“House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s son Paul Pelosi Jr. visited Ukraine in 2017 to meet with government officials in connection to a business initiative. Now, unearthed records reveal that Paul Pelosi Jr. was an executive of a gas industry company that did business in Ukraine – and his mother Nancy Pelosi was featured in one of the company’s promotional videos.

Journalist Patrick Howley broke the story Thursday:

(…) As Patrick Howley found, Paul Pelosi Jr. previously held top positions with the energy-sector companies Viscoil Group and NRGLab.

On March 5, 2013, NRGLab New Technology posted two videos on Youtube. One video opened with a clip of Nancy Pelosi discussing energy-efficient technology, followed by a direct-to-camera statement from her son Paul Pelosi Jr., filmed in Washington, D.C. in 2010.

(…) Another video posted that same day confirmed that NRGLab was working in Ukraine.

Paul Pelosi (l), Nancy Pelosi (c) and Paul Pelosi, Jr. (Credit: UPI)

(…) NRGLab’s website states that the company is based in Singapore and notes, “The company’s additional projects include a strategic partnership and investment from Viscoil Holdings to recycle waste materials into eco-friendly diesel fuel. NRGLab has obtained an exclusive license for the Viscoil Technology for the South East Asian region for all raw materials.”

Viscoil Holdings is currently suspended by the California Secretary of State. It was registered in 2009 to a manager named David Strawn in Escondido, California. As of 2010, it listed two managers: Strawn and an individual named Sergey Sorokin based in Moscow, Russia.

Paul Pelosi Jr. co-founded the company Natural Blue Resources, which the SEC charged with securities fraud in 2014.

Nancy Pelosi led a congressional delegation to Ukraine in 2015 to discuss issues including “energy security.” (Read more: National File/Patrick Howley, 10/03/2019) (Archive) 

Today Michael Flynn and his attorney Sidney Powell returned to federal court for a status hearing before Judge Emmet Sullivan.  Generally status hearings are uneventful; however, this hearing falls on the heels of an explosive filing by Flynn’s defense outlining allegations of serious prosecutorial misconduct; and claims the DOJ is withholding Brady material.

(…) “A DOJ memo exists dated February 8, 2017, that clears General Flynn of the Logan Act violation he was accused of violating. (Remember, the “Logan Act” was said by Sally Yates to be a big part of the reason for the FBI to interview Flynn.)

Then Ms. [Sidney] Powell went on to discuss the issues surrounding the missing notes from FBI Agent Joseph Pientka, and the original FD-302 written by Pientka.  The DOJ says they don’t have it.

Judge Sullivan asked Ms. Powell if she was going to withdraw the guilty plea based on the direction she was going.  Ms. Powell said no, and pointed to the possibility of dismissal based on wrongful prosecution; and a case that would never have been brought if all the evidence was visible.

(Read more: Conservative Treehouse, 9/10/2019)

“Last month the DOJ admitted to the FISA court that two of the four FISA warrants used against Carter Page were fraudulently obtained.

However, what the DOJ did not admit publicly was how the current FBI Chief Legal Counsel, Dana Boente, participated in obtaining the April 2017 warrant.  In hindsight, this story explains the ongoing issues within the FBI.

The original FISA application was October 21st, 2016. The first FISA renewal was January 12, 2017 (84 days from origination) and prior to the inauguration of President Trump. The second renewal was April 7, 2017 (85 days from prior renewal). The third renewal was on June 29th, 2017 (83 days from prior renewal).

The originating FISA and first renewal were authorized by the Obama administration officials.  However, it was the second renewal -now identified as fraudulent- on April 7th 2017, under the Trump administration, when the conniving FBI ran into a problem.

Here’s what happened.

On January 30th, 2017, Sally Yates was fired for refusing to defend the Trump travel ban from extremist countries.  Yates was replaced on January 31st by the U.S. Attorney from the Eastern District of Virginia (EDVA), Dana Boente.  There wasn’t an existing AG because Loretta Lynch had left.

As a result of Yates exit and Dana Boente’s entry, Boente was Acting Deputy Attorney General, and in charge until Jeff Sessions was confirmed on February 8th, 2017.

On February 9th, 2017, President Trump issued executive order 13775 changing the line of DOJ succession, moving the EDVA up, and granting Boente the full legal authority to carry out the duties of the Deputy AG until a permanent replacement was confirmed.

When Jeff Sessions became Attorney General, Dana Boente became Acting Deputy AG, a role Boente would retain until Rod Rosenstein was confirmed on April 25th, 2017. (Note: Boente also remained EDVA U.S. Attorney)

On March 2nd, 2017, Dana Boente was one of a small group who participated in a conversation that led to the recusal of Jeff Sessions from anything related to the 2016 election.  This recusal included the ongoing FBI counterintelligence investigation known as Crossfire Hurricane, which was later picked up by Robert Mueller.

The other attendees for the recusal decision-making meeting (see above schedule) included Sessions’ chief of staff Jody Hunt; Criminal Chief in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Maryland, Jim Crowell; Deputy Assistant Attorney General (DAAG) in the Department of Justice National Security Division Tash Gauhar (FISA lawyer); and Associate Deputy Attorney General Scott Schools.  [Note: Tash Gauhar was lawyer for FBI Clinton case; and Scott Schools was part of drafting Clinton exoneration letter.]

Boente, Crowell, Gauhar and Schools convinced AG Jeff Sessions he must recuse himself.  In hindsight each of the people giving Sessions advice was connected to previously corrupt activity within Main Justice that included the Clinton and Spygate operations.  Not knowing the conflict each advisor was carrying Sessions took their advice and recused himself; a big mistake.

With AG Jeff Sessions recused from anything involving the 2016 election; which included the Russia investigation; effective the evening of March 2, 2017, FBI Director James Comey now reported to Acting Deputy AG Dana Boente.

Technically, as this point in March 2017 Boente is still U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia (EDVA) and is only ‘acting’ as Deputy AG.  With Sessions recused Boente would be needed when the Carter Page FISA would be up for renewal (April, 2017).

With Sessions recused from the Russia investigation, and without a confirmed Deputy AG able to authorize, all of the material the FBI investigators needed from Main Justice would have to flow through Dana Boente.  [Note: Deputy AG Rod Rosenstein was not confirmed until April 25th.]

The January 12th FISA renewal was going to expire on April 12th, 2017 (90-days).  FBI Director James Comey had to work with and brief Dana Boente on the sensitive issues around the Russia investigation; including discussions with Boente about President Trump as a target of that investigation, and surveillance issues; if he was going to extend the FISA warrant with DOJ approval.

Toward the end of March 2017 FBI Director Comey was in discussions with Dana Boente about the issue.

We discover the hand-written notes later on as they were leaked to MSNBC, almost certainly leaked by the people within the Mueller investigation in April 2018. [You’ll see how we know in a minute]  However, at the time of the 2018 leak there was no context for the notes that Boente was taking.

It was only after the FISA application was declassified in July 2018 that Boente’s hand-written notes and the topic therein made sense.   To date no-one has connected this issue… until now.  (Pay attention to the date, Comey March 30th, 2017)

Obviously these notes are from a conversation between then Acting AG Dana Boente and FBI Director James Comey on March 30th, 2017.  It appears to be a phone call.

In hindsight the subject matter almost certainly relates to the issue of the Russia investigation, the sensitivity of administration being under that investigation, and James Comey sharing his interactions with President Trump with Dana Boente.

With Jeff Sessions recused, it is now Acting AG Dana Boente approving whatever James Comey needs from Main Justice.  James Comey wants the Carter Page FISA extended.

AG Jeff Sessions is recused (incapable); there is no Deputy AG in position; therefore the U.S. Attorney for the EDVA holds the authority to perform the duties of the office.  Dana Boente is the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia.

After the February 9th executive order initiating the change of DOJ succession was signed Dana Boente can now officially sign the Carter Page FISA application renewal.  Which is exactly what happens a week after their March 30th call when James Comey and Dana Boente sign the admittedly fraudulent FISA renewal – April 7th, 2017:

(Page #271 – Carter Page FISA Application)

Do you see what just happened here? President Trump signed an executive order that facilitated the FBI continuing to spying on his administration.

(…) So when FBI Director James Comey is making contact with Acting DAG Dana Boente on March 30th, 2017, for issues relating to the need for a FISA renewal in April 2017, the FBI was absolutely certain there was no validity to the underlying evidence within the FISA application.

Yet the FBI team was so determined to get the fraudulent FISA reauthorized, they ignored all of the evidence that undermined their objective.

Think about the scale of deceit and corruption involved.

But it doesn’t end…. it gets worse.

On April 25th, 2017, Deputy AG Rod Rosenstein is confirmed.   Rosenstein now takes over the responsibilities held by Acting DAG Dana Boente; this includes the FBI counterintelligence probe.

On May 9th, 2017, FBI Director James Comey is fired.

On May 10th, 2017, FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe opens a criminal ‘obstruction of justice investigation’ of President Trump to parallel the ongoing counterintelligence investigation into the Trump campaign and administration.

(Credit: Conservative Treehouse)

Dana Boente now becomes the Asst. Attorney General and head of the DOJ National Security Division (DOJ-NSD).  Simultaneously retaining role as U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of VA.  At that moment, guess who is Dana Boente’s legal counsel – Michael Atkinson.

Yes, that’s the same Michael Atkinson who is the current ICIG who facilitated the Whistle-blower complaint; was senior legal counsel to Dana Boente while he headed the DOJ-NSD.

On May 16th, 2017, Rosenstein takes Robert Mueller to the White House to meet President Trump. On May 17th, 2017, Rosenstein appoints the Robert Mueller special counsel probe. And we’re off to the Trump-Russia-Collusion-Obstruction races…

On June 29th, 2017, Rod Rosenstein and Andrew McCabe reauthorize that same fraudulent FISA application for Robert Mueller and his corrupt team of 19 special prosecutors and now 40 FBI agents to continue to exploit.

Dana Boente is still head of DOJ-NSD from May 11th, 2017 through the end of October 2017 when he officially announced his intent to retire.  But wait,… On January 23rd, 2018, FBI Director Christopher Wray announces Dana Boente has shifted over to the FBI to be Chief Legal Counsel (replacing James Baker).

Yes, that is correct.  As Mueller is using 19 lawyers, and 40 FBI investigators, Boente now becomes a legal adviser to Christopher Wray, inside the FBI, while the Mueller probe is ongoing….. Oh, and as you can see from his participation with Mueller, Dana Boente is also now a fact witness within the Mueller investigation.

It gets better, who do you think is in charge of the 40 FBI agents now conducting the third year of that fraudulent Mueller investigation?

Yup, the very same Dana Boente!

This is staggeringly unreal.  It’s no wonder FBI Director Christopher Wray appears detached, disconnected and completely unfazed by the scale and scope of the corrupt enterprise he is in charge of.  His own chief legal counsel was a key player in the operation to remove the president.

It always seemed odd that White House Counsel Don McGahn left in 2018; until you look at the bigger picture.  The Carter Page FISA Application was officially declassified and made public in late July 2018.  No doubt as McGahn looked at the FISA issues from his unique perspective, he likely realized in hindsight how the FISA issues crossed-over two administrations and what the executive orders on DOJ succession were really all about.

In his position as White House Counsel, Don McGahn would now be a fact witness if anyone started investigating.   Approximately two weeks after the FISA applications were declassified and made public, in August 2018, Don McGahn submitted his resignation.

PS. The deadline for the FBI and DOJ to inform the FISA Court about their sequestration and recovery effort (ie. a proverbial search for the fruit of a poisonous tree. Where is it?), was February 5th. (Read more: Conservative Treehouse, 2/13/2020)  (Archive)

(…) From the IG Report — Footnote 336 — is that David Laufman, Chief of the Export Control Section of the National Security Division of DOJ, told the IG that he negotiated the terms of the Danchenko interview with Danchenko’s attorney.

Laufman told us that he negotiated with the Primary Sub-source’s counsel to facilitate the FBI’s interview and sought to “build a cooperative relationship that could … result in the Bureau’s being in a position to assess the validity of information in the [Steele election reporting] resulting from [the Primary Sub-source’s] activities or the collection of [his/her] sub-subsources. So I saw my role as a broker to get that relationship consolidated .” Laufman said that the portion of the interview he attended established the line of communication with the Primary Sub-source and, as he recalled, generally covered the facts in a “superficial” way. He said that after the completion of the interview, he never saw the FBI’s written summary of the interview.

The IG Report says that Laufman attended only the first day of the 3-day interview and that one of his deputies attended days 2 and 3.  Note that Laufman told the IG he never saw the 57 page EC that documented the interview.  In my experience that would not be unusual. EC’s are normally internal FBI documents and do not get circulated outside the Bureau.  Both Laufman and his deputy were present and able to take notes for themselves.  I would be most curious to know — one hasn’t surfaced yet — if either of them prepared a “memo to file” or something similar reflecting what Danchenko said.  I would not have done so had I been there — that would be creating another document possibly subject to discovery — though it would likely be covered by a privilege.  I would have probably kept handwritten notes, and held onto those for later use if needed.

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)

What is also curious about Laufman’s presence is “Why him?”  The reliability of PSS and verification of his information was a key issue in the ongoing Carter Page FISA that was supervised and approved by the Officer of Intelligence of the National Security Division.  Why wasn’t it the OI Chief who attended the meeting?  Was it to contain the information?  Laufman is a partisan Democrat loyalist — he’s made that clear since he left government.  That is a question Mary McCord should answer since she was the Acting Assistant Attorney General for the National Security Division at the time, and it would have been her decision — assuming she made it — to have Laufman interact with Danchenko’s attorney and then attend the FBI interview.

So Laufman’s presence for the first day of the interview was not a coincidence, and it wasn’t because the FBI called him and said “Steele’s PSS is going to be interviewed. Do you want to be present?”

Further, a “use immunity” agreement doesn’t just lay around on a desk somewhere waiting for someone to fill in the blanks, date, and sign it.  These documents have various titles, and take various forms and have varying content — “proffer letter” is another common phrase used in describing them.  The EC references that a “proffer letter” is attached.”  (Read more: RedState, 7/25/2020)  (Archive)

John Podesta (l), Glenn Simpson (c) and Jake Sullivan

“Top officials with the Hillary Clinton campaign re-engaged with the opposition researchers behind the Steele dossier just three weeks after Donald Trump’s inauguration, newly declassified congressional witness transcripts reveal, indicating her campaign’s participation in an ongoing and well-funded effort to undermine the president by casting him as a tool of the Kremlin.

Clinton’s campaign chair John Podesta testified that he met on Feb. 10, 2017, with Daniel Jones, a former aide to California Sen. Dianne Feinstein, and Glenn Simpson and his partner Peter Fritsch of Fusion GPS. In separate testimony, Clinton’s senior foreign policy adviser Jake Sullivan revealed he also participated in the meeting. The Clinton campaign had funneled money through a law firm, Perkins Coie, to pay Fusion to compile the now-discredited dossier which was a prime driver of the Trump-Russia conspiracy theories – and FBI investigations — that have shadowed his administration.

Glenn Simpson and Peter Fritsch, co-founders of Fusion GPS, join Andrea Mitchell and defended their investigation into Donald Trump’s contacts with Russia in 2015. Simpson says that there was no Democratic conspiracy to frame Trump, and that the allegation that Christopher Steele’s dossier about Trump’s contacts in Russia had originated from Ukraine is ‘another phony conspiracy theory.'(Credit: Andrea Mitchell/MSNBC)

“They were interested in trying to raise money to continue their efforts to investigate the Russian interference in the campaign,” Podesta told the House Intelligence Committee in December 2017. The transcripts of his and Sullivan’s testimony were among the dozens of Russiagate interviews that had been withheld from the public for more than two years before being released last week.

Podesta said he agreed to help the trio open doors to big Democratic fund-raisers and sit down for press interviews and documentaries regarding any “new developments” uncovered by dossier author and former British intelligence officer Christopher Steele. Sullivan accompanied Podesta to the meeting, which he said lasted about an hour and was held in an office building in Washington.

“Was the conversation about the then-dossier?” a House panel staffer asked Sullivan, who had previously worked in the Obama administration as Vice President Joe Biden’s national security adviser.

“I mean not specifically about the dossier,” Sullivan replied. “lt was sort of about the effort that they had put into finding out ties between Trump and Russia and what their belief was based on the accumulation on that.”

Sullivan testified behind closed doors in a separate hearing held about two weeks after Podesta’s testimony.

Neither man was asked whether their efforts were known by Clinton, who has publicly suggested that Russia has compromising information. Podesta’s testimony did confirm earlier reporting by RealClearInvestigations that Clinton knew her campaign was paying opposition researchers to examine Trump’s ties to Russia.

Just 10 days before the  February 2017 meeting, Jones had incorporated a nonprofit called The Democracy Integrity Project (known internally as TDIP) after huddling with Simpson. The goal of their ongoing project is to “prove” the allegations in the dossier while digging up new dirt on Trump and feeding it to media outlets, congressional investigators and the FBI to derail his presidency.” (Read more: RealClearInvestigations, 5/14/2020)  (Archive)

Peter Strzok testifies to the Judiciary Committee on July 12, 2018. (Credit: Samira Bouaou/The Epoch Times)

“Peter Strzok, former FBI head of counterintelligence operations, significantly changed an early draft of the official FBI report from its questioning of Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, newly released text messages indicate.

To this day, the FBI hasn’t shown the early draft to Flynn. An eye-witness said the draft included exculpatory information, which was removed in the final version, Flynn’s lawyer, Sidney Powell, previously said.

(…) Agents are supposed to memorialize their interviews in an FD-302 form within five days, but the earliest 302 draft Flynn was provided was dated Feb. 10, 2017.

The new text messages suggest that an earlier version of the draft existed, either produced on Feb. 10 or earlier.

Strzok said he was “trying to not completely rewrite” the document “so as to save [redacted] voice.”

(Powell/Flynn Documents)

According to Powell, Strzok and Page were editing the Flynn 302 and Strzok was referring to the Supervisory Special Agent (SSA) who co-conducted the interview with him. The Epoch Times and other media have identified the agent as Joe Pientka.

The texts show “that there, in fact, exists an original 302 document created by SSA,” Powell said in an April 30 statement.

(…) “I’ve now found a witness who says the original 302 did in fact say that Flynn was honest with the agents and did not lie,” she told Larry O’Connor on his WMAL radio show. “So for somebody to delete that from the 302 is just beyond outrageous.”

She told The Epoch Times the witness saw the document.

The new text messages are among a number of documents recently handed over to Flynn as a result of an ongoing review of his case by Jeffrey Jensen, U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Missouri, who was directed in January to perform the review by Attorney General William Barr.

The documents revealed that an FBI official involved in the decision to interview Flynn had questioned whether the bureau was trying to catch Flynn in a lie rather than get to the truth through their questioning.” (Read more: The Epoch Times, 5/01/2020)  (Archive)

Late last week General Michael Flynn’s attorney Sidney Powell released her filing to the court. …It is clear that as requested by Powell, General Flynn’s case must be dismissed based on the many crimes committed by the government to set him up.

Techno Fog was first on the Internet to analyze the document –

(Techno_Fog/Twitter)

Powell describes how the Flynn 302 was altered –

(Techno_Fog/Twitter)

(Doc at Techno_Fog/Twitter)

Powell also notes in a footnote that James Clapper was related to the illegal leak of General Flynn’s phone call with Russian Ambassador Kislyak  –

(Techno_Fog/Twitter)

(Techno_Fog/Twitter)

(Timeline editor’s note: We’re including a clipping of Lisa Page (incoming) and Peter Strzok’s (outgoing)  February 10, 2017 text messages that are included in Sidney Powell’s court filing.)

(Powell Briefing – PDF page 48/161)

On page 26, Powell states the government’s case against Flynn is “so fundamentally unfair as to be shocking to the universal sense of justice.”

Powell also asserts that the government has the original 302’s that the FBI agents prepared as a result of their illegal interrogation of Flynn in the White House. The FBI’s system does not lose these documents. The only way they could be lost is through tampering. The government doesn’t want to provide them because it is clear that they will exonerate Flynn and it will be “game over” for the Deep State.

A few days later, Sidney Powell is retweeted:

(Cassandra Payne/Twitter)

(Read more: X22 Report, 10/29/2019)

“The records also include a February 10, 2017, email from Strzok to Page mentioning then-national security adviser Michael Flynn (five days before Flynn resigned) and includes a photo of Flynn and Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak. Strzok also makes a joke about how McCabe had fat-shamed Kislyak.” (Judicial Watch, 7/17/2020)

Shared photo of General Flynn and Sergey Kislyak (Credit: Peter Strzok)

George Papadopoulos (l) and Professor Joseph Mifsud meet in Rome, March 14, 2016. (Credit: CNN)

(…) “Documents I obtained from sources show Mifsud told the FBI in February 2017 that his contacts with Papadopoulos a year earlier, during the 2016 presidential campaign, were mostly innocuous. He made that point both in an FBI interview and a follow-up email to agents.

He described the contacts as an academic exercise in pursuit of peace, not a global plot to hijack the election. And he went out of his way to say there was no talk of sinister cybersecurity intentions such as a plot to hack Hillary Clinton’s emails.

“I reaffirm that the content of our conversations was always on wide geo-strategic issues,” he wrote FBI agents on Feb. 11, in an email that was quickly sent to the very top of the FBI’s counterintelligence division. Mifsud sent the email just hours after agents interviewed him

He said the conversations mostly centered around “how the Trump then-campaign team looked to develop a conversation on Europe/UK … and with Russia” and “the fallout in policy in the deteriorating relationship between the major countries in the world today.”

(…) “Mifsud acknowledged he introduced Papadopoulos to a contact in Russia, whom he identified as Dr. Ivan N. Timofeev, who he described as “a director of a think tank in Moscow with strong links with a number of U.S. institutions.”

But, again, he stressed the contacts were mostly academic in nature.” (Read more: The Hill, 8/29/2018)

“President Trump’s national security adviser, Michael Flynn, resigned late Monday night amid mounting accusations that he had illicit communications with the Russian ambassador to the United States that positioned him as a potential target for blackmail.

Flynn submitted his letter of resignation to the president just three weeks into the administration, saying he “inadvertently” gave Vice President Mike Pence “incomplete information” on phone calls he had with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak in which he allegedly discussed lifting sanctions against Moscow.

“I have sincerely apologized to the President and the Vice President,” the letter stated, “and they have accepted my apology.”

Flynn, who was fired by then-President Barack Obama as head of the Defense Intelligence Agency, said he was honored to serve with Trump and believed in the mission to “make America great again.”

Retired Army Gen. Keith Kellogg will take over on an interim basis.” (Read more: The New York Post, 2/13/2017)

Hillary Clinton is putting her newly-found extra free time to good use and trolls General Flynn and his son via Twitter.

The two-time failed presidential candidate responds to a tweet from long-time confidante Phillipe Reines directed at General Michael Flynn and his son saying “what goes around ‘COMETS’ around,“ a reference to the Pizzagate scandal.

Reines tweets late in the evening on the same day General Flynn resigns as President Trump’s national security advisor:

A few minutes later, Reines retweets Clinton’s quick response to his tweet:

Reines is referencing a tweet that Flynn posted in December 2016.

(The tweet has since been deleted)

(…) There is a SCIF at Mar-a-Lago, which is used when President Donald Trump is in town.

Ironically, the existence of the SCIF at the president’s private club in Palm Beach was first revealed in a White House press briefing on February 14, 2017, to rebut criticism Trump himself had put sensitive discussions at risk.

That was days after Trump held an impromptu security gathering in a Mar-a-Lago dining area with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and their aides moments after a North Korea missile test.

Aides surround Shinzo Abe after he and Trump are notified of a North Korea missile launch during his visit to Mar-a-Lago on February 11, 2017. (Credit: Shannon Donnelly/Daily Wire)

But during a press briefing three days later, former White House press secretary Sean Spicer downplayed the discussion and said Trump had been briefed in a secure area before dinner.

“The president was briefed in a SCIF ahead of dinner,” Spicer said. “He went with his national security team. They briefed him on the situation in North Korea.”

President Donald Trump receives a briefing on a military strike on Syria from his National Security team, including a video teleconference with Secretary of Defense, Gen. James Mattis, and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Joseph F. Dunford, on Thursday, April 6, 2017, in a secured location at Mar-a-Lago in West Palm Beach, Florida.(Credit: Shealah Craighead/Wikipedia)

Spicer said people wrongly jumped to “nefarious conclusions” about the famous photo of Trump, Abe and their aides huddled around a table with Mar-a-Lago members and guests seated nearby.

“At that time, apparently there was a photo taken, which everyone jumped to nefarious conclusions about what may or may not be discussed,” Spicer told the media that day. “There was simply a discussion about press logistics, where to host the event. And then after the dinner, the president went back into the SCIF to get a further update from his team. So I’m not really sure where people jumped to conclusions. There is a SCIF there. It was utilized on two occasions that evening to convey to the president by his national security team the situation in North Korea.” (Read more: The Palm Beach Post, 11/5/2019)  (Archive)

On February 14, 2017, former-Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for the Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs, Kathleen Kavalec forwarded Ohr a Huffington Post article touting the Steele Dossier’s claim that an alleged deal between Russian oil company Rosneft and Trump supporter Steve Schwarzman constituted a “high crime of treason worthy of impeachment.” Ohr forwarded the article to the FBI’s Washington Field Office the same day.

(A snippet from the Huffington Post article)

Four months prior to this exchange, Kavalec had found Christopher Steele not credible because of factual inaccuracies that he had relayed to her in October 2016, as uncovered by Judicial Watch.

(Judicial Watch, 8/14/2019)

Statement for the Record

Senate Select Committee on Intelligence
James B. Comey
June 8, 2017

Chairman Burr, Ranking Member Warner, Members of the Committee

Thank you for inviting me to appear before you today. I was asked to testify today to describe for you my interactions with President-Elect and President Trump on subjects that I understand are of interest to you. I have not included every detail from my conversations with the President, but, to the best of my recollection, I have tried to include information that may be relevant to the Committee.

February 14 Oval Office Meeting

James Comey (Credit: ABC News)

On February 14, I went to the Oval Office for a scheduled counterterrorism briefing of the President. He sat behind the desk and a group of us sat in a semi-circle of about six chairs facing him on the other side of the desk. The Vice President, Deputy Director of the CIA, Director of the National CounterTerrorism Center, Secretary of Homeland Security, the Attorney General, and I were in the semi-circle of chairs. I was directly facing the President, sitting between the Deputy CIA Director and the Director of NCTC. There were quite a few others in the room, sitting behind us on couches and chairs.

The President signaled the end of the briefing by thanking the group and telling them all that he wanted to speak to me alone. I stayed in my chair. As the participants started to leave the Oval Office, the Attorney General lingered by my chair, but the President thanked him and said he wanted to speak only with me. The last person to leave was Jared Kushner, who also stood by my chair and exchanged pleasantries with me. The President then excused him, saying he wanted to speak with me.

When the door by the grandfather clock closed, and we were alone, the President began by saying, “I want to talk about Mike Flynn.” Flynn had resigned the previous day. The President began by saying Flynn hadn’t done anything wrong in speaking with the Russians, but he had to let him go because he had misled the Vice President. He added that he had other concerns about Flynn, which he did not then specify.

The President then made a long series of comments about the problem with leaks of classified information — a concern I shared and still share. After he had spoken for a few minutes about leaks, Reince Priebus leaned in through the door by the grandfather clock and I could see a group of people waiting behind him. The President waved at him to close the door, saying he would be done shortly. The door closed.

The President then returned to the topic of Mike Flynn, saying, “He is a good guy and has been through a lot.” He repeated that Flynn hadn’t done anything wrong on his calls with the Russians, but had misled the Vice President. He then said, “I hope you can see your way clear to letting this go, to letting Flynn go. He is a good guy. I hope you can let this go.” I replied only that “he is a good guy.” (In fact, I had a positive experience dealing with Mike Flynn when he was a colleague as Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency at the beginning of my term at FBI.) I did not say I would “let this go.”

The President returned briefly to the problem of leaks. I then got up and left out the door by the grandfather clock, making my way through the large group of people waiting there, including Mr. Priebus and the Vice President.

I immediately prepared an unclassified memo of the conversation about Flynn and discussed the matter with FBI senior leadership. I had understood the President to be requesting that we drop any investigation of Flynn in connection with false statements about his conversations with the Russian ambassador in December. I did not understand the President to be talking about the broader investigation into Russia or possible links to his campaign. I could be wrong, but I took him to be focusing on what had just happened with Flynn’s departure and the controversy around his account of his phone calls. Regardless, it was very concerning, given the FBI’s role as an independent investigative agency.

The FBI leadership team agreed with me that it was important not to infect the investigative team with the President’s request, which we did not intend to abide. We also concluded that, given that it was a one-on-one conversation, there was nothing available to corroborate my account. We concluded it made little sense to report it to Attorney General Sessions, who we expected would likely recuse himself from involvement in Russia-related investigations. (He did so two weeks later.) The Deputy Attorney General’s role was then filled in an acting capacity by a United States Attorney, who would also not be long in the role. After discussing the matter, we decided to keep it very closely held, resolving to figure out what to do with it down the road as our investigation progressed. The investigation moved ahead at full speed, with none of the investigative team members — or the Department of Justice lawyers supporting them — aware of the President’s request.

Shortly afterwards, I spoke with Attorney General Sessions in person to pass along the President’s concerns about leaks. I took the opportunity to implore the Attorney General to prevent any future direct communication between the President and me. I told the AG that what had just happened — him being asked to leave while the FBI Director, who reports to the AG, remained behind — was inappropriate and should never happen. He did not reply. For the reasons discussed above, I did not mention that the President broached the FBI’s potential investigation of General Flynn. (Read more: CNN, 6/8/2017)

On February 14, 2017, Strzok forwards Priestap a New York Times article titled “Trump Campaign Aides Had Repeated Contacts With Russian Intelligence.” In his cover note, Strzok states, “This is the article Mike K [presumably Kortan] gave a heads up on earlier. Contains flat out inaccuracies. I will sit down with [redacted] early and draft some comments in advance of D [Director Comey] meeting with Burr.”

New York Time’s headline, 2/14/2017

Priestap replies, “Thank you and, yes, please get info to [redacted] Lisa and Rybicki (and cc me), as soon as you have finished.” Strzok then forwards the exchange to Page, Rybicki, Jon Moffa and an unidentified person, saying, “See thread below. There are several significant errors/inaccuracies in the NYT article this evening. We’ll get you a red-lined copy with comments first thing tomorrow in advance of D meeting with Burr.”

Judicial Watch

February 15, 2017, Michael Kortan emails Strzok about the same piece, saying, “Pete, Can you send me you [sic] latest analysis on the NYT story from last night?” Strzok replies, “Just sent on red side.”

(Judicial Watch, 8/28/2020)

The Penn Biden Center, located in Washington, DC, opened its doors in February 2018. (Credit: New York Post)

“A government watchdog is demanding the US attorney probing Hunter Biden in Delaware investigate tens of millions in anonymous donations from China to the University of Pennsylvania, where an academic center is named for his father, President Biden.

The Ivy League college raked in a total of $54.6 million from 2014 through June 2019 in donations from China, including $23.1 million in anonymous gifts starting in 2016, according to public records.

Most of the anonymous donations came after the university announced in February 2017 that it would create the Penn Biden Center for Diplomacy and Global Engagement. Joe Biden, whose term as vice president had just ended, was to lead the center and was also named a professor at the university.

The center, which is located in Washington, DC, opened its doors in February 2018. Antony Blinken, whom Biden named as secretary of state, briefly served as its managing director.

The Ivy League university received $15.8 million in anonymous Chinese gifts that year, including one eye-popping $14.5 million donation in May 2018, records show.

The flurry of donations may be related to first son Hunter Biden’s business interests in China, the National Legal and Policy Center, a Virginia-based watchdog, alleged in complaints sent in May and October 2020 to the Departments of Education and Justice.”

Last week, the group asked US Attorney David Weiss to step in and investigate the Chinese largesse to the school as part of his federal tax probe of Hunter Biden.

“We’ve asked … Weiss to pursue the larger network of individuals and institutions who benefited from millions doled out by foreign interests connected to Hunter Biden’s work in China and Ukraine,” said Tom Anderson, director of the NLPC’s Government Integrity Project.

In its 12-page complaint, the watchdog cited a 2017 text found on Hunter Biden’s infamous laptop that CEFC China Energy Co, one of the firms that Hunter Biden had a financial stake in, wanted to lobby politicians in the US but did not want to register under the Foreign Agent Registration Act, as required for all foreign lobbyists.” (Read more: New York Post, 4/9/2022)  (Archive)

Also, checked Hunter’s laptop and this e-mail regarding the Penn Biden Center is fascinating…

Item 4. Wealth Creationhttps://t.co/ZE8gL7Ucxq pic.twitter.com/2XiETZXb53

— Titania (@Titania977) January 10, 2023

Only Solution To CCP Infiltration Is Subpoena Of Every Penny Of CCP Money That Went In US Pockets

Julian Assange (l) and Adam Waldman (Credit: public domain)

(…) “This yarn begins in January 2017 when Assange’s legal team approached Waldman — known for his government connections — to see if the new Trump administration would negotiate with the WikiLeaks founder, holed up in Ecuador’s London embassy. They hoped Waldman, a former Clinton Justice Department official, might navigate the U.S. law enforcement bureaucracy and find the right people to engage.”

(…) “Assange had a bargaining chip: The U.S. government knew he had a massive trove of documents from classified CIA computers, identifying sensitive assets and chronicling the agency’s offensive cyber warfare weapons.

Waldman contacted Ohr, a Justice official he’d met during the Russia election case. They talked by phone and encrypted text messages in early January, then met Feb. 3, 2017, in Washington, records show. In between, Waldman met three times with Assange in London.”

(…) “Ohr consulted his chain of command and the intelligence community about what appeared to be an extraordinary overture that raised hopes the government could negotiate what Assange would release and what he might redact, to protect the names of exposed U.S. officials.

Assange made clear through the lawyer that he would never compromise his sources, or stop publishing information, but was willing to consider concessions like redactions.”

(…) “The shuttle diplomacy soon resulted in an informal offer — known in government parlance as a “Queen for a Day” proffer — in which Assange identified what he wanted and what he might give.

“Subject to adequate and binding protections, including but not limited to an acceptable immunity and safe passage agreement, Mr. Assange welcomes the opportunity to discuss with the U.S. government risk mitigation approaches relating to CIA documents in WikiLeaks’ possession or control, such as the redaction of agency personnel in hostile jurisdictions and foreign espionage risks to WikiLeaks staff,” Waldman wrote Laufman on March 28, 2017.

Not included in the written proffer was an additional offer from Assange: He was willing to discuss technical evidence ruling out certain parties in the controversial leak of Democratic Party emails to WikiLeaks during the 2016 election. The U.S. government believes those emails were hacked by Russia; Assange insists they did not come from Moscow.

“Mr. Assange offered to provide technical evidence and discussion regarding who did not engage in the DNC releases,” Waldman told me. “Finally, he offered his technical expertise to the U.S. government to help address what he perceived as clear flaws in security systems that led to the loss of the U.S. cyber weapons program.”

A snippet of Julian Assange’s agreement.

(…) “But an unexpected intervention by Comey — relayed through Warner — soured the negotiations, multiple sources tell me. Assange eventually unleashed a series of leaks that U.S. officials say damaged their cyber warfare capabilities for a long time to come.

What U.S. officials did not fully comprehend was that an earlier event weighed heavily on the Assange team’s distrust of U.S. intentions.

Just a few days after the negotiations opened in mid-February, Waldman reached out to Sen. Warner; the lawyer wanted to see if Senate Intelligence Committee staff wanted any contact with Assange, to ask about Russia or other issues.

Warner engaged with Waldman over encrypted text messages, then reached out to Comey. A few days later, Warner contacted Waldman with an unexpected plea.

“He told me he had just talked with Comey and that, while the government was appreciative of my efforts, my instructions were to stand down, to end the discussions with Assange,” Waldman told me. Waldman offered contemporaneous documents to show he memorialized Warner’s exact words.” (Read more: The Hill, 6/25/2018)

CNN framed a story of White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus asking the FBI to rebuke an earlier story, based on anonymous leaks, of Trump campaign contacts with Russia.  According to the agenda, CNN wanted to make it look like the administration was pressuring the FBI to provide the White House political cover.

However, the truth behind the entire episode shows an entirely different story than the false narrative created by CNN.

On February 15th while discussing another issue FBI Assistant Director Andrew McCabe asked Reince for 5 minutes alone after the meeting.  At the one-on-one McCabe told Priebus the New York Times Russia and Trump campaign story was a “bunch of BS”.

Andrew McCabe (l) and Reince Preibus (Credit: Conservative Treehouse)

Priebus asked McCabe if McCabe would be able to say that publicly.  McCabe said he would check.  Later, McCabe called back and said he couldn’t issue a statement about it. (See Screengrab)

So the entire construct by CNN of the White House (via Priebus) trying to pressure the FBI is complete nonsense. Very Fake News…aka a false narrative.  It was the FBI who approached Priebus and wanted to clear the record.

Priebus is simply asking the FBI to make the same disclosure public that they were making to him in private.   Reince Priebus is asking for transparency, for truth, for openness.

President Trump goes to twitter to call out two issues. First, the media constructing fake news:

However, perhaps more important, it’s the leaks within the FBI, to CNN which aid in the construction of the false narrative, that are now becoming more concerning to President Trump.

(Read more: Conservative Treehouse, 2/24/2017)

“In our last article, we went through a series of warrants related to the U.S. Dept. of Justice (DOJ) investigation of Lt. Gen. Michael T. Flynn (Ret.). DOJ disclosed the warrants late in 2020 in response to a FOIA lawsuit brought by a coalition of corporate media outlets. We left off by asking:

“The warrants in Attachments 4 and 5 specifically name email accounts and electronic devices, unlike Attachments 1 through 3 where the named targets were individuals in the earlier versions or law firms in the revimedised ones. And all the electronic files and devices are “currently located at [the] FBI Washington [D.C.] Field Office.

So the FBI is already in possession of the electronic files and devices. The only reason that should be the case is if they had already been subpoenaed or turned over willingly by the Trump transition team/administration. In either case, the FBI shouldn’t need a warrant to search the evidence already in their possession. So what’s the deal?”

~Excerpt from “The DOJ Used The Logan Act to Obtain Warrants Against General Flynn”

We believe we found the answers for both; how the FBI obtained the materials and why The Logan Act was used as the basis for the final two warrants. When both are considered together, the degree of government corruption is simply shocking.

The story of how the FBI came into possession of the material is detailed in a 285-page Senate report jointly by Sen. Chuck Grassley’s (R-IA) Committee on Finance and Sen. Ron Johnson’s (R-WI) Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs from October 2020. The report is titled appropriately enough, “Don’t Brief the Trump Team: How the GSA and the FBI Secretly Shared Trump Transition Team Records,” and exposes the degree of bureaucratic resistance and corruption the Trump administration was facing right out of the gates.

October 2020 Grassley-Johnson Senate Report

In short, officials at the highest level of the General Services Administration (GSA) were gaslit by media reports about Gen. Flynn’s resignation as President Trump’s National Security Advisor (NSA) on February 15, 2017. Based solely on the news—without being prompted and on their own accord—they reached out to the FBI through their Office of Inspector General (GSA OIG) to see if they should begin preserving all Trump Presidential Transition Team (PTT) records still in their possession. This was done in direct contrast to a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) GSA had with Trump’s PTT organization (Trump for America, Inc. or “TFA”), and in violation of their own rules and without any legal basis to do so. Based simply on a phone call with the FBI, GSA halted its standard procedures of wiping all PTT records and devices. This despite the fact they were the private records of TFA and not the property of GSA or U.S. Government records subject to any record-keeping regulations.

GSA OIG Carol Ochoa previously worked for the law firm Covington & Burling.

GSA would then spend most of 2017 misleading the Trump White House and TFA about the status of the PTT records in coordination with the FBI and Mueller Special Counsel Office (SCO), even denying Trump’s representatives access to copies of their own records for an extended period of time. GSA would eventually hand over the PTT records to the FBI and Mueller SCO late in the summer of 2017, again without any legal justification. Trump’s White House or TFA was not even informed ahead of time—affording them the opportunity to review, object, or exert executive privilege or attorney-client privilege on anything—and was only made aware of the GSA disclosures well after-the-fact in mid-December 2017.

October 2020 Grassley-Johnson Senate Report

(Read more: The Washington Pundit, 6/22/22)  (Archive)

Cofer Black (Credit: Jack MacGregor)

“Mitt Romney’s national security adviser in his 2012 campaign — a career CIA spook who rose to its top levels — sits on the board of directors of Burisma, the Ukrainian gas company that formerly paid Hunter Biden $50K a month despite his complete lack of credentials or qualifications.

It is also an odd coincidence that Mitt has, as CNN puts it, “been a lone Republican voice expressing concern about President Donald Trump’s July phone call with Volodymyr Zelensky in which Trump asked Ukraine’s President to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden and his family.”

Still more oddly coincidental is the background of Mitt’s adviser deep in the CIA, part of the Intelligence Community that has “six ways from Sunday” in foiling a mere president who might oppose it, according to Chuck Schumer.

(…) Here are the specifics:

Back on October 6, 2011, presidential candidate Mitt Romney proudly announced that Joseph Cofer Black (listed as “Cofer Black”) was among the people chosen as “special advisers”:

… to advise Governor Romney on foreign policy strategy, defense issues, intelligence matters, counterterrorism, and regional policy. These advisers will assist Governor Romney as he presents his vision for restoring American leadership in the world and securing our enduring interests and ideals abroad.

Mr. Black brought to this role his extensive background at the CIA, which he joined in 1974 and where he trained for covert operations.  He rose rapidly through the ranks, becoming director of the National Counterterrorism Center from 1999 to 2002.  Coincidentally, this was the time in which al-Qaeda planned and carried out the 911 attack without hindrance from the counterintelligence apparatus of the Intelligence Community.  But Black was not penalized; he failed upward, being appointed ambassador at large and coordinator for counter-terrorism by President George W. Bush in December 2002. (Read more: American Thinker, 9/26/2019)

(…) “The media’s focus on Trump’s Russian connections ignores the much more extensive and lucrative business relationships of top Democrats with Kremlin-associated oligarchs and companies. Thanks to the Panama Papers, we know that the Podesta Group (founded by John Podesta’s brother, Tony) lobbied for Russia’s largest bank, Sberbank. “Sberbank is the Kremlin, they don’t do anything major without Putin’s go-ahead, and they don’t tell him ‘no’ either,” explained a retired senior U.S. intelligence official. According to a Reuters report, Tony Podesta was “among the high-profile lobbyists registered to represent organizations backing Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich.” Among these was the European Center, which paid Podesta $900,000 for his lobbying.

That’s not all: The busy Podesta Group also represented Uranium One, a uranium company acquired by the Russian government which received approval from Hillary Clinton’s State Department to mine for uranium in the U.S. and gave Russia twenty percent control of US uranium. The New York Times reported Uranium One’s chairman, Frank Guistra, made significant donations to the Clinton Foundation, and Bill Clinton was paid $500,000 for one speech from a Russian investment bank that has “links to the Kremlin that was promoting Uranium One stock.” Notably, Frank Giustra, the Clinton Foundation’s largest and most controversial donor, does not appear anywhere in Clinton’s “non-private” emails. It is possible that the emails of such key donors were automatically scrubbed to protect the Clinton Foundation.

Let’s not leave out fugitive Ukrainian oligarch, Dymtro Firtash. He is represented by Democratic heavyweight lawyer, Lanny Davis, who accused Trump of “inviting Putin to commit espionage” (Trump’s quip: If Putin has Hillary’s emails, release them) but denies all wrongdoing by Hillary.

(…) Lobbying for Russia is a bi-partisan activity. Gazprombank GPB, a subsidiary of Russia’s third largest bank, Gazprombank, is represented by former Sen. John Breaux, (D., La.), and former Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott (R., Miss.), as main lobbyists on “banking laws and regulations, including applicable sanctions.” The Breaux-Lott client is currently in the Treasury Department list of Russian firms prohibited from debt financing with U.S. banks.” (Read more: Forbes, 2/18/2017)

“A Chinese-American businessman at the center of a Clinton campaign finance scandal secretly filmed a tell-all video as an ‘insurance policy’ – because he feared being murdered.”

Johnny Chung (Credit: The Daily Mail)

(…) “In the never-before-released footage, [Johnny] Chung described how he feared for his life after he publicly admitted to funneling money from Chinese officials to President Bill Clinton’s 1996 reelection campaign.

He also claimed Democrats pressured him to stay silent about his dealings with the Clintons and said the FBI tried to enlist him in a sting against a top Chinese general at a Los Angeles airport.

The video comes amid renewed interest in foreign influence in Washington, as some members of President Donald Trump’s team have been scrutinized for their associations with Russian officials.

The video grew out of a controversy in the mid-1990s when evidence surfaced that Chinese officials were pouring hundreds of thousands into then president Bill Clinton’s reelection campaign through American straw donors.

Chung, one of the main players in the ‘Chinagate’ scandal, was accused of giving over $300,000 to the Democratic National Committee on behalf of the head of China’s military intelligence agency during Clinton’s reelection bid.

Chung cooperated with the Department of Justice during the investigation, and was sentenced to five years of probation for campaign finance violations, bank fraud and tax evasion in 1998. (Read more: The Daily Mail, 2/23/2017)