say definitively that Danchenko’s statement related to Dolan was literally true, concluding that “there are sufficient arguments of context” to allow the trial to move forward.
Trenga also said that, regarding the Millian-related charges, he “can’t conclude that there is an undisputed fact that is not actionable” through criminal charges.” (Read more: Washington Examiner, 9/29/2022)(Archive)
Judge Aileen Cannon on Thursday ruled in favor of Trump and rejected Special Master Raymond Dearie’s request to have Trump’s legal team “verify that the government’s inventory log of seized items is accurate.” ABC News reported.
Special Master Raymond Dearie last Thursday asked President Trump’s lawyers to prove the FBI planted evidence during its raid of Mar-a-Lago in August.
Judge Dearie gave Trump’s legal team a September 30 deadline to submit a declaration.
President Trump’s legal team Wednesday night in a filing said Biden’s corrupt Justice Department actually seized 200,000 pages of documents from Mar-a-Lago.
The DOJ told the Court that they seized 11,000 documents.
Trump’s lawyers allege the 11,000 documents actually tally up to 200,000 *pages* which is why so many vendors have “declined the potential engagement.”
“The problem is compounded by the fact that when Plaintiff’s counsel referred to either 11,000 pages or even 11,000 documents during the status conference (we are still awaiting the transcript), the Government chose not to interject with an accurate number. In conversations between Plaintiff’s counsel and the Government regarding a data vendor, the Government mentioned that the 11,000 documents contain closer to 200,000 pages,” the lawyers said.
Today, a federal judge ordered the FBI to “produce the information it possesses related to Seth Rich’s laptop.”
(…) This fight dates back to 2017 and includes two FOIA lawsuit. In the first lawsuit, the FBI produced no responsive documents. The parties knew the FBI had something, and so this sparked a second lawsuit – where the FBI somehow found 20,000 pages of potentially responsive documents. The court explains:
Judge Amos L. Mazzant (Credit: public domain)
Of those 20,000 pages, the government found 1,596 pages of responsive documents, of which the government withheld 1,469 pages under various FOIA exemptions (privacy, law enforcement exemption, etc.).
The FBI also withheld the contents of Seth Rich’s personal laptop, which it possesses, in its entirety, alleging the privacy of Rich’s family in “preventing the public release of this information” outweighs the public interest in disclosure.
The court rejected that argument, stating “the FBI has not satisfied its burden of showing more than a de minimis privacy interest that would justify withholding information from Seth Rich’s laptop.”
“In my 23 years in the FBI, I have not seen a more impactful series of missteps that has called into question the entire organization and more thoroughly damaged the FBI’s reputation.”
Kash Patel sat with Jan Jekielek from The Epoch Times for an explosive interview this past week at Kash’s Corner.
During their conversation, Kash warned viewers about what is coming out next from the FBI whistleblowers.
Kash Patel: “I think it’s going to be an explosive topic. I don’t think you’ve seen any real damaging information yet. And that’s scary, right? Because this is very damaging. Because when you put it in perspective you’re going to see so much more damaging information. One of the other whistleblowers that came forward was on Dan Bongino’s Show. And he literally said wait til you see the acts of sexual complicity that the 7th floor of the FBI was engaging (in) during this entire time… And I was the guy that exposed the Lisa Page, Peter Strzok thing. I know how that organization at that level of political operatives work. So, there’s a lot more coming.”
“During an interview aired on Tuesday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” former Hunter Biden business associate Tony Bobulinski stated that if Facebook, Twitter, or anyone else had reached out to him to verify the authenticity of emails sent to him in The New York Post’s Hunter Biden laptop story, he would have produced the email, with the metadata, within minutes, but no one did.
Bobulinski said, “I went to the second debate in Nashville between President Trump and Joe Biden. That night, I flew to D.C., and the next morning, there was a big debate. Do I voluntarily walk into the FBI or do I go sit down with Sen. Johnson (R-WI) and Sen. Grassley (R-IA)? My lawyers decided it was better that I voluntarily go in to sit and provide these facts. And so, on the morning of October 23, the morning after the debate, I spent five-plus hours sitting in a room with, at one point, I think as [many] as six federal agents, walking through all the facts of my knowledge of the Biden family, how I got involved in this, the trips around the world, CEFC, Chairman Ye, and stuff like that. At the end of that meeting, and remember, I voluntarily went there, so they were happy to take any information I provided to them. I wish I had pictures of the faces of the two main agents that were interviewing me. Because I would say something and you could just see the shock in their face and they would say, let’s take a minute, they’d get up and walk out of the room, and the agents would sort of convene and then come back and restart the interview. Because these facts are just for the sake of our country, for national security, at that point, he was candidate Joe Biden, now he’s the sitting President of the United States, the most powerful person in the free world, and daunting.”
He continued, “So, at the end of that five-plus hour interview, the head of station told my lawyers, listen, an individual named Tim Thibault is going to run point on all of this. We’re definitely going to have Tony come back in for a follow-up interview. It could be as early as next week. Some of the people that were in the room weren’t well-versed on all these facts, we may want to have people come in from Baltimore or Delaware. And I was ready to sit down with anybody that needed me to or travel wherever I wanted to. And so the head of station gave my lawyers Tim Thibault’s cell phone number. Tim was not there that day. … But my lawyers had an hour, hour-and-a-half call with him that Friday night, October 23. And subsequent calls through the weekend and the following week, when I was then coming on your show to provide the facts to the American people. And they were supposed to be working [on] a follow-up interview. And Tim Thibault, in his last discussion with my legal counsel [said], listen, we know Tony’s cooperating. We appreciate all the information he’s provided. We will follow up with you. We’re definitely going to have him come in for a follow-up interview or spend some more time on this. And I haven’t heard from them since.”
Huma Abedin joins “The View” on October 6, 2022. (Credit: Screenshot/ABC/The View)
“Former campaign vice chair for Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign, Huma Abedin, told “The View” hosts on Thursday that Clinton faced “impossible standards” as a woman in politics.
Co-host Ana Navarro said “politics have become a personality contest” and asked Abedin about Vice President Kamala Harris being “judged” by the same “phantom ideal woman” as Clinton.
“I know the challenge and you know this well that Hillary had to face just as a woman in politics,” Abedin said. “All these impossible standards, you know, she needs to be taller, shorter, talk this way. This is annoying, you know, she looks angry when she speaks. It was almost like you couldn’t win no matter what you said.”
(Timeline editor’s note: Our timeline suggests the “impossible standards” that Hillary “faced” and had a hard time living up to, are the basic moral standards most people try to live by every day.)
(…) Expect Charles Dolan to testify to his conversations with Danchenko and others relating to the dossier allegations at the trial. He’s already testified before a grand jury. For background, Dolan is described in the Danchenko indictment as having “maintained historical and ongoing involvement in Democratic politics.” His history includes serving as chairman of a national Democratic political organization, being a state chairman of Bill Clinton’s 1992 and 1996 presidential campaigns, and an advisor to Hillary Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign.
Based on his ties with the Clintons, one would think that the Clinton Campaign would have known about Dolan’s contacts with Danchenko. However, the Danchenko indictment states “individuals affiliated with the Clinton Campaign did not direct, and were not aware of, [Dolan’s] meetings with Danchenko and other Russian nationals.”
That statement concerns Dolan’s lack of interactions with the Clinton Campaign. It still leaves unanswered the question of whether Danchenko had any contacts with the Clinton campaign, and whether the Clinton campaign was aware of Danchenko’s activities.
Two theories on that. It’s possible that the Clinton campaign received updates on the opposition research but otherwise isolated itself from these matters, preferring its lawyers at Perkins Coie and its contractors at Fusion GPS (and their sources) get their hands dirty. That would be consistent with what we saw in the Michael Sussmann trial, a real-time demonstration of how the Clinton machine uses the attorney-client and work-product privileges to manipulate the press, spread false accusations, and hide a number of sins.
It is also possible that the Clinton campaign had more knowledge about Danchenko than has been made publicly available. I bring that up because back in December, we discussed a curious filing by Durham, which confirmed that the Clinton campaign and “multiple former employees of that campaign” were subject to “matters before the Special Counsel.” In that filing, Durham discussed the potential conflict of interest of Danchenko’s lawyers, whose firm also represented the Clinton campaign and those former campaign employees.
Specifically, Durham raised these areas of inquiry that may become issues at the Danchenko trial:
The Clinton Campaign’s knowledge or lack of knowledge concerning the veracity of information in the dossiers sourced by Danchenko;
The Clinton Campaign’s awareness or lack of awareness of Danchenko’s collection methods and sub-sources;
Meetings or communications between and among the Clinton Campaign, Fusion GPS, and Christopher Steele regarding or involving Danchenko;
Danchenko’s knowledge or lack of knowledge regarding the Clinton Campaign’s role in the activities surrounding the Steele Dossier; and
The extent to which the Clinton Campaign and/or its representatives directed, solicited, or controlled Danchenko’s activities.
All of those points are important, but that last one is particularly compelling and is worth repeating: “The extent to which the Clinton Campaign and/or its representatives directed, solicited, or controlled Danchenko’s activities.”
That implies the Clinton Campaign’s awareness of Danchenko and contacts with Danchenko. (After all, if the answer was “no,” then there would be no conflict.) Thus the potential conflict described by Durham:
“the Clinton Campaign and [Danchenko] each might have an incentive to shift blame and/or responsibility to the other party for any allegedly false information that was contained within the Company Reports and/or provided to the FBI.”
All this reminds us of a question we have previously asked. If the Clinton Campaign was being informed of the work by Fusion GPS, what of the likelihood that the Clinton Campaign was informing the work of Fusion GPS?
And here’s a follow-up question: from whom did Danchenko get the name Sergei Millian?
Furthermore, one has to ask whether those Clinton Campaign/Danchenko contacts, if they existed, stopped after the election – or whether they continued through Danchenko’s 2017 interviews with the FBI.
Will these issues be raised, and will we get answers on the Clinton Campaign’s ties to Danchenko (or Danchenko’s “sources”)? As outside observers, we can’t – and won’t – make guarantees. There’s danger in false promises just like there’s danger in false hope. Durham, however, has suggested the possibility of former representatives of the Clinton Campaign testifying at trial, stating:
“in the event that one or more former representatives of the Clinton Campaign are called to testify” at trial, Danchenko and the witness “would be represented by the same law firm, resulting in a potential conflict.”
“The FBI team that was in communication with Facebook before the social media company censored the original Hunter Biden laptop story has been identified, according to a new court filing.
Meta, Facebook’s parent company, identified the team as the FBI’s Foreign Influence Task Force (FITF), according to an updated complaint entered late on Oct. 6.
Meta named the team after receiving a subpoena in a case alleging the federal government pressured Big Tech firms to censor users.
Laura Dehmlow (Credit: public domain)
Elvis Chan (Credit: public domain)
“Pursuant to the third-party subpoena, Meta has identified the FBI’s FITF, as supervised by Laura Dehmlow, and Elvis Chan as involved in the communications between the FBI and Meta that led to Facebook’s suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop story,” the updated complaint states.
Mark Zuckerberg, Meta’s CEO, said inAugust that Facebook reduced the reach of posts about Hunter Biden’s laptop in response to advice from the FBI.
(…) Laura Dehmlow is a supervisor of FITF. She has been named as a defendant in the case along with Elvis Chan, a special agent who manages the cyber branch at the FBI’s San Francisco Field Office.
According to new documents produced by the government as part of discovery in the case, Dehmlow briefed the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency’s (CISA) Cybersecurity Advisory Committee on March 1, 2022. Minutes of the meeting show Dehmlow telling members that the FITF actually started in 2016 and has since grown to 80 workers.
CISA Director Jen Easterly (Credit: Wikipedia)
Asked about goals for approaching mal-, mis-, and disinformation, Dehmlow said that “we need a media infrastructure that is held accountable; we need to early educate the populace; and that today, critical thinking seems to be a problem currently,” according to the minutes.
Chan, meanwhile, bragged on a recent podcast that the San Francisco office “was very involved in helping to protect the US elections in 2020” by working with private companies and election officials. He also indicated he works closely with CISA Director Jen Easterly, who has been revealed to have taken part in pressuring Big Tech companies to crack down on alleged misinformation.
“We talked with all of these entities I mentioned regularly, at least on a monthly basis. And right before the election, probably on a weekly basis. If they were seeing anything unusual, if we were seeing anything unusual, sharing intelligence with technology companies, with social media companies, so that they could protect their own platforms. That’s where the FBI and the US government can actually help companies,” Chan said. (Read more: The Epoch Times, 10/07/2022)(Archive)
“We have the transcripts from day 1 of the Igor Danchenko trial. Pretrial matters and jury selection took up all of yesterday morning; openings and the prosecution’s case-in-chief, led by Special Counsel Durham, started in the afternoon.
Let’s dig in and start with the opening statements.
Special Counsel Prosecutor Michael Keilty opened with explanations of Danchenko’s lies to the FBI and discussed some FBI misconduct:
(…) Auten was also present for the FBI’s interview of Steele in October 2016, just weeks before the first FISA application was submitted.’
Q: When you and Mr. Varacalli, and Mr. Gaeta, and Mr. Guessford met with Christopher Steele in early October of 2016, did Christopher Steele provide any corroborative information for the information that was contained in his reports, in the dossier reports?
A: Not for the allegations, no.
( ) …Durham asked about the FBI offer to pay Steele to corroborate his information – what we might call the “million dollar” question. Here is Auten’s testimony on that matter:
As to Steele’s sources, Auten admitted Steele didn’t provide the FBI with the names of any sources back in October 2016.
Q: So you talked to Mr. Steele about sourcing. Do you recall whether or not Mr. Steele, in early October of 2016 provided you or your colleagues with the names of any of the sources?
A: Sources, no.
(…) Durham also asked Auten about Sergei Millian, whose name had been discussed in the October 2016 Steele interview. Auten stated that Millian had previously been a confidential human source (CHS) for the FBI’s Atlanta Field Office.
Q: And what was that relationship?
A: Mr. Millian, at one time, had been a source.
Q: When you say “source,” that’s the same thing as confidential human source, correct?
A: That is correct.
Q: In common parlance, might be known as an informant?
A: In common parlance, yes.
Q: And do you remember for how long Mr. Millian had been a confidential human source for the FBI?
A: I don’t recall that.
Q: Do you recall or do you know in German what the nature of the assistance was that Millian provided?
A: I know where he had provided the assistance. I don’t know exactly what type of assistance it had been.
Q: Okay. So you know that he has helped as a CHS?
A: Correct.
Q: For a period of time?
A: Correct.
Q: And you said you knew where he was providing that information?
A: Correct.
Q: And where was that?
A: I believe it was the Atlanta — the Atlanta field office.
Q: Okay. Do you know, again, personal knowledge, do you know whether or not at some point in time Millian’s status as a CHS ended, he was closed?
A: Yes.
Q: And why was it closed, if you know?
A: I believe it was closed because he moved out of the area of responsibility for the Atlanta field office.
Q: Now, with respect to Mr. Millian, you heard about Millian from Steele, you knew he had a relationship with the bureau, correct?
A: Correct.
As an aside, let’s briefly discuss the importance of Millian’s prior relationship with the FBI. Most significantly, it put the FBI on notice that Millian would be willing to corroborate any Steele/Danchenko allegations. The FBI never took advantage of that prior relationship. Again, here we have the FBI failing to follow-up on leads because it knew such steps would blow-up its investigation.
Back to the transcript. Auten said the FBI opened an investigation on Millian after the October 2016 interview of Christopher Steele. He admitted the FBI found no evidence Millian had “assisted in the interference” of the 2016 presidential election.
Q: Would you tell the ladies and gentlemen of the jury whether or not — again, to your personal knowledge – whether or not the bureau opened some file on Mr. Millian?
A: Yes.
Q: And was that a matter investigated by the Bureau?
A: Yes.
Q: And to your personal knowledge, was it at some point closed?
A: Yes.
Q: Were any charges brought against Millian?
A: No.
Q: Was there any wrongdoing in terms of him assisting in the interference in some way with the 2016 presidential election?
A: No.
However, the Millian allegations – which arose from Danchenko’s claims to Steele – were still included in original FISA application and all subsequent renewals:
“Yesterday the government asked for more time to respond to U.S. District Judge Amos Mazzant’s September 29, 2022order directing the FBI to produce all records related to Seth Rich’s laptop. Somewhat relatedly, the FBI is withholding three reports produced by CrowdStrike in August of 2016 regarding the purported hack of the Democratic National Committee.
The order itself is pretty straightforward, at least with respect to Seth’s personal laptop, because it directs the FBI to “produce the information it possesses related to Seth Rich’s laptop and responsive to Plaintiff’s FOIA requests within 14 days of this Order.” On the other hand, the order does not discuss Seth’s work laptop, which is also in the possession of the FBI.
I’m waiting for the FBI to explain what it thinks needs to be clarified, then I may be filing my own motion for clarification. Meanwhile, the FBI has cited only one narrow basis for withholding the records related to Seth’s laptop, namely his privacy. I’m not sure why it takes four weeks and an appellate lawyer to figure out why the judge did or didn’t get that issue right.
In any event, I’m reminded of something that I learned almost thirty years ago when I was a newspaper reporter: people with nothing to hide don’t try to hide nothing. (Read more: Lawflog, 10/13/2022)(Archive)
( ) …During the IG’s investigation, Auten had given “a number of positive statements regarding Mr. Danchenko.” He had also made positive statements to Congress about Danchenko – testimony Auten still stands by (if only because he’s dug himself into a hole):
“I believe the primary sub-source was being truthful about who his sub-sources were. I don’t think he was fabricating sub-sources.”
However, after Durham was appointed, Auten became – and apparently remains – a subject of the investigation:
Danchenko’s defense was effective when asking about Auten’s impression of Danchenko at the time of the interview. Auten thought Danchenko was “trying to help.” And Auten admitted that he and Stephen Somma didn’t necessarily want to conduct a thorough interview of Danchenko at the time, thus explaining why they didn’t demand documents or ask about every allegation in the Steele Dossier. They also laid the groundwork for the defense that Dolan wasn’t necessarily a “source” for Danchenko, in that Dolan relied on some open source articles when relaying information on the Trump campaign.
The defense also spent a good deal of time discussing Millian’s various phone numbers and the possibility that he (or the person Danchenko “thought” was Millian) used an App like Skype, WhatsApp, Wickr, or Telegram to contact Danchenko. The flaw? Danchenko’s e-mails to Millian requesting to speak over the phone or meet – after the alleged call.
Redirect by Durham
Durham again focused on Auten and the Crossfire Hurricane Team’s efforts to corroborate Danchenko’s statements. Auten’s testimony was an admission of how little they did, ignoring both travel records and phone records.
There were further details on Auten being a “subject” of an “inquiry.” The investigation into Auten – who is a subject, not a target – has to do with the Danchenko matter and also Crossfire Hurricane and the Carter Page FISAs:
Charles Dolan Jr. is the first witness on the stand. Kielty will be examining for the government.
Dolan goes through his background. Involved in the 1980 presidential campaign for President Jimmy Carter.
Dolan also worked as a political consultant for Congressional campaigns and the Democratic Governors Association. He has joined a government relations firm and served as a liaison between lobbying operations and public affairs communications operations.
He reportedly worked for DC-based PR unit Powell Tate as well as Ketchum Inc. in early 2000s for 4-5 years. Beyond Jimmy Carter’s presidential campaign, Dolan says that he has worked as a paid advisor or a volunteer for every DNC campaign since Carter’s besides Obama campaign.
While working for Ketchum, Dolan worked closely with Russia because Ketchum represented the Russian federation. His role at Ketchum was to attract foreign investment. Dolan had regular conference calls with Dmitry Peskov, who is the press secretary for Russian President Putin.
Dolan had meetings with Russian ambassadors and people at embassy as well as various ministers. As far as Dolan’s personal interactions with Peskov, the 2 men met 1-2x per year. When Kielty asks what Dolan talked about w Peskov, Dolan stutters & says: “Things we were working on.”
While working with Ketchum, Dolan traveled to Russia 1-2 times per year, and through this work with the Russian Federation he was also involved in the G20 summit. Dolan also worked with Walt Disney in Russia helping to get their cable TV network and broadcast underway.
Around 2015 Dolan was employed at KGlobal, a PR firm in D.C. Danchenko met Dolan through Fiona Hill of the Brookings Institute who, per the Brookings Institute website: “[is] a senior fellow in the Center on the United States and Europe in the Foreign Policy program at Brookings.
She recently served as deputy assistant to the president and senior director for European and Russian affairs on the National Security Council from 2017 to 2019.
From 2006 to 2009, she served as national intelligence officer for Russia and Eurasia at The National Intelligence Council.” Fiona Hill had previously been appointed by Trump as deputy assistant to the president and senior director…for European and Russian affairs on his National Security Council staff. Hill left the White House on July 15, 2019.
Back to how Dolan and Danchenko met.
Olga Galkina (Credit: The Daily Mail)
Danchenko was trying to help his former schoolmate Olga Galkina find a PR firm. During March or April of 2016, she met with Dolan in the company of Danchenko. Dolan says he met with Galkina to discuss KGlobal doing business with the company she worked for.
Dolan also mentioned Gregg Hartley, a Republican lobbyist. Dolan said that his communications with Danchenko occurred over email and phone, plus having breakfast and lunch together at times.
Dolan said that he would communicate with Danchenko to check on Olga Galkina. Dolan understood that Danchenko was working as a political risk operative in London, where Orbis is based.
Dolan learned of Christopher Steele and Christopher Borrows of Orbis through Danchenko, who said in an email that Dolan would meet Steele and Borrows at some point if he was in London or if Steele and Borrows came to Washington, D.C.
Government Exhibit 702 is an email from Danchenko to Dolan dated April 29, 2016. Danchenko thanks Dolan for lunch and says he forwarded Dolan’s letter to Steele and Borrows.
He makes the point that he’ll introduce the 3 men if they ever are in London or D.C., respectively.
Danchenko says he didn’t get his new passport this month so he would be available for breakfast on May 20 or 13; he also said he’d be in Russia the first half of June. Mentions the Hotel Peter across the street from the Central Bank…
Dolan says he never met Christopher Steele in person and didn’t work with Orbis Business Intelligence which is Steele’s company.
Keilty* brings up Government Exhibit 703, an email dated April 29, 2016, from Danchenko to Dolan with an attachment and subject line is: Business Intelligence.
The email roughly read: “FYI, sample byproduct of my due diligence practice. Confidential: We don’t post these projects online.” The attachment is an Orbis document prepared by Danchenko; Dolan says he didn’t know what the document was about.
Note mentioned in the middle of this information: In May of 2016, Dolan finalized a trip to Cyprus to meet with Olga Galkina and make a presentation to her boss. Dolan’s PR firm, KGlobal, signed a contract with Galkina’s company.
Dolan says he kept communicating with Danchenko, and was approached by the Young Presidents’ Organization (YPO) to set up a conference in Moscow. Dolan felt that Danchenko would be useful.
YPO, according to Dolan, is an organization that sets up networking events to connect CEOs of various companies. Dolan mentions his relations with Steven Kupka, a D.C. attorney who was involved in YPO. Kupka wanted to organize a visit to Moscow.
The YPO conference scheduled for October 2016 was to be called “Inside the Kremlin.” Dolan was to be involved due to his extensive experience in Russia. The conference purpose was to introduce business people to Russian government officials.
Dolan approached Danchenko because he’s fluent in Russian and knows English well. At one point, they scouted hotels and venues in Moscow for the attendees to gather.
Dolan recalls meeting with Danchenko in Moscow in June 2016 and having lunch together. He reiterates their communications involved emails, phone calls, lunch, and breakfast, and would both attend the YPO conference. In fact, Danchenko was a speaker there.
In July 2016, when Dolan went to Cyprus for 3-5 days to meet w Danchenko’s friend Galkina for purported business with her company, Dolan confirms to Keilty he did “superficially” discuss upcoming US Presidential election with Galkina. Dolan specifically says they spoke about HRC.
After his visit in Cyprus, Dolan returned to the U.S., continuing to be in contact with Danchenko and planning the YPO conference.
Government Exhibit 712A is an email dated August 19, 2016 at 1:08 PM from Danchenko to Dolan. Danchenko says:
“Hi Chuck,
“Here are the bios of two of four. Who were the others?” This is referring to the people speaking at the YPO conference.
Danchenko then writes: “Could you please ask someone to comment on Paul Manafort’s resignation and anything on the Trump campaign? Off the record of course! Any thought, rumor, allegation. I am working on a related project against Trump.
I asked Gregg three months ago but he didn’t say much although shared a couple insights.
Thanks a lot!
Best,
Igor”
Gregg Hartley (Credit: public domain)
The “Gregg” that Danchenko is referring to is the aforementioned Gregg Hartley, Republican D.C. lobbyist.
Next, Keilty shares Dolan’s response. It roughly says: “Let me dig around on Manafort. Pretty sure the new team wanted him gone asap and used the recent NYT story to drive a stake in his heart.”
There an add’l reply after from Dolan to Danchenko that includes:
“Hi Igor,
I had a drink w a GOP friend of mine who knows [some things]. . . Corey Lewandowski who hates Manafort and still speaks to Trump & regularly played a role. He is said to be doing a happy dance for it.”
There was also a following paragraph that said “a number of people wanted Manafort out.”
At the end of the email, Dolan attached a Politico article about Paul Manafort.
On the stand, Dolan testifies under oath to Keilty that he actually never met this “GOP friend,” but got his story from cable news.
Dolan says he felt like embellishing the story because he knew Danchenko was working in political risk and inferred that Danchenko had helped him before so he was trying to return the favor.
Government Exhibit 713B is Danchenko’s response email to Dolan regarding the Manafort information.
Dated August 20, 2016, Danchenko wrote: “Our goals clearly coincide.” He adds that any additional insights from Dolan would be greatly appreciated.
Dolan’s ultimate response to Danchenko asking for more information was, “Thanks, I’ll let you know if I hear anything else.” Dolan testifies that he did not provide more insights on Manafort.
Dolan says that he probably would’ve been involved in the Clinton campaign but at that time was not.
Despite Danchenko writing to Dolan that he was working on an important project, Dolan did not know if Danchenko was working for anyone in particular.
Dolan makes it a point to note that this email exchange was one of 50 emails he had received from various people and didn’t put too much thought into it.
Dolan met with the Special Counsel on numerous occasions. He claims that he knew about the Steele dossier because his client at the time of its publishing, Galkina’s company, was named in the report.
Government Exhibit 112, a page from the dossier, dated August 22, 2016, Paragraph 3 reads: “Speaking separately, also in late July 2016, an American political figure associated with Trump and his campaign outlined the reason behind Manafort’s recent demise. . .”
The paragraph cites nearly verbatim what Charles Dolan wrote in his email to Danchenko about Paul Manafort. Coincidentally, Dolan’s email with the Manafort information was sent to Danchenko on August 20, 2016. So two days later, the information ended up in the Steele dossier.
There’s more discussion of Dolan describing his relationship with Danchenko. Dolan mentions a time that he saw Danchenko was at a park near his house with his daughter, so he went to go meet with him. Note: Dolan casually mentions picking up over the counter drugs for Danchenko.
Keilty brings up Government Exhibit 1202, the January 10, 2017, Buzzfeed article all about Trump’s “alleged” ties to Russia with the Steele dossier attached to it.
Conversation under seal.
Morning after Buzzfeed article published, on Jan 11, 2017, Dolan testifies he received many calls from # of people. Keilty asked if Dolan spoke with Danchenko that day. Dolan, stuttering on the stand, says he called Danchenko because he, “Was curious where the article came from.”
Keilty asked if Galkina was involved in the Steele dossier, to which Dolan responds that he isn’t sure but, “heard she was.”
In the January 11, 2017 phone call between Dolan and Danchenko, Dolan says that Danchenko told him that he would find out where the Steele dossier came from, but never got back to Dolan.
No further questions.
Fiona Hill (Credit: public domain)
Sears begins cross-examining Dolan. Sears asks, “Besides Fiona Hill, how did you meet Danchenko?” Dolan says maybe through the Brookings Institute.
Regarding Dolan’s relationship with Olga Galkina, Dolan says he spoke to Galkina without Danchenko for most of their relationship, which began in D.C. in March 2016.
Sears probes that the YPO October 2016 conference was not always held in Russia? Dolan confirms that the conference was regularly held in various capitals around the world; just so happened to occur in Moscow at that time.
Dolan says that he and Danchenko were together at the October 2016 conference in Moscow and that Danchenko was a speaker there.
During cross examination, Dolan claims that the first time he ever saw the Steele dossier was in the January 10, 2017Buzzfeed article, and that he was unaware Danchenko was working on the project.
Regarding Dolan’s October 31, 2021 meeting with the Special Counsel, Dolan says he doesn’t recall if he told the Special Counsel at the time that he didn’t think anything in the Steele dossier was from him.
Defense Exhibit 250 is shown. In August of 2021, Dolan still didn’t see anything in the Steele dossier that was from him.
On September 7, 2021, Dolan brought emails he had to the Special Counsel interview. Sears asks if they pressured Dolan to say that information in the dossier came from him? Dolan agreed that the information in the dossier was “very similar.”
Dolan doesn’t recall that he was being told by the Special Counsel that he was the subject of this investigation. Sears suggests that Dolan was upset upon finding out; Dolan still seems confused and says he’s not familiar with these terms, but hesitantly says, “Yes.”
Dolan says that the government reminded him that he needed to tell the truth. Dolan agreed that he had zero insider knowledge about Paul Manafort; he simply read articles and consumed news.
Dolan says that he had “no phone calls” about specific issues [related to the Steele dossier) or anything about the Trump campaign’s alleged connections to Russia.
Sears asks: “Wasn’t it your understanding Danchenko was writing a book?”
Dolan doesn’t agree and clarified that his understanding was that Danchenko was a political risk analyst and simply responded, and per Sears’ rhetoric, “threw [Danchenko] a bone” with the Manafort story.
Dolan reiterates that the specific email exchange with Danchenko was “1 of 50 that he had” with various individuals that day.
Sears asks Dolan if he’s aware that the government issued subpoenas for most of Dolan’s communications. Dolan testifies under oath that he never communicated with Danchenko about anything that was in the Steele dossier.
[END OF CROSS-EXAMINATION]
Keilty begins his redirect of Dolan and brings up the August 20, 2016 email where Dolan talked about “having a drink with his GOP friend” who Dolan alleged had dirt that could be useful for Danchenko, followed by the Manafort story.
Keilty makes it a point to tell Dolan that he said nothing about cable news in that email, only the GOP friend. This email was a response to Danchenko’s August 19, 2016 email asking Dolan for any “truth, rumor, etc.” about Manafort.
Keilty: “You think Danchenko was after you for open source research?”
The government retracts question just as the defense objects.
A few short reiterations of previously stated queries.
No further questions.
Kevin Helson, Danchenko’s handling agent, is called to the stand.
Helson has worked for the FBI for 20 years. He has a bachelors degree in chemistry and microbiology. He worked at the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation until 2002 before signing on to the FBI.
“Russia” is Helson’s assigned area within the FBI. Helson says his job is to identify individuals who are in U.S. under false pretenses or are acting against U.S.
In 2016, Helson worked in Washington, D.C. field office. He was asked to join Crossfire Hurricane, Helson declined.
Durham asks if Helson was aware in mid-September 2016, there was a Yahoo News article that the FBI was investigating Carter Page, or anything about Christopher Steele. Helson says that he was later aware but not part of the project.
At the end of January 2017, Helson was approached by people from Crossfire Hurricane (Steve Somma* and supervisory intelligence analyst Crossfire Hurricane). For context, Helson confirms to Durham that Auten worked out of headquarters but that Helson worked in the D.C. field office.
Helson’s supervisor gave him a task to meet with Igor Danchenko and eventually bring him on as a confidential human source (CHS). Auten and others related to Crossfire Hurricane were reportedly concerned about follow-up questions from the Steele dossier…
…that merged with Helson’s own projects out of the D.C. office, since Helson’s assigned focus area is matters of intelligence related to Russia.
In late Feb or early March 2017, Kevin Helson, Steve Somma, and Jason Ruehle (Danchenko’s co-handling agent to Helson) had initial meeting with Danchenko to set stage for future meetings & discuss questions regarding the Steele dossier. Helson says this lasted less than an hour.
Durham asks Helson if he had any trouble understanding Danchenko, to which Helson says that Danchenko spoke fluent English and that he had no difficulty communicating with him.
Helson says he didn’t know much about the Steele dossier, and if he wanted to know anything, other people involved in the project had to provide him with the information. Helson makes it a point to note that Crossfire Hurricane later became known as the Mueller investigation.
In conversing with Durham during the examination, Helson discusses his own methods of assessing whether a subject is lying or not based on the idea that, “It’s harder to keep a lie straight during multiple times of telling the same story.”
Sergei Millian (Credit: Twitter)
Durham asks how Helson first became familiar with the names Sergei Milian and Chuck Dolan. Helson somehow found out about them and needed to look it up.
Helson says during his working relationship with Danchenko, his goal was to obtain any new information that could corroborate the Steele dossier. Helson says Danchenko didn’t provide corroborating information.
Durham asks Helson if he’s aware how much of the Steele dossier was attributed to Danchenko. Off the top of his head, Helson says 80%.
Special Counsel John Durham pulls Government Exhibit 1502, which is the LinkedIn message from Igor Danchenko to Anastasia Gnezditskaia where he says he was responsible for 80% of the raw intelligence & 50% of the analysis. Helson says he had no reason to doubt that this is true.
Durham: “Do you recall if Danchenko was to be a paid CHS or not?”
Helson: “[That was dependent upon] what information he gave.” Helson said he probably would become paid over time.
Helson recalls that Danchenko was not paid during their initial meeting in the Alexandria, Virginia, field office, and that when Danchenko was paid for the first time it was less than $3,000.
Helson expected, given that he was eventually paid, that Danchenko would be giving full disclosure, truthful, and as forthright as possible.
Durham shows Government Exhibit 118 paragraph #1. Which reads: “Your client agrees to supply complete and truthful info and testimony to all persons in this matter, as well as other proceedings, etc. …
and that the client must not withhold any info or attempt to protect any person or entity through false info or false implication.”
Helson discusses with Durham his process of collecting information during meetings with Danchenko—by getting record of what was being said and for nuanced things, needed a recording. Helson tells Durham that Danchenko was unaware he was being recorded.
Government Exhibit 151 is a recording; G.E. 151T is the transcript. There was some information in the recording related to the Steele dossier, Helson says, but not all of it.
Government Exhibit 118-11 is a stipulation for the aforementioned recording and translation, wherein both parties agreed that both were a true and accurate copy of a meeting between Danchenko, Helson, and Ruehle. This is one recording among numerous.
Trenga instructs the jury that if there’s any discrepancy while looking at the transcript and the recording to go by the recording.
Durham asks if Danchenko had a copy of the dossier in front of him in each instance that the Steele dossier was discussed. Helson says yes.
Per the FBI recording of the meeting recorded in G.E. 151 and G.E. 151T, Durham asks Helson if it’s relevant that Danchenko said he himself would “record things when speaking with people in case he ever needed them.” Helson concurs this is relevant and [odd].
Durham asks Helson if or when Sergei Milian came up. Helson says that Milian came up at one of his first meetings with Danchenko. Durham asks if Helson is familiar with Report 2016/95; Helson says he looked at this during trial prep.
Helson adds that in March of 2017, Brian Auten raised an issue about Milian, saying there were discrepancies in the information about him.
Government Exhibit 152 and 152T are a recording and transcript.
Durham: “Was there any record that could corroborate that Danchenko received [the] anonymous phone call?”
Helson: “That would have requiring looking at phone records.” Helson says that they had asked Danchenko to provide any phone communication records, which he says would include apps, but Danchenko produced nothing.
Durham: “Was it then your job to get the records?”
Helson said that he wasn’t allowed to legally obtain the phone records of Danchenko since Danchenko was voluntarily providing the FBI information. Helson said to obtain the records legally, they would have needed a predicated investigation and they didn’t have that.
Back to Government Exhibit 152 and 152T; in the recording, Danchenko mentions that he uses WhatsApp.
In this recording, it’s also the first time that Helson says he inquired about Milian’s part of the dossier.
Durham asks if Helson ever recorded Danchenko in conversations outdoors. Helson says it’s difficult to record outdoors because of picking up outside noise but also because the FBI seeks to limit outdoor communications [with brevity].
Durham asks Helson about the electronic Dropbox where Danchenko was supposed to provide documents to the FBI. Helson says that Danchenko provided a “wide depth” of information, and that himself and Ruehle were in “receive mode” during their meetings with Danchenko.
Helson says they allowed the intelligence team to analyze the information.
Durham asks if Danchenko provided corroborating info for the Steele dossier. Helson says no.
Helson says that the information he received depended upon what was received from the Crossfire Hurricane team and later the Mueller investigation. Helson says that eventually the Steele dossier talk “faded off” as a topic they discussed.
Durham asks Helson if Danchenko ever provided supporting documents about the alleged anonymous call from Milian or communications.
Durham pulls Government Exhibit 164 and 164T. In this recording, Helson asks Danchenko about his relationship with Milian. Helson: “There was an email and I think there was a call with a guy up in New York who you thought was Milian?”
Danchenko responds that he doesn’t have Milian’s number; doesn’t remember. Danchenko says, “He never showed up in NY.”
Danchenko provides the email to Helson: “sergio@russianamericanchamber.com”
Durham asks Helson if he ever found out how Danchenko obtained these email addresses. Helson says: “No.”
Back to the recording. Danchenko provides Helson with a phone number that he says is one of Milian’s with a Georgia area code.
It’s very evident in this recording that Danchenko was avoiding having a conversation.
Durham: “It would’ve been helpful to know how Danchenko got Milian’s email addresses and for the dossier, right?”
Helson agrees.
Prior to dealing with Danchenko, Helson says he was unaware of Milian’s prior history with FBI.
Durham shows G.E. 204; it’s an email from Danchenko to MilianGroup July 21, 2016. The subject is “Question about Trump + China”.
Helson says Danchenko never provided him this email.
Durham: “Seeing this email would’ve been important to the investigation, yes?” Since Milian is an alleged sub source of the Steele dossier.
Helson agrees with Durham.
Durham then shows Government Exhibit 205 and 205T; the translation is there because this email was originally written in Russian. It’s from Sergei Milian to Dmitri Zlodorev. Dated July 26, 2016. Milian is asking Zlodorev “Who is Igor?” After receiving an email from him.
Helson does not know if Crossfire Hurricane team ever had a record of whether Milian was in fact even in the U.S. during July 2016. This is relevant because of the allegations that Danchenko said he was supposed to meet with Milian toward the end of July and he “never showed up.”
Government Exhibit 206 and 206T is Zlodorev’s response to Sergei.
Government Exhibit 207 and 207T is an email from Danchenko to MilianGroup dated August 18, 2016.
It opens with:
“Hello Sergey,
I wrote to you several weeks ago. We are contacts on LinkedIn.”
Later in the email Danchenko wrote: “If there’s any opportunity let’s meet.” Zero reference to phone app or anything that Milian never showed up to a meeting.
Helson says that any communications between Danchenko and Sergei would’ve been relevant.
Durham asks if Helson had these communications, would it have changed the investigation? Helson says yes.
On July 21, 2016, Danchenko wrote an email asking Milian about a construction company from Switzerland. To Helson’s knowledge, Danchenko was not in business with this construction company.
Durham asks Helson if he has knowledge of the communications between Danchenko and Milian between July 21, 2016 and August 18, 2016.
Helson says he expected he would’ve been provided those but he was not.
Helson believed documents Danchenko provided that he would say how he was communicating (either thru regular phone calls or thru phone apps).
Durham brings up Government Exhibit 610 & 610T. It’s a Facebook exchange that was originally in Russian between Galkina and Danchenko.
Galkina: “Call me in exactly 15 minutes. It’s regarding Chuck and me.”
Danchenko: “I will try. If I can get thru directly. Possibly Viber or WhatsApp.”
Gov Exhibit 611 is a Facebook message from Igor asking recipient if they have Signal after he referred to something as a “Delicate topic.” According to Helson, Signal is an “encrypted app in which parties can communicate back and forth. The conversations erase when you’re done.”
Government Exhibit 102. On October 24, 2017, there was an in-person meeting with Danchenko in Alexandria, Virginia. Helson raised questions about Danchenko’s communications with the alleged anonymous caller that Danchenko believed was Milian.
His reasoning for believing that the caller was Milian was because he listened to a YouTube video of Sergei Milian speech and in his opinion it sounded just like him. Danchenko said he has no in-person meeting with Milian.
The FBI confronted this because it didn’t line up with what Steele said. Danchenko refuted Steele’s take but never corrected him. Danchenko told FBI he never met with Milian in person. However, Danchenko claimed he spoke on the phone a few times with who he believed was Milian.
Durham: “How confident are you (Helson) that on October 24, 2017, Danchenko said he spoke to Milian on the phone a couple times?
Helson: “Very confident.”
G.E. 103 confirms on November 2, 2017, Helson and Danchenko had an in-person meeting and they discussed Milian again.
Durham: “Why did you have to go back to the Milian piece?”
Helson: “Brian Auten said there were inconsistencies between what Danchenko said regarding his contact with Milian versus what Steele said.”
Durham: “Going off of what Danchenko told Steele, right?”
Helson: “Steele thought Danchenko and Milian met in-person but Danchenko never corrected him.”
Durham: “Based on your interactions with Danchenko, was there ever any indication that there was other information besides what came from Steele? Did Charles Dolan ever come up?”
Helson: “Yes. I didn’t know of Dolan until I found out through Crossfire Hurricane.” Helson said that Danchenko never brought up Charles Dolan to him.
Durham probes: “Isn’t it the goal to corroborate what’s in the Steele dossier?”
Helson: “Yes, to identify the source.”
Durham: “Would it have been helpful to have a U.S. citizen whose info was in the dossier?”
Helson: “Yes. Much easier.”
Government Exhibit 171T. June 15, 2017. The third recorded conversation between Helson, Danchenko, and Ruehle.
Eventually after Helson was Danchenko’s handler, he learned of the emails between Danchenko and Dolan.
Durham shows email G.E. 712A August 19, 2016 from Danchenko to Dolan asking him about info on Paul Manafort and how Danchenko said he was working on a project on Trump. As well as Dolan’s reply to Danchenko G.E. 712B with the “Drink w GOP friend of mine & Paul Manafort” info.
Prior to June 15, 2017, Helson said he had not seen these emails; he said no one on Crossfire Hurricane gave this to him.
Durham: “With respect to his email, wouldn’t it have been good to know this during June of 2017 and prior?”
Helson: “Yes.”
Durham pulls up G.E. 714, the dossier report 216/105. Paragraph 3 is the paragraph that is nearly identical (with superfluous language to polish it up) language that was in Dolan’s email to Danchenko about Paul Manafort.
While looking at this, Durham is asking Helson questions about how he gathered information to corroborate the dossier. Helson, with the request of Mueller’s investigative team, obtained questions to ask Danchenko by Brian Auten and Amy Anderson.
G.E. 171 & 171T is recording & transcript from June 15, 2017 between Helson & Danchenko.
Helson: “For whatever reason, they’re either missing you? Or they’re not finding . . . We’re trying to figure out. . You said something to Steele. . . Do you know Chuck Dolan?”
(Long pause)
Danchenko: “Yes. I’ve known [of] Chuck for 12 years… a couple years [close].” Danchenko says Dolan was always in Russia,
Helson: “You never talked to him about anything shown in the dossier, right?”
Danchenko: “No.”
Helson asks when was last time Danchenko saw Dolan. He replies September of last year in Moscow, but then pulls an exact time.
Helson: “I wasn’t expecting an exact time!” He then asks if Dolan is close to the Kremlin.
Danchenko suggests Dolan is close to Putin professionally.
Durham asks Helson what Danchenko’s demeanor was during this interaction and Helson responds: “A bit of hesitation and a noticeable pause.”
Durham: “Did Danchenko ever mention immediately after the Steele dossier was published in Buzzfeed on January 10, 2017, that Dolan reached out to Danchenko on January 11, 2017?”
Helson: “No.”
Durham: “You would’ve wanted to know that, right?”
Helson: “Yes.”
Durham and Helson briefly talk about the FBI interview with Olga Galkina in D.C.
Helson’s intent was to obtain any knowledge he could find to corroborate the dossier.
Durham asks about how Danchenko referenced his communications in forms (apps, etc.) how he would send screenshots of conversations to Helson.
Helson: “Yes.”
Durham brings up how on New Year’s Day in 2017, Danchenko met with Dolan in a park. “What was your impression of this?”
Helson found it to be interesting. Helson was under the impression that Danchenko introduced Galkina to Dolan.
When Helson asked Danchenko if Dolan would know Steele, he replied: “I think he would.” However, Danchenko did not mention business interactions with either to Helson.
Durham: “Would you learn of Dolan’s connections to Dmitry Peskov?” (Putin’s press secretary)
Helson: “Yes.”
Government Exhibit is a May 17, 2017 2-page report with 3 screenshots of a conversation between Galkina and Danchenko. On bullet point 4, there’s a note that “Galkina claims she can’t travel til September but [Danchenko] made a good pitch.”
G.E. 120 mostly redacted doc. There’s a part discussing Danchenko speaking on social media and another portion. “At this point the development . . . Trump collusion and the gov’t . . . ”
“All of Danchenko’s info was obtained through conversations with colleagues and friends.”
Durham: “Do you recall that Danchenko discussed Dolan’s relationship to Peskov?”
Durham and Helson are talking about “Russian disinformation” in relation to Peskov’s role as Putin’s press secretary.
It’s noted that even as a paid informant, Danchenko did not get Helson any information on Dolan [to corroborate the dossier].
Government Exhibit 605 is a picture of Danchenko and Dolan together in Russia from June 14, 2016. This had been posted to Facebook.
The day the photo was posted to Danchenko’s profile, Galkina tried to arrange a [vicinity?] for Danchenko.
In March 2017, Helson said he first asked Danchenko about Dolan. Danchenko said Dolan was, “A nice guy, a friend.”
Then on September 22, 2017, Danchenko’s story changed and he told Helson that Dolan “has dubious connections in Russia.”
Helson attributed this to the fact that he was simply asking Danchenko about people around him who could be a security risk.
Durham makes a point to conclude that a well-coordinated conspiracy, Report 95 was used on a FISA application, unvetted, against an American citizen.
No further questions.
During cross-examination, Sears probes that, “Wasn’t Danchenko SHOCKED at how Steele presented what he said in the dossier?” Helson agreed. The two men agree that Danchenko never vouched for the information.
Defense Exhibit 100 discusses what the motivations were for Danchenko to become a confidential human source. Helson said: “Patriotism.” Both Helson and Danchenko had concerns for his safety.
Sears states that Helson and Danchenko had a working relationship from March 2017 to October 2020.
Sears asks Helson about the “one time” that Danchenko allegedly acted erratic.
He supposedly walked into an in-person meeting and demanded more money, jumping up and down and very upset.
Sears says that Danchenko later apologized for this and it was revealed that his wife and lawyer had been telling him he should be asking for more money due to his having children and being at risk. Helson confirms this.
Sears reminds Helson he testified to OIG that Danchenko was “gold” as human source following “single erratic behavior incident” because Helson would have known going forward if there was a time that Danchenko was lying. According to Helson, Danchenko never acted like that again.
Helson also said that the Crossfire Hurricane team never raised an issue about information Danchenko had provided Helson. However, Helson says that there were times Danchenko couldn’t recall where something or someone came from source-wise in the dossier.
Sears is pushing that Danchenko, as far as Helson was aware, had never known about or seen the Steele dossier until it was published in Buzzfeed on January 10, 2017.
During this interaction, Helson says he legally wouldn’t have been able to obtain all of Danchenko’s communications unless he had voluntarily provided them himself. Danchenko would later tell Crossfire Hurricane that he deleted nearly all of his communications.
Helson reportedly TOLD Danchenko to scrub his phone. He says following the January 2017 FBI interview, Danchenko was instructed on multiple occasions to scrub his phone because he’d be, “A target to Russians.”
Sears asks Helson about Danchenko’s relationship with Dolan. The two men agree that Danchenko said he approximately knew Dolan for 10 years based on Russia connections.
Danchenko knew that Dolan worked for Ketchum, who did PR for the Kremlin. According to Helson, Danchenko reportedly said Dolan was “naive to Russia.”
In reference to Danchenko saying in October 2017 that Dolan had dubious connections to Russia, Sears and Helson agree that Danchenko then provided the FBI with the names of the “dubious Russia contacts.”
It’s noted that Steele did not contain Danchenko’s identity as the primary source of the dossier, but that Danchenko concealed his own identity.
During Helson’s testimony to the OIG, Sears reminds him that he said Danchenko never struck him as “someone who would lie.”
Danchenko never told Helson that he lied to Steele about his meeting Milian; Danchenko simply never corrected Steele.
About 10 months after Danchenko met with FBI, he told them that he was going to meet with Steele. The FBI was having Danchenko fish information from Steele.
Sears asks Helson if he was trying to drive a wedge between Danchenko and Steele; he replies, “Yes.”
According to Sears & Helson, Danchenko had concerns about giving more info to Steele because he supposedly embellished info Danchenko originally gave to him for the dossier.
Items that Danchenko said were rumors, Steele wrote as fact. Sears is animatedly suggesting that according to Danchenko, Steele was obsessed with “proving the dossier to be true” and that Danchenko eventually “expressed concern about Dolan and Galkina’s relationship.”
Sears: “Danchenko is charged with lying, saying he never spoke to Dolan about anything in the Steele report.”
Helson: “Correct.”
Defense Exhibit 102 is debrief notes from the June 15, 2017 recorded meeting between Helson and Danchenko. Helson’s wrote in a note that Danchenko had known Dolan for “2 years more closer.”
Helson had asked how long it had been since Danchenko had spoken to Dolan. He mentioned the Moscow trip in 2016 and then the January 1, 2017 meeting in the park.
Defense Exhibit 103. Helson does not know if Danchenko ever saw Report 105, which was all about Dolan.
Auten also did not ask Danchenko about it. No one apparently ever focused Helson’s attention on
Paragraph 3 of the dossier report that was all about Paul Manafort; nearly verbatim to what Dolan had written in his reply email to Danchenko.
Government Exhibit 120 is very redacted but begins w/: “At this point in the development source understands the priority is to obtain any and all info that would indicate collusion between Trump’s campaign, administration, & the Russian government or any of its representatives.”
It continues: “Speaking on social media. He keeps asking when I am visiting. On good terms. Asking him about Romeo and Juliet setting.”
In reference to the anonymous phone call with Milian, Danchenko told Auten he emailed Milian after the alleged scheduled meeting that Milian never showed up for, but he did not tell Helson or show him that email.
The issue is again raised that there was contradictory information about Danchenko’s meeting with Milian due to what Steele said, which is why Helson had an October 24, 2017 meeting with Danchenko and then another on November 2, 2017.
Sears: “Did you believe Danchenko knew what Steele told the FBI about his communications with Milian?”
Helson: “I don’t recall.”
Testifying to OIG on Oct 21, 2019, Helson states Danchenko said Steele was completely wrong about his relationship w/ Milian & that Danchenko was not happy w/ Steele about what he put in dossier. Sears insists that Danchenko lying about this could compromise relationship w/ FBI.
Referring to how Danchenko’s August 2016 email to Milian read that the two men never met, Sears argues that if Danchenko had written in the email that they had talked a few weeks back (alluding to the purported anonymous 10-15 call…
…that Danchenko believed to be Milian), Milian may have never called him again if he was trying to remain anonymous.
Sears brings up the Amtrak records of Danchenko going to New York and that Milian was supposedly flying into JFK airport on July 27, 2016.
Helson was unaware of late July FB message from Danchenko to his wife about the giraffes at the Bronx zoo that said “Another meeting later.”
Sears also raises Milian reached out to @GeorgePapa19 around same time that Danchenko believed he received an anonymous call from Milian.
In two of Helson’s Field Office Annual Source Reports, he wrote that any inconsistencies in Danchenko’s report were minor. Steele’s motivations came into question. Helson testified to the OIG that Danchenko’s had “real information” that was helpful to the FBI.
Defense Exhobit 109 stated that Danchenko reported critical reporting that added in a top FBI investigation. It also said that some of Danchenko’s reporting has been added to 25 IRs. An IR is an intelligence report.
Defense Exhibit 110 is a payment amount of $10,000 for the confidential human source, Danchenko, for reporting he provided during January of 2018. He was involved in 5 separate investigations, and his information…
…led to recognizing cyber actors [affecting] the 2016 election, according to the FBI. Danchenko reportedly assisted in uncovering “ongoing-maligned influence.”
Notes that former AG Bill Barr was launching an investigation into how the FBI handled Carter Page. Helson was concerned that the publishing of the redacted January 2017 interview would damage Danchenko.
Helson wrote a memo in July of 2020 that he disagreed with the move to release this. “Internet detectives” figured out who had been interviewed.
On October 21, 2020, Helson drafted an electronic communication to give a lump sum payment of $346,000 to Danchenko, since he would now have safety issues and had provided information for at least 25 FBI investigations.
The lump sum payment request was denied. Danchenko’s total lifetime payments would have been around $565,000 if he had actually received the $346,000.
Sears argued that the FBI didn’t have as much information until Danchenko, which Helson agrees with.
Helson says that they never thought Danchenko was partisan because said some of the things Danchenko brought to FBI were items that would negatively affect Trump. In other words, they’re inferring Danchenko tried to prevent those things from occurring.
No further questions.
In redirect, Durham calls out Helson, because he said there was no derogatory info on Danchenko in reports, but this wasn’t true. Durham raises that there is an open espionage case on Danchenko at that time.
References 65/8, a counterintelligence report. Durham asks if Helson bothered to obtain access to the report and see what it was about. Helson says that he spoke with Laura Pino about it and she said it was hearsay.
Durham: “Did you read the underlying documents? Is it not true that Human Validation recommended that Helson read the file.”
Again, Helson claiming he didn’t have access. Despite his knowledge that there was a witness, Helson said someone countered the witness.
Durham: “Danchenko’s Visa had expired. Did you know whether or not he stayed in the country anyway?” Durham raises the need to determine whether or not there was fraud committed with his immigration status in the states.
Durham: “Did Crossfire Hurricane, Mueller, or ANYONE do what was recommended?”
Conversation under seal.
Helson said he only checked Danchenko’s travel records going forward at that point, not backward.
Durham: “Did you check his financials to find unsolicited reporting that would have [indicated] the FBI might NOT be the primary audience for his reporting?”
Helson: “No.”
Durham: “Did you look into anything regarding his Visa or immigration status?!”
Helson: “No.”
Durham: “Did you polygraph? He could’ve been tasted by a foreign government entity to get intelligence?”
Helson: “No.”
Durham is pissed.
Sears cuts in and tries to say it that Helson disagreed with people trying to invalidate Danchenko as a human source.
“Did you know this woman from Human Validation Unit was an army counterintelligence officer in Europe.”
Helson says this doesn’t make her an expert on Russian intelligence officers in U.S.
Durham probes that Helson maybe opposed this being a 65A case instead of 105.
Durham: “Do you recall any of you or any of your colleagues attempting to corroborate the report? Did you do ANYTHING when the FBI mistakenly thought Danchenko left the country.”
(…) The purposes of making Danchenko a CHS should be quite clear. The Crossfire Hurricane investigation was plagued with problems from the outset. The reasons for opening the investigation were bunk. Those problems continued as the investigation went on, with claims of Trump/Russia collusion proven unverified or outright false. (Thus the targeting of Flynn for a Logan Act violation.)
Those problems continued with the Carter Page FISA applications, first submitted to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) in October 2016, and which relied substantially on the Steele Dossiers (aka Steele Reports). The FISA applications were renewed three times – more on that later. Each application had its own problems, from FBI lawyers lying about Carter Page to the Court being generally misled.
Realizing its own misconduct, the FBI made Danchenko a paid CHS in March 2017 – just before the third FISA warrant was submitted in April 2017. This would allow Comey’s FBI to work directly with Danchenko in support of its counter-intelligence investigation against President Trump.
Danchenko being a CHS also served another purpose: it protected the Bureau and the Mueller Special Counsel from revealing their “sources and methods.” How do you hide misconduct? Bury the witness. (Techno Fog, 9/13/2022)(Archive)
On Friday, October 14th, we learned the FBI directed Igor Danchenko to scrub his phones and erase all incriminating evidence:
We’ve known since last week that the FBI made Danchenko a confidential human source so as to hide him from Nunes’ and other inquiries into the Russiagate scam. Now we find out that an added benefit was that Danchenko could legally dispose of evidence of the Russiagate scam. Ufb. pic.twitter.com/fHQoLp2Pfv
Judge Anthony J. Trenga (Credit: American Law Institute)
“The judge in Special Counsel John Durham’s trial on Igor Danchenko on Friday dismissed one of the five federal counts the Russian intelligence expert was facing for allegedly lying to the FBI, after the defense team made the request, arguing prosecutors has failed to provide sufficient evidence.
The count – one of five – was dismissed by U.S. District Judge Anthony Trenga in a federal court in northern Virginia.
The count alleged Danchenko lied to FBI Special Agent Kevin Helson when he said he had not “talked” to longtime Democratic operative and PR executive Charles Dolan about information that went into the so-called Steele dossier to which Danchenko provided 80% of its information.” (Read more: JusttheNews, 10/14/2022)(Archive)
Russian analyst Igor Danchenko walks to the Albert V. Bryan U.S. Courthouse on Oct. 11, 2022, in Alexandria, VA (Credit: Drew Angerer/Getty Images)
“On Friday, Special Counsel John Durham finished presenting evidence in the Igor Danchenko trial.
The most damning part of the day, if not the trial? Testimony that FBI supervisors within the Mueller Special Counsel refused requests to interview a source for the Steele Dossier: longtime Democrat activist Charles Dolan.
But first we start with the redirect examination of a witness from Thursday afternoon – FBI Special Agent Kevin Helson – who handled Danchenko when he was a confidential human source. (Our prior article discussed Helson’s investigative failures at length.)
Durham questioned Helson about efforts to determine the Danchenko-Dolan connection in the summer of 2017. By that time, the Mueller Special Counsel had been ongoing since May 2017 and had, on its own, taken part in the last Carter Page FISA renewal. And if you recall from our last articles, Danchenko had been an FBI CHS since March 2017. Once Mueller was appointed, Helson was the go-between, asking Danchenko questions posed by the then-Special Counsel’s team.
By June 2017, the Mueller Special Counsel had developed information that Democrat Charles Dolan may have been a source of the Steele Dossier. They passed questions about Dolan to Agent Helson:
Q Who did those [Dolan] questions come from?
A It came from the Mueller investigative team, particularly Ms. [Amy] Anderson.
Durham also cleaned-up Helson’s sloppiness. The previous day, Helson testified that Danchenko didn’t know the Steele Dossier was going to the FBI. Helson admitted he didn’t have any evidence to support his own conclusion.
Q You were asked a question yesterday that you adopted — you were asked a question about, well, the defendant didn’t know that Steele’s reports were going to the FBI, and you said yes. Do you have any independent knowledge of that?
A No.
Q That’s just what the defendant told you, right?
A Yeah.
Q So when you told the jury that he, Mr. Danchenko, didn’t know that they were going to the FBI, you don’t know that to be the case?
A I had no other knowledge that suggested that, no.
Q Right. There’s no independent evidence of any sort, correct?
A Yes, correct.
Helson was also asked about Danchenko’s lack of complete honesty with respect to his interactions with Charles Dolan and his travels to Moscow. As you’ll see, Helson’s answers also implicate his own failure to fully investigate his source.
Q Did Mr. Danchenko tell you about his having been in Moscow in June of 2016?
A No, he did not tell me that.
Q Did he tell you anything about his having met with or seen Mr. Dolan in Moscow in June of 2016?
A No, sir.
Q Do you recall, sir, whether or not you ever learned the dates on which Mr. Danchenko was in Moscow in June of 2016?
A I learned of it later.
Q And do you remember: When you learned at a later point in time he had been in Moscow in June of 2016, did you talk to him about that?
A No.
Danchenko’s June 2016 Moscow trip, where he met with Dolan, has significant timing because Danchenko flew from Moscow to London to give “a report”. Who was in London? Christopher Steele.
Durham also inquired about Helson’s October 24, 2017 interview of Danchenko. Helson described the purposes of that meeting:
“This meeting was — in part, it was a direction from the Mueller investigative team bringing up the discrepancies in the Sergei Millian matter, and they wanted me to go back specifically to ask the questions and get his response.”
Just so we’re clear – by October 24, 2017, the Mueller Team knew there were issues with Danchenko’s allegations about Sergei Millian. At a minimum, they were aware of the discrepancies in Danchenko’s claims about Millian. And how did Danchenko respond? By changing his story.
The importance is two-fold. First, it confirms to the Mueller Special Counsel that there are even more problems with Danchenko’s story. Second, it catches Danchenko in a lie that would, 4+ years later, be part of his own indictment. (Read more: Techno Fog/The Reactionary, 10/15/2022)(Archive)
“Hertzog was with the FBI from 2008 through 2019 as an intelligence analyst with a primary focus on Russian counterintelligence. She described her role as an analyst who “looks at information and tries to identify trends, patterns, and investigative next steps.” She was assigned to the Directorate of Intelligence at FBI Headquarters.
Hertzog was assigned to Special Counsel Mueller’s Office in July 2017. She described her role and chain of command with the Mueller Team:
Q And what, generally, was your role with the Special Counsel Mueller’s team?
A I was primarily initially to focus on looking into reports that the FBI had received on Russian matters.
Q All right. Did those reports have a particular name?
A We referred to them typically as the Steele dossier.
Q Now, as a member of Special Counsel Mueller’s team, was there a chain of command?
A Yes.
Q Can you describe the chain of command that you worked with?
A I reported directly to SIA Brian Auten. Above him was Special Counsel Mueller. There were horizontal chains of reporting as well. So there was an attorney, a supervisory special agent, and then head of FBI personnel.
Q Okay. So you had occasion to work with special agents as well, correct?
A Correct.
Q And who were some of the special agents that you worked with Special Counsel Mueller?
A I worked with Supervisory Special Agent Amy Anderson and Supervisory Special Agent Joe Nelson.
Hertzog became familiar with the Steele Dossier, and with the parties involved in the Steele Dossier, once she joined the Mueller Team:
Q And how did you become familiar with Mr. Steele?
A When I reported [July 2017] to the Special Counsel’s Office, SCO, I had received background information on the investigation up until that point.
It was her job to “look into the Steele Dossier.” She described this as “trying to identify the sourcing for the claims in the dossier and, specifically, the national security threat with regards to the Russian influence piece.” Hertzog explains:
Q And a lot of names appeared in those dossier reports?
A Correct.
Q Did you learn that there were a number of different sources that the defendant relied on?
A Yes.
Q Did you have a particular focus on any of those sources?
A There were a number of sub-sources that were identified for investigative next steps.
Q Okay. And did you have a particular individual that you focused on?
A Yes. There was an individual named Olga Galkina who was — when I was assigned to SCO, was my primary focus initially.
Compare Hertzog’s testimony to the words of Robert Mueller:
How do we not conclude that Mueller lied to Congress?
Unless his own team kept him in the dark about their own investigation of the Steele Dossier?
The title of this post references “obstruction” by the Mueller Special Counsel. Just to clarify, we’re not saying that there will be charges of obstruction of justice from anyone on the Mueller Team. (We’re not going to predict what comes next.) By obstruction we mean obstructing the truth, or obstructing the efforts to determine the truth. We plan to dive deeper into this Mueller issue in the near future.
Back to Hertzog. She took investigative steps to look into the Steele Dossier. She investigated Olga Galkina. She also looked into Charles Dolan:
Q And what’s your understanding of who Mr. Dolan is?
A Mr. Dolan, to my understanding, having reviewed FBI databases, had connectivity to both Mr. Danchenko and Ms. Galkina.
Q So your testimony is that you learned about Mr. Dolan through the various FBI databases?
A I believe information was provided to me as background when I on boarded with SCO, and I became aware of more information as I researched.
In fact, Hertzog connected Dolan to Olga Galkina, and also to those who had worked in the Russian government (such as Putin ally and confidant Dmitry Peskov). She checked Dolan’s travel records, finding he had traveled to Cyprus (where Galkina was located) and also to Russia. She found Dolan’s link to Galkina, a “sub-source for the Steele Dossier” of particular importance.” (Read more: Techno Fog/The Reactionary, 10/15/2022)(Archive)
“An elite Washington, D.C., think tank has employed individuals who’ve worked for front groups controlled by Chinese spy agencies, a Daily Caller News Foundation investigation found.
The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace has employed over a dozen individuals who’ve worked in a range of capacities at China-based nonprofits set up or co-opted by Chinese intelligence agencies, including the Ministry of State Security (MSS) and the intel arm of the People’s Liberation Army.
These individuals have served as experts in various policy areas, including international relations, American politics and nuclear policy while working at both the think tank’s D.C. headquarters and at its Tsinghua University center in Beijing. Moreover, not only did Carnegie employ the majority of these experts while current CIA Director William Burns was president of the think tank, but, according to the nonprofit’s current records, Carnegie still employs individuals working for Chinese intelligence front groups.
Carnegie, the CIA and Director Burns did not respond to multiple requests for comment from the DCNF.
The DCNF was able to identify Carnegie staff who’ve worked for Chinese spy fronts by cross-referencing publicly available employment information with a new book on Chinese Communist Party (CCP) intel and influence operations written by Alex Joske, a former analyst at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute.
The book, called “Spies and Lies,” details Chinese intelligence agents’ efforts to infiltrate and influence Western institutions. Joske reveals a front set up by China’s version of the CIA began courting Carnegie in the early 2000s — a relationship the DCNF discovered has persisted to this day. (Read more: Daily Caller, 11/11/2022)(Archive)
FISA Court rubber stamps FBI warrant applications to spy on Americans. (Credit: River City Reader)
(…) The FBI’s use of the uncorroborated Steele dossier was not the FBI’s worst offense, however. Worse still was the Crossfire Hurricane team’s last-minute amendment to the FISA application that misleadingly framed Steele’s source network as one established during his time as an MI6 agent, when, in fact, neither Danchenko nor any of Steele’s other dossier sources had been sources during his time with British intelligence.
While Steele would later confirm for the inspector general that his source network did not involve sources from his time with MI6, but “was developed entirely in the period after he retired from government service,” from Auten’s detailed trial testimony, we now know that the Crossfire Hurricane team either knew Steele’s source network was not connected to British intelligence or knew that it could not, in good faith, make that representation to the FISA court.
For two days, Durham elicited testimony from Auten of the FBI’s attempts to ascertain Steele’s source network, including during a trip to Europe in early October, but Steele refused to identify his sources. Auten’s testimony in this regard proves significant when considered together with details previously revealed in the Office of Inspector General’s report on FISA abuse.
In discussing the process the FBI undertook to obtain the first FISA warrant on Page, the OIG explained that the day before the FISA court granted the surveillance order, the government submitted a “read copy” of the FISA application to the FISA court’s legal adviser for a preliminary assessment of any issues. The FISA court’s legal adviser asked the attorney working with the FBI on the application “how it was that Steele had a network of subsources?”
The government lawyer “provided additional information to him regarding Steele’s past employment history,” the OIG report explained; that response implied Steele’s source network came from his time with MI6. Significantly, the FISA court’s legal adviser then indicated the additional detail of Steele’s prior work with British intelligence should be included in the official FISA application to the court.
“That the legal advisor not only raised the question about Steele’s access to a network of sources, but then insisted that the FISA application be updated to include information concerning Steele’s prior government position, shows the FISA court placed great significance on Steele’s previous British intelligence work for purposes of assessing the reliability of his source network.” And with that misleading information added, the next day, Oct. 21, 2016, the FISA court issued the first of four orders authorizing the surveillance of Page’s phone and email accounts.
Given the importance the legal adviser placed on understanding Steele’s source network, it seems unlikely the FISA court would have authorized the surveillance of Page had the FBI either acknowledged that Steele’s source network came from his private work with Orbis or conceded that Steele had refused to reveal his sources. It was this final deception, then, and not merely the FBI’s reliance on the uncorroborated Steele dossier, that led to the illegal surveillance of Page. And, here, those involved in adding the last-minute, credibility-boosting footnote reference to Steele’s MI6 work knew full well that misrepresentation would score the bureau a surveillance warrant, making it an even worse transgression.” (Read more: The Federalist, 10/14/2022) (Archive)
There are, at the very least, 459 documented violations of state and federal laws and regulations on the infamous device.
For the past thirteen months, MarcoPolo—a nonprofit research group comprised of six men from across the U.S. dedicated to exposing corruption and blackmail—has been writing a comprehensive Report on the Biden Laptop and the crimes thereon. Our motives and budget were transparent; thousands of Americans financed its production. We neither sought nor received any institutional/corporate backing. We were delayed for various reasons, but finished the dossier for 35k underbudget.
At long last, the Report is complete. It has been sent to members of the U.S. House & U.S. Senate, U.S. attorneys for the jurisdictions in which the Bidens and their associates committed crimes, state and local law enforcement, and—for good measure—every contact on the Biden Laptop, which includes all of Hunter’s classmates at Archmere Academy and a portion of the current White House staff.
It is simple but dense: 630 pages. 2,020 footnotes. Broken up neatly into seven sections with the biggest focus being Business-Related Crimes. We believe that it is the deepest digital colonoscopy ever performed on a sitting U.S. first family.
Let’s talk about Hillary Clinton, Lafarge, ISIS, the law firm Paul | Weiss and Corporations paying “fines” for “Conspiring to Provide Material Support to Foreign Terrorist Organizations” ⚖️💥🎻
From 1985-1992, HRC made $31,000 per year as a board member of Lafarge Corporation 🧵 pic.twitter.com/sAGodpNN5A
In 2001, Loretta Lynch signed off as Commissioner of the Telcordia Technologies, Inc. > NeuStar, Inc. transfer 22 days before 9/11.https://t.co/zofZuPZRvO
“We need to make sure that those who get the benefit of such an arrangement comply with their responsibility.” said John Carlin, a senior member of the deputy attorney general’s office. “If not, you should expect to see serious repercussions.”https://t.co/eKuD1Bv1Na
Paul, Weiss was advising Neustar in its $3.1 billion sale to TransUnion… Coincidentally, announced just THREE DAYS before the Sussman Indictment is unsealed.https://t.co/Pwo5IJ1Jpypic.twitter.com/HU2rVOqyRp
Royal Embassy of Saudi Arabia <=> Hogan Lovells <=> Neustar <=> Rodney Joffe <=> Perkins Coie <=> John Podesta <=> Michael Sussman <=> Hillary for America <=> Steptoe & Johnson | Hogan Lovells | Kirkland & Ellis ALL DONATED to HFA.
Howard Topaz was the tax lawyer who filed income tax returns for the Clintons’ 2004 + 2007-14 joint tax returns – which were prepared by Hogan & Hartson/Hogan Lovells.
Hogan & Hartson employed Gold Star Father Khizr Khan, there he worked on the EB5 travel visa program. pic.twitter.com/cyRhV4kJIZ
SWEDISH TELECOM GIANT LM ERICSSON & ITS U.S. DIVISION ERICSSON INC. SUED BY 862 AMERICANS FOR ALLEGED PROTECTION MONEY PAYMENTS TO AQ, AQ-IN-IRAQ & ISLAMIC STATE
That Alex Jones is a nationally detested villain for getting a story incorrect (despite apologizing and retracting countless times, something I’ve yet to see CNN, MSNB anchors do for Rittenhouse) and yet most people couldn’t have cared less about Epstein – a man who trafficked thousands of children, purportedly helped to found the Clinton Foundation, and was suicided in the most painfully obvious manner possible – says a lot about banal and shallow values of our culture and how easily our attention can be diverted to meaningless noise.
It’s like…
On the one hand, you have something that’s kind of bad. Grieving parents get weird voicemails and messages calling them liars (and in one case the n-word despite being white)… OK sure, that’s bad. Did Alex tell them to do that? No. Did Alex apologize and rescind his theory? Yes. OK great, let’s stop talking about this!
Then on the other hand you have a pedophile with his own island and more powerful connections than you can count – many of those connections holding legal positions of authority over your life including PRESIDENTS. The trafficking alone is infinitely worse than a couple of parents being harassed, not to mention the implications of a compromised government that’s complicit in the trafficking (who are willing to murder to cover their tracks). Can we discuss this rather than demonize the guy who’s been screaming about it since 2008?!?!?
Anyways… God bless Whitney Webb for sticking to true journalism. The entire interview is worth a watch:
“The FBI is asking a U.S. court to reverse its order that it produce information from Seth Rich’s laptop computer.
If the court does not, the bureau wants 66 years to produce the information.
(…) In the new filing, government lawyers said the FBI never extracted the data, which it revealed as originating with a law enforcement agency. They said the information is on a compact disc containing images of the laptop.
“The FBI did not open an investigation into the murder of Seth Rich, nor did it provide investigative or technical assistance to any investigation into the murder of Seth Rich. As a result, the FBI has never extracted the data from the compact disc and never processed the information contained on the disc,” they said.
To produce the information, the FBI would have to convert information on the disc into pages and then review the pages to redact information per FOIA, according to the government.
If Mazzant upholds his order, the FBI wants a lengthy period of time to perform the work—66 years, or 500 pages a month.
“If the court overrules the FBI’s motion, the FBI wants to produce records at a rate of 500 pages per month. At that rate, it will take almost 67 years just to produce the documents, never mind the images and other files,” Ty Clevenger, a lawyer representing Huddleston, told The Epoch Times in an email.
“After dealing with the FBI for five years, I now assume that the FBI is lying to me unless and until it proves otherwise. The FBI is desperately trying to hide records about Seth Rich, and that begs the question of why.” (Read more: The Epoch Times, 10/28/2022)(Archive)
The National Archives in Washington D.C. (Credit: National Archives.gov)
“Biden’s lawyers discovered the materials in November and self-reported them, and some were classified at the top secret level, officials said.
The issue of handling of classified documents boomeranged Monday on President Joe Biden, just months after the FBI raided Donald Trump’s Florida home, as officials confirmed a small number of classified documents were found in a private office once used by the current president at his think tank.
A senior government official directly familiar with the discovery told Just the News that the National Archives asked the Justice Department to open an investigation in November after a small number of classified documents — some marked top secret — were found in a locked closet in the Penn Biden Center in Washington, where Biden worked after he left the Obama administration.
The official, who spoke only on condition of anonymity, said Attorney General Merrick Garland has asked a U.S. attorney in Illinois — a holdover from the Trump administration — to oversee the investigation with NARA and the FBI. The documents appear to be from the Obama administration.
The White House released a statement Monday evening confirming the discovery and the investigation, saying Biden’s lawyers self-disclosed the existence of the documents when the office previously used by the president was being vacated for another party.
“The White House is cooperating with the National Archives and the Department of Justice regarding the discovery of what appear to be Obama-Biden Administration records, including a small number of documents with classified markings,” White House special counsel Richard Sauber said in a statement after the discovery was reported by CBS and CNN. “The documents were discovered when the President’s personal attorneys were packing files housed in a locked closet to prepare to vacate office space at the Penn Biden Center in Washington, D.C.” (Read more: Just the News, 1/9/2023)(Archive)
Joe Biden speaks at the Penn Biden Center for Diplomacy and Global Engagement. (Credit: New York Post)
“Classified documents from Joe Biden’s tenure as Vice President were found in early November at the Penn Biden Center in Washington, CBS News reports, citing two sources with knowledge of an inquiry launched by Attorney General Merrick Garland.
The investigation into the roughly 10 documents will be conducted by the US Attorney in Chicago (shocking!), according to the sources.
The classified material was identified by personal attorneys for Mr. Biden on Nov. 2, the day before the midterm elections, Richard Sauber, special counsel to the president confirmed. The documents were discovered when Mr. Biden’s personal attorneys “were packing files housed in a locked closet to prepare to vacate office space at the Penn Biden Center in Washington, D.C.,” Sauber said in a statement to CBS News. The documents were contained in a folder that was in a box with other unclassified papers, the sources said. The sources revealed neither what the classified documents contain nor their level of classification. A source familiar told CBS News the documents did not contain nuclear secrets. -CBS News
Remember when the DOJ raided former President Trump and made a huge deal about classified documents having been commingled with not-classified documents? Pepperidge Farm remembers.
According to Sauber, the White House counsel’s office notified the National Archives on the same day the material was discovered, after which the Archives took possession the next morning.
“The discovery of these documents was made by the President’s attorneys,” said Sauber. “The documents were not the subject of any previous request or inquiry by the Archives. Since that discovery, the President’s personal attorneys have cooperated with the Archives and the Department of Justice in a process to ensure that any Obama-Biden Administration records are appropriately in the possession of the Archives.”
In charge of the investigation is John Lausch, U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, who will seek to determine how the classified material ended up at the Penn Biden Center (which received $54.6 million in Chinese donations after the Biden Center was announced in 2016). (Zero Hedge, 1/10/2023)(Archive)
(…) Joe Biden STOLE highly classified documents from a SCIF while he was a US Senator and Vice President. He had no right to store any classified material at his home or the Penn Biden Center.
Not only did Biden steal SCIF-designated documents and improperly scatter them everywhere, evidence shows he likely used them to provide classified briefings on Ukraine to his son/bagman Hunter Biden.
It also appears Biden is hiding documents from NARA.
According to investigative reporter Paul Sperry, records reveal Joe Biden had his personal lawyer send a FedEx driver to the Penn Biden Center to pick up his boxes of classified White House documents on November 2, 2022 – just ONE DAY BEFORE the National Archives (NARA) arrived to the center to seize the documents.
Did Joe Biden withhold classified documents from the National Archives?
BREAKING: Records reveal Biden had his personal lawyer send a FedEx driver to the Penn Biden Center to pick up boxes of WH docs on Nov 2, 2022–the day before (Nov 3) the National Archives arrived @ the Center to retrieve classified WH docs “discovered” there. Docs w/h from NARA?
Representative Jim Jordan (R., Ohio), is expected to become chairman of the Judiciary Committee if Republicans take the House. (Credit: yahoo!news)
“House Judiciary Republicans on Friday released a 1,000-plus page report on FBI whistleblower disclosures on “the politicization of the FBI And Justice Department.”
The members called the report “the first comprehensive accounting of the FBI’s problems to date, which undermine the FBI’s fundamental law-enforcement mission.”
They also say in an announcement about the report that the 1,050 document “primarily concerns FBI abuses, due to the experiences and roles of whistleblowers, but also examines the actions of the Justice Department where appropriate for context and explanation.”
(…) “The thousand-page report builds on various whistleblower disclosures describing the FBI’s Washington hierarchy as ‘rotted at its core’ with a “systemic culture of unaccountability,” the report also reads.
The House Judiciary Republicans list as some of the “key takeaways” in the report as:
FBI leadership abusing its law-enforcement authority for political reasons.
The FBI artificially inflating and manipulating domestic violent extremism statistics for political purposes.
The FBI downplaying and reducing the spread of the serious allegations of wrongdoing leveled against Hunter Biden.
The Justice Department and FBI using counterterrorism resources to target parents resisting a far-left educational curriculum.
“The FBI took possession of the Biden Laptop—via grand jury subpoena—on December 9, 2019. The two agents from the Wilmington Resident Agency of the Baltimore Field Office who delivered that subpoena to the laptop repair shop owner (Mac Isaac) were Josh Wilson and Mike Dzielak.
Wilson and Dzielak have since attempted to scrub their online footprint, but Wilson is still featured in several articles. Locating a picture of Dzielak, however, proved somewhat difficult—and now we know why. In his soon-to-be-released book, Mac Isaac recounts how Dzielak told Mac Isaac the following—in a serious tone—after delivering the grand jury subpoena: “It is our experience that nothing ever happens to people that don’t talk about these things.” Well, Mac Isaac did “talk about these things” after Dzielak and Wilson (& the FBI HQ) slow-walked the investigation into the Bidens.”
Alexander Vindman testifies before a House Intelligence Committee hearing as part of the impeachment inquiry into President Trump on November 19, 2019. (Credit: Jonathan Ernst, Reuters)
“A federal judge dismissed a lawsuit brought by star impeachment witness Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman (Ret.) against Donald Trump Jr., Rudy Giuliani, and two Trump White House staffers for supposed “witness intimidation” during Trump’s impeachment hearings.
Vindman filed his suit in February, just over a year after he had enjoyed fifteen minutes of infamy before Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) and the House Intelligence Committee, as Democrats sought to impeach and remove Trump for allegedly pressuring Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate allegations of corruption against Joe Biden, his leading rival in the 2020 election.
(…) Vindman alerted a contact in the intelligence committee — whom he refused to name under oath — about a July 2019 phone call between Trump and Zelensky, triggering the investigation into Trump. Schiff would not allow Vindman to be questioned about the so-called “whistleblower” who first approached the House Intelligence Committee with his second-hand concerns about the call. Vindman did admit, however, that the Ukrainians felt no “pressure” to investigate Biden.
(…) U.S. District Court James Boasberg of the District of Columbia, a Barack Obama appointee, issued a 29-page ruling, The Hillreported, concluding that even if “Defendants leveled harsh, meanspirited, and at times misleading attacks” against Vindman, “political hackery alone does not violate [the law at issue].” White House staffers Dan Scavino and Julia Hahn, a former reporter for Breitbart News, were also named as defendants in the lawsuit.” (Read more: Breitbart, 11/8/2022)(Archive)
Patrick Moore (l, bottom) and his law office in Boston, Massachusetts. Moore was appointed as the First Assistant Attorney General by the newly elected Massachusetts Attorney General, Andrea Campbell, in December 2022. (Credit: MSN)
Nine boxes of documents were taken from President Biden’s attorney Patrick Moore’s Boston office, but have yet to be reviewed, the National Archives disclosed in a response letter to Sens. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., and Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, this week first obtained by Fox News Digital.
The Archives had not previously publicly disclosed the number of boxes taken from Boston. It had been reported that Moore had shipped boxes of documents from the Penn Biden Center to his Boston office before discovering the initial trove of classified documents at the Washington, D.C.-based think tank.
In response to questions by Johnson and Grassley in a Feb. 24 letter asking how and when the archives learned that records were transported to Boston, Acting Archivist of the United States Debra Steidel Wall responded the agency learned about it on Nov. 3, 2022.
“When NARA [National Archives and Records Administration] contacted President Biden’s personal counsel on November 3, 2022, to arrange to pick up boxes from the Penn Biden Center in Washington, D.C., they informed NARA that Mr. Moore had moved other boxes from the Penn Biden Center to Mr. Moore’s law firm in Boston,” the letter states.
In addition, the archives notified the Department of Justice’s Office of Inspector General on Nov. 4 that the documents had been moved. The documents were then picked up on Nov. 9 and were secured in the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library in Boston.
“NARA staff retrieved nine boxes from Mr. Moore’s Boston office,” Wall continued, which had not been previously known.
Despite having possession of the documents since November, the Archives has not yet reviewed the boxes’ content to determine whether additional classified materials are inside.
“NARA has not reviewed the contents of the boxes found at Mr. Moore’s Boston office,” Wall states in the letter dated Tuesday. (Read more: Fox News, 3/08/2023)(Archive)
FoiaFan@15poundstogo highlights a few of the released documents:
Wow. From the latest Crooked Hillary FBI foia drop. "Bad guy within" "Put ___ up to it" "determined not to prosecute" "all handled quietly" pic.twitter.com/qgf9i31Uwn
Funny how the FBI quickly announced before Election Day '16 that the Weiner Laptop offered nothing new on the Hillary investigation. But they DIDN'T INTERVIEW the laptop's OWNER until 2 MONTHS AFTER the election. Isn't that special?!? AND, they made the agents sign NDAs!!! pic.twitter.com/Dc8gLdTJTu
“In the shift of the left against free speech principles, there is no figure more actively or openly pushing for censorship than Hillary Clinton. Now, reports indicate that Clinton has unleashed her allies in the corporate world to coerce Musk to restore censorship policies or face bankruptcy. The effort of the Clinton-linked “Accountable Tech” reveals the level of panic in Democratic circles that free speech could be restored on one social media platform. The group was open about how losing control over Twitter could result in a loss of control over social media generally. For Clinton, it is an “all-hands on deck” call for censorship. She previously called upon foreign governments to crackdown on the free speech of Americans on Twitter.
We have been discussing how Clinton and others have called on foreign countries to pass censorship laws to prevent Elon Musk from restoring free speech protections on Twitter. It seems that, after years of using censorship-by-surrogates in social media companies, Democratic leaders seem to have rediscovered good old-fashioned state censorship.
Accountable Tech led an effort to send a letter to top Twitter advertisers to force Musk to accept “non-negotiable” requirements for censorship.
General Motors was one of the first to pull its advertising funds to stop free speech restoration on the site.
Of course, the company had no problem with supporting Twitter when it was running one of the largest censorship systems in history — or supporting TikTok (which is Chinese-owned and has been denounced for state control and access to data). Twitter has been denounced for years for its bias against conservative and dissenting voices, including presumably many GM customers on the right. None of that was a concern for GM but the pledge to restore free speech to Twitter warrants a suspension.
The letter is open about the potential cascading effect if free speech is restored on one platform: “While the company is hardly a poster child for healthy social media, it has taken welcome steps in recent years to mitigate systemic risks, ratcheting up pressure on the likes of Facebook and YouTube to follow suit.”
The letter insists that free speech will only invite “disinformation, hate, and harassment” and that “[u]nder the guise of ‘free speech,’ [Musk’s] vision will silence and endanger marginalized communities, and tear at the fraying fabric of democracy.”
Among other things, the letter demands “algorithmic accountability,” a notable inclusion in light of Democratic politicians demanding enlightened algorithms to protect citizens from their own bad choices or thoughts.
This is a copy of the letter posted in Turley’s article. The original letter was posted on Scribd and has since been removed.)
General Motors was one of the first to pull its advertising funds to stop free speech restoration on the site.
Of course, the company had no problem with supporting Twitter when it was running one of the largest censorship systems in history — or supporting TikTok (which is Chinese owned and has been denounced for state control and access to data). Twitter has been denounced for years for its bias against conservative and dissenting voices, including presumably many GM customers on the right. None of that was a concern for GM but the pledge to restore free speech to Twitter warrants a suspension.
The letter is open about the potential cascading effect if free speech is restored on one platform: “While the company is hardly a poster-child for healthy social media, it has taken welcome steps in recent years to mitigate systemic risks, ratcheting up pressure on the likes of Facebook and YouTube to follow suit.”
The letter insists that free speech will only invite “disinformation, hate, and harassment” and that “[u]nder the guise of ‘free speech,’ [Musk’s] vision will silence and endanger marginalized communities, and tear at the fraying fabric of democracy.”
Among other things, the letter demands “algorithmic accountability,” a notable inclusion in light of Democratic politicians demanding enlightened algorithms to protect citizens from their own bad choices or thoughts.
In addition to Accountable Tech, twenty-five other groups signed the letter to demand the restoration of censorship policies, including Media Matters and the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation. Accountable Tech has partnered in the past with Hillary Clinton’s Onward Together nonprofit group.
I have no objection to boycotts, which are an important form of free speech. However, this boycott action is directed at restoring censorship and preventing others from being able to post or to read opposing viewpoints.
If consistent with their past records, these companies will likely cave to these demands. While the public has clearly shown that they want more (not less) free speech, these executives are likely to yield to the pressure of Clinton and other powerful figures to coerce Musk into limiting the speech of others on his platform.
These campaigns only add support to Musk’s push for alternative revenue sources, including verification fees. As I previously wrote, we can show that there is a market for free speech by supporting Twitter in trying to reduce the dependence on corporate sponsors. If Musk remains faithful to free speech, many customers are likely to join his platform and support his effort to reduce censorship on social media. (Read more: Jonathan Turley, 11/17/2022) (Archive)
“Attorney General Merrick Garland will appoint a special counsel to determine whether former President Donald Trump should face charges stemming from Justice Department probes, according to a person familiar with the matter.”
Updates as they come through:
Jack Smith (Credit: public domain)
AG Garland named former federal prosecutor Jack Smith as Special Counsel. Smith most recently worked at the International Criminal Court at The Hague. From 2010 to 2015, Smith served as Chief of the Public Integrity Section of the US Department of Justice, where he oversaw complex public corruption cases across the US. Further information on Smith can be found here.
The scope of Smith’s appointment includes January 6 and the ongoing classified/national security documents investigation. As to January 6, Smith is tasked to “conduct the ongoing investigation into
What of Jack Smith’s past? Here’s some background on his connections to Lois Lerner and his involvement in the IRS targeting scandal back in the early 2010s:
In their letter to Attorney General Eric Holder, the Committee said, “The Justice Department convened a meeting with former IRS official Lois Lerner in October 2010 to discuss how the IRS could assist in the criminal enforcement of campaign-finance laws against politically active nonprofits. This meeting was arranged at the direction of Public Integrity Section Chief Jack Smith.”
As to January 6, Smith is tasked to “conduct the ongoing investigation into whether any person or entity violated the law in connection with efforts to interfere with the lawful transfer of power following the 2020 presidential election or the certification of the Electoral College vote held on or about January 6, 2021.”
With respect to the Mar-a-Lago raid, Smith “is further authorized to conduct that investigation . . . and any matters that arise or may arise directly from that investigation.”
If you’re concerned about new Special Counsel Jack Smith, here’s reason for further warning – an endorsement from corrupt Special Counsel Mueller member Andrew Weissmann:
Jack Smith, the new Special Counsel, is a very aggressive prosecutor who represents the best of the Department, who will bring cases if warranted be fact sand the law.
For the Biden DOJ, this step is no surprise. They would have planned for it to take place once Trump announced his candidacy. And sure enough, here we are. While the special counsel is quasi-independent, allegedly, it will still be subject to the control of Attorney General Garland. (Read more: Techno Fog/The Reactionary, 11/18/2022)(Archive)
“A Big Tech lawsuit has uncovered one of the most disturbing revelations yet about social media companies’ collusion with law enforcement agencies to police speech on the Internet. A former FBI agent, Elvis Chan, revealed during the court hearings that the bureau held weekly meetings with major social media companies prior to the 2020 and 2022 elections.
On Wednesday, the court transcript of former FBI agent Elvis Chan’s testimony was released and corroborated earlier reports.
“Mr. Chan, or Agent Chan, who do you recall on the social media platform side participating in these — in these working group meetings that you have been testifying about from 2020 and 2022?”
“The companies that I remember attending the meetings are Facebook; Microsoft; Google; Twitter; Yahoo!, which have been known as Verizon Media at the time; Wikimedia Foundation and Reddit,” Agent Chan said.
Chan was then asked why the FBI was participating in these meetings.
“And why are you included in particular?”
“The reason that I attend these meetings is because the way the FBI works is FBI field offices are responsible for maintaining day-t0-day relationships with the companies that are headquartered in their area of responsibility, which I may occasionally abbreviate AOR,” Chan responded. “And all of the companies that have been listed, with the exception of Microsoft, are all headquartered in San Francisco’s territory.”
Chan also testified that he was in regular contact with Facebook’s Steven Siegel and Twitter’s Yoel Roth, as reported by Lee Fang.
FBI agent Elvis Chan, at the San Francisco field office for the agency, testified that he was in regular contact with Facebook’s Steven Siegel and Twitter’s Yoel Roth. pic.twitter.com/oIoeRQ5STR
Yoel Roth, formerly Twitter’s Head of Trust and Safety, was recently terminated by Elon Musk, as was Twitter’s General Counsel Jim Baker, who was formerly the FBI’s General Counsel.
Chan also related the U.S. government is in regular correspondence with major social media platforms regarding elections; namely, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency (or CISA).
Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt, one of the attorneys general that filed the lawsuit, earlier disclosed an overview of FBI agent Elvis Chan’s testimony on ‘weekly meetings’ about censoring Internet posts ahead of the 2020 election.
“In our deposition of FBI agent Elvis Chan on Tuesday, we found that the FBI plays a big role in working with social media companies to censor speech – from weekly meetings with social media companies ahead of the 2020 election to asks for account takedowns,” Schmitt wrote in a Twitter thread.
“Chan, the FBI’s FITF, and senior CISA officials had meetings with social media companies in the lead-up to the 2020 election, in which Chan personally told the social media companies that there could potentially be a Russian ‘hack and leak’ operation shortly before the election,” he continued. “Those meetings were initially quarterly, then monthly, then weekly heading into the 2020 election.”
“Chan stated that the FBI regularly sent social media companies lists of URLs and social media accounts that should be taken down because they were disinformation from ‘malign foreign influence operations’,” Schmitt went on. “The FBI then inquired whether the platforms have taken down the content. On many occasions, the platforms took down the accounts flagged by the FBI.”
Chan testified because of the agent’s extensive knowledge of the FBI’s interaction with social media companies, the judge in the case stated.
“Chan had authority over cybersecurity issues for the FBI in the San Francisco, California region which includes the headquarters of major social-media platforms and played a critical role for the FBI in coordinating with social-media platforms related to censorship,” Judge Terry A. Doughty wrote in his court order.
“Even if Chan played no role in the Hunter Biden laptop communication issue, he may have knowledge of who did, and his deposition is nonetheless warranted,” the judge aded. “If Chan played no role in the suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop story, then such information will be made clear in his deposition.” (Read more: Becker News, 12/07/2022)(Archive)
(…) “Some of the first tools for controlling speech were designed to combat the likes of spam and financial fraudsters. Slowly, over time, Twitter staff and executives began to find more and more uses for these tools. Outsiders began petitioning the company to manipulate speech as well: first a little, then more often, then constantly,” Taibbi wrote. “By 2020, requests from connected actors to delete tweets were routine. One executive would write to another: ‘More to review from the Biden team.’ The reply would come back: ‘Handled.'”
Taibbi shared a screenshot of that October 2020 exchange featuring links to tweets Biden’s team allegedly wanted taken down. Many of them were to tweets featuring pornographic images of Hunter Biden found in his laptop, according to Washington Free Beacon investigative reporter Andrew Kerr.
8. By 2020, requests from connected actors to delete tweets were routine. One executive would write to another: “More to review from the Biden team.” The reply would come back: “Handled.” pic.twitter.com/mnv0YZI4af
Both parties had access to these tools. For instance, in 2020, requests from both the Trump White House and the Biden campaign were received and honored. However… This system wasn’t balanced,” Taibbi wrote. “It was based on contacts. Because Twitter was and is overwhelmingly staffed by people of one political orientation, there were more channels, more ways to complain, open to the left (well, Democrats) than the right.”
“The resulting slant in content moderation decisions is visible in the documents you’re about to read. However, it’s also the assessment of multiple current and former high-level executives,” the journalist teased.
He then quickly pivoted to the “Twitter Files” regarding the suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop story.
Taibbi tweeted “there’s no evidence – that I’ve seen” that the federal government had a role in suppressing the Hunter Biden laptop story but that “the decision was made at the highest levels of the company, but without the knowledge of CEO Jack Dorsey, with former head of legal, policy and trust Vijaya Gadde playing a key role.”
Taibbi then shared a screenshot of an exchange between Gadde, Twitter’s former Trust and Safety chief Yoel Roth and Twitter spokesman Trenton Kennedy, who wrote “I’m struggling to understand the policy basis for marking this as unsafe.”
“Can we truthfully claim that this is part of the policy?” Twitter’s former VP of Global Comms Brandon Borrman similarly asked at the time, according to a separate screenshot shared by Taibbi.
Twitter’s former Deputy General Counsel Jim Baker replied, “I support the conclusion that we need more facts to assess whether the materials were hacked” but added “it’s reasonable for us to assume that they may have been and that caution is warranted.”
https://t.co/j4EeXEAw6F can see the confusion in the following lengthy exchange, which ends up including Gadde and former Trust and safety chief Yoel Roth. Comms official Trenton Kennedy writes, “I’m struggling to understand the policy basis for marking this as unsafe”: pic.twitter.com/w1wBMlG33U
28. To which former Deputy General Counsel Jim Baker again seems to advise staying the non-course, because “caution is warranted”: pic.twitter.com/tg4D0gLWI6
Taibbi then revealed that Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna reached out to Gadde about the “backlash re speech,” noting that Khanna “was the only Democratic official I could find in the files who expressed concern.”
Gadde responded to the California lawmaker by “diving into the weeds” of Twitter’s policy, but Khanna warned Gadde “this seems [to be] a violation of the 1st Amendment principles.”
“I say this as a total Biden partisan and convinced that he didn’t do anything wrong. But the story now has become more about censorship than relatively innocuous emails and it’s becoming a bigger deal than it would have been,” Khanna wrote. (Read more: Fox News, 12/2/2022)(Archive)
Former FBI general counsel James A. Baker leaves Sussmann trial on May 19, 2022. (Credit:Ron Sachs/CNP for NY Post)
“As thousands of Twitter documents are released on the company’s infamous censorship program, much has been confirmed about the use of back channels by Biden and Democratic officials to silence critics on the social media platform. However, one familiar name immediately popped out in the first batch of documents released through journalist Matt Taibbi: James Baker. For many, James Baker is fast becoming the Kevin Bacon of the Russian collusion scandals.
Baker has been featured repeatedly in the Russian investigations launched by the Justice Department, including the hoax involving the Russian Alfa Bank. When Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann wanted to plant the bizarre false claim of a secret communications channel between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin, Baker was his go-to, speed-dial contact. (Baker would later testify at Sussmann’s trial). Baker’s name also appeared prominently in controversies related to the other Russian-related FBI allegations against Trump. He was effectively forced out due to his role and reportedly found himself under criminal investigation. He became a defender of the Russian investigations despite findings of biased and even criminal conduct. He was also a frequent target of Donald Trump on social media, including Twitter. Baker responded with public criticism of Trump for his “false narratives.”
After leaving the FBI, Twitter seemed eager to hire Baker as deputy general counsel. Ironically, Baker soon became involved in another alleged back channel with a presidential campaign. This time it was Twitter that maintained the non-public channels with the Biden campaign (and later the White House). Baker soon weighed in with the same signature bias that characterized the Russian investigations.
Weeks before the 2020 presidential election, the New York Post ran an explosive story about a laptop abandoned by Hunter Biden that contained emails and records detailing a multimillion dollar influence peddling operation by the Biden family. Not only was Joe Biden’s son Hunter and brother James involved in deals with an array of dubious foreign figures, but Joe Biden was referenced as the possible recipient of funds from these deals.
The Bidens had long been accused of influence peddling, nepotism, and other forms of corruption. Moreover, the campaign was not denying that the laptop was Hunter Biden’s and key emails could be confirmed from the other parties involved. However, at the request of the “Biden team” and Democratic operatives, Twitter moved to block the story. It even suspended those who tried to share the allegations with others, including the White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany, who was suspended for linking to the scandal.
(…) Baker quickly jumped in to support the censorship and said that “it’s reasonable for us to assume that they may have been [hacked] and that caution is warranted.” (Read more: Jonathan Turley, 12/4/2022)(Archive)
Attorneys representing the Missouri and Louisiana AGs in their case against the government have uncovered that the State Department was funding fact checkers possibly in the US.
(…) The Gateway Pundit readers know that The Gateway Pundit’s Jim Hoft is a co-Plaintiff, along with several doctors and a Louisiana news outlet, in Missouri and Louisiana lawsuit against the Biden Administration. The AGs of Missouri and Louisiana are suing the Biden Administration (Missouri, et al, v. Biden, et al), the Department of Homeland Security, the FBI, the DOJ, Jen Psaki, Anthony Fauci, Health and Human Services, Xavier Becerra, and other federal agents and agencies for colluding with Big Tech to censor Americans all across the nation.
Daniel Kimmage (Credit: video screenshot)
(…) The Attorneys General recently deposed Daniel Kimmage, the Acting Coordinator for the Global Engagement Center at the Department of State.
The Gateway Pundit tonight can confirm that we’ve uncovered something shocking and potentially corrupt or even criminal that was revealed during his deposition.
…the Acting Coordinator for the Global Engagement Center at the Department of State. In this role, Mr. Kimmage leads [led] efforts to coordinate and synchronize U.S. government communications efforts designed to counter terrorist recruitment and state-sponsored propaganda and disinformation.
Based on Kimmage’s testimony we’ve uncovered information that the State Department was funding online fact-checkers. Kimmage doesn’t state whether it was foreign or domestic fact-checkers that the State Department was funding.
In the deposition in the Missouri and Louisiana case against the government, Kimmage shared the following:
(Page 183 / Lines 1-4 & 17-25)
1 Q. Has the GEC ever supported
2 fact-checking organizations inside the United
3 States?
4 A. I don’t believe so.
17 Q. What fact-checkers do you work
18 with?
19 A. I believe the Pointer(sp) Institute is
20 the only one I recall. I don’t recall the —
21 the specific organizations.
22 Q. Where is that? Where is that
23 located?
24 A. I don’t recall.
25 Q. Is that a foreign or domestic
(Page 184 / Lines 1-4 & 12-23 )
1 fact-checking organization?
2 A. I don’t — I don’t recall. I don’t
3 recall anything beyond the name.
12 Q. Do you have any understanding of
13 how GEC works with fact-checking organizations,
14 in general?
15 A. I believe it would be identifying
16 an organization that works in a location where a
17 foreign propaganda disinformation actor, like
18 Russia or China, would be active and supporting
19 them in some fashion.
20 Q. What kind of fashion?
21 A. Support could range from a grant or
22 a financial support to information sharing or
23 training in tools and techniques.
Kimmage must have tried to hide who that entity was that he was talking about.
The Gateway Pundit found that Poynter Institute operates Politifact one of the most notorious fact-checkers in the business. The Poynter Institute also brags about teaching classes on ethics. This and all the while the Institute according to Kimmage was being given grants by the US State Department.
The Poynter Institute does mention that it is supported by government agencies:
We rely on support from several funding sources who value the essential role of the free press in our society, including corporate partners, philanthropic foundations, government agencies and individual donors.
“Twitter’s former Head of Trust and Safety, Yoel Roth, had weekly meetings with the FBI, Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Office of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) at least as far back as 2020, when former President Donald Trump was still in office, internal communications between Twitter staff obtained by journalist Matt Taibbi Friday reveal.
Yoel Roth (Credit: screenshot/CNN)
Yoel participated in one such weekly meeting shortly after the company’s moderation team was thrown into a crisis following its decision to suppress an October 2020New York Post story concerning a laptop owned by Hunter Biden, according to Taibbi. Roth appeared to explicitly ask the government officials in the meeting to “share anything useful” concerning the laptop story, but they apparently declined to do so.
“We blocked the NYP story, then we unblocked it (but said the opposite), then we said we unblocked it… and now we’re in a messy situation where our policy is in shambles, comms is angry, reporters think we’re idiots, and we’re refactoring an exceedingly complex policy 18 days out from the election. In short [fuck my life],” Roth apparently wrote in an internal message, Taibbi reported. “Weekly sync with FBI/DHS/DNI re: election security. The meeting happened about 15 minutes after the aforementioned Hacked Materials implosion; the government declined to share anything useful when asked.”
20. This post about the Hunter Biden laptop situation shows that Roth not only met weekly with the FBI and DHS, but with the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI): pic.twitter.com/s5IiUjQqIY
Roth’s weekly meetings with government officials may have involved separate meetings, with not all agencies present, Taibbi reported. “I have to miss the FBI and DHS meetings today, unfortunately,” Roth wrote to a Twitter staffer, indicating that the two agencies may not have been scheduled to meet with him at once.
The FBI also reported tweets to Twitter, one of which former Republican Councilor John Basham of Tippecanoe County, Indiana, posted, which alleged that “Between 2% & 25% Of Ballots By Mail Are Being REJECTED For Errors!” according to Taibbi. After deliberation, the team applied a “Learn how voting is safe and secure” label to Bashman’s tweet at Roth’s discretion, with one employee noting internally “it’s totally normal to have a 2% error rate,” Taibbi reported.” (Read more: The Daily Caller, 12/09/2022)(Archive)
2. Twitter once had a mission “to give everyone the power to create and share ideas and information instantly, without barriers.” Along the way, barriers nevertheless were erected.
4. Or consider the popular right-wing talk show host, Dan Bongino (@dbongino), who at one point was slapped with a “Search Blacklist.” pic.twitter.com/AdOK8xLu9v
6. Twitter denied that it does such things. In 2018, Twitter’s Vijaya Gadde (then Head of Legal Policy and Trust) and Kayvon Beykpour (Head of Product) said: “We do not shadow ban.” They added: “And we certainly don’t shadow ban based on political viewpoints or ideology.”
8. “Think about visibility filtering as being a way for us to suppress what people see to different levels. It’s a very powerful tool,” one senior Twitter employee told us.
Seth Rich is pictured on a poster created by police officials to urge people with information about his murder to come forward. (Credit: Metropolitan Police Department)
“The FBI not only has possession of a laptop computer owned by Democratic National Committee (DNC) staffer Seth Rich—who was murdered in 2016 by unknown assailants—but a report detailing forensic imaging of what’s being described as Rich’s work computer, the bureau revealed in a new filing.
The FBI’s records office located the report while searching for the work computer, Michael Seidel, chief of the office, said in a sworn declaration filed with a federal court in Texas on Dec. 9.
He described the document as “a three (3) page forensic report detailing the actions performed by an outside entity to image the work laptop.”
The report was among four documents that never had been disclosed by the FBI in relation to Rich’s case.
Journalist Sy Hersh said a source told him around 2017 about an FBI report on Rich. According to the source, Rich’s computer showed the DNC staffer had relayed DNC documents to WikiLeaks, a pro-transparency group. Hersh spoke about the source’s claims during a phone call with Ed Butowsky, an investor who later retracted claims about Rich’s brother Aaron being a WikiLeaks source, and discussed the call during a deposition.
(…) The new records were found after the records office contacted an unnamed FBI special agent during its search for Rich’s work computer, according to Seidel.
The other records include a letter from a third party that accompanied the work computer and two FBI chain of custody forms.
None of the records were indexed to Rich inside of the bureau’s central records system, and neither the forensic report nor the custody forms mention Rich’s name, according to the FBI. They also weren’t included in an electronic file created for Rich’s case.
The agent claimed that disclosure of the records would harm an FBI investigation into the allegations that Russians had hacked into U.S. systems.
The FBI now wants the court to agree to keep the new records shielded from Brian Huddleston, a Texas resident who filed a lawsuit against the bureau for ignoring a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for records on Rich.” (Read more: The Epoch Times)(Archive)
3. We’ll show you what hasn’t been revealed: the erosion of standards within the company in months before J6, decisions by high-ranking executives to violate their own policies, and more, against the backdrop of ongoing, documented interaction with federal agencies.
5. Whatever your opinion on the decision to remove Trump that day, the internal communications at Twitter between January 6th-January 8th have clear historical import. Even Twitter’s employees understood in the moment it was a landmark moment in the annals of speech. pic.twitter.com/tQ01n58XFc
7. Twitter executives removed Trump in part over what one executive called the “context surrounding”: actions by Trump and supporters “over the course of the election and frankly last 4+ years.” In the end, they looked at a broad picture. But that approach can cut both ways. pic.twitter.com/Trgvq5jmhS
10. As the election approached, senior executives – perhaps under pressure from federal agencies, with whom they met more as time progressed – increasingly struggled with rules, and began to speak of “vios” as pretexts to do what they’d likely have done anyway.
12. These initial reports are based on searches for docs linked to prominent executives, whose names are already public. They include Roth, former trust and policy chief Vijaya Gadde, and recently plank-walked Deputy General Counsel (and former top FBI lawyer) Jim Baker.
14. On October 8th, 2020, executives opened a channel called “us2020_xfn_enforcement.” Through J6, this would be home for discussions about election-related removals, especially ones that involved “high-profile” accounts (often called “VITs” or “Very Important Tweeters”). pic.twitter.com/xH29h4cYt9
16. The latter group were a high-speed Supreme Court of moderation, issuing content rulings on the fly, often in minutes and based on guesses, gut calls, even Google searches, even in cases involving the President. pic.twitter.com/5ihsPCVo62
18. Policy Director Nick Pickles is asked if they should say Twitter detects “misinfo” through “ML, human review, and **partnerships with outside experts?*” The employee asks, “I know that’s been a slippery process… not sure if you want our public explanation to hang on that.” pic.twitter.com/JEICGRTyz7
20. This post about the Hunter Biden laptop situation shows that Roth not only met weekly with the FBI and DHS, but with the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI): pic.twitter.com/s5IiUjQqIY
23. Some of Roth’s later Slacks indicate his weekly confabs with federal law enforcement involved separate meetings. Here, he ghosts the FBI and DHS, respectively, to go first to an “Aspen Institute thing,” then take a call with Apple. pic.twitter.com/i771hD8aCD
26. The group then decides to apply a “Learn how voting is safe and secure” label because one commenter says, “it’s totally normal to have a 2% error rate.” Roth then gives the final go-ahead to the process initiated by the FBI: pic.twitter.com/lyZm4gmT19
“The latest installment of the “Twitter Flies” notes the extent to which public pressure as well as private machinations contributed to Twitter’s decision to ban former President Donald Trump in January 2021.
Former First Lady Michelle Obama posted an irate tweet on Jan. 7, 2021, one day after the Capitol incursion.
“Now is the time for Silicon Valley companies to stop enabling this monstrous behavior — and go even further than they have already by permanently banning this man from their platforms and putting in place policies to prevent their technologies from being used by the nation’s leaders to fuel insurrection,” she wrote in part of her statement.
“And if we have any hope of improving this nation, now is the time for swift and serious consequences for the failure of leadership that led to yesterday’s shame,” she added.
The message was noted by journalist Michael Shellenberger in the fourth “Twitter Files” release.
“But after the events of Jan 6, the internal and external pressure on Twitter CEO @jack grows. Former First Lady @michelleobama, tech journalist @karaswisher, @ADL, high-tech VC @ChrisSacca, and many others, publicly call on Twitter to permanently ban Trump,” he wrote.
But after the events of Jan 6, the internal and external pressure on Twitter CEO @jack grows.
The series of tweets suggests Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey was a bystander to what would follow.
“Dorsey was on vacation in French Polynesia the week of January 4-8, 2021,” Shellenberger tweeted, saying former Twitter Head of Trust and Safety Yoel Roth and former Head of Legal, Policy, & Trust Vijaya Gadde were the lead executives handling the question of whether to ban Trump after the events of Jan. 6.
The series of tweets suggests Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey was a bystander to what would follow.
“Dorsey was on vacation in French Polynesia the week of January 4-8, 2021,” Shellenberger tweeted, saying former Twitter Head of Trust and Safety Yoel Roth and former Head of Legal, Policy, & Trust Vijaya Gadde were the lead executives handling the question of whether to ban Trump after the events of Jan. 6. (Read more: The Western Journal, 12/11/2022)(Archive)
The National Archives in Washington D.C. (Credit: National Archives.gov)
“The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) is quietly preparing to release hundreds of pages of internal Obama White House records that could contain information about Hunter Biden’s relationship with Ukrainian energy company Burisma, Insider has learned — and the Biden Administration, which could put a stop to it by invoking executive privilege, is refusing to say whether it will allow the release to go forward.
The records, which include almost 300 full or partial emails that mention Burisma, date back to 2014 when Joe Biden was serving as vice president in the Obama Administration. According to a letter that the archives sent to the Biden White House and the Obama Foundation in November, NARA is proposing to release the records in response to a Freedom of Information Act request for emails that contain the word “Burisma.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky (left), meets with Ihor Kolomoisky (right), in Kiev, Ukraine, Sept. 10, 2019. The two are known to have long-time business ties. (Credit: Reuters)
The letter doesn’t describe the emails but says that “several” of them are press inquiries after the 2014 announcement that Hunter Biden had joined the company’s board, earning as much as $83,333 a month despite having no experience in the energy sector. The letter also says NARA will withhold 22 emails, without specifying why. The Freedom of Information Act offers exemptions for draft documents and comments that are “part of the deliberative or policy-making process.” Documents that could violate someone’s privacy or expose trade secrets are also potentially exempt.
(…) But first, the Biden White House must make a politically fraught decision about whether to invoke executive privilege to keep the emails secret. Under the Presidential Records Act, Biden and Obama’s respective legal teams have 60 days to assert claims of privilege before the Burisma emails will be released. If they choose to do so, the emails will remain sealed until January 2029, unless a court orders otherwise.
Mark Zaid, a national-security lawyer who has represented many federal whistleblowers, said the case for executive privilege was weak on legal grounds for those documents that are already in third-party hands, and invocation for any document carried political risks as well. “Any selective invocation of privilege,” he said “would no doubt only serve to highlight the sensitivities.”
The Biden White House repeatedly declined to answer questions about whether it intended to fight release.
We have newly unsealed documents – including the depositions of Ghislaine Maxwell and one of her victims – revealing new details on the extent of the abuse and victimization that took place by Jeffrey Epstein. Those filings come from Giuffre v. Maxwell, a civil case filed against Maxwell in 2015 in the New York Southern District.
Some of the broader allegations have already been made public. Sarah Ransome, who accused Epstein and Maxwell of abuse that took place during her early 20s, settled a civil lawsuit against them in 2018. Ransome has publicly described some of the abuse. And there have been reports on what transpired at Little St. James, often referred to as Epstein Island.
Unsealed photographs of Ghislaine Maxwell at Epstein Island. (Credit: public domain)
Let’s get to the new details, starting with the testimony of Ransome, available here. She actually lived one of Epstein’s apartments in 2006 with a few other girls. During that time, she worked for what she described as an “agency” which arranged paid dinners with wealthy clients: “I was paid to spend dinner with a gentleman.” Whatever happened after dinner with the client was done on her “own accord” and “after that time period had finished.”
Ransome was introduced to Epstein by a female associate of his (her name is still redacted), who described Epstein as a wealthy “philanthropist” who “really cares about people” and “really wants to help them.” She was open to meeting Epstein because she was struggling financially. Soon after meeting Epstein, Ransome was invited to travel on Epstein’s plane to Epstein Island. She was told it “was going to be a girls’ week” and they would have “so much fun”:
Q. How did the flight meeting become arranged, if you know?
A. So it was pretty a last-minute thing. phoned me up and said that Jeffrey Epstein would very much like to have me go to his island. It was going to be so much fun, it was going to be a girls’ week, there were lots of other girls going, we were going to have so much fun, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera.
What happened on the flight – her first flight with Epstein – must have been shocking to Ransome. She described what happened after they took off:
“The rest of the passengers in the — I think it’s towards the front of the plane where all the seats are — we all — all the guests were — fell asleep. I pretended to be asleep.
Jeffrey then went – Jeffrey went to his — was in his bed on the plane, having open sex with for everyone to see, on display.”
Ransome would eventually give massages to Epstein at the Island. She had been told that Epstein “loves women, loves getting massages” and that this “was a nice way to make extra cash.” At first, the massages were relatively normal. Then they escalated to the type of “massage” Epstein is now notorious for – much of which was done without Ransome’s consent.
She described her experiences at Epstein’s Island as being constantly surrounded by “beautiful young people” and that there “were always girls” there to visit “Jeffrey and Ghislaine.” Ransome also gave a description of the Island as having multiple buildings – a main house and then various buildings around the Island for Epstein and his guests:
“like little shelter things where him and his guests used to have sex with the girls, like beds set up for instant sexual entertainment.”
There was a “constant influx of girls” at this Island. It was a type of brothel. According to Ransome:
“It’s like, I’m sure if you go into a hooker’s brothel and see how they run their business, I mean, it’s just general conversation about who’s going to have sex with who and, you know — what do you talk about when all do you is have sex every day on rotation? I mean, what is there to talk about?”
She testified that all those girls “appeared to be teenagers.” They “looked young.” One girl in particular “looked well under 18.” This girl told Ransome that “they abused her on the island.” Another girl ran out of Epstein’s room crying and saying she was “forced to have sex with Jeffrey Epstein.” (Read more: Techno Fog/The Reactionary, 12/14/2022)(Archive)
(…) The recently disclosed Twitter Files — a cache of internal communications from the social media giant — offer new evidence of one of the Russiagate disinformation campaign’s core functions: protecting the rule of domestic elites, particularly in the Democratic Party.
In two consecutive presidential elections, the Russian boogeyman has been invoked to stigmatize and silence reporting on the Democratic candidate. It began in 2016 when journalists who reported on the stolen DNC emails’ revelations about Hillary Clinton’s Wall Street speeches or the DNC’s bias against Bernie Sanders were blamed for Trump’s victory and deemed to be unwitting Kremlin dupes promoting “disinformation” – in reality, factual material that embarrassed the pre-ordained winner.
Four years later, that same playbook was deployed for Clinton’s successor at the top of Democratic ticket, Joe Biden. In the weeks before the November 2020 election, Twitter and Facebook censored the New York Post’s reporting about the contents Hunter Biden’s laptop on the grounds that the computer material could be “Russian disinformation.” The Post’s stories detailed how Hunter Biden traded on his family name to secure lucrative business abroad, and raised questions about Joe Biden’s denials of any involvement.
The US media responded to the suppression of the laptop story with indifference or even approval. In one notable case, Glenn Greenwald resigned from the outlet that he co-founded, The Intercept, after its editors attempted to censor his coverage of the laptop controversy. Even stories that had long been public — such as the unqualified Hunter receiving an $80,000-per-month Burisma board seat just months after his father’s administration helped overthrow Ukraine’s government – were effectively off-limits.
There was never a shred of evidence that Russia was behind the laptop story, but that was of no consequence. Dutiful media editors, reporters, and pundits took their cues from a group of more than 50 former intelligence officials, who issued a statement declaring that the Hunter Biden laptop story “has all the classic earmarks of a Russian information operation.”
These intelligence veterans’ claim was in fact a classic Russiagate disinformation operation, as the Twitter files newly underscore.
“To me, this is just classic textbook Soviet Russian tradecraft at work,” former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper says as authorities are investigating if recently published emails are tied to a Russian disinformation effort targeting Biden. https://t.co/shyMNnJ7Yrpic.twitter.com/GFSeIWXeY4
The files, obtained by journalist Matt Taibbi, confirm that Twitter executives suppressed the Hunter Biden laptop story based on the suspicion that Russia was behind it, despite their awareness that they had no evidence for that belief.
Asked to explain the rationale, Twitter’s then-Global Head of Trust and SafetyYoel Roth told colleagues that the “policy basis is hacked materials,” even though, he added, “the facts remain unclear.” Roth justified the fact-free censorship by invoking what he called “the SEVERE risks here and lessons of 2016.” By “lessons of 2016”, Roth was referring to the similarly evidence-free claims that Russia was behind the release of stolen DNC emails. By “SEVERE risks,” one plausible interpretation is that Roth is referring to the risk that dissemination of factual material could again, as in 2016, hurt the Democratic candidate, not to mention the career prospects of those who allow that to happen.
Joining Roth in agreement was Jim Baker, Twitter’s deputy general counsel, who advised that “it is reasonable for us to assume that they may have been [hacked] and that caution is warranted.” (emphasis added) Baker’s mere presence at Twitter, and willingness to “assume” a falsehood that could justify censorship, reveals another lesson of 2016: from media outlets to social media giants, US intelligence officials have been granted unprecedented influence over the flow of public information – including stories in which they have blatant conflicts of interest. (Read more: Aaron Maté/Substack, 12/16/2022)(Archive)
Independent journalist Matt Taibbi has released the sixth installment after review of more Twitter File data [SEE HERE]. Keep in mind, the research group containing Mr. Taibbi are only seeing the consequences side of the content removal process. What specifically happened in/around the portal of information flowing into Twitter HQ is a different division. Taibbi et al are only seeing the consequences from the requests that entered the Twitter system.
The first section of Taibbi’s analysis is the most interesting. Having tracked the issue for several years, I would modify some of the descriptive language Taibbi presents yet agree with the overall context of his presentation.
Taibbi begins by noting, “Twitter’s contact with the FBI was constant and pervasive, as if it were a subsidiary.” I would safely take that a step further, yes there is a subsidiary relationship; however, as years of government involvement continued by 2016 Twitter became the subsidiary of DHS, not vice-versa. This dynamic within the relationship explains some of the more curious elements that Taibbi struggles to fully understand.
Notice the timing of escalation by DHS/FBI: “The FBI’s social media-focused task force, known as FTIF, created in the wake of the 2016 election, swelled to 80 agents and corresponded with Twitter to identify alleged foreign influence and election tampering of all kinds.”
As we have noted from the lead into and out of the 2016 election, the surveillance state took action specifically to protect itself from President Trump. This activity included the NSA, FISA court, FBI, DOJ-NSD, CIA, ODNI while specifically and purposefully enmeshing the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI).
Protecting Washington DC from the risk President Trump represented was a whole of government approach. The executive and legislative branches worked together and weaponized national security claims to involve the judicial branches in the effort. In the aftermath of the 2016 election outcome, now we see social media being pulled further into the approach.
The next three paragraphs are key in this Taibbi outline:
8. Federal intelligence and law enforcement reach into Twitter included the Department of Homeland Security, which partnered with security contractors and think tanks to pressure Twitter to moderate content.
Highlight: “security contractors,” now where have we heard that before? Yes, the same FBI contractor access to raw/bulk NSA metadata that was discovered being extracted in the height of the 2016 GOP nomination contest. In the aftermath of the election, and in coordination with the Twitter context, now those same security contractors are part of the surveillance system generating actionable items.
9. It’s no secret the government analyzes bulk data for all sorts of purposes, everything from tracking terror suspects to making economic forecasts.
Here’s where Taibbi comes dangerously close to realizing the inflection point created by President Obama and AG Eric Holder. Prior to the arrival of the Obama administration the bulk data was a process of collection by the NSA (while looking outward for threats and limited in review by 4th amendment protections) and then delivery to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence for transfer to DHS and FBI in order to take action on anything flagged.
When the flagged data was transferred into and out of the ODNI, the constitutional and lawful processes around the 4th amendment needed to be applied. That’s where the FISA court comes into play and applications for surveillance, that pass through the DOJ National Security Division (DOJ-NSD), based on the intelligence data from the ODNI office, are put together.
The NSA was/is monitoring the raw data with a radar turned outward toward foreign entities. When something is flagged, that data is then transferred to the ODNI and exits toward the Dept of Homeland Security. The fourth amendment protection against unlawful search and seizure of private papers is supposed to apply when the data leaves ODNI. Before the FBI can use anything, the DOJ-NSD has to get a warrant, either from a federal judge or the FISA Court depending on the issue.
This process was what Barack Obama and Eric Holder worked around as they created a quasi-constitutional surveillance system. That’s where Taibbi’s next paragraph comes into play. Remember, even though President Trump was in office, the system operators in the institutions were from the Obama-Holder era:
10. The #TwitterFiles show something new: agencies like the FBI and DHS regularly sending social media content to Twitter through multiple entry points, pre-flagged for moderation.
Security contractors were reviewing the public information pages, then transmitting results to DHS and FBI…. who would then use their portal connection into Twitter to make “pre-flagged” requests. What type of requests? Example:
This example is only on the subject of the 2020 election; however, you can see what bullet point #3 requests, “any location information associated with the accounts that Twitter would voluntarily provide.”
Don’t get too hung up on the example, because it only references a priority of looking at the 2020 election. Instead ask yourself the bigger question, what other priorities would be in the mind of political ideologues within DHS and FBI? What other DHS tasks, DHS assignments and FBI operations would take place that would benefit from the networking between the government and social media?
In 2011 the DOJ was using IRS filings to conduct investigations of Americans. That was what the entire IRS Tea Party scandal was really about. It wasn’t the IRS wrongdoing that led to the class action settlement, it was the DOJ origination of a request for information from the IRS about the 501-c (3)(4) groups, specifically their “schedule B’ forms, that triggered the problem starting.
After the IRS issue surfaced publicly in 2012 the DOJ immediately dropped their use of the data that was contained on 21 CD-ROMS delivered by the IRS.
Aided by advances in technology, the Obama administration switched to surveillance via direct review of available metadata. Social media platforms were enlisted as DHS partners under the auspices of ‘national security’, and suddenly there was a full-fledged surveillance state underway.
The exploitation of the FISA process and the exploitation of the social media partnership is all connected to the same surveillance effort.
Taibbi posits a question in paragraph 12, “An unanswered question: do agencies like FBI and DHS do in-house flagging work themselves, or farm it out? “You have to prove to me that inside the fucking government you can do any kind of massive data or AI search,” says one former intelligence officer.” A question he previously answered when he talked about federal contractors.
The government doesn’t need to violate the constitution directly with unlawful searches and seizures. The government can outsource that part to national security contractors.
What the government needs to do is collect all the data, then pay or contract someone else to search it based on the needs of the DHS, FBI, DOJ-NSD etc etc.
That domestic surveillance system is what President Obama and Eric Holder created. That system is defended under the shield of ‘national security‘ as noted in the judicial ruling in the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals (Trump Mar-a-Lago case):
The remainder of the Matt Taibbi outline showcases how various organizations could also reach out to Twitter and request content removal. Taibbi concludes, “what most people think of as the “deep state” is really a tangled collaboration of state agencies, private contractors, and (sometimes state-funded) NGOs. The lines become so blurred as to be meaningless.
Indeed, those lines were erased Matt. Indeed, they were.
Barack Obama and Eric Holder did not create a weaponized DOJ and FBI; the institutions were already weaponized by the Patriot Act. What Obama and Holder did was take the preexisting system and retool it, so the weapons of government only targeted one side of the political continuum.
This point is where many people understandably get confused.
Elevator Speech:
(1) The Patriot Act turned the intel surveillance radar from foreign searches for terrorists to domestic searches for terrorists.
(2) Obama/Biden then redefined what is a “terrorist” to include their political opposition.
(3) The DHS, ODNI, DOJ-NSD and FISC became the four pillars of this new surveillance system. Atop these pillars is where you will find the Fourth Branch of Government.
This is the scale of corrupt political compromise on both sides of the DC dynamic that we are up against. Preserving this system is also what removing Donald Trump is all about. The targeting of President Trump in order to preserve the system, the system that was weaponized during the Obama administration, is what the actions of the DOJ and FBI are all about.
What would powerful people in DC do to stop the American people from finding this out?
“Michael Shellenberger has just published the latest batch of what has come to be known as the Twitter Files. It’s a follow-up to Matt Taibbi’s recent Twitter Files release concerning FBI’s pressure campaign against Twitter to remove content the agency found objectionable.
Today’s release provides more details on the relationship between Twitter and the FBI, the suppression and removal of the Hunter Biden story from Twitter the FBI’s desire for Twitter to confirm a “foreign interference” narrative that didn’t exist, and how the FBI sought user location information for tweets that weren’t remotely criminal.
For a refresher, here are the highlights from one of the most recent releases from Taibbi, who has done excellent work on this continuing story:
The FBI requested take action on what it determined to be misinformation, which included jokes from small Twitter accounts about voting dates.
FBI e-mails to Twitter asking for assessment of terms of service violations and “location information” about accounts that allegedly “spread misinformation about the upcoming election.” Some of those accounts were permanently suspended.
How the 2016 “Russian election interference” hoax influenced the FBI’s 2020 operations into reviewing American social media posts.
Today’s thread by Shellenberger expands on what we have learned.
1. TWITTER FILES: PART 7Biden laptop,
The FBI & the Hunter Biden Laptop
How the FBI & intelligence community discredited factual information about Hunter Biden’s foreign business dealings both after and *before* The New York Post revealed the contents of his laptop on October 14, 2020
The FBI continued its requests of location and VPN IP data from Twitter users, done without a warrant and without a subpoena: “would Twitter be open to sharing which service provider(s) those VPN IP addresses resolved to?” To its credit, Twitter pushed back on this request.
In one case, the FBI requested user data for an account that was critical of BLM and the Democrats. Twitter responded by confirming “the account in question is domestic in origin.”
The US intelligence community was pushing Twitter to “share more information” and change its user privacy settings.
(…) Then we have one of the more remarkable pieces of information to be released from the Twitter: confirmation that Twitter was paid nearly $3.5 million for assisting the FBI with its processing requests.
22. Then, in July 2020, the FBI’s Elvis Chan arranges for temporary Top Secret security clearances for Twitter executives so that the FBI can share information about threats to the upcoming elections. pic.twitter.com/YXCR2Guxz5
24. Recently, Yoel Roth told @karaswisher that he had been primed to think about the Russian hacking group APT28 before news of the Hunter Biden laptop came out.
When it did, Roth said, “It set off every single one of my finely tuned APT28 hack-and-leap campaign alarm bells.” pic.twitter.com/RKoR4NtH1s
26. Who is Jim Baker? He’s former general counsel of the FBI (2014-18) & one of the most powerful men in the U.S. intel community.
Baker has moved in and out of government for 30 years, serving stints at CNN, Bridgewater (a $140 billion asset management firm) and Brookings pic.twitter.com/FggRI2zITX
28. Baker wasn’t the only senior FBI exec. involved in the Trump investigation to go to Twitter.
Dawn Burton, the former dep. chief of staff to FBI head James Comey, who initiated the investigation of Trump, joined Twitter in 2019 as director of strategy.
31. The organizer was Vivian Schiller, the fmr CEO of NPR, fmr head of news at Twitter; fmr Gen. mgr of NY Times; fmr Chief Digital Officer of NBC News
Journalist Michael Shellenberger reveals “How the FBI and intelligence community discredited factual information about Hunter Biden’s foreign business dealings both after and *before* The New York Post revealed the contents of his laptop on October 14, 2020.”
In Twitter Files #6, we saw the FBI relentlessly seek to exercise influence over Twitter, including over its content, its users, and its data. https://t.co/g66XzH9ISr
The story begins in December 2019 when a Delaware computer store owner named John Paul (J.P.) Mac Isaac contacts the FBI about a laptop that Hunter Biden had left with him
8. The next day, October 14, 2020, The New York Post runs its explosive story revealing the business dealings of President Joe Biden’s son, Hunter. Every single fact in it was accurate. pic.twitter.com/TC2AnLNJAw
10. On Dec 2, @mtaibbi described the debate inside Twitter over its decision to censor a wholly accurate article.
Since then, we have discovered new info that points to an organized effort by the intel community to influence Twitter & other platforms https://t.co/1ZF3oottKR
12. And yet, during all of 2020, the FBI and other law enforcement agencies repeatedly primed Yoel Roth to dismiss reports of Hunter Biden’s laptop as a Russian “hack and leak” operation.
14. Were the FBI warnings of a Russian hack-and-leak operation relating to Hunter Biden based on *any* new intel?
No, they weren’t
“Through our investigations, we did not see any similar competing intrusions to what had happened in 2016,” admitted FBI agent Elvis Chan in Nov. pic.twitter.com/tFPMqbydbA
18. It’s not the first time that Twitter’s Roth has pushed back against the FBI. In January 2020, Roth resisted FBI efforts to get Twitter to share data outside of the normal search warrant process. pic.twitter.com/NAssnLMpds
20. Time and again, FBI asks Twitter for evidence of foreign influence & Twitter responds that they aren’t finding anything worth reporting.
“[W]e haven’t yet identified activity that we’d typically refer to you (or even flag as interesting in the foreign influence context).” pic.twitter.com/ghGNz4ZzXB
GOP Rep. James Comer, expected to be the House Oversight Chairman next year, told FBN’s Maria Bartiromo that the latest installment of the “Twitter Files” contains some things he plans to investigate:
(Timeline editor’s note: This is a rough interpretation of Comer’s discussion with Bartiromo.)
MARIA BARTIROMO: Elon Musk has exposed corruption in Washington, part seven of “The Twitter Files” reveals how the intelligence community pressured news and social media outlets to discredit evidence of influence-peddling from Hunter Biden on the Biden laptop, despite the FBI knowing truth for nearly a year before the New York Post story dropped.
Independent writer Michael Shellenberger reporting that throughout 2020, the FBI was repeatedly warning Twitter that stories about Hunter’s laptop was a “Russian hack and leak operation.” They knew otherwise because they had the laptop since October 2019. FBI agent Elvis Chan also emailed Twitter’s head of security a trove of documents just one day before the Post story came out.
The chairman-elect of the Huse Oversight Committee… Kentucky Congressman James Comer is here… What does this latest tranche of Twitter exposé mean to you?
REP. JAMES COMER: Well it means a lot. More evidence of wrongdoing. In the beginning I thought that there were probably two or three rogue employees who were orchestrating this cover-up of the Hunter Biden laptop, but now we know that the FBI had a division of at least 80 agents. We also know that the FBI paid Twitter over three million dollars for their time, all the time they took over the past couple years, in telling them who to suppress, who to ban. You know just things that government has no role in.
The FBI was never granted the authority to create any type of disinformation task force that police the social media sites. This we know with Twitter. We’ve heard similar stories from Zuckerberg. Who knows what went on at YouTube and Google. This is an agency that is out of control, and the most frustrating thing for me right now, Maria, is the fact in this omnibus bill, there is increased funding for the FBI, plus a $1.75 billion dollars headquarters facility for the FBI. We need to halt everything with the FBI. All funding until they come forward, and explain to Congress exactly what they were doing, why they were doing it, and who gave them the authority to do it.
BARTIROMO: That is extraordinary that there is all of that money earmarked for the FBI, despite all this with wrongdoing and evidence of collusion. I don’t know why your colleagues in the Senate are going along with this omnibus bill weakening you right before you take the gavel.
COMER: Um-hmm, it does. The one thing that we have the ability to do is stop the spending. Stop the spending. We need an FBI we really do. But this FBI is out of control. It is doing things, that Congress never granted the authority to do. In no way, shape or form should the government be in the business of censoring free speech, whether liberal or conservative speech that is just something the government should not do.
But to dedicate a task force of at least 80 employees to do nothing but communicate with social media sites, telling them what soties to suppress, who to ban, is just wrong. It is a gross misuse of taxpayer dollars and a violation of the Constitution.
And to think that as we speak, the Senate is sitting here giving them more money for the next 12 months, tying our hands and our ability to get the FBI in front of the committee. One way we could get the FBI in front of the committee really quickly is say we’re not giving you a penny, until you all come down here and explain to us, what this task force was, why you told Twitter to suppress the Hunter Biden laptop story when you knew darn well it was true.
The Senate is counter to everything we’re trying to do in the House from an oversight standpoint right now, especially with respect to the FBI.
BARTIROMO: That is horrible who or senators agreeing to this, Mitch McConnell? Who else?
COMER: We’ve got Richard Shelby, Rob Portman, and ironically, Maria, a lot of senators are going out of office, they are not even going to be in Congress in 10 days. This is something that should be punted until first of the year, we’ve got questions.
Look at the southern border, we are not holding anyone accountable from a budgetary standpoint for the crisis at the border, we’re not holding anyone accountable at the debacle in the NIH and the CDC, all the bad decisions they made, and all the money they waisted during Covid. And here we are with the FBI, an agency that is clearly out of control. No one, no one in Congress, even the liberals, would say the FBI has any business censoring free speech.
BARTIROMO: This is one more piece of evidence that the Senate Republicans are working against the American people. There is no other way to look at it. They continue to go with Democrat colleagues and vote for this spending, and then they complain that inflation is at 40-year highs.
…
The idea that the FBI was paying Twitter, okay? I know the FBI and DOJ pays human sources, to do their work, they paid spies during Russia collusion story, that whole made-up story that Trump colluded with Russia, they paid old spies is to entrap Trump officials. What did they do with Twitter? Why is the FBI paying Twitter? That is outrageous.
COMER: According to the latest Twitter dump, the FBI was spending so much time with Twitter executives, every two weeks having meetings that lasted for hours, telling them what stories to suppress, what looked like disinformation, who to ban from Twitter, — I mean things that the FBI has no business doing. They reimbursed them for their time, over $3 million dollars over a two-year period. And that is just Twitter, we don’t know how much they paid Facebook, Google, YouTube, the other social media platforms.
80 employees, that’s roughly $12 million dollars in salary and benefits dedicated to policing social media sites, are you kidding me? At a time when crime is out of control, human trafficking is out of control, we have a crisis of fentanyl, we have a crisis of shoplifting, and the crime rate in these cities is higher than it has been in my adult lifetime, ans the FBI’s focused on policing social media sites? This is a gross misuse of the taxpayer dollars. (RealClearPolitics, 12/20/2022)(Archive)
“The FBI relied more extensively on Christopher Steele’s debunked dossier in their Russiagate investigation than has been revealed, inserting key parts from it into their applications for warrants to spy on the 2016 Trump campaign.
Agents did this without telling the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court that the precise wording was plucked directly from a political rumor sheet paid for by Hillary Clinton’s campaign or providing judges with any independent corroboration of the explosive allegations.
But the notion that mere “snippets” of the reporting by paid Clinton subcontractor Christopher Steele showed up in FISA applications, as CNN has described it, no longer holds up to scrutiny.
A close examination of all four of the FISA warrants reveals that the FBI lifted dozens of key phrases from the dossier – as well as practically some entire sentences – and pasted them verbatim into their sworn affidavits. It did so repeatedly without citing its sources or using typical hedging language such as “allegedly” or “purportedly” to indicate that the claims were unverified.
As a result, the FBI lent its voice of authority to many of the unsourced – and now debunked – accusations in the dossier.
For example, it avowed under oath in all four warrant applications that “the FBI has learned” that onetime Trump campaign adviser Carter Page had secretly met with sanctioned Kremlin officials in Moscow. But those allegations came from Steele’s D.C.-based collector Igor Danchenko, who admitted to the FBI in a January 2017 interview his input was just “hearsay” gathered from “conversation with friends over beer.”
It is not clear whether the bureau decided to pay Steele in connection with the dossier so that it could represent the material as originating from one of its own confidential sources. At one point it reportedly offered him $1 million if he could verify key claims (he could not).
Meanwhile, the FBI repeatedly portrayed improbable third-hand rumors as sound “intelligence,” despite taking them directly from paid political opposition research operatives. Suggesting independent verification, the bureau repeatedly assured the FISA court it “assesses” the truth of damning claims.
In some cases, the FBI mixed partial information from one dossier report with partial information from another report to draw broader conclusions. It then used these as a foundation to claim evidence of a grand election “conspiracy” between the Trump campaign and Russia, with Page acting as an “intermediary.” Such a conspiracy was what counterintelligence agents needed to convince the FISA court that their main target Page was a Kremlin agent who posed a national security threat, and that deploying the government’s most intrusive investigative method – electronic surveillance – was necessary to investigate him.
In short, the FBI fabricated conclusions from fabrications and turned them into sworn representations before the powerful Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.
Veteran FBI investigators who have worked counterintelligence cases and sworn out wiretap warrants say the agents who ran the Russiagate investigation, codenamed Crossfire Hurricane, violated the fundamental principle requiring them to independently verify evidence they present to the court.
Cl “Their actions – lying and misrepresentations on warrants and affidavits – are antithetical to every instruction at FBI training at Quantico and in the field,” said 27-year FBI veteran Michael Biasello. “Any FBI Academy trainee and agent in the field is aware that search warrants, affidavits and any accompanying documents and information contained therein requiring federal judicial approval is to be vetted and verified to create a pristine document. Their accuracy is vital.”
The FBI declined comment.
The bureau’s reliance on the dossier – a series of 17 reports compiled by Steele for Fusion GPS, the Washington-based opposition research firm employed the Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee – has been brought into sharp relief by the work of Special Counsel John Durham.
His team investigated for possible criminal misconduct the Russiagate probe that hobbled the Trump presidency. It zeroed in on the FBI’s handling of the dossier both before and after the agency began using it to gain FISA court approval to wiretap Page in 2016 and 2017. Investigators questioned several FBI witnesses about their interactions with Steele and Danchenko, some of whom Durham said were not forthcoming about their involvement and obtained related documents. Danchenko, who provided an estimated 80% of the dossier’s content, was indicted last year for lying about the sources of his information, though he was acquitted in October by a D.C.-area jury.
Like CNN, the New York Times has tried to minimize the agency’s reliance on the dossier. In a recent article on Durham’s inquiry, the Times maintained that the FBI only used “some” claims from the dossier in applying for court permission to wiretap Page.
In fact, the FBI used several claims – and those claims happened to constitute the most critical “evidence” in the wiretap applications. Even former deputy FBI director Andrew McCabe has admitted that if not for the Steele dossier, no surveillance warrant would have been sought for Page.
All told, the FBI used four dossier reports – Report 80, Report 94, Report 95 and Report 102 – in all four of its FISA wiretap warrants targeting Page in 2016 and 2017. And three of the reports were based on a fictitious source.(Read more: RealClearWire, 12/20/2022)(Archive)
“Aides to President Joe Biden have discovered at least one additional batch of classified documents in a location separate from the Washington office he used after leaving the Obama administration, according to a person familiar with the matter.
Since November, after the discovery of documents with classified markings in his former office, Biden aides have been searching for any additional classified materials that might be in other locations he used, said the source, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to provide details about the ongoing inquiry.
Joe Biden (Credit: Nathan Howard/Getty)
The White House did not reply to a request for comment. The Justice Department had no comment.
The initial discovery of classified documents in an office used by Biden after his vice presidency was first reported on Monday by CBS News.
The classification level, number and precise location of the additional documents was not immediately clear. It also was not immediately clear when the additional documents were discovered and if the search for any other classified materials Biden may have from the Obama administration is complete.
Biden aides have been sifting through documents stored at locations beyond his former Washington office to determine if there are any other classified documents that need to be turned over to the National Archives and reviewed by the Justice Department, the person familiar with the matter said.” (Read more: NBC News, 1/11/2023)(Archive)
“The initial statement issued by White House attorney Richard Sauber on Monday to address the CBS News report on classified documents being discovered at the Penn Biden Center on November 2, 2022, failed to disclose that additional classified documents were found at Joe Biden’s Wilmington, Delaware home on December 20 by Biden’s personal attorneys. It was not until Thursday morning that Sauber announced that a second set of classified documents were found in Biden’s garage and was confirmed by Biden in a contentious colloquy with Fox News reporter Peter Doocy.”
Peter Doocy: “Classified materials, next to your Corvette? What were you thinking?”
Elvis Chan (l) and Yoel Roth (Credit: SMG/Twitter)
“Controversial FBI agent Elvis Chan has denied he warned Twitter‘s then-security chief about a supposed Russian operation to hack and leak false information on Hunter Biden.
Yoel Roth had claimed in a sworn declaration to the Federal Election Committee in December 2020 that he felt compelled to censor the Hunter Biden laptop story and label it as coming from ‘hacked materials’ based on information FBI agents had given him at weekly meetings.
But Chan, a supervisory special agent for the Bureau, insisted in a deposition in November that none of the agents specifically mentioned the Hunter Biden story as one of the possible ‘hack-and-leak’ operations.
He testified as part of a lawsuit against the Biden administration, accusing the now president of organizing meetings in San Francisco for as many as seven DC-based FBI agents in the months leading up to the 2020 presidential election.
Those FBI agents would then meet with Big Tech officials to remove ‘disfavored speakers, viewpoints and content on social media platforms… under the guise of combating misinformation,’ the Republican attorneys general of Louisiana and Missouri claim.
In his declaration, Roth claimed: ‘I was told… that the intelligence community expected that individuals associated with political campaigns would be subject to hacking attacks and that material obtained through those hacking attacks would likely be disseminated over social media platforms, including Twitter.
‘I also learned in these meetings that there were rumors that a hack-and-leak operation would involve Hunter Biden,’ he added, as Twitter tried to defend itself against a complaint by the Tea Party Patriots Foundation that its censorship was an ‘in-kind’ campaign contribution to then-candidate Joe Biden.
Under questioning by Solicitor General John Sauer late last month, Chan said he ‘would interpret’ what Roth said in his sworn testimony ‘differently.’
He insisted he had never discussed Hunter Biden’s laptop as being subject to a ‘hack-and-leak operation’ at weekly meetings with content moderation officials at Facebook, Google, Twitter, Yahoo!, Reddit and even LinkedIn.
‘In my estimation, we never discussed Hunter Biden specifically with Twitter,’ he said. ‘And so the way I read that is that there are hack-and-leak operations, and then at the time, I believe he flagged one of the potential current events that were happening ahead of the elections.’
Chan then explained that because he does not actually remember discussing the Hunter Biden laptop, ‘we didn’t discuss it.
‘So this would have been something that he would have just thought of as hot-button issue on his own.’
Chan also revealed in his testimony that the FBI now plans to hold more meetings with Big Tech officials ahead of the 2024 presidential election — and this time will include representatives from Apple and the Wikimedia Foundation.
‘They were added because they are a cloud infrastructure company,’ he said of adding Apple to the discussions.
‘And we believe the tactical information, specifically indicators that we shared with them related to foreign-state-sponsored actors, might pop-up on any screening they do on iCloud.’
Chan also spoke of his close relations with the so-called ‘FBI lovers’ who had tried to discredit then-President Trump with claims that his administration had close ties to the Kremlin.
He admitted he knew Peter Strzok, a former deputy assistant director of counterintelligence for the Bureau, as well as Lisa Page, an FBI attorney.” (Read more: The Daily Mail, 12/21/2022)(Archive)
“House Republicans gathered a trove of text and email messages showing House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office was directly involved in the creation and editing of the Capitol security plan that failed during the Jan. 6, 2021 riot and that security officials later declared they had been “denied again and again” the resources needed to protect one of the nation’s most important homes of democracy.
The internal communications were made public Wednesday in a report compiled by Republican Reps. Rodney Davis, Jim Banks, Troy Nehls, Jim Jordan and Kelly Armstrong that encompasses the results of months of investigation they did of evidence that had been ignored by the Democrat-led Jan. 6 committee. The lawmakers were authorized by House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy to do their own probe.
Pelosi’s chief of staff Terri McCullough and another aide assigned to Pelosi’s staff, Jamie Fleet (pictured), had regular contact with police and the sergeant at arms over the security planning for Jan. 6 starting in early December 2020. (Credit: public domain)
The report concludes the Capitol was left vulnerable on Jan. 6 as a result of failures by the Democratic leadership in the House and law enforcement leaders in the Capitol Police who allowed concerns about the “optics” of having armed officers and National Guardsmen visible to the public to override the need for enhanced security.
“Leadership and law enforcement failures within the U.S. Capitol left the complex vulnerable on January 6, 2021. The Democrat-led investigation in the House of Representatives, however, has disregarded those institutional failings that exposed the Capitol to violence that day,” it concluded.
“Leadership and law enforcement failures within the U.S. Capitol left the complex vulnerable on January 6, 2021. The Democrat-led investigation in the House of Representatives, however, has disregarded those institutional failings that exposed the Capitol to violence that day,” it concluded.
It also corroborated prior reporting by Just the News that Capitol Police began receiving specific warnings in mid-December that there could be significant violence planned against the Capitol and lawmakers by protesters planning to attend the certification of the 2020 election results.
“Prior to that day, the U.S. Capitol Police (USCP) had obtained sufficient information from an array of channels to anticipate and prepare for the violence that occurred,” the report noted.
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rep. Devin Nunes, along with Rep. Peter King and Rep. Ron DeSantis, speaks on Capitol Hill, October 24, 2017. (Credit: Susan Walsh/AP)
“My post yesterday regarding the DoJ/FBI investigation of two of Devin Nunes’ top lawyers sparked a response from a former FBI agent—as sometimes happens here. You’ll recall that the investigation in question was a full criminal investigation that featured the use of grand jury subpoenas to obtain personal information regarding the two staffers (including Kash Patel) who were involved in Nunes’ investigation of Russia Hoax abuses—especially the fraudulent FISA applications that were submitted against Carter Page. Because of various procedural irregularities it’s apparent—failure to notify Nunes—there seems little doubt that the purpose of the investigations was to obtain personal information that could be used to pressure Nunes into backing off from his investigation. In fact, DAG Rod Rosenstein and Chris Wray had threatened to launch exactly such investigations in a meeting with Nunes and Kash Patel—unless Nunes backed off.
Needless to say, investigations launched for such a purpose are totally lacking in predication—they lack a legitimate government legal purpose, since conducting legislative oversight investigations is not a violation of federal law (!). I harp on this matter of predication because, to me—and I think objectively, the abuse of the investigative/prosecutorial process for political purposes is perhaps the ultimate and most serious form of corruption. It undermines the justice system and the very concept of rule of law rather than rule of men—the basis of our constitutional order. As I noted at that time, it is clear that such considerations play no part at all in the decisions of men like Rosenstein and Wray—and far too many more. These are real and serious violations of the law, which go unpunished.
Here is the email (slightly edited to preserve anonymity) that I received last night. Readers will readily imagine that the sentiments expressed are widely held among former and active FBI personnel. Bear in mind that, while these abuses are receiving widespread publicity, most FBI agents are not involved and are ashamed to be associated with the activities that are being exposed.
Having been required to read and comprehend the Domestic Investigative Operations Guide (“DIOG”) when it came out and being a Bureau legal advisor which required that I speak DIOG fluently, I think we are collectively making a mistake to think that anyone at the Department of Justice (“DOJ”) and the Bureau cares one whit about predication. No DOJ or Bureau employee has ever punished for violating the DIOG or federal criminal statutes. As a result, when the DOJ and Bureau can claim the mantle of “national security” and effectively and easily thwart any attempts at Congressional oversight, what does it matter if the investigation of Nunes and his staffers was properly predicated? I am asking rhetorically. I understand that the DOJ and Bureau violated the DIOG/law/Constitutional requirements and should be held accountable. But when no one can hold the DOJ or Bureau to account for such violations, why even bother with the charade of seeking predication? I read the Electronic Communication (“EC”; after it was publicly released) that opened the investigation into general Flynn. It was a complete joke. All it alleged was that Flynn met with some Russians and did some overseas travel. There was nothing within the four corners of that document that would have been the proper basis of any predication of the investigation (as a side note, had any agent brought such a piece of garbage to me to review as a legal advisor, I would have laughed them out of my office and then had a serious discussion with said agent’s supervisor about that agent’s fitness for duty, but I digress). Yet the investigation proceeded, Flynn was indicted, arrested and prosecuted with no proper predication. What is/was to stop the DOJ and Bureau from just opening an investigation on Nunes or anyone else for that matter and ignoring the need to abide by “the rules”? I respectfully submit, not a damn thing.
Every crime victim I ever interviewed all shared the same sentiment: “I didn’t think it (crime) could happen to me.” The point is that it appears that many of the machinations by the DOJ and Bureau are completely lawless with no basis in legally comprehensible evidence of criminal violations. I think the sooner we all collectively realize “That it can happen here/to us” the better we will be able to address this issue. Please don’t take this as a criticism of you and your work, it’s just an observation made by a retired agent.
All of which brings me to a serious question: What concrete things can we do to: A) Address the current issues facing our Republic (DOJ/Bureau overreach, profligate spending, creeping government sponsored surveillance state, potential nuclear war, and…?) and B)How do we fix our society at a very basic level to create wise citizens who can keep our Republic in good order? I am pretty much done reading the latest “outrage” in the conservative press. I understand that things are a mess. My overarching question to complainers/commentators/politicians is: “What are you going to do about it?” I have steadily volunteered to assist the Republican party over the last two years to little or no avail. I am redirecting my efforts and concentrating on assisting local legislators address local issues where I may have some small amount of control.
Anyway, deep thoughts on a rainy, cold afternoon. I am going to throw another log on the fire. Thanks for listening to my rant. I fervently wish that you and yours have a peaceful, prosperous and boring New Year!
My response:
I’m totally on board with you. I would simply add–and I’m not making excuses for the Bureau–that too few people understand how much of this is driven by DoJ. Especially given that so many of the HQ legal people are joined at the hip with DoJ, either mentally from prior education or because they have prior work experience there. I refuse to believe that DoJ wasn’t in on the Twitter (and other) censorship. The Bureau gets the headlines, the talk of a new Church Commission, but DoJ is arguably the biggest threat to the nation.
And the response to my response:
As to the DoJ, there is absolutely no way any of this “stuff” happened without their full knowledge and support.
7/ But CISA had a First Amendment problem. The US government cannot sandblast millions of voters off the Internet because of their speech about elections.
11/ Alex Stamos, a former Facebook exec, is the founder of the EIP censorship network and Krebs’ business partner.
Stamos is a member of the CFR, a member of the Aspen Institute, the director of the Stanford Internet Observatory, and he loves censoring his political opponents. pic.twitter.com/Ww45NogbNS
13/ Kate Starbird is the head of the University of Washington’s Center for an Informed Public director and CISA’s “disinformation” advisor subcommittee.
15/ In October 2018, Starbird told her Facebook followers to vote Democrat to hold Trump responsible for “corruption and collusion” and his “racist, anti-LGBT agenda.”
Starbird claimed Trump’s “nationalism” didn’t stand for “patriotism” but instead stood for “white supremacy.” pic.twitter.com/aFjdtaQbAG
17/ Graham Brookie is the figure who led the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensic Research Lab and a previous Obama White House National Security Council member.
The Atlantic Council is a NATO think-tank with seven living CIA directors as members. pic.twitter.com/w2lqNQOQLO
19/ In Oct. 2020, Brookie would call the #BidenLaptop “laundered unverified misinfo.”
When DNI John Ratcliffe stated that the laptop was legitimate, Brookie publicly condemned Ratcliffe’s “credibility” and accused him of “politicizing intel.” pic.twitter.com/lpvKEtkkEw
25/ In effect, the left was allowed to discuss the vulnerabilities of voting machines after the 2016 election, and the right was banned from social media platforms for discussing those very same vulnerabilities after the 2020 election. pic.twitter.com/mupJcI3Qhe
27/ The political establishment and the left used the covid-19 crisis to push for nationwide mail-in voting, which increased the number of ballots cast by mail from 28.8 million in 2016 to 66.4 million in 2020, a massive 131% increase. pic.twitter.com/yVCHS5VhfT
31/ Regardless of your opinion on voting machines or mail-in voting, it’s clear that this public-private censorship network conspired with big tech & big government to censor one side of the discussion.
Journalist Whitney Webb sits down with Redacted’s Clayton Morris for a dense conversation about her bombshell new book on Jeffrey Epstein’s deep connections to the world’s biggest power players.
“Politico Playbook exclusively reported Wednesday that publishing giant HarperCollins is preparing to release the next investigative bombshell book by six-time New York Times bestselling author Peter Schweizer titled Red-Handed: How American Elites Get Rich Helping China Win.
![CBS](https://i0.wp.com/assets.realclear.com/images/43/433545_5_.jpg?resize=650%2C486&ssl=1 "Clinton Press Sec: \")
Secret Service entrance logs reveal Joffe visited the White House several times during the Obama administration. And in 2013, Comey gave Joffe an award recognizing his work helping agents investigate a cybersecurity case. Sources told RCI that Joffe has also worked as an FBI informant on various cybersecurity cases opened by the bureau over roughly the past 15 years.
“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.
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)
“Special counsel John Durham requested a federal court to issue 30 subpoenas for testimony in the trial against Igor Danchenko, British ex-spy Christopher Steele’s alleged main source for his discredited dossier.
“The FBI raided Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida and broke into a safe in his palatial home, the former president said Monday.
In Part One we outlined the background of the modern Deep State {Go Deep}. In Part Two we outlined the specifics of how President Trump was targeted by political operatives using tools created by the DC system {Go Deep}. In Part Three we outlined how and why President Trump was blocked from releasing documents {Go Deep}. Here in Part 4, we begin to assemble the specifics of what documents likely existed in Mar-a-Lago.
“Here we go… It was only a matter of time before the DOJ-NSD architects of the Trump targeting operation came out from the shadows. This is the moment long-time readers of CTH should have been waiting for. For the past five years, Mary McCord has been one of a small and select lawfare group organizing the targeting of President Trump.
“Last we checked in on the Mar-a-Lago Raid legal proceeding, Judge Aileen M. Cannon issued a Labor Day order announcing she will appoint a Special Master, and prohibiting the feds from using the seized documents until further notice (except that the feds could continue their national security risk assessment), Judge Appoints Special Master, Temporarily Bars FBI/DOJ Review Or Use Of Records Seized in Mar-a-Lago Raid.
“An elite Washington, D.C., think tank has employed individuals who’ve worked for front groups controlled by Chinese spy agencies, a Daily Caller News Foundation investigation found.
“Aides to President Joe Biden have discovered at least one additional batch of classified documents in a location separate from the Washington office he used after leaving the Obama administration, according to a person familiar with the matter.
