Just what do the newly unsealed General Michael Flynn case documents actually reveal? Are they really “bombshells?”

Do they exonerate Flynn, President Trump’s former national security advisor?

And, was the Steele dossier really a product of Russian disinformation, as some are alleging, with Sergei Millian playing a role?

In this episode, we sit down with investigative journalist 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.”

This is American Thought Leaders 🇺🇸, and I’m Jan Jekielek.

An exhaustively researched book that reads like an investigative thriller, Fallout reveals how Obama’s “Russian Reset” led to corruption, scandal, and a desperate bid to impeach Donald Trump.

(Official publication date, July 14, 2020)

In 2015, a major story broke exposing Hillary Clinton’s role in approving the sale of American uranium assets to the Russian state nuclear agency, Rosatom. Not only did the sale of Uranium One put 20 percent of America’s domestic uranium supply under the control of Vladimir Putin, there was also evidence that the Clintons themselves had hugely profited from the deal.
When presidential candidate Donald Trump made Uranium One the centerpiece of his “Crooked Hillary” attacks, the Clinton team feared its potential to damage Hillary’s campaign. Others in the Obama-Biden camp worried that if elected, Trump would expose their role in selling out America’s security to Putin. Their desperate need to neutralize the issue led them to launch an unprecedented investigation into the Trump campaign’s purported ties to Russia.

The infamous Steele dossier, produced by Clinton-connected Fusion GPS, sparked an investigation under FBI Director James Comey. Instead of ending after the election, the investigation grew bigger, eventually leading to Comey’s firing and the appointment of Special Counsel Robert Mueller. When Mueller failed to find grounds for impeachment, Democrats seized on an ambiguous phone call with the Ukrainian president as a pretext to remove Trump from office. This gambit blew up in their faces when it exposed the secrets that Democrats tried hard to keep buried.

An indispensable guide to the hidden background of recent events, Fallout shows how Putin’s bid for nuclear dominance produced a series of political scandals that ultimately posed one of the greatest threats to our democracy in modern American history.” (Amazon)

Chris Wray (Credit: public domain)

An interesting article from Fox News asks the question of whether Mueller’s special counsel attorney Brandon Van Grack misled Judge Sullivan in the Flynn case by not being forthcoming about the background documents under the DOJ Brady obligation.

Additionally, as a consequence of the Flynn evidence discoveries, people are now asking why the FBI and DOJ did not produce these documents earlier.  Representative Jim Jordan is specifically asking these questions of current FBI Director Chris Wray.

In response to the Fox News article, the FBI has released a statement which itself is very interesting.  Apparently the FBI Director is trying to dig himself and his institution out of a hole, but it is only getting worse.  First, here’s the follow-up from the FBI:

After this article was published, the FBI provided a statement to Fox News saying that under Wray’s leadership, the bureau had turned over relevant Flynn materials to the U.S. attorney probing possible FBI criminal misconduct during the Trump probe, John Durham — but the FBI didn’t say when exactly the handoff happened.

“Under Director Wray’s leadership, the FBI has fully cooperated and been transparent with the review being conducted by U.S. Attorney Jeff Jensen, just as it has been with U.S. Attorney John Durham and was with Inspector General Michael Horowitz,” the statement read.

The FBI continued: “With regard to certain documents in the Michael Flynn matter from the 2016-2017 time period that are now the subject of reporting by the press, the FBI previously produced those materials to the Inspector General and U.S. Attorney Durham. The Flynn investigation was initiated and conducted during this time period, under prior FBI leadership.

Since taking office, Director Wray has stressed the importance of strictly abiding by established processes, without exception. Director Wray remains firmly committed to addressing the failures under prior FBI leadership while maintaining the foundational principles of rigor, objectivity, accountability, and ownership in fulfilling the Bureau’s mission to protect the American people and defend the Constitution.” (link)

The FBI statement is factually flawed on many levels and substantively false on the specifics.

“With regard to certain documents in the Michael Flynn matter from the 2016-2017 time period that are now the subject of reporting by the press, the FBI previously produced those materials to the Inspector General and U.S. Attorney Durham.

Notice how this part of the statement does not say the exculpatory documents were turned over to the Special Counsel (they were).  Also notice how Wray is attempting to deflect the timing by saying they were produced to the IG and Durham.

U.S. Attorney John Durham didn’t enter the picture until May 2019, as instructed by newly confirmed AG Bill Barr.  So what was the FBI doing with those documents prior to Durham in 2017 and 2018?

The prosecution of Flynn started mid-2017; and Chris Wray knew of the specific misconduct within the FBI at the same time.  Remember, Wray removed James Baker from official duty as FBI legal counsel in December 2017 [LINK] approximately three weeks after the corrupt and coerced Flynn guilty plea on November 30th.

FBI Director Wray allowed James Baker to remain in the FBI, in some unknown capacity, through May 4, 2018, when Baker officially resigned [LINK]  By late December 2017 Wray clearly knew several FBI officials were participants in a multitude of corrupt schemes, including the prosecution of Michael Flynn.

The sheer volume of removals from the FBI outlines the extent of Chris Wray’s knowledge. Think about it….

FBI Agent Peter Strzok was removed; FBI lawyer Lisa Page was removed; FBI counsel James Baker was removed; FBI public relations officer Michael Kortan was removed; and eventually FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe was removed.  All of these removals surrounded discovery of their corrupt and political activity in 2016, 2017, and early 2018….

…But the evidence was not provided to the Flynn defense until April 2020?

Let’s not forget in July 2018, a full year after FBI Director Chris Wray took over leadership, the FBI lied to the FISA court about the Carter Page FISA application; and the DOJ/FBI made the ridiculous claim the FISA application was still adequately predicated.

So it seems more than a little ridiculous for FBI Director Chris Wray to justify the hidden documents by saying the FBI did turn them over to John Durham (2019) and/or AUSO Jeff Jensen in 2020; when he held back the evidence in 2017, 2018, while the underlying activity was being discovered.

Also don’t forget the original purpose of U.S. Attorney John Lausch (Chicago), yeah, remember him?  In 2018 John Lausch’s entire function was to produce documents.

Additionally, if the FBI did factually turn over all of these documents to Inspector General Michael Horowitz while three distinct IG investigations were ongoing, then how did the IG claim they could find “no evidence of political bias”, when the explosive documents – specifically the Bill Priestap notes – show direct evidence of biased intent?  What does that say about the fidelity of the Inspector General?

Lastly, again the construct of the Mueller investigation being used as a shield surfaces.  Not only did the corrupt Mueller probe control various elements within the DOJ and FBI, but the Mueller probe as an “ongoing investigation”, shielded those documents from sunlight and discovery.” (Read more: Conservative Treehouse, 5/05/2020)  (Archive)

Photo of John McCain with “Source D-Source E” of Steele Dossier — Sergei Millian. (Credit: Paul Sperry/Twitter)

“Sergei Millian is not in hiding. Even if he was, he isn’t any longer. He reached out to SaraACarter.com on Tuesday to dispute a recent podcast interview with a famous British historian who accused him of possibly being connected to Russia’s GRU, Moscow’s military intelligence. He called the allegations outlandish and accused historian Nigel West of attempting to spread disinformation about him, much like former British spy Christopher Steele did about the Trump campaign.

Millian, an American citizen born in Belarus, was believed to be an unwitting source, in Steele’s infamous and now-debunked dossier. But lawmakers and some intelligence experts have more questions than answers when it comes to Millian. They say Millian is the only one that can provide clarity on what exactly happened during his time with Steele.

On Monday, this reporter interviewed West on The Sara Carter Show podcast. He stated that he believed, based on Millian’s own past statements in open-source media, that he could be linked to Russian intelligence.

Shortly after the podcast and story were posted, Millian reached out to this reporter to dispute West’s assertions saying emphatically that the information is “one-hundred percent false.”

“Nigel West so far gave 100% false information about me in his last public interview in London (where he claimed I was PSS),” Millian told me. “Now, he doubled on from the first lie and there is not an ounce of truth what he claims. He is an out of his mind crazy, deranged man. I’m not kidding. Ask him to provide proof of any of his false rumors and wild innuendoes. USSR disbanded when I was still a teenager. The big question is why West, out of London, lies about me, an AMERICAN citizen, so much just like Steele before West? Is it coordinated and what’s their plan?”

But a mystery still surrounds Millian and senior U.S. lawmakers are seeking to interview him. Ranking Republican of the House Intelligence Committee Devin Nunes has said he wishes to interview the mysterious Millian.” (Read more: Sara Carter, 5/05/2020) (Archive)

The DOJ has finally released a less redacted version of the second special counsel scope memo, written August 2, 2017 by Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein.

The second scope memo (full pdf here) authorized Robert Mueller to target Carter Page, Paul Manafort, George Papadopoulos, Michael Flynn, and an unknown entity (Richard Gates, Michael Cohen, Michael Flynn Jr. likely possibilities).

The DOJ has been hiding the second scope memo behind redactions for almost three years.  A heavily redacted version was released in April 2018.  They are finally releasing a less redaction version today (see below).  Don’t forget, the DOJ has never released or discussed the third (super secret) scope memo written on October 20, 2017.

The scope memos are important because when contrast against known evidence of investigative corruption the scope memos show how targets were selected by the Mueller team and approved by Deputy AG Rod Rosenstein.  Additionally, the scope memos show what actions Mueller’s corrupt investigative authorities were looking into.

On a personal note CTH has been like a dog with a bone on these scope memos for almost three years because it was clear the FBI investigative unit was fully aware the Russian involvement was total nonsense in early 2017.  So all of these expanded scopes were based on a false premise.  DAG Rosenstein was authorizing the special counsel to target people with clear knowledge the primary basis for the targeting was false. These were investigations in search of a crime.

When the 2nd scope was previously released (April 2nd 2018), page two was almost entirely redacted.  Everyone knew Carter Page was primary, and now we can officially see who three additional targets were, and based on what claims: (page 2)

The strongest possibility for the remaining redaction is Richard Gates (Manafort’s partner who was never charged).  However, it could be Michael Cohen, President Trump’s attorney; or it could be Michael G Flynn Jr (Mike Flynn Jr) who was also never charged.

The fifth redaction will likely be claimed as justified by the DOJ, because the person outlined was not charged with a crime. Hence the possibility of Mike G Flynn or Richard “Rick” Gates…. [It could also be Jeff Sessions]

However, with public trust in the DOJ/FBI at nil, I will not trust that traditional justification….

There is a possibility the Fifth name is redacted because it would be damaging or embarrassing to the DOJ and/or would highlight the corrupt intents of the Mueller investigation.  My gut tells me this is the reason.

♦Regarding Papadopoulos:  Notice how the Mueller team was claiming the possibility of “lobbying for the Israeli government”.  Another FARA violation.  It was non-existent because Papadopoulos wasn’t lobbying, however, it now makes more sense why the corrupt Mueller team tried to set-up Papadopoulos with the $10,000 sting operation.

Papadopoulos was lured to Israel under the pretense of a contract for consultation on energy development.  That’s where CIA operative George Tawil gave Papadopoulos $10,000 in cash under sketchy circumstances.   The FBI was waiting for Papadopoulos at Dulles airport upon his return, and they searched for the cash without a warrant using the authority of customs, duties and a legal airport search.  [More Here]

#1) Papadopoulos was lured to Israel and paid in Israel to give the outline of a FARA premise (ie. Papadopoulos is an agent of Israel). #2) Bringing $10,000 (or more) in cash into the U.S., without reporting, is a violation of U.S. treasury laws. Add into that aspect the FARA violation and the money can be compounded into #3) laundering charges.

(A “laundering” charge applies if the money is illegally obtained. The FARA violation would be the *illegal* aspect making the treasury charges heavier. Note: the use of the airport baggage-check avoids the need for a search warrant (the agents didn’t have one).)

Andrew Weissmann and Brandon Van Grack (special counsel 951/FARA expert) were conducting an entrapment scheme that would have ended up with three violations of law: (1) Treasury violation; (2) FARA violation; (3) Money laundering…. All they needed was Papadopoulos to carry the undeclared cash into the U.S.

The key aspect is the FARA violation.  As we have seen in the EDVA case against Flynn’s partner Bijan Rafiekian, the DOJ-NSD bizarre interpretation of FARA laws creates a violation from any unregistered purposeful business contact with a foreign entity.

What Weissmann wanted for Papadopoulos was to create the same FARA scenario that previously trapped Manafort, Flynn, and Rafiekian.  They intercepted Papadopoulos in Washington DC because it was the customs port of entry.  Papadopoulos was ticketed to Chicago with a transfer flight at Dulles.

However, because Papadopoulos suspected something, and left the money in Greece with his lawyers, upon arrival at the DC airport the sting operation collapsed in reverse.

No money means no treasury violation, no laundering and no evidence of the consultancy agreement; which would have been repurposed in the DOJ filing to mean lobbying for Israel via Mr. Tawil (FARA 951 violation) and Tawil would have become a confidential informant and witness (though Tawil would likely never be used to testilie because the special counsel would force a plea).

That operational collapse is why the FBI agents were “scrambling” at the airport and why they had no pre-existing criminal complaint.  The DOJ couldn’t get a warrant because they couldn’t tell a judge their suspect was traveling with $10k from Israel because the judge would ask how they knew that.

The entrapment’s success was contingent upon the cash as a pre-existing condition; and arriving at a Federal airport means they didn’t need a search warrant.

Note how even if Papadopoulos didn’t have the full $10k, the DOJ-NSD would only have lost the treasury violation…. they could still have used any substantial amount of money to charge the FARA part of the business arrangement by questioning Papadopoulos about where he gained the cash from.  [Full Backstory Here]

♦Regarding Michael Flynn – Notice the first ridiculous point: “Committed a crime or crimes by engaging in conversations with Russian government officials during the period of the Trump transition.”   That’s Rod Rosenstein authorizing the Mueller special counsel to investigate a Logan Act violation…. authorizing that IN AUGUST 2017?  Total nonsense.

The fourth bullet point on Flynn was the claim they used against Mike G Flynn Jr. to get Lt. General Flynn to plea.   This argument was later made in court against Flynn’s business partner Bijan Rafiekian (Flynn Intel Group), only to have the case totally thrown out of court by a Virginia judge; in a blistering and extremely rare judicial move.

All four points against Flynn were fabrications; but seeing them written down as to justify the fraudulent investigations is blood-boiling.

Page #3 of the August 2, 2017, scope memo:

But wait… The release of the second scope memo is not good enough…

We know there is a third scope memo dated October 20, 2017, because it was outlined in the Mueller report:

This third scope memo is perhaps the most damaging of all because it was written so long after the DOJ and FBI knew the underlying claims of the Trump-Russia investigation were totally and completely untrue.  Yet DAG Rosenstein authorized another expanded scope.

The October 20, 2017, scope memo will be guaranteed to show Robert Mueller asking Rod Rosenstein to authorize the targeting of Mike G Flynn and at least one other person.

If anyone from the DOJ, FBI or ODNI is reading this, please don’t think we will be satisfied with only one expanded scope memo….

….We also need to see the October 20th scope!

(Read more: Conservative Treehouse, 5/06/2020)  (Archive)

Shawn Henry Transcript (Credit: Fox News graphic)

Aaron Mate’ does a deep dive into Shawn Henry’s recently released transcript of his testimony to the House Intelligence Committee:

— Aaron Maté (@aaronjmate) May 7, 2020

9:42 PM · May 7, 2020

11:37 PM · May 7, 2020

11:40 PM · May 7, 2020

11:43 PM · May 7, 2020

Shawn Henry had an entirely different message for the American public when he wasn’t under oath. From January 6, 2017:

(Shawn Henry Transcript)

Shawn Henry (R) speaks during a news conference with other officials from the FBI’s Financial Fraud Enforcement Task Force at the Department of Justice December 6, 2010. (Credit: Chip Somodevilla/The Associated Press)

“The cybersecurity firm that investigated and remediated the alleged hack of the Democratic National Committee’s servers in 2016 found no direct evidence that hackers stole any data or emails, according to a newly declassified interview transcript.

Shawn Henry, the president of CrowdStrike Services, told the House Intelligence Committee in late 2017 that his firm had no evidence that the alleged Russian hackers stole any data from the Democratic National Committee (DNC) servers.

(…) Mueller’s indictment alleges that Russian hackers broke into a DNC server and stole emails on or about May 25 and June 1 of 2016, roughly three weeks after CrowdStrike installed its software on the DNC servers and assessed that Russian hackers had gained access.

CrowdStrike’s involvement in the events surrounding the alleged DNC hack has long been the subject of controversy. Some facts about the firm’s involvement remain disputed by key players, including Henry, who told the House Intelligence Committee that he was not aware of the DNC or CrowdStrike denying any FBI requests related to the server hack. Henry’s testimony contradicted what then-FBI Director James Comey told the Senate Intelligence Committee in January 2017. Comey told senators that the FBI sought and was repeatedly denied access to the physical DNC servers.

(Shawn Henry transcript – pg. 30-31)

Henry was not the only one to contradict Comey. The DNC’s director of technology, Andrew Brown, told the House Intelligence Committee the DNC fully cooperated with every FBI request. The DNC’s IT director, Yared Tamene, told the committee the FBI never requested access to the physical servers. And Michael Sussman, the DNC’s outside counsel, told the committee that the FBI declined a DNC offer for full access to its servers.” (Read more: The Epoch Times, 5/11/2020)  (Archive)

(Ben Rhodes Transcript, 10/25/2017 – pg. 23)

Ben Rhodes is the brother of CBS News president David Rhodes.

On June 22, 2018, he is interviewed by CBS News and says:

(…) “It was not until after President Obama ordered what became the 2017 Intelligence Community Assessment – an effort led by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence – that the picture became clearer and starker, Rhodes said.

“My sense was all of the information that went into that review – suddenly different things are corroborating each other,” he said, adding that this included information that came to light only after the election. He also explained that the inclusion of information from the FBI, in particular, brought much more of the picture into focus.

“When the FBI’s material was put together with everything else, once again, it confirmed a more alarmist picture of what had happened,” Rhodes told Morell. The delivery of that cumulative assessment, Rhodes said, was what “drove the needle to ten.”

In April, 2019:

“Ben Rhodes, the former deputy national security advisor to President Obama, told Nicholas Ballasy with PJ Media that Attorney General Bill Barr and the Justice Department “will find nothing” showing that former President Obama or his White House staff had any political “involvement” with the FBI investigation of the Trump campaign or the creation or distribution of the Steele dossier.

“No, no, I cannot be clear enough about this. We didn’t even know there was an FBI investigation of Trump. I didn’t. President Obama didn’t, like, we actually abided by the firewalls between – if there were any investigations that took place, those decisions were made in the Justice Department, in the FBI, not in the White House,” Rhodes said following a discussion at Georgetown University about his book, “The World as It Is: A Memoir of the Obama White House,” on Thursday.” (RealClearPolitics, 4/29/2019)

“Brandon Van Grack, the lead prosecutor in the government’s case against former national security adviser and retired Gen. Michael Flynn suddenly resigned Thursday, without explanation.

In a single sentence filing to the court, Van Grack informed federal Judge Emmet Sullivan that he would be quitting the case.

Pressure from President Trump and his supporters has built in the past weeks to, not just exonerate Flynn, but have the entire case thrown out of court as the result of newly publicized documents revealing that FBI investigators set Flynn up to lie to the agency.” (Read more: JusttheNews, 5/07/2020)  (Archive)

Loretta Lynch Transcript (Credit: Fox News graphic)

(Transcript clipping – pg. 26)

Regardless of the fact that former AG Loretta Lynch admits to seeing no evidence of Trump colluding with Russia, just three months into his presidency in March, 2017, she takes to the airwaves encouraging Antifa to continue their attacks against his supporters.

Simona Mangiante

Representative Eric Swalwell knew that the CIA/FBI spy, Joseph Mifsud, was a member of the Clinton Foundation and hid that evidence from the American people.

Simona Mangiante, George Papadopoulos’ wife, testified to the House Intelligence Committee on July 18, 2018, and stated Joseph Mifsud mentioned several times while in her company, that he was a member of the Clinton Foundation.

Simona Mangiante and Swalwell’s discussion were clipped from pages 49-51 of the above-linked transcript.

“Former Obama administration defense official Evelyn Farkas testified under oath that she lied during an MSNBC interview when she claimed to have evidence of alleged collusion, a newly declassified congressional transcript of her testimony shows. Farkas testified before the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence on June 26, 2017, as part of the committee’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election between Donald Trump and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

Lawmakers keyed in on an appearance Farkas made on MSNBC on March 2, 2017, in which she urged intelligence community bureaucrats to disseminate within the government and potentially even leak to media any incriminating information they had about Trump or his aides.

“I had a fear that somehow that information would disappear with the senior [Obama administration] people who left…[that] it would be hidden away in the bureaucracy,” Farkas said.

Farkas, who served in the Obama administration as the deputy assistant secretary of Defense for Russia, Ukraine, and Eurasia from 2012 through 2015, also claimed that administration officials appointed by Trump might even destroy evidence of alleged collusion if they “found out how we knew what we knew about the Trump staff’s dealing with Russians.”

They might “try to compromise those sources and methods,” Farkas alleged in the MSNBC interview. “And we would no longer have access to that intelligence.”

“Not enough was coming out into the open and I knew there was more,” Farkas claimed.

Evelyn Farkas Transcript

(Read more: The Federalist, 5/07/2020)  (Archive)

“There are at least forces within the FBI that wanted her to lose,” John Podesta said during an interview with John Heilemann hosted by NewCo. (Credit: The Associated Press)

“In recently unsealed testimony to Congress, former Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta acknowledged that both he and Hillary Clinton were aware that her campaign had purchase opposition research and was looking for dirt on Donald Trump’s ties to Russia during the 2016 election.

Podesta’s comments are the most direct acknowledgment about what Donald Trump’s opponent knew in real-time about the effort that ultimately became known as the Steele dossier.

In a second appearance before the House Intelligence Committee in December 2017, Podesta testified that Clinton likely didn’t know the names of the firm, Fusion GPS, and former British spy Christopher Steele who had conducted the research. But he said she and he were both cognizant of an opposition research effort to connect Trump to business dealings in Russia.

“I think she was — she knew that we had an — we had an opposition research staff in-house. We, the campaign, directly purchased some opposition research. And she knew I think in general terms that we were trying to figure out, which was not easy, what Mr. Trump’s financial relationships were, what his relationships might be to Russia and other former Soviet Union actors that, you know. But I don’t – I don’t think we – I mean, she wasn’t – you know, if I wasn’t, she certainly wasn’t sort of saying, ‘Who are your vendors?’ ”

(Read more: JusttheNews, 5/11/2020)  (Archive)

(Timeline editor’s note: I am adding more clippings from Podesta’s testimony}:

John Podesta Transcript 12/2017 (pg. 26-27)

(Susan Rice Transcript (Credit: Fox News graphic)

(Susan Rice transcript clipping – pg. 27)

In April 2017, Rice appears on CNN to defend the actions she took, based on the intelligence she received.

Samantha Power Transcript (Credit: Fox News graphic)

(Samantha Power transcript clipping – pg. 61)

Newly declassified records show that Samantha Power made seven separate unmasking requests related to Flynn in late 2016 and early 2017.

Former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power testified to Congress in 2017 that she never sought to unmask records containing information about former White House National Security Adviser Michael Flynn. Newly declassified documents from the National Security Agency (NSA), however, show that her name appeared on at least seven separate requests to unmask Flynn’s name between Nov. 30, 2016, and Jan. 11, 2017.

(Samantha Powers/Unmasking Document)

James Clapper Transcript (Credit: Fox News graphic)

When searching for a video of Clapper saying the opposite to the American public via media interviews, it appears he has been one of the few in Obama’s administration who has consistently admitted there was no evidence that Trump colluded with Russia. From May, 2017:

Committee Chairman Adam Schiff and Ranking Member Rep. Devin Nunes listen to Gordon Sondland, the U.S ambassador to the European Union, testify before the House Intelligence Committee on Capitol Hill November 20, 2019. (Credit: Doug Mills/Getty Images)

• Interview Transcript of Rinat Akhmetshin (November 13, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Stephen Bannon (January 16, 2018)
• Interview Transcript of Stephen Bannon (February 15, 2018)
• Interview Transcript of Andrew Brown (August 30, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Michael Caputo (July 14, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of John Carlin (July 27, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Thomas Catan (October 18, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of James Clapper (July 17, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Samuel Clovis (December 12, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Dan Coats (June 22, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Michael Cohen (October 24, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Rick Dearborn (January 17, 2018)
• Interview Transcript of Diana Denman (December 5, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Marc Elias (December 13, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Boris Ephsteyn (September 28, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Evelyn Farkas (June 26, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Peter Fritsch (October 18, 2017) 
• Interview Transcript of Michael Goldfarb (December 12, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Rob Goldstone (December 18, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Jeffrey Gordon (July 26, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Rhona Graff (December 22, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Shawn Henry (December 5, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Hope Hicks (February 27, 2018)
• Interview Transcript of Ike Kaveladze (November 2, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of David Kramer (December 19, 2017)
  • Letter from Counsel to David Kramer to HPSCI (December 23, 2017)
    
• Interview Transcript of David Kramer (January 10, 2018)
  • Letter from Counsel to David Kramer to HPSCI (January 5, 2018)
  • Letter from Counsel to David Kramer to HPSCI (January 10, 2018)
• Interview Transcript of Jared Kushner (July 25, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Corey Lewandowski (January 17, 2018)
• Interview Transcript of Corey Lewandowski (March 8, 2018)
• Interview Transcript of Loretta Lynch (October 20, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Simona Mangiante (July 18, 2018)
• Interview Transcript of Andrew McCabe (December 19, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Mary McCord (November 1, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Alexander Nix (December 14, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Carter Page (November 2, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Brad Parscale (October 24, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Walid Phares (December 8, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of John Podesta (June 27, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of John Podesta (December 4, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Samantha Power (October 13, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Erik Prince (November 30, 2017)
  • Letter from HPSCI to Department of Justice (April 30, 2019)
• Interview Transcript of Benjamin Rhodes (October 25, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Susan Rice (September 8, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Jonathan Saffron (October 12, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Anatoli Samochornov (November 28, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Felix Sater (December 20, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Keith Schiller (November 7, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Jefferson Sessions (November 30, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Roger J. Stone, Jr. (September 26, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Jake Sullivan (December 21, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Michael Sussman (December 18, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Matthew Tait (October 6, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Yared Tamene Wolde-Yohannes (August 30, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Donald Trump, Jr. (December 6, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Witness Name Redacted (December 20, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Sally Yates (November 3, 2017)
• Interview Transcript of Christopher Wylie (April 25, 2018)

Report

• House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence – Democratic Minority Views (March 26, 2018)
• House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence – Republican Report on Russian Active Measures (March 22, 2018)

ODNI Director Ric Grenell also releases a copy of the transcripts.

Q: Does the new evidence show that the counterintelligence case against General Flynn was simply left open to lay a trap for lying?

BARR: Yes. Essentially.

As customary CBS only broadcast a small snippet of the interview between CBS reporter Catherine Herridge and U.S. Attorney General Bill Barr.   The full interview is much longer and much more interesting than the edited narrative broadcast by CBS.

When you read the conversation you will immediately notice why CBS refused to broadcast it, and why the segment that did air was so brutally edited.Here is the transcript.

The video can be seen in its entirety, here.

(Copy also pasted at Conservative Treehouse, 5/07/2020)  (Archive)

Ric Grenell enters the DOJ with the satchel. (Credit: public domain)

Earlier this afternoon Acting Director of National Intelligence Richard “Ric” Grenell delivered a satchel of declassified documents to Attorney General Bill Barr.  According to DC sources the content could possibly be released tomorrow in an explosive Friday document dump.  Stay tuned…

(Read more: Conservative Treehouse, 5/07/2020) (Archive)

The Justice Department files a motion to drop the charges against former national security adviser Michael Flynn. Read the filing here.

(Department of Justice, 5/07/2020)

Rep. Adam Schiff and the entire apparatus of official Washington has been exposed by the recently released House Intelligence Committee transcripts, as well as by the documents just released in the Michael Flynn case. Tucker shows us a montage of various media clips of Adam Schiff lying to the American public and claiming there was overwhelming evidence of Trump colluding with Russia. He also quotes the transcripts of several Obama officials who deny ever seeing any evidence of collusion between Trump and Russia.

“The good news is former President Obama is panicked by recent sunlight; the slight possibility of a U.S. DOJ that may soon have him in the cross-hairs; and the more obvious possibility the American people will discover the scale of his corrupt weaponization of intelligence to target his political opposition.

The better news is former President Obama is so heavily concerned about the looming possibilities; rather than relying on intermediary instructions through Media Matters; he is giving political operatives and national media his instructions directly.  LISTEN:

(Conservative Treehouse, 5/08/2020)  (Archive)

“How Van Grack’s misrepresentations about the Flynn investigation and evidence led Judge Sullivan to issue an inaccurate opinion.

Why a show-cause hearing is appropriate.

Van Grack told Judge Sullivan that the Flynn “lies” “impeded” and “had a material impact on” the Trump/Russia investigation.

Van Grack also told Judge Sullivan that he had provided all Brady evidence – and all “information that could reasonably be construed as favorable and material to sentencing.”

Van Grack to Judge Sullivan:

The govt has provided all Brady Evidence.

The government has not “suppressed evidence.”

(All this turned out to be false.)

Flynn FBI Notes

“Here are the 12 revelations that unraveled the false narrative and Mueller’s prosecution of a 33-year military veteran:

1. Flynn’s RT visit with Putin wasn’t nefarious. In fact, it was cleared by his former employer, the Defense Intelligence Agency, and he received a defensive briefing before he went to Russia and debriefed with U.S. intelligence after he returned. https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/423558-exculpatory-russia-evidence-about-mike-flynn-that-us-intel-kept-secret

2. Not a Russian agent. A Justice Department memo exonerated Flynn of Russia collusion on Jan. 30, 2017, nearly a year before he pled guilty. “The FBI did not believe Flynn was acting as an agent of Russia,” a DOJ memo states. https://justthenews.com/accountability/political-ethics/fbis-russia-collusion-case-fell-apart-first-month-trump-presidency

3. Case closed memo. FBI agents wrote a memo to close the investigation of Flynn on Jan. 4, 2017, writing they found “no derogatory” evidence that Flynn committed a crime or posed a national security threat. FBI management then ordered the closure to be rescinded and pivoted toward trying to lure Flynn into an interview. https://justthenews.com/accountability/russia-and-ukraine-scandals/fbi-found-no-derogatory-russia-evidence-flynn-planned

4. DOJ heartburn. Senior Justice officials expressed concern and alarm at the way the FBI was treating Flynn, including trying to interview him without the normally required notification to the Trump White House. Former acting Attorney General Sally Yates expressed significant concern that White House officials weren’t being advised. “The interview was problematic from Yates’ perspective because, as a matter of protocol and courtesy, the White House Counsel’s Office should have been notified beforehand,” a DOJ memo stated. https://justthenews.com/accountability/political-ethics/yates-other-obama-doj-officials-sounded-alarm-about-fbis-treatment

5. Logan Act threat wasn’t real. DOJ officials immediately did not believe Flynn could realistically be prosecuted under the Logan Act for his conversations with the Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak. Former Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe testified he was told such a prosecution was a “long shot,” and former Assistant Attorney General Mary McCord “said that upon learning of Flynn’s phone calls with Ambassador Kislyak, a Logan Act prosecution seemed like a stretch to her,” DOJ memos say. https://justthenews.com/accountability/political-ethics/yates-other-obama-doj-officials-sounded-alarm-about-fbis-treatment

6. Unequal treatment. James Comey bragged in a videotaped interview that he authorized the FBI to try to conduct a Flynn interview without the proper notifications and protocol, hoping to catch Flynn and the new Trump White House off guard. In other words, they didn’t follow procedure or treat Flynn like others when it came to due process. Comey said the tactic was “something I probably wouldn’t have done or maybe gotten away with in a more organized administration.” https://www.foxnews.com/politics/comey-admits-decision-to-send-fbi-agents-to-interview-mike-flynn-was-not-standard

7. Disguising a required warning. FBI officials debated whether they could avoid, disguise or slip in the required FBI admonition against lying to agents at the start of Flynn’s interview to keep him off guard. “It would be an easy way to just casually slip that in,” FBI lawyer Lisa Page texted during the discussions. https://justthenews.com/accountability/russia-and-ukraine-scandals/breaking-fbi-notes-detail-effort-catch-flynn-lie-get-him.

8. “Playing games.” Then-Assistant Director for Counterintelligence William Priestap wrote in handwritten notes that he feared the bureau was “playing games” with the Flynn interview in an effort to get the national security adviser to lie so “we can prosecute him or get him fired.” https://justthenews.com/accountability/russia-and-ukraine-scandals/breaking-fbi-notes-detail-effort-catch-flynn-lie-get-him

9. No deception. The FBI agents who interviewed Flynn, including Peter Strzok, did not believe Flynn intended to lie or be deceptive in his interview. “Strzok provided his view that Flynn appeared truthful during the interview,” a memo from Mueller’s team stated. https://justthenews.com/accountability/political-ethics/yates-other-obama-doj-officials-sounded-alarm-about-fbis-treatment

10. No actual denial. The FBI agents who interviewed Flynn indicated in a draft report that Flynn did not directly deny talking to Kislyak about sanctions, as he was accused by Mueller. Instead they noted he couldn’t remember, wasn’t sure and even conceded it was possible. Here’s a direct quote from the draft interview memo. “FLYNN stated it was possible that he talked to KISLYAK on the issue, but if he did, he did not remember doing so.” That’s a far cry from a direct denial. https://int.nyt.com/data/documenthelper/6936-michael-flynn-motion-to-dismiss/fa06f5e13a0ec71843b6/optimized/full.pdf

11.) Interview Reports Edited. According to evidence DOJ disclosed this month, FBI officials subsequently edited the original Flynn interview report. After Strzok and fellow special agent Joe Pientka interviewed the Trump adviser, Pientka wrote the original interview report, known as a 302, then Strzok heavily edited it, so much so that he worried he was “trying not to completely re-write” the memo. Then FBI lawyer Lisa Page, who neither attended the interview nor is an agent, edited it again, according to the DOJ evidence. And then that version of the 302 was never given to the court. Instead, a substitute summary of the interview written months later was presented as official evidence, an act current and former FBI officials told me was extraordinarily unusual. https://www.wsj.com/articles/rewrite-in-flynns-case-shows-fbi-needs-reform-11588541993

12.) Evidence withheld. The biggest, and perhaps most troubling discovery, according to DOJ officials and Flynn’s lawyers, was the majority of the above evidence was withheld from the courts and Flynn’s legal team for years despite repeated orders that all exculpatory Brady materials, i.e. evidence of innocence, be produced.

(Read more: JustthNews, 5/09/2020)  (Archive)

“Former CIA Director and Spygate ringleader John Brennan lashed out at President Trump on Saturday after the DOJ dropped its case against Flynn.

The Justice Department dropped its case against General Mike Flynn Thursday after bombshell documents released proved he was framed by Comey’s FBI.

The DOJ said in its motion to dismiss that “The interview of Mr. Flynn was untethered to, and unjustified by, the FBI’s counterintelligence investigation into Mr. Flynn.”

During an interview on Fox & Friends Friday morning, co-host Brian Kilmeade asked Trump, “Why did it take a judge to release these [Flynn] documents and where was the FBI Director Chris Wray? Why did he not put this out?”

President Trump replied, “Well, a lot of things are going to be told over the next couple of weeks and let’s see what happens. He was appointed by Rod Rosenstein and a lot of things are coming out. You’ll see a lot of things coming out. It’s disappointing.”

Brennan is not happy that his plot to sabotage and ultimately remove President Trump from office is being exposed.” (Read more: The Gateway Pundit, 5/09/2020)  (Archive)

(John Brennan/Twitter)

“In its pursuit of establishing surveillance on the Trump campaign, the FBI turned its attention to Trump campaign adviser Carter Page in the spring of 2016, culminating in the issuance of a FISA warrant—which allows for some of the most intrusive spying methods on an American citizen.

As part of this process, the FBI relied extensively on the flawed Steele dossier, leading an FBI legal counsel to note that this was “essentially a single source FISA.”

(The Epoch Times, 5/11/2020)  (Archive)

“GOP Sen. Chuck Grassley is taking on the media, the Justice Department, and even President Obama over the federal government’s handling of the Michael Flynn case.

(…) Among the revelations was that FBI agents, in the early days of the Trump administration, went beyond the scope of federal government’s case to interview the then-White House national security adviser. Flynn later, in a plea agreement, pleaded guilty to lying to federal agents.

(…) The senator also questioned purported comments made last week by President Obama cautioning that the rule of law may be at risk following the Justice Department’s recommendation to drop the case against Flynn, a retired lieutenant Army general.

“I believe the opposite is true,” he said. “The rule of law is at risk if the federal government can get away with violating the constitution to do what they did to Lt. Gen. Flynn.”

Grassley then asked why the former president would choose to comment on the dropping of the case against Flynn, but not the significant evidence that government directors under his control lied and manipulated processes at every turn of the investigation into him.

“I’ve heard no comment from Mr. Obama about independent inspector general findings that Andrew McCabe lied under oath to federal investigators multiple times,” said Grassley, referring to the former FBI deputy director.

“Or about how DOJ prosecutors falsely told the court that they had produced all Brady material to Flynn. Or when the federal government surveilled an American citizen connected to the Trump campaign without probable cause and based on intelligence the FBI knew was questionable at best,” Grassley continued.

Grassley hinted that the evidence released last week is so significant in its implications of top-tier government corruption that, “it’s time we asked: what did Obama and Biden know and when did they know it?” (Read More: JusttheNews, 5/11/2020) (Archive)

“Senator Grassley sends a letter (pdf here) thanking AG Bill Barr and DNI Richard Grenell for the declassified documents produced so far.  With the DOJ deciding to drop the Flynn prosecution Grassley notes there are three more buckets of classified documents he would like to see declassified and presented soon:

(1) The Flynn/Kislyak transcript. (2) The Susan Rice Memo to file. (3) The original and mysteriously missing Flynn 302 authored by FBI agent Joe Pientka. [Grassley Press]

Within the letter, Senator Grassley notes he previously requested the release of these documents from former DAG Rod Rosenstein; who refused to submit them and made excuses to congressional oversight.

(Grassley Press Release, 5/12/2020)

Additionally, Senator Grassley appeared on Fox Business for an interview with Liz MacDonald.  Interestingly Ms. MacDonald went into a deep dive on the 2016 FISA Court ruling by Judge Rosemary Collyer today…. and, even more interestingly, MacDonald connected the FBI searches of the NSA database to the recent activities of the DNI.

Here she is interviewing Senator Grassley about his letter and other interesting developments… listen carefully at 02:20:

(Conservative Treehouse, 5/12/2020)  (Archive)

Viktor Shokin and Joe Biden (Credit: Volodymyr Petrov/Agence France Presse)

Former Prosecutor General Viktor Shokhin has appealed to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky as the guarantor of the Constitution with a request to ensure the response of law enforcement agencies to allegations of unlawful acts by former U.S. Vice President Joseph Biden.

At the Interfax-Ukraine agency’s press conference on Tuesday, Shokin’s lawyer Oleksandr Teleshetsky noted that the State Bureau of Investigations (SBI) and the Prosecutor General’s Office (PGO) have not complied with a number of court decisions on the registration and investigation of the crimes that Shokin alleges.

Teleshetsky said more than three months passed after Shokin appealed to law enforcement authorities about the commission of criminal acts against him, but no investigative actions were carried out.

According to him, SBI investigators sent Shokin’s statement to the National Police, and then the crime statement returned to the SBI, where it was ignored. According to Shokin’s complaint, the court had ordered the SBI investigators to enter information about the allegations to the Unified Register of Pretrial Investigations, something that was not done.

“Shokin again went to court and on April 14 received a relung, which obliges the PGO to open proceedings on the fact that SBI officials did not comply with the court decision,” the lawyer said, adding that this decision also remains unfulfilled.

“In connection with another failure to comply with the court decision … Shokin was forced to appeal again to the court with a corresponding complaint about inaction,” the lawyer said.

According to him, Shokin was never questioned either as a victim, or even as a witness, and no other investigative actions were carried out either.

“Obviously, the investigator and the prosecutor were given the task … to block and ignore this case,” the lawyer said.

Teleshetsky said proceedings on Shokin’s statement about Biden’s criminal actions are in the investigative department of the National Police, but investigators there are not taking any steps to investigate.

This is why Shokin is appealing to Zelensky, the lawyer said.

“Shokin prepared an appeal to the president with a request to ensure the protection of the rights and interests as a citizen of Ukraine in this criminal proceeding and bring those responsible to justice for the systematic failure to execute court decisions in criminal proceedings according to his statements,” the lawyer said.

He also added that there is every reason to provide Shokin with protection in connection with the information published by him about Biden’s pressure.

“Shokin’s life could be in danger. The Ukrainian state should initiate protection through law enforcement agencies. …We believe that today there are enough grounds for this,” the lawyer said.

As reported, on February 27, the SBI registered a criminal proceeding about pressure on Shokhin by former U.S. Vice President Joseph Biden. The reason for the pressure was the investigation by the PGO of serious crimes in the field of international corruption related to the activities of ex-Minister of Ecology of Ukraine Mykola Zlochevsky and the leaders of the Burisma company. The case was opened under Part 2 of Article 343.

The lawyer of U.S. President Donald Trump Rudolf Giuliani in a number of interviews announced the intervention of the former vice president in Ukrainian politics and participation in corruption cases. In particular, he claims that Shokin was fired at the request of Biden – ostensibly for his knowledge of Burisma’s ties with his son Hunter Biden.

At the end of January 2020, Shokin stated that he had been poisoned with mercury five months ago [August 2019] during his stay in Greece, after which he underwent a long period of treatment.

“I don’t have any obvious enemies whom I can blame for this. Of course, one of the versions, but this version requires investigation, is that Biden was somehow involved in some way in these issues. I officially addressed the Greek law enforcement authorities on this and asked them to investigate… Officially, I haven’t received an answer yet, although I contacted them quite a while back about opening criminal proceedings in connection a premeditated attempt to murder me,” Shokin said. (Interfax-Ukraine, 5/12/2020)  (Archive)

“Judge Sullivan is requesting retired judge John Gleeson to file an amicus brief outlining why: (a) the charge against Flynn should not be dropped, and (b) frame the argument about how to prosecute Flynn for perjury.

Former Judge John Gleeson (U.S. district judge for the Eastern District of New York) recently penned an op-ed in the Washington Post arguing that Flynn should continue to be prosecuted.

John Gleeson (Credit: Wikipedia)

May 11, 2020 – (…)  There has been nothing regular about the department’s effort to dismiss the Flynn case. The record reeks of improper political influence. Hours after the career prosecutor abruptly withdrew, the department moved to dismiss the indictment in a filing signed only by an interim U.S. attorney, a former aide to Attorney General William P. Barr whom Barr had installed in the position months before.

The department now says it cannot prove its case. But Flynn had already admitted his guilt to lying to the FBI, and the court had accepted his plea. The purported reasons for the dismissal clash not only with the department’s previous arguments in Flynn’s case — where it assured the court of an important federal interest in punishing Flynn’s dishonesty, an interest it now dismisses as insubstantial — but also with arguments it has routinely made for years in similar cases not involving defendants close to the president.  ~ John Gleeson

There are now questions being raised about whether Judge Emmett Sullivan is having ex-parte communication about the case; with outside interests helping to steer the decision-making. It would not come as a surprise to discover this is happening, albeit unethically.

Now the purpose of the leaked conference call, aka instructions, from former President Barack Obama comes into play; especially considering that Obama specifically mentioned “perjury” which is now part of what Judge Sullivan is attempting to accomplish.” (Conservative Treehouse, 5/13/2020)  (Archive)

Ironically, it appears Judge Gleeson will be arguing against a precedent that was set in a case he oversaw in October 2014.

(StephenMcIntyre@ClimateAudit/Twitter)

(Hasbajrami v US* (October 2014) Gleeson J)

On May 11, 2020, John Gleeson penned this Washington Post article, “The Flynn case isn’t over until the judge says it’s over.“

The attorneys for the Mueller team withheld Brady evidence from General Flynn for over a year.

Just a reminder, the last time the Lawfare types filed an outraged amicus brief with a court…

…it was with the FISA Court, trying to claim that @DevinNunes memo was false for claiming FISA abuse 🤦🏻‍♂️

— Undercover Huber (@JohnWHuber) May 13, 2020

“During President Trump’s impeachment, former U.S. Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch testified to Congress that she knew little beyond an initial briefing and “press reports” about Burisma Holdings, the Ukrainian natural gas firm that had hired Vice President Joe Biden’s son Hunter and was dogged by a corruption investigation.

“It just wasn’t a big deal,” she declared under oath on Oct. 11, 2019.

But newly unearthed State Department memos obtained under the Freedom of Information Act show Yovanovitch’s embassy in Kiev, including the ambassador herself, was engaged in several discussions and meetings about Burisma as the gas firm scrambled during the 2016 election and transition to settle a long-running corruption investigation and polish its image before President Trump took office.

Yovanovitch, for instance, was specifically warned in an email by her top deputy in September 2016 — three years before her testimony — that Burisma had hired an American firm with deep Democratic connections called Blue Star Strategies to “rehabilitate the reputation” of the Ukrainian gas firm and that it had placed “Hunter Biden on its board,” the memos show.

She also met directly with a representative for Burisma in her embassy office, less than 45 days before Trump took office, a contact she did not mention during her impeachment deposition.

The discussions about Burisma inside Yovanovitch’s embassy were so extensive, in fact, that they filled more than 160 pages of emails, memos, and correspondence in fall 2016 alone, according to the State Department records obtained under FOIA by the conservative group Citizens United.

The contacts included a detailed private letter hand-delivered to Yovanovitch by one of Burisma’s lawyers in September 2016, a briefing later that month from her staff on Burisma’s issues, and a meeting scheduled between the ambassador and a Burisma representative shortly before Christmas 2016 as the Obama administration was preparing to leave office.” (Read more: JustTheNews, 5/13/2020)  (Archive)

“Top Obama administration officials purportedly requested to “unmask” the identity of former national security adviser Michael Flynn during the presidential transition period, according to a list of names from that controversial process made public on Wednesday.

The list was declassified in recent days by Acting Director of National Intelligence Richard Grenell and then sent to GOP Sens. Chuck Grassley and Ron Johnson, who made the documents public. The roster features top-ranking figures including then-Vice President Joe Biden — a detail already being raised by the Trump campaign in the bare-knuckle 2020 presidential race where Biden is now the Democrats’ presumptive nominee.

The list also includes then-FBI Director James Comey, then-CIA Director John Brennan, then-Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, and Obama’s then-chief of staff Denis McDonough.

(…) Both the DOJ and Grenell had been discussing these “unmasking” files, after Grenell appeared to have delivered those files to the department last week. There were some tensions between the two offices over who would actually pull the trigger to release them — ultimately, the publication came from Capitol Hill after Grenell sent lawmakers the files.

The declassified list specifically showed officials who “may have received Lt. Gen Flynn’s identity in response to a request processed between 8 November 2016 and 31 January 2017 to unmask an identity that had been generically referred to in an NSA foreign intelligence report,” the document, obtained by Fox News, read.

(…) “Each individual was an authorized recipient of the original report and the unmasking was approved through NSA’s standard process, which includes a review of the justification for the request,” the document said. “Only certain personnel are authorized to submit unmasking requests into the NSA system. In this case, 16 authorized individuals requested unmasking for [REDACTED] different NSA intelligence reports for select identified principals.”

The document added: “While the principals are identified below, we cannot confirm they saw the unmasked information. This response does not include any requests outside of the specified time-frame.”

(Read more: Fox Business, 5/13/2020)  (Archive)

We noted in the list provided by Senators Grassley and Johnson that the unmaskings occurred long before General Flynn’s conversation with Russian Ambassador Kislyak regarding sanctions on December 29, 2016.

First things first: ♦Understand Obama’s Surveillance Operation.  ♦Michael Flynn was not under a FISA Title-1 Warrant …. that’s the background.

Devin Nunes appears on Lou Dobbs to discuss the recent list of Obama-era officials who unmasked NSA intercepts of Michael Flynn talking to foreign government officials.  Rep. Nunes reminds the audience that Flynn is only one person within a much larger group of Trump transition team members who were under surveillance by Team Obama.

March 27, 2017, then-House Intelligence Committee Chairman, Devin Nunes, held a brief press conference and stated he was provided intelligence reports brought to him by unnamed sources including ‘significant information’ about President-Elect Trump and his transition team.

These reports included unmaskings of President Trump campaign officials; and included Donald Trump himself…. You know what that means:

1.) …”On numerous occasions the [Obama] intelligence community incidentally collected information about U.S. citizens involved in the Trump transition.”

2.) “Details about U.S. persons associated with the incoming administration; details with little or no apparent foreign intelligence value were widely disseminated in intelligence community reporting.”

3.) “Third, I have confirmed that additional names of Trump transition members were unmasked.”

4.) “Fourth and finally, I want to be clear; none of this surveillance was related to Russia, or the investigation of Russian activities, or of the Trump team.

“The House Intelligence Committee will thoroughly investigate surveillance and its subsequent dissemination, to determine a few things here that I want to read off:”

• “Who was aware of it?”
• “Why it was not disclosed to congress?”
• “Who requested and authorized the additional unmasking?”
• “Whether anyone directed the intelligence community to focus on Trump associates?”
• “And whether any laws, regulations or procedures were violated?”

“I have asked the Directors of the FBI, NSA and CIA to expeditiously comply with my March 15th letter -that you all received a couple of weeks ago- and to provide a full account of these surveillance activities.”

(Read more: Conservative Treehouse, 5/13/2020)  (Archive)

George Papadopoulos (Credit: public domain)

(…) [The Judiciary Committee releases] recently declassified Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) applications submitted by the Department of Justice to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, a unique judicial body that approves requests for secret warrants used by law enforcement to conduct covert electronic and physical surveillance of U.S. citizens, reveal that the predicate for the FBI’s Crossfire Hurricane investigation into alleged Russian collusion by the Trump campaign was triggered by a May 10, 2016, meeting between Papadopolous and an Australian diplomat, Alexander Downer (who at the time was the Australian Ambassador to the United Kingdom) in a London bar.

According to Downer, Papadopolous revealed that, based upon an April 26 conversation with a Maltese professor named Joseph Mifsud, “he [Papadopolous] thought that the Russians may release information, might release information, that could be damaging to Hillary Clinton’s campaign at some stage before the election.”

Downer and a fellow Australian diplomat who was also at the meeting and witnessed Papadopolous’ statement, drafted a cable back to the Australian Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Canberra recording the gist of the conversation. “There was no suggestion from Papadopoulos nor in the record of the meeting that we sent back to Canberra, there was no suggestion that there was collusion between Donald Trump or Donald Trump’s campaign and the Russians,” Downer said. “All we did is report what Papadopoulos said.”

After the release by WikiLeaks on July 22, 2016, of thousands of emails allegedly sourced from the DNC, Downer, concerned that there might be a link between Papadopolous and the DNC emails, provided a copy of his cable to the U.S. Embassy in London, which forwarded it on to the FBI. This cable was used by the FBI to initiate its Crossfire Hurricane counterintelligence investigation into the Trump campaign; a derivative investigation into Papadopolous was given the codename “Crossfire Typhoon.”

As far as predicates for sensitive counterintelligence investigations of presidential campaigns go, the Papadopolous conversation with Misfud is transparently weak. A cursory examination of the emails released by WikiLeaks on July 22, 2016, shows that no in-time reference pre-dates May 25, 2016, more than a month after the alleged “data staging” event that Schiff highlighted as the link between the DNC hack and Papadopolous.

In short, regardless of the content of Papadopolous’s conversation with Mifsud, as relayed by Downer, there was no linkage between any emails alleged to be in the possession of Russia at the time of April 26, 2016, Papadopolous-Misfud meeting and the actual data released by WikiLeaks on July 22, 2016, that the FBI used to justify the opening of both the Crossfire Hurricane and Crossfire Typhoon investigations. As Mueller notes in his report, the information released by WikiLeaks on July 22, 2016, coincides with a separate, alleged cyber attack on the DNC Microsoft Exchange Service between May 25 and June 1, 2016 — an attack that Mifsud could not have known about when he met with Papadopolous in April.

Moreover, the FBI knew before it interviewed Papadopolous on Jan. 27, 2017, that Papadopolous was not involved in any scheme to acquire purloined Russian emails on behalf of the Trump campaign. In September and October of 2016, the FBI made use of two confidential human sources (CHS) to engage Papadopoulos in conversations designed to elicit corroboration into its now-debunked theory.

In a Sept. 15, 2016, meeting between Papadopolous and an FBI-controlled CHS, Papadopolous was asked outright whether or not the Trump campaign could benefit from third-party intervention from the likes of WikiLeaks or Russia. Papadopolous made it clear in his response that no one in the campaign was advocating for this kind of intervention because it was “illegal,” “compromised national security,” and “set a bad precedent.”

News media around the federal courthouse in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 7, 2018, waiting for former Trump adviser George Papadopolous, found guilty of lying to the FBI, (Credit: Phil Roeder/Flickr)

“At the end of the day,” Papadopolous said, “it’s an illegal, it’s illegal activity. Espionage is treason. This is a form of treason.” And when asked by a second FBI-controlled CHS on Oct. 29, 2016, about who he thought was behind the hacking of the DNC, Papadopolous responded that it could be “the Chinese,” “the Iranians,” “Bernie supporters,” or “Anonymous” — but not the Russians. “Dude, Russia doesn’t have any interest in it anyways,” Papadopolous said. “They — dude, no one knows how a president is going to govern anyways. I mean…Congress is very hostile to Russia anyways.” It was a prescient, and telling, exchange — one the FBI chose to ignore.

In the court filing detailing the facts sustaining Papadopolous’s guilty plea, Mueller declared that “defendant PAPADOPOULOS impeded the FBI’s ongoing investigation into the existence of any links or coordination between individuals associated with the Campaign and the Russian government’s efforts to interfere with the 2016 presidential election.”

However, any careful examination of the data used by the FBI to link Papadopolous to the WikiLeaks release of DNC emails on July 22, 2016, clearly shows that there was absolutely no connection. As such, Papadopolous’s conversation with Mifsud had zero material bearing on the FBI’s investigation, a fact known to the FBI prior to its interview of Papadopolous on Jan. 27, 2017.” (Read more: Scott Ritter/Consortium News, 5/14/2020)  (Archive)

Jim Jordan (Credit: Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg)

“Republicans are demanding that Secretary of State Mike Pompeo turn over a broad scope of unreacted Obama-Biden State Department documents pertaining to the corrupt Ukrainian company which that was at the center of the impeachment inquiry earlier this year against President Donald Trump.

“I write regarding documents that the State Department recently released pursuant to the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA),” stated Jordan, in a letter to Pompeo on Thursday. “Although these documents are partially redacted, they appear to shed new light on the actions of State Department employees during the Obama-Biden Administration in relation to the corrupt Ukrainian energy company, Burisma Holdings, and its founder, Mykola Zlochevsky.”

(…) According to Jordan the State Department documents also reveal that the alleged “whistleblower” who began the partisan impeachment against President Trump “also played a role in facilitating the Obama-Biden Administration’s interactions with the Ukrainian government relating to Burisma and Hunter Biden.”

Jordan told Pompeo that the documents reportedly detail “how the ‘whistleblower,’ as a National Security Council (NSC) detailee, hosted a White House meeting that took place with Ukrainian prosecutors in January 2016 regarding a concern that HunterBiden’s role with Burisma could complicate a potential prosecution of the company’s wrongdoing.”

Moreover, “contemporaneous visitor logs confirm that numerous Ukrainian officials were present at the White House on the day of the meeting,” he added.

(…) The recently redacted documents also reveal information pertaining to former Vice President Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, as well as former Secretary John Kerry’s stepson, Christopher Heinz, and Devon Archer, who worked together during that time period.

Jordan referenced a Wall Street Journal story, which revealed that Hunter Biden, Heinz and Archer may have been part “of a broad effort by Burisma to bring in well-connect Democrats during a period when the company was facing investigations backed not just by domestic Ukrainian forces but by officials in the Obama Administration.”

The original stories, which were first published by John Solomon, who was then with The Hill and now with Just The News, focused on Hunter Biden’s role on the board of Burisma Holdings at the same time his father, Vice President Joe Biden, was responsible for the United States’s diplomatic efforts with Ukraine.” (Read more: Sarah A. Carter, 5/14/2020)  (Archive)

In this week’s quarantine episode of our Useful Idiots podcast, host Matt Taibbi and Katie Halper are joined by Aaron Maté, host of Push Back, to talk about the resurfacing of the Russiagate story and how it’s helped Trump.

Matt rants about the recent “leak” of Barack Obama talking to former members of his administration about the disposition of the Michael Flynn case. “The premise that this is some kind of scoop is so transparent and ridiculous,” says Matt, who argues it was intentionally leaked. “The other thing is, this idea that the dropping of a false-statements case, not a perjury case as [Obama] says, that this is some kind of threat to the rule of law — has he ever been to Washington? Perjury happens routinely there, it’s routinely excused, and you can find it on both sides of the aisle let off constantly.”

(Credit: CNN)

“On May 18, 2020, then-Attorney General Bill Barr made a statement to the media, declaring that special counsel John Durham’s investigation into the origins of the Russiagate hoax wasn’t focused on either former President Barack Obama or former Vice President Joe Biden, stating that “I don’t expect Mr. Durham’s work will lead to a criminal investigation of either man.”

In his new book, Barr has revealed that he made that statement in response to a series of tweets by then-President Donald Trump. A week earlier, Trump had started using the term “Obamagate” on Twitter, alleging that both Obama and Biden had “led the charge” on the FBI’s phony Russiagate investigation.

Barr recounts in his book that he felt it was unacceptable for Trump to attempt to drag his presidential election opponent into the Russiagate scandal and that Barr felt that it was incumbent upon him to make a public statement.

The corporate media immediately seized upon Barr’s statement, with The Washington Post running a same-day headline that “Barr says he does not expect Obama or Biden will be investigated by prosecutor reviewing 2016 Russia probe.” The New York Times’ headline went further, claiming that “Barr Dismisses Trump’s Claim That Russia Inquiry Was an Obama Plot.”

Barr’s May 18 claim is an often underappreciated statement, the fallout of which was felt throughout the 2020 presidential election. Although Barr now claims that he issued his statement from a position of fairness, what he actually did was insert himself and the Department of Justice (DOJ) into the presidential campaign, and in doing so, he set the stage for the media’s whitewashing of questions of corruption that swirled around Biden throughout the campaign.

It’s also worth noting that Barr’s decision to make a public statement contrasts sharply with former FBI Director James Comey, who claimed that as a matter of DOJ policy he wouldn’t confirm or deny if President Trump was actually under investigation in 2017.

More importantly, Barr’s May 18 statement stands in stark contrast to his decision to remain silent after the second presidential debate in October 2020, when Biden falsely blamed the story about his son Hunter’s laptop on a “Russian plot.”

Barr recently recounted that he “was very disturbed during the debate when candidate Biden lied to the American people about the laptop.” Barr told Fox News in an interview that Biden “was squarely confronted with the laptop and he suggested that it was Russian disinformation. … And I was shocked by that. … When you’re talking about interference in an election, I can’t think of anything more than that kind of thing.”

Barr’s supposed “shock” over Biden’s claims of Russian disinformation during the debate begs a simple question: If Barr actually felt that Biden’s assertions of “Russian disinformation” amounted to “interference in an election,” why didn’t Barr say anything at the time?”  (Read more: Zero Hedge, 3/26/2022)  (Archive) (The Epoch Times, 3/23/2022)

“Acting DNI Richard Grenell declassified the hidden paragraph of the Susan Rice memo and it was released earlier today.  Our suspicions about the content of the redacted paragraph being Michael Flynn connected are confirmed.

On January 5, 2017, President Obama and Susan Rice were discussing incoming National Security Advisor Michael Flynn with FBI Director James Comey. The motive for Susan Rice to write the January 20, 2017, memo to file becomes clear.  Here’s the paragraph:

Within this paragraph we find the motive for writing it (emphasis mine):

“Director Comey affirmed that he is proceeding “by the book” as it relates to law enforcement.” … “Comey said he does have some concerns that incoming NSA Flynn is speaking frequently with Russian Ambassador Kislyak.”  “Comey said that could be an issue as it relates to sharing sensitive information.”  “President Obama asked if Comey was saying that the NSC should not pass sensitive information related to Russia to Flynn.”  Comey replied, “potentially.”  “He added that he has no indication thus far that Flynn has passed classified information to Kislyak, but he noted that “the level of communication is unusual.”

Remember, the position of President Obama and Susan Rice is that they were unaware of any FBI investigation of Flynn (or the Trump campaign); nor did they have any involvement in directing it to take place.

The content of this January 5th meeting makes the first part of their claim challenging to accept.   Thus the need for Susan Rice to cover for it.

Here’s the full memo in context (including the redacted paragraph):

A day or two prior to this meeting DNI James Clapper briefed President Obama on the nature of the call between Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak and Michael Flynn.

James Clapper received raw “intelligence cuts” about the call from FBI Director James Comey and used them to brief President Obama.

It gets very sticky for the Obama white house to claim they didn’t know about, nor direct, an FBI investigation of Michael Flynn given the fact they were briefed on the intercepted phone communications conveyed by the FBI, via Clapper, to President Obama.

If the FBI wasn’t investigating Flynn, then why were they intercepting his calls?

Understandably President Obama and NSA Susan Rice would be worried about being attached to a potentially very unlawful investigation of the incoming administration and NSA Michael Flynn; hence the ‘stay behind’ meeting.

As a result of prior briefing material President Obama knew the FBI was monitoring and intercepting Flynn’s communication. The aspect of Obama questioning Comey about sharing sensitive information from Flynn; and Comey’s response; points to Obama/Rice knowledge of an FBI operation against Flynn.   An FBI operation against Flynn (and Trump) that Susan Rice knows she needs to specifically claim she and Obama did not know about.

From a hindsight perspective it gets very sticky for Obama/Rice to deny knowledge with that 1/5/17 meeting content in the fray. That’s the purpose of the Jan 20th CYA memo to file.  Think about it:

Question:  Ms Rice how can you claim to have no knowledge of an FBI investigation when the FBI was providing the White House FBI with intercepts of Flynn communication?

Are you saying the FBI intercepts were not authorized by President Obama?

Rice’s CYA memo is attempting to say exactly that.  She’s pinning FBI Director James Comey as “rogue.”

Without the memo FBI Director James Comey could claim President Obama and Susan Rice were well aware of the FBI’s Flynn operation.  With the memo Obama/Rice position themselves as having no idea until Comey started talking…

That’s the purpose for the memo; Obama & Rice protecting themselves from Comey if things go sideways.” (Read more: Conservative Treehouse, 5/19/2020)  (Archive)

Ukrainian MP Andriy Derkach has made public audio materials that may indicate the influence of ex-Vice President of the United States Joseph Biden on the fifth President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko.
“We will unveil recordings of telephone conversations with voices similar to those of Petro Poroshenko and Joseph Biden, testifying to the facts of international corruption and state treason at the highest state level,” Derkach said during an online conference at Interfax-Ukraine agency on Tuesday.

on May 19, 2020, Andrii Derkach and Konstantin Kulyk (the Ukrainian prosecutor who recovered $1.5 billion of embezzled funds – the ONLY major recovery ever accomplished) held press conference that released Biden-Poroshenko tapes. Here is a link to video https://t.co/DpURLieKml

— Stephen McIntyre (@ClimateAudit) February 22, 2024

According to Derkach, he received the recordings from investigative journalists, and Poroshenko personally did the recording of the conversations.

The first topic of the recordings, the deputy noted, concerns the receipt of “$1 billion in exchange for maintaining Burisma schemes and international corruption.” The records, as Derkach notes, date back to 2015-2016, in particular, they refer to the need to dismiss Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin at that time, “who was investigating the Burisma case and tapped into Biden at that time.”

“Biden leaves for Kyiv to put pressure on Petro Oleksiyovych regarding Shokin. There’s a powerful argument … in Biden’s pocket … a $1 billion loan guarantees … such was a price to save Biden from prison,” Derkach said.

The deputy claims that the $1 billion received was used to receive military government orders by enterprises related to Poroshenko.

The second topic of the recordings, according to Derkach, concerns the collapse of the parliamentary coalition and the upcoming elections in February 2016. “Poroshenko admits that there is no coalition … instead of fulfilling the requirements of the Constitution and declaring a re-election, Petro Oleksiyovych held to the promises given to Biden personally and blocked the Cabinet’s dismissal,” Derkach explained.

“These conversations clearly show … Biden ruled Ukraine,” the deputy said.

Also, according to him, the audio recordings say about Biden’s influence through the supervisory boards of large state enterprises.

“We handed over all the hours-long records we have at our disposal together with a statement about high treason, as well as of facts of international corruption to the Prosecutor General’s Office … for registering criminal proceedings,” Derkach summed up.

He also added that, in his opinion, Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada, Dmytro Razumkov, “blocks the creation of the inquiry commission … which is a violation of the law on regulations.” “Such a commission could effectively investigate the facts of international corruption,” Derkach said.

Former prosecutor Kostiantyn Kulyk, who was present at the press conference, added that Ruslan Riaboshapka, when he was the prosecutor general, “completely stopped the investigation of economic crimes of the Yanukovych regime and stopped the $6 billion budget confiscation planned for 2019.”

“A report has been prepared on this fact that Riaboshapka had committed the crimes pursuant to Articles 349, 364 and 365 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine … it is about interference with the activities of a law enforcement officer, abuse of power, exceeding of the limits of authority and disclosure of the secrets of pretrial investigation. I hope that the monitoring over the investigation by will be organized by Ukrainian parliamentarians … I consider it necessary to initiate the creation of a temporary investigative commission of the Verkhovna Rada to investigate opposition to the investigation of economic criminal cases of the Yanukovych regime,” Kulyk said. (Interfax-Ukraine, 5/19/2020) (Archive)

Sidney Powell (Credit: Fox News)

“Sidney Powell, the attorney for former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn, told  Hannity Tuesday that U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan has “gone way out into left field” since the Justice Department moved to dismiss the case against her client earlier this month.

Earlier Tuesday, Flynn’s legal team filed a petition for a writ of mandamus with the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals seeking Sullivan’s removal and the dismissal of the case against Flynn.

“I wish I knew what was going on with Judge Sullivan,” Powell told host Sean Hannity. “I can’t say that I do, other than he has gone way out into left field by himself, as we say in our mandamus petition, [with] this notion that he can appoint an amicus for himself and solicit other amicus briefs and not rule on our motion on the government’s motion to dismiss.

“The law is clear,” Powell went on. “There’s a new Supreme Court decision unanimously decided just within the last two weeks that makes it clear he cannot invite the amicus brief. So he … doesn’t have that authority as a district court judge.

“And then there are Supreme Court and D.C. Circuit cases that make clear he must grant the motion to dismiss … That’s a case and controversy issue under the Constitution, a separation of powers issue under the Constitution,” Powell added. “And the law is clear. He doesn’t have authority to grant it. He can’t appoint the prosecutor himself.” (Read more: Fox News, 5/19/2020)  (Archive)

“A very interesting letter from Senator Chuck Grassley and Senator Ron Johnson asking DNI Richard “Ric” Grenell to declassify and release all of the unmasking requests from January 2016 to January 2017.

Results to be provided in tranches if needed.

Within the letter (pdf here) the senators appear to be targeting specific dates for cross-referencing with previously identified NSA database abuses.  Some of their inquiry appears to be guided by ‘open source’ reporting on the issue.

This approach is very interesting because “unmasking” would be an outcome of creating some form of intelligence reporting. Perhaps a CIA report; perhaps part of the FBI investigation; or perhaps even material that enters the presidential daily briefing or similar.

We know there are thousands of results from contractors searching the NSA database without any effort to minimize the results and sharing those results outside the intelligence community. {Go Deep}

The non-minimized database extractions, the search results themselves, were eventually deleted at the direction of NSA Direction ADM Mike Rogers; who also stated the NSA preserved the audit-logs of ‘non-compliant’ system users who unlawfully searched the database.

There should be is an easy way to cross-reference the dates, times, and extractions to any material later used in the assembly of a report or briefing material, which was eventually unmasked.   Take the Trump campaign names from the queries and compare them to any unmasked Trump campaign names in any subsequent reports (FBI or other).

NSA Director Mike Rogers previously said he retained the audit-trail and audit logs that match the exact time-frame outlined within the letter by Senators Johnson and Grassley.   The custodian of those NSA logs is currently…. wait for it…. Ric Grenell. (Conservative Treehouse, 5/19/2020)  (Archive)

“The “EC” or electronic communication that started the July 31st counterintelligence operation was one of the original declassification requests from Devin Nunes original bucket list in 2018.   The EC has been declassified and Judicial Watch received it.

Originally the EC was presumed to be a CIA communication to the FBI detailing the need for a counterintelligence investigation; however, the EC as presented is originated by FBI Agent Peter Strzok and centers around George Papadopoulos.

This means Crossfire Hurricane, the FBI investigation into the Trump campaign, was predicated based on gossip, innuendo and rumors related to George Papadopoulos.   The information was relayed by Australian Diplomat Alexander Downer.

(Judicial Watch) […] The redacted document details seeming third hand information that the Russian government “had been seeking prominent members of the Donald Trump campaign in which to engage to prepare for potential post-election relations should Trump be elected U.S. President.” The document also alleges Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos, claimed to an unnamed party that “they (the Russians) could assist the Trump campaign with the anonymous release of information during the campaign that would be damaging to Hillary Clinton.” (more)

The EC is below:

If we take the CTH timeline on George Papadopoulos it will help to assemble the picture of what took place:

♦Early Feb. 2016 After leaving the campaign of Ben Carson, George Papadopoulos joins London Center for International Law Practice (LCILP)

♦Mid March, 2016, Papdopoulos travels to Rome as part of LCILP role. During visit Papadopoulos introduced to Joseph Mifsud. Mifsud introduced as professor for London Academy for Diplomacy, London England.

♦March 17,2016, Papadopoulos returns to London.

♦March 21, 2016, President Trump names Papadopoulos amid list of foreign policy advisors, with focus on energy sector.

♦March 24, 2016, Papadopoulos meets Mifsud in London. Mifsud accompanied by Olgya Polonskya who Mifsud introduced as former student/Putin niece. [sketchy]

♦March 31, 2016, Trump campaign foreign policy team meeting, Washington DC. Trump International Hotel. [famous table photograph with Papadopoulos, Sessions, Trump]

♦Early April, 2016, Mifsud continues contact w/ Papadopoulos via email. Ms. Polonskya also emailing Papadopoulos; however, later discovered Mifsud actually writing Polonskya emails. Papadopoulos returns to London, U.K.

♦April 11, 2016, Mifsud emails Papadopoulos about his own upcoming travel to Russia. Suggests meeting for following day, April 12.

♦April 12, 2016, Papadopoulos and Mifsud meet at Andaz Hotel in London, U.K. This meeting is in advance of Mifsud traveling to Russia.

♦April 18, 2016, Mifsud emails Papadopoulos from Russia. Introduces Ivan Timofeev.

♦April 25, 2016, Mifsud returns to London after a stopover in Rome.

♦April 26, 2016, Papadopoulos and Mifsud meet again at Andaz Hotel in London, U.K. During meeting Mifsud claims Russians “have dirt” on Hillary Clinton; “emails of Clinton”; and “thousands of emails”.

♦May 6, 2016, Papadopoulos gets call from Christian Cantor (Israeli Embassy) wanting to introduce his ‘girlfriend’ Erika Thompson (Australian Embassy aide to Ambassador Alexander Downer). They meet at a London Pub.

(NOTE: Mueller cites the content of May 6, 2016, meeting as communicating “clinton emails” from Papadopoulos; however, Mueller conflates and falsely attributes the content material of this Erika Thompson meeting. Mueller attributes content to Ambassador Downer meeting with Papadopoulos on May 10, 2016.  Conflation appears intentional)

♦May 6, 2016, Following initial meeting, Papadopoulos gets email from Erika Thompson suggesting meeting with her boss, Australian Ambassador Alexander Downer.

♦May 10, 2016, Papadopoulos meets Ambassador Downer at the Kensington Wine Rooms in London, England.

MEDIA CLAIM: “Downer met with George Papadopoulos, where Papadopoulos — having been introduced through two intermediaries, Christian Cantor and Erika Thompson — mentioned that Russians had material on Hillary Clinton.”

Both Papadopoulos and Downer refute their May 10th meeting discussed Clinton’s emails.  Papadopoulos notes that Ambassador Downer is recording their conversation.

Alexander Downer is the Australian diplomat who engaged George Papadopoulos in London just days after U.S. intelligence asset Joseph Mifsud told Papadopoulos that Russians had emails from Hillary Clinton.  The communication from Ambassador Downer to the United States is what’s referenced in that EC above.

On April 18, 2019, coinciding with the release of the Mueller report, the Australian government declassified and released information that is specifically connected to the EC released today.  We can take the Australian release and overlay it into some really fantastic research on Alexander Downer, previously done by TWE:

In 1956, Australia — alongside New Zealand — were both added to the newly expanded UKUSA Agreement, which extended intelligence co-operation to those two countries with the current members of the agreement — United Kingdom, United States and Canada — which formed the alliance known as “Five Eyes”.

Many years later, on February 22, 2006, Alexander Downer and Bill Clinton signed a memorandum of understanding to spread grant money over the course of four years to a project to provide screening and drug treatment to AIDS patients in Asia as part of the Clinton Foundation.

On February 18, 2014, Downer was announced as Australia’s next High Commissioner to London, where he would replace Mike Rann.

Between March 7–13, 2016, Director James Comey visited Australia and met with Attorney General George Brandis and Justice Minister Michael Keenan.

Three days later, on March 16, Director James Clapper arrived in Australia from New Zealand via a C-17 Globemaster.

On May 10, 2016, at the Kensington Wine Rooms in London, England, Downer met with George Papadopoulos, where Papadopoulos — having been introduced through two intermediaries, Christian Cantor and Erika Thompson — mentioned that Russians had material on Hillary Clinton.

There’s a little bit of a conflict in the dates (likely due to the significantly different time zones between London and Australia). According to Downer’s calendar schedule the meeting with Papadopoulos was May 11th, 2016 (as released).

♦May 11, 2016, Ambassador Downer files notes to Australian government about the content of the conversation and the outlook of the Trump campaign foreign policy.

Here’s the heavily redacted cable communique from Downer to Canberra, AU office, on May 11th, 2016, the day he meting Papadopoulos (as released):

Here’s the excerpt from Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report that describes the events. However, worth noting Mueller assigns this meeting to May 6th, 2016. (Conflating earlier meeting with Erika Thompson – with Ambassador Downer meeting with Papadopoulos on May 10, 2016. Conflation appears intentional.)

[Page #89, Muller Report]

Alexander Downer decided to inform the United States Embassy in London, England about his conversation with Papadopoulos, upon the release of the Democratic National Committee’s e-mails by WikiLeaks on July 22, 2016.

On July 23, 2016, the Australian Government contacted Elizabeth Dibble at the United States Embassy to inform her about Downer and Papadopoulos’s conversation.

♦July 26, 2016, Mueller says (pg 89, fn465) Australia informs U.S. government of Papadopoulos statements about Clinton emails.

Somehow the information was transmitted to the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Crossfire Hurricane was then opened on July 31, 2016 by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

Two days later, on August 2, 2016, Special Agent Peter Strzok and another agent at the Federal Bureau of Investigation met with Downer directly in London to discuss his conversation with Papadopoulos further. Strzok then received reading materials, which he texted about to Lisa Page.

However, it’s worth noting information provided by Devin Nunes (April 2018) as it pertains to an unofficial channel of information that surrounded these events:

REPRESENTATIVE DEVIN NUNES: “That’s correct. So it took us a long time to actually get this, what’s called the “electronic communication”, as we know it now for your viewers, what it is it’s the original intelligence, original reasons that the counterintelligence was started.

Now this is really important to us because the counterintelligence investigation uses the tools of our intelligence services that are not supposed to be used on American citizens. And we’ve long wanted to know: what intelligence did you have that actually led to this investigation? So what we’ve found now, after the investigators have reviewed it, is that in fact there was no intelligence.

So we have a traditional partnership with what’s called the Five Eyes Agreement. Five Eyes Agreement involves our friends in Australia, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, Canada, and of course, us. So long time processes and procedures in place where we move intelligence across.

We are not supposed to spy on each others’ citizens. And it’s worked well. And it continues to work well. And we know it’s working well because there was no intelligence that passed through the Five Eyes channels to our government.

And that’s why we had to see that original communication. So now we’re trying to figure out, as you know, we are investigating the State Department, we think there’s some major irregularities in the State Department, and we’re trying to figure out how this information about Mr. Papadopoulos of all people who was supposedly meeting with some folks in London, how that made it over across into the FBI’s hands.” (Video Interview Link)

.

…On the day Peter Strzok starts Crossfire Hurricane he says it “feels momentous“…

(Conservative Treehouse, 5/20/2020)  (Archive)

The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee meets on Capitol Hill, May 20, 2020, to issue a subpoena to Blue Star Strategies. (Credit: Andrew Harnik/The Associated Press))

“The Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee approved on Wednesday its first subpoena as part of an investigation into the relationship between former vice president Joe Biden and the Ukrainian energy company Burisma Holdings.

The Republicans senators in the committee approved the subpoena, at the request of the panel’s chairman Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wisc.), for Blue Star Strategies in an 8-6 party-line vote.

It will cover records dating back to Jan. 1, 2013, regarding the public relations firm’s work for Burisma.

Hunter Biden, son of Joe Biden, joined the board of Burisma in April 2014 when the former vice president was leading the Obama administration’s Ukraine policy. He left Burisma in 2019.

Trump asked Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in mid-2019 to “look into” corruption allegations against the Bidens, noting that Joe Biden forced the ouster in 2016 of a prosecutor who was probing Burisma. The phone call sparked an impeachment inquiry against Trump, leading to his impeachment in December 2019.

Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) supports the subpoena and said it will provide the Senate with the full picture of Biden’s relationship with Burisma.” (Read more: The Epoch Times, 5/20/2020)  (Archive)

Vlodomyr Zelensky and Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko debate on April 19, 2019. (Credit: Wikipedia)

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called for an investigation Wednesday of leaked recordings purportedly depicting then-Vice President Joe Biden telling Zelensky’s predecessor Petro Poroshenko that his country would receive U.S. aid once top prosecutor Viktor Shokin was replaced.

The presumptive Democratic presidential nominee already has acknowledged such an arrangement publicly. But the leaked audio revived criticism that Biden was engaged in a kind of quid-pro-quo, much like President Trump was accused — during impeachment proceedings — of linking U.S. aid to calls for Zelensky to probe Shokin’s ouster.

The new audio indicates Poroshenko went along with Biden’s plan but did not think Shokin was involved in wrongdoing.

Shokin purportedly has said under oath that he had launched a probe concerning Hunter Biden’s role at Ukrainian energy firm Burisma Holdings when he was ousted. Hunter Biden held a lucrative post there, despite limited expertise, while his father handled Ukrainian policy as vice president. At the least, Ukrainian prosecutors had previously been investigating Burisma’s founder. Biden’s defenders have argued his intervention had nothing to do with Burisma and was focused on corruption concerns.

Zelensky said at a news conference in Ukraine that the contents of the leaked conversations, however, “might be perceived, qualified as high treason,” according to The Washington Post. Ukrainian prosecutors have said they are looking into sweeping “international corruption.” Zelensky has tried to maintain good relations with the Trump administration, even as his 2019 discussions were at the core of the U.S. president’s impeachment.

Andriy Derkach, a member of Ukraine’s parliament, released the recordings a day earlier.

“It’s going to be critical for him to work quickly to repair the damage that Shokin did,” the man identified as Biden says in one clip. “And I’m a man of my word. And now that the new prosecutor general is in place, we’re ready to move forward to signing that new $1 billion loan guarantee. And I don’t know how you want to go about that… I’ll leave it to you to how you want it done and where you want it done.”

(Read more: Fox News, 5/20/2020)  (Archive)

By Holman W. Jenkins, Jr.

(Credit: Sean Delonas/PoliticalCartoons)

(…) “To many hack commentators, “conspiracy theory” has become a term used to make certain kinds of implicit and explicit cooperation unacknowledgeable.

With evidence newly in hand last week, we see that the resources poured into promoting the Steele dossier before the 2016 election were nothing next to those mobilized by Clinton campaign chief John Podesta after the inauguration. Transcripts two years old show various Obama officials denying under oath that they possessed evidence of Trump-Russia collusion while they implied the opposite on TV.

Even the outside firm that the FBI relied on for its claim that Democratic emails were hacked by the Russians admitted under oath to finding no evidence that emails had been actually removed from Democratic servers.

Newsies in the aftermath of the Russia hoax now insist they were merely reporting on official actions. They carefully avert their eyes from the fact that the leaks they received and possibly even the official acts they reported were manufactured deliberately to put lies into the news.

If they had any grit, many of our senior reporters would be hopping mad now to learn they had been manipulated into reporting untruths to the public.

If they had any grit. Instead many of them seem to be hanging around the same leakers and whisperers, hoping for new talking points to get themselves off the hook in air-clearing now coming. It’s all part of what Matt Taibbi of Rolling Stone and Aaron Maté of The Nation (two left-wing critics of the Russia hoax) call the “privilege protection racket.”

Take a podcast in February with former Obama adviser David Axelrod and Rep. Adam Schiff, under the auspices of the University of Chicago and CNN. In an hourlong, intimate setting, how could Mr. Axelrod not ask about the unraveling of the Russia collusion theory and the Steele dossier that Mr. Schiff so assiduously promoted for three years?

The questions needn’t be accusatory, but how does someone with a living mind not ask? Instead, Mr. Axelrod abused JFK by painting Mr. Schiff as a profile in courage for peddling a lie that made him extraordinarily popular with the anti-Trump media (as if this could ever be courage).

At least Mr. Axelrod noted that Mr. Schiff comes from a safe seat unlike the many Republicans Mr. Schiff constantly accuses of cowardice. But how could any GOP officeholder work with Democrats to rein in Mr. Trump when voters back home see Mr. Schiff falsely trying to frame the GOP president as a Kremlin mole?

The failure to think about these larger consequences is the real cowardice. (For the record, Messrs. Taibbi and Maté in their own podcast refer to Mr. Schiff as a “pathological liar” and the person most likely to assure Mr. Trump’s re-election.)

When all is said and done, half the story of our age will be how Democrats and the press became more Trumplike than Trump in their opposition to Trump.”  (Read more: The Wall Street Journal, 5/22/2020)  (Archive)

The Washington Post headline reads (emphasis mine): “Federal judge hires high-powered D.C. attorney to defend his actions in Flynn case.” Which gives some insight into the framework and purpose of this event, and how it reached the WaPo narrative engineers.

The Washington Post is, as an institution, adverse to the interests of Michael Flynn.  So this story, specifically the events behind the story, is written in a posture to aid Judge Sullivan and oppose Flynn.  Keep that in mind (I’ll explain after).

Judge Sullivan has hired a high profile DC lawyer to assist him in responding to the inquires of the DC circuit:

(…) In a rare step that adds to this criminal case’s already unusual path, U.S. District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan has retained Beth Wilkinson to represent him in defending his decision to a federal appeals court in Washington, according to a person familiar with the hire who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter.

(…) Wilkinson, known for her top-notch legal skills and get-results style, is expected to file a notice with the court in the coming week about representing the judge. She declined to comment when reached Friday evening. Sullivan also declined to comment through his office.

(…) A federal judge doesn’t typically hire private counsel to respond to an appeals court, and yet so much about Flynn’s case has been a departure from the norm.

(…) Flynn’s lawyers then accused Sullivan of bias and asked the U.S. Court of Appeals to intervene.  On Thursday, that higher court took the extraordinary step of ordering Sullivan to answer within 10 days. The court also invited the Justice Department to comment.

(…) Wilkinson, a go-to advocate for prominent officials snared in major Washington investigations and high-stakes legal battles, now joins the fray. (read more)

I’m not going into the weeds to outline the motives of Beth Wilkinson.  Suffice to say the reason she is considered ‘high-profile’ or ‘high-powered’ is because of her connections to the DC system; a political system that frequently becomes enmeshed with the legal system.  Beth Wilkinson is well-connected; that’s the part that matters.

A federal judge hiring a well-connected lawyer to write his response to a DC circuit court appeals panel is the part that’s interesting.  There’s no guarantee the appeals court will accept such a response; but that’s also another issue.   Bottom line: Judge Sullivan is importing a lawyer to represent his interests.  Very unusual.

CTH readers are smart; aware and smart enough not to get stuck in the weeds; so let’s stay elevated on this and look at the whole picture.  Consider this decision by Judge Emmet Sullivan through the prism of recent events surrounding Flynn:

♦ The DOJ joined with the defense position and filed an unopposed motion to drop the case against Michael Flynn.

♦ A USAO from Missouri, Jeff Jensen, has discovered a trail of internal evidence pointing toward a corrupt originating prosecution for the case against Flynn.   Mr. Jensen has been revealing those documents and providing them to the court (and defense).

♦ Meanwhile DNI Ric Grenell has declassified and revealed documents showing a corrupt intent by the U.S. Intelligence Community (USIC) against Michael Flynn.

♦ Just yesterday (5/22/20) the FBI Director announced an internal investigation into officials inside the FBI for wrongful conduct specifically as it relates to a corrupt operation, now discovered and public, against Michael Flynn.

Additionally, we shall not play games and ignore the obvious.

Judge Emmet Sullivan is well aware of the reason why former Judge Rudolph “Rudy” Contreras was recused from the Flynn case; only days after accepting the first plea agreement, and less than 72 hours after the Peter Strzok and Lisa Page text messages publicly surfaced.

Lisa Page: “Rudy is on the [Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court]! Did you know that?” “Just appointed two months ago”

Peter Strzok: “I did. We talked about it before and after. I need to get together with him.”

On November 30th, 2017, Mike Flynn signed a guilty plea; ostensibly admitting lying to investigators.  The plea was accepted by Judge Rudolph “Rudy” Contreras; who is also a FISA court judge.  Six days later, December 7, 2017, Judge Contreras “was recused” from the case without explanation.

If the conflict -which required recusal- existed on December 7, 2017, wouldn’t that same conflict have existed days earlier on November 30th?

The same DC circuit now ordering Judge Sullivan to explain his decision-making, is the same DC circuit that previously recused and replaced Judge Contreras from the Flynn case.  None of this, including the specific tone of the panel in their order, is disconnected from the larger background.

So when we take everything in total, the decision by Sullivan to hire a high-profile and well connected DC lawyer to represent his interests in the Flynn case…. well, it looks to me like Sullivan just hired himself a defense attorney.

The phase of the “resistance” that federal Judge Emmet Sullivan was participating in, and had a role to play, is now almost totally engulfed in sunlight.  With few options for deniability and justification remaining, Sullivan has hired himself a lawyer.

(Conservative Treehouse, 5/23/2020)  (Archive)

Joe diGenova (l) and Greg Jarrett (Credit: Fox News)

“The Obama administration was “afraid” retired Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn would find out about improper access to National Security Agency data as President Trump’s national security adviser, according to former U.S. Attorney Joe diGenova.

His assertion adds insight to an allegation by Flynn’s lawyer, Sidney Powell, who claims her client was prepared to “audit” the U.S. Intelligence Community as White House national security adviser when he was “set up” by the FBI, resulting in an ensuing controversy that led to his swift ouster from the role.

Fox News legal analyst Gregg Jarrett asked diGenova, a lawyer whose work was caught up in the Ukraine-impeachment controversy if the previous administration sought to “sabotage” the Trump presidency by “going after” Flynn, who was under investigation in the FBI’s Russia inquiry.

“I don’t think there is any doubt that was part of it,” diGenova said on Witch Hunt: The Flynn Vindication, a program that aired Sunday evening on Fox News. “They needed to get Gen. Flynn removed because once he’s installed as the national security adviser, within a short period of time, he would know everything that had gone on in Crossfire Hurricane, and he would know about the illegal basis for everything that had transpired before it.”

“We know now, by the way, that President Obama is the only president to have multiple opinions by the FISA court, chief judges, accusing him and his FBI and DOJ of illegally accessing NSA databases, and that is one of the things they were really afraid of Flynn finding out about,” he added.

DiGenova appeared to be referring to information that was disclosed in 2017 through Freedom of Information Act litigation by the American Civil Liberties Union and reported by a former columnist at The Hill, John Solomon, in a piece about the NSA and the FBI informing the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court or the Justice Department’s national security division about surveillance violations between 2016 and 2019.”  (Read more: Washington Examiner, 5/25/2020)  (Archive)

By: Larry Doyle

Clinton Foundation Whistleblower Library: As our following grows, we welcome maintaining this ongoing ‘library’ at which you’ll find much info/extensive links. Our only request? Please retweet/share this library far and wide. Armed with info, we can’t/won’t be beat. Let’s roll:

** NOTE: Please know I use the term Book in these texts not literally but rather in a colloquial fashion. I want to make sure that I am not potentially confusing anybody. That said, I did write a book published in January 2014 titled In Bed with Wall Street (Palgrave MacMillan) exposing real financial regulatory corruption.

Book 1: “US House Oversight and Government Reform Congressional Hearing (December 13, 2018) on Not-for-Profits w/Specific Case Study on Clinton Foundation”. We enter at the 90-minute mark:

Book 2: “Appeal to US Tax Court”: Clinton Foundation Whistleblowers (Doyle-Moynihan) v IRS. In early 2019 we receive final denial from IRS to our whistleblower submission. In March 2019, we appeal to USTC. Case is ongoing: U.S. Tax Court/Docket Display

Book 3: “Let’s Follow the Drugs” back to India in 2003. Learn about Clinton Fdn partner company Ranbaxy Pharma distributing garbage drugs, guilty plea to 7 felony counts/paid $500mm fine in 2013 (3 days after Lois Lerner/ IRS/Tea Party Patriots explodes):

14. October 11, 2019: Former Ranbaxy execs (Singh brothers) are arrested on a subsequent $337mm fraud;

15. March 2020: Clinton Foundation Whistleblowers, Doyle and Moynihan v IRS case proceeds in US Tax Court:

— FBH (Financial Bounty Hunters/USA) (@LWDoyleUSA) March 17, 2020

Book 4: “The Perils of Drug Resistance”: those garbage drugs carry real price called drug resistance. Learn a LOT on that topic and supply chains. #BillClinton, #BillGates, #HillaryClinton, current #WHO chair #DrTedrosAdhanom need to be called to account:

Clinton Foundation Whistleblowers (Doyle-Moynihan): How is it that new viruses develop? At least partially due to drug resistance from attempting to fight prior viruses, such as HIV (human immunodeficiency virus). Why do Clinton Foundation, Gates Fdn & Global Fund need to be called on the carpet and held to account? Indian-based Ranbaxy Pharmaceuticals (Clinton Fdn partner) pled guilty to 7 felony counts and paid a $500mm fine in 2013 for actions going back to 2003 in producing and distributing ‘garbage drugs:

— FBH (Financial Bounty Hunters/USA) (@LWDoyleUSA) March 23, 2020

Book 5: “Let’s Follow the Money”: learn about #USAID/#PEPFAR, WHO-affiliates Geneva-based #GlobalFund and #UNITAID (Clinton Fdn largest donor) (#GatesFoundation on both boards), flows of $$, HRC State Dept interaction w/#GlobalFund ‘tantamount to #fraud:

Clinton Foundation Whistleblowers, (Doyle-Moynihan): In light of our current public health crisis, I expect we will be hearing more from/about the World Health Organization (WHO) and the need for more global government funding a la a new Global Fund. Stay with me. This gets good:

— FBH (Financial Bounty Hunters/USA) (@LWDoyleUSA) March 27, 2020

Book 5 Epilogue: Not technically part of our formal whistleblower submission but worthy of inclusion in the library: “#GlobalFund Donors -#Covid19 Correlation.” We highlight 80%+ correlation between top donors to GF and those nations being hit w/#Covid19:

1. The other day, we followed the $$, connected the dots and highlighted real probable cause of corruption/ fraud w/Clinton Foundation, USAID/PEPFAR, and Geneva-based Global Fund which is part of World Health. Let’s keep following $$ in re correlation with #Covid19. Stick w/me:

— FBH (Financial Bounty Hunters/USA) (@LWDoyleUSA) March 31, 2020

Books 1-5 provide a nice backdrop to our 4+ years’ efforts but really only scratch the surface. We submitted to the #IRS, #DOJ, #FBI, #USPS, #NYSAG and others w/judicial oversight/responsibility 100+ formal exhibits >6000+ pages inc: email exchanges, foreign contracts, interviews current (Clinton Fdn CFO) and former CF execs w/much to say, internal CF legal reviews and more. We shared our story but not exhibits w/Congress. They can’t make a case. We’re fighting for you, the American taxpayers. Pls join the fight. Share this CF Whistleblower Library. TYVM!

Book 6: Bill Gates and the Gates Foundation: Some might think him the smartest guy in the room and w/biggest wallet. Upon further reflection, “friends like these who needs enemies”

Clinton Foundation Whistleblowers (Doyle-Moynihan): Let’s take harder look at individual and organization whom many in US and around the world hold out as ‘the smartest guy(s) in the room’ along with having the biggest wallet to back it up. Who? #BillGates and #GatesFoundation

— FBH (Financial Bounty Hunters/USA) (@LWDoyleUSA) April 3, 2020

Book 7: US State Dept-PEPFAR-Clinton Foundation-Ivy League Universities-501c3s AND more: “Garbage drugs, drug resistance; Ivy-league universities scoring huge US govt grants; fraud within Clinton partners and MORE:

Clinton Foundation Whistleblowers (Doyle-Moynihan) Given the now daily presence of the President’s Coronavirus Task Force in our lives inc. our lead representative to PEPFAR and US rep to the board of the Global Fund, let’s navigate these paths in re Clinton Fdn(stick w/me)

— FBH (Financial Bounty Hunters/USA) (@LWDoyleUSA) April 8, 2020

Book 8: Clinton Foundation/CHAI – Population Services Intl How do American taxpayer $ line Clintons’ pockets? Here’s how > Donors to CHAI Inc: WHO, Global Fund, & Population Services Intl (all receiving big $ by USG):

Clinton Foundation Whistleblower Library:
Book 8: Clinton Foundation/CHAI – Population Services Intl
How do American taxpayer $ line the Clintons’ pockets? Here’s how >> Donors to CHAI inc: World Health Org, Global Fund, and Population Services Intl (all primarily funded by USG)

— FBH (Financial Bounty Hunters/USA) (@LWDoyleUSA) April 9, 2020

Book 9: “I Know Where All the Bodies Are Buried” (#ClintonFoundation CFO, 11-30-16, ~8:15 am, Princeton Club, NYC):

Clinton Foundation Whistleblowers (Doyle-Moynihan): “I know where all the bodies are buried”: Clinton Foundation CFO made that statement to my partner and I on November 30, 2016 at a breakfast meeting in NYC. (details in this 5-minute clip @CSPAN https://t.co/QQAE2kK756)

— FBH (Financial Bounty Hunters/USA) (@LWDoyleUSA) April 10, 2020

Book 10: Clinton Foundation/CHAI: Largest Donor is the World Health Organization hosted entity UNITAID:

Clinton Foundation/CHAI Largest Reported Donor > UNITAID, ‘hosted’ by World Health Organization. Let’s ‘keep punching’: Who is UNITAID (https://t.co/RklqHHXKTu)? A Geneva-based organization founded in 2006 by Bill Gates, Bill Clinton and a host of others. https://t.co/GIMRZhglyP

— FBH (Financial Bounty Hunters/USA) (@LWDoyleUSA) April 11, 2020

(The Clinton Foundation Whistleblowers are continuously updating this thread. The Whistleblowers also have a video library that is updated.)

“…An interesting couple of things happened just as Richard Grenell passed the sunlight baton to DNI John Ratcliffe. First, SSCI Vice-Chair Mark Warner is angered about the sunlight Grenell has delivered. Second, former AAG Matt Whitaker outlines how the Mueller investigation threatened him. Both issues merge (outlined below).

When considering that Robert Mueller was used as a weapon (threat) and a shield (bury information); and when considering Senator Mark Warner’s recent protestations against Grenell; it is well worth going back in history to May 2018 when SSCI Vice-Chairman Warner was demanding the Mueller investigation must not allow congressional oversight.

Yes, it now makes sense, why Senator Mark Warner was demanding DAG Rod Rosenstein and FBI Director Christopher Wray must keep records from congress.

(Source link)

According to Mark Warner in May 2018, it would be “irresponsible” and “potentially illegal” for congressional oversight to keep demanding records from the FBI and DOJ about their spying and surveillance activity against the campaign of Donald Trump.

Now the statements yesterday by AAG Matt Whitaker make sense.

Within an interesting interview conducted by Jan Jekielek of The Epoch Times, former AAG Matt Whitaker confirms the Mueller investigation was used by corrupt interests within the special counsel’s office to threaten any/all executive branch and congressional officials with “obstruction of justice” charges if they revealed any exculpatory or counter-narrative information during the Mueller probe. (read more)

Additionally, Senator Mark Warner carried a massive conflict because he was an active participant in the legislative side of the soft coup effort.

You see, when Dianne Feinstein stepped down as Vice-Chair from the Senate Intel Committee after the 2016 election, it was Mark Warner who took her place.  This puts Warner on the Gang-of-Eight starting January 3, 2017.

Coincidentally, the Gang-of-Eight conducts all oversight over DOJ and FBI covert and counterintelligence operations…. including those covert actions that took place in 2016.

It gets better….

Senator Mark Warner was also the guy caught text messaging with DC Lawyer Adam Waldman in the spring of 2017 (his first assignment).   Waldman was the lawyer for the interests of Christopher Steele – the author of the dossier.

While he was working as an intermediary putting Senator Warner and Christopher Steele in contact with each-other.  Simultaneously Adam Waldman was also representing the interests of… wait for it,…. Russian billionaire Oleg Deripaska.

Derispaska was the Russian person approached by Andrew McCabe and Peter Strzok and asked to assist in creating dirt on the Trump campaign, via Paul Manafort.

Senator Mark Warner holds a vested interest in making sure that no-one ever gets to the bottom of the 2016 political weaponization, spying and surveillance operation.  Hence Mark Warner was/is furious with the efforts of Ric Grenell as DNI.

Senator Mark Warner was a participant in the execution of the “insurance policy” trying to remove President Trump via the Russian Collusion narrative.  Documents that Ric Grenell has declassified and left for DNI Ratcliffe create a trail that encompasses the activity of Warner.

Senator Feinstein’s 2016 senior staffer (with Gang-of-Eight security clearance) was Dan Jones.  It was revealed that Dan Jones contracted with Christopher Steele to continue work on the Russia conspiracy narrative after the 2016 election, and raised over $50 million toward the ideological goals of removing President Trump. {See Here}

Staffer Dan Jones surfaces again in text messages from Feinstein’s replacement on the Gang-of-Eight, Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman, Mark Warner {See Here}

Senator Warner was texting with Adam Waldman about setting up a meeting with Chris Steele.  Waldman is a lobbyist/lawyer with a $40,000 monthly retainer to represent the U.S. interests of Russian billionaire Oleg V. Deripaska.

Senator Mark Warner was trying to set up a covert meeting.  In the text messages Adam Waldman is telling Senator Warner that Chris Steele will not meet with him without a written letter (request) from the Senate Intelligence Committee.

Senator Warner didn’t want the Republican members to know about the meeting.  Chris Steele knew this was a partisan political set-up and was refusing to meet unilaterally with Senator Warner.   His lawyer Adam Waldman was playing the go-between:

That “Dan Jones”, mentioned above, talking with Chris Steele and told to go to see Senator Warner, is the former senate staffer Dan Jones, Dianne Feinstein’s lead staff.

Simultaneously, while working to connect Senator Warner to Christopher Steele, Adam Waldman is representing Oleg Deripaska:

Oleg Deripaska was a potential source (highly likely in multiple aspects) of intelligence information within the Steele Dossier; and Deripaska was also well known to the FBI as they attempted to recruit him for the stop Trump effort.

John Solomon – (…) Deripaska also appears to be one of the first Russians the FBI asked for help when it began investigating the now-infamous Fusion GPS “Steele Dossier.” Waldman, his American lawyer until the sanctions hit, gave me a detailed account, some of which U.S. officials confirmseparately.

Two months before Trump was elected president, Deripaska was in New York as part of Russia’s United Nations delegation when three FBI agents awakened him in his home; at least one agent had worked with Deripaska on the aborted effort to rescue Levinson. During an hour-long visit, the agents posited a theory that Trump’s campaign was secretly colluding with Russia to hijack the U.S. election. (more)

Now, for more motive for Senator Warner to keep sunlight from the operation, listen carefully to the opening statement from former CIA Director John Brennan May 23rd, 2017, during his testimony to congress.

Pay very close attention to the segment at 13:35 of this video of Brennan’s testimony:

Brennan: [13:35] “Third, through the so-called Gang-of-Eight process we kept congress apprised of these issues as we identified them.”

“Again, in consultation with the White House, I PERSONALLY briefed the full details of our understanding of Russian attempts to interfere in the election to congressional leadership; specifically: Senators Harry Reid, Mitch McConnell, Dianne Feinstein and Richard Burr; and to representatives Paul Ryan, Nancy Pelosi, Devin Nunes and Adam Schiff between 11th August and 6th September [2016], I provided the same briefing to each of the gang of eight members.”

“Given the highly sensitive nature of what was an active counter-intelligence case [that means the FBI], involving an ongoing Russian effort, to interfere in our presidential election, the full details of what we knew at the time were shared only with those members of congress; each of whom was accompanied by one senior staff member.”…

So when CIA Director John Brennan was providing “individual” briefings to each of the gang-of-eight members (pictured above), they were accompanied by one senior staff.  That means a personal, individualized, briefing to Dianne Feinstein and Dan Jones.

The same Dan Jones who participated in the 2016 Brennan briefings, is the same Dan Jones who continued paying for Christopher Steele’s involvement after the Trump inauguration (ie. payoff); and the same Dan Jones who was a liaison visiting Senator Mark Warner to help continue the effort.

Things making sense now?

Now we see why Senator Mark Warner did not want a “paper trail”…

(Read more: Conservative Treehouse, 5/28/2020)  (Archive)

“In a departing letter to SSCI Vice-Chair Mark Warner, Grenell responds to a Warner inquiry demanding justification for his blitz of sunlight and naming of unmaskers.

Specifically pointing to the release of names that unmasked Trump administration officials Grenell notes “the decision to declassify the names of individuals who sought to unmask the identity of General Flynn poses absolutely no risk of compromise of either sources or methods.”  Grenell also tells Warner, “cherry picking certain documents for release while attacking the release of others that don’t fit your political narrative is part of the problem the American people have with Washington DC politicians.”

The Daily Caller has compiled a partial list of Grenell’s accomplishments to include:

— Directed the IC to change the way they protect the identities of U.S. citizens contained within intelligence reporting

— Completed the IC review of 53 transcripts from the House Intelligence Committee’s investigation into alleged Russian collusion in the 2016 election and made the transcripts publicly available

— Declassified previously redacted footnotes from the Justice Department Inspector General’s report into the origins of the Russian collusion investigation

— Declassified a list of government officials who requested the unmasking of National Security Advisor Michael Flynn

— Replaced FBI with ODNI as the primary group responsible for briefing presidential campaigns on information derived from national intelligence

— Declassified former national security adviser Susan Rice’s email to herself regarding a January 2016 Oval Office where progress on the Russia investigation was discussed

— Declassified additional transcripts in ODNI’s possession for potential public release by incoming DNI John Ratcliffe

(READ MORE)

And even that list doesn’t include the declassification of the Rosenstein/Mueller scope memos and several more important contributions during his tenure.

Grenell’s greatest contribution as DNI was personifying a belief that government, including the intelligence apparatus, works for the people; and as a direct result the intelligence apparatus has a responsibility to provide sunlight upon all aspects of their function that does not impede national security.

(Read more: The Conservative Treehouse, 5/26/2020)  (Archive)

Within an interesting interview conducted by Jan Jekielek of Epoch Times, former AAG Matt Whitaker confirms what CTH long suspected. The Mueller investigation was used by corrupt interests within the special counsel’s office to threaten any/all executive branch and congressional officials with “obstruction of justice” charges if they revealed any exculpatory or counter-narrative information during the Mueller probe.

Whitaker describes this as the “obstruction of justice trap.”

Essentially, this approach confirms the second-prong purpose of the Mueller investigation itself. First, use the special counsel in 2017, 2018 and into the beginning of 2019, as a shield (hide information); and secondly a weapon (threats) against any entity who would reveal the background intelligence that undercut the Trump-Russia collusion narrative.

We know President Trump was threatened by Rod Rosenstein not to declassify any information in September of 2018 or the Mueller investigation would use that act as evidence of obstruction. Whitaker confirms that same approach was applied toward any executive branch officer who would reveal or release information to congress during the tenure of the special counsel; even within the DOJ and including the attorney general.

This is how the Mueller probe was weaponized to mislead the American people.

While the Mueller team continued the same corrupt process started in 2016; and essentially transferred the same objectives as the DOJ/FBI team under Crossfire Hurricane; that same investigative unit was used to keep information from surfacing in ’17, ’18 and ’19 that would expose the corrupt nature of the investigation itself.

Documents could not be released without Mueller approval; interviews with key FBI/DOJ officials could not be conducted without Mueller team approval; information could not be declassified without Mueller team approval, etc.

Any agency or individual that attempted to release any information was subject to the threat of indictment by the same corrupt prosecutors leading the investigation. It’s a self-fulfilling safety mechanism.  Even DOJ officials like Matt Whitaker were under threat. Whitaker calls it the “Obstruction of Justice Trap”.

With that in mind, this is a very serious flaw in the authority of the special counsel statute that needs to be addressed by congress. Who can watch the watchers, when the watchers were specifically selected because they would knowingly contribute to the corruption.

Very disturbing (timestamps for interview):

♦03:43 On Judge Sullivan choosing not to dismiss the case against Gen. Flynn
♦06:54 On FBI director Christopher Wray calling for an internal investigation
♦08:41 What kind of accountability will we see for 2016 election surveillance?
♦15:27 The problem with the regulation creating Special Counsels
♦19:32 Obstruction of justice trap?
♦35:38 Communist China’s a greater threat than Russia

(Conservative Treehouse, 5/27/2020)  (Archive)

Lt. General Michael Flynn and Susan Rice attend the Passing The Baton conference at the U.S. Institute of Peace on January 10, 2017. (Credit: Mark Wilson/Getty Images)

“Highly sought-after summaries and transcripts of intercepted phone calls between former White House National Security Adviser Michael Flynn and Russian ambassador Sergei Kislyak contradict key claims made by former Special Counsel Robert Mueller in his criminal case against Flynn. The transcripts were provided to Congress on Friday and obtained by The Federalist. You can read the full documents here and here.

(…) Flynn was charged by Mueller in 2017 with making false statements to federal officials about conversations he had with Kislyak on December 22 and December 29, 2017. According to the charging documents from Mueller, Flynn allegedly falsely claimed to Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) agents that he did not ask Kislyak to “refrain from escalating” in response to U.S. expulsion of Russian diplomats and falsely claimed that he did not ask Kislyak to help defeat an anti-Israel resolution pending before the United Nations at the time. Mueller also claimed that Flynn lied when he said he didn’t remember Kislyak telling him that Russia would “moderate its response” to the expulsions.

The transcript of the December 29 conversation, which was cited by Mueller, does not include a request from Flynn that Russia “refrain from escalating” in response to U.S. expulsions of Russian diplomats. According to the transcript, Flynn asked Kislyak for Russia’s response to be “reciprocal” so that the U.S.–not Russia–would not be forced to escalate beyond the expulsions. The transcript makes clear that Flynn fully expected Russia to respond to the situation by expelling U.S. diplomats in response to the Obama administration’s move to expel nearly three dozen Russian diplomats from the U.S., and that his primary concern was preventing a situation where the U.S. would have to escalate tensions in response to Russia.

“Make it reciprocal,” Flynn reportedly said. “[D]on’t go any further than you have to. Because I don’t want us to get into something that has to escalate, on a, you know, on a tit for tat.”

“I really don’t want us to get into a situation where we’re going, you know, where we do this and then you do something bigger, and then you know, everybody’s got to go back and forth and everybody’s got to be the tough guy here, you know?” Flynn continued. “We need cool heads to prevail, and uh, we need to be very steady about what we’re going to do because we have absolutely a common uh, threat in the Middle East right now.”

“We agree,” Kislyak responded.

Later in the conversation, Flynn again used the word “escalate” in reference not to a potential Russian response, but to what he hoped the United States would not have to do in response to Russian actions.

“If you have to do something, do something on a reciprocal basis,” Flynn said. “And, and then, we know that we’re not going to escalate this thing[.]”

Mueller’s operation also conflated discussions of financial sanctions levied against Russian entities and individuals via executive order on December 28, 2016 with the expulsion of Russian diplomats, which were two separate and distinct issues. In fact, the specific executive order cited by Mueller in his charging documents against Flynn pertained only to Treasury-enforced financial sanctions against nine Russian intelligence individuals and institutions, not to the separate expulsions of Russian diplomats, which were enforced by the U.S. State Department. In his remarks announcing the various maneuvers by his administration against Russia, President Obama even noted that sanctions and expulsions were entirely separate issues handled by different agencies and requiring different legal authorities.

(…) The executive order signed by Obama and referenced by Mueller had nothing to do with expulsions of Russian diplomats, which was the topic of Flynn’s conversations with Kislyak.

The transcripts show that while Kislyak obliquely raised the issue of financial sanctions against certain Russian intelligence officials, Flynn himself never discussed the financial sanctions against Russian individuals and entities levied by the Obama administration. Instead, Flynn focused on preventing U.S. “tit-for-tat” escalation following the Obama administration’s expulsion of Russian diplomats. Although Obama officials claimed via leaks to the press that Flynn, a decorated combat veteran and retired three-star Army general, was illegally operating as a secret Russian agent, the transcripts show that Flynn’s primary focus throughout his conversations with Kislyak was ensuring that Russia and the U.S. could work together to defeat Islamist terrorist and the growing influence of ISIS throughout the Middle East. Obama officials never explained how working with international partners to defeat ISIS constituted a federal crime.”  (Read more: The Federalist, 5/29/2020)  (Archive)

Dana J. Boente (Credit: Mark Wilson/Getty Images)

FBI’s top lawyer Dana Boente was asked to resign on Friday. Two sources familiar with the decision to dismiss Boente said it came from high levels of the Justice Department rather than directly from FBI Director Christopher Wray.

His departure comes on the heels of recent criticism by Fox News for his role in the investigation of former Trump National Security Advisor Michael Flynn.

A spokesman for the FBI confirmed to NBC News that Boente did in fact resign on Friday.

Boente signed one of the warrants renewing the FBI’s authority to surveil Flynn. The warrants, known as FISA warrants, were renewed several times and had to be approved by a judge.

(Timeline editor’s note: Dana Boente did NOT sign one of the FISA warrants to surveil Flynn. The FISA warrants were used to surveil Carter Page.)

Boente also said in a recently leaked memo that material put into the public record about Flynn was not exculpatory for the former national security advisor. The memo undermines the Justice Department’s latest position that material about Flynn was mishandled by prosecutors.

Fox Business host Lou Dobbs said on April 27 that, “Shocking new reports suggest F.B.I. General Counsel Dana Boente was acting in coordination with F.B.I. Director Christopher Wray to block the release of that evidence that would have cleared General Flynn.” (Read more: NBC News, 5/29/2020)  (Archive)