Full video interview HERE:
“What you have, at least optically, is the Clinton campaign nested into the [Igor] Danchenko camp and his representation. So all the information John Durham turns over in discovery, they could conceivably give over to Hillary Clinton.”
According to a recent court filing by John Durham’s team, two Clinton campaign lawyers are representing Steele dossier source Igor Danchenko, the Russian analyst who was indicted by a grand jury in November on five false statement charges.
In this episode, Kash breaks down the potential conflicts of interest this creates.
Below is a rush transcript of this Kash’s Corner episode from Dec 24, 2021. This transcript may not be in its final form and may be updated.
Kash Patel: Hey, everybody, and welcome to our holiday special of Kash’s Corner. Thanks for tuning in this entire year, and we hope you enjoy our Christmas special.
Jan Jekielek: Yeah. So, to start here, I think we do need to say merry Christmas to everybody. Happy new year to your families, to your loved ones, to everybody. This is a very difficult year or has been a very difficult year for everybody, and I really hope that everyone gets a chance to celebrate a little bit. Find those things that perhaps they don’t look at too often, especially if things are looking a little grim and celebrate those.
Mr. Patel: And perhaps watch our episode on Christmas Eve and take it in with your family to brighten your day.
Mr. Jekielek: Absolutely. Well, and so it’s very interesting. It seems like Special Counsel Durham has a Christmas present for, I guess, many folks.
Mr. Patel: It is for me. I’ll take it.
Mr. Jekielek: Yeah. Well, so it’s really interesting. Friday afternoon, low news cycle as is typical of him. No fanfare there. He issues a filing, and in the filing, we learn a number of things, which we’ll talk about here, but one of the things we learn is simply that Igor Danchenko, one of the indicted people that he indicted, is actually being represented by the same lawyers that represent the Hillary Clinton Camp 2016 Campaign. I mean, fascinating, right?
Mr. Patel: It’s a shocking development, and I would say if it was the only one in the last five years saga of everything that was Russiagate, but as obviously we’ve shown to be the largest organized criminal enterprise. It’s no longer shocking unfortunately. It’s just more tragic application of law, and fact, and bias in the Department of Justice and the FBI, and it just continues.
I thank God that John Durham is on the case to help us keep our law enforcement members in check and also, equally as important, prosecute cases under the law and apply the facts wherever they lead, irrespective of who is possibly involved, i.e. a former senator, a former presidential candidate, a former secretary of state, and so many others.
So I’m glad that he is taking his action in a measured fashion, and he’s not taken to the media as we’ve talked about previously. He just doesn’t do that. I don’t even think he has a spokesperson, and if he does, all they say is, “No comment,” but he does talk where he’s legally and permissively allowed to talk, which is his filings in federal court.
We’ve talked about the indictments in the past of Sussmann and Danchenko, and I urge our viewers to… If you haven’t seen it, go check out those episodes. We did some fantastic deep dives into those indictments, but he did give us another pleading on Friday night.
Mr. Jekielek: Well, and so going back to the Sussmann indictment very briefly, we did learn the identity of Dolan, right?
Mr. Patel: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Mr. Jekielek: Somebody who seems like he was the main source for Danchenko, right? What’s very interesting about this is that nobody knew about him, and at the same time, this person was also deeply connected with the 2016 Clinton Campaign and others.
Mr. Patel: Yeah. No. You’re absolutely right. Look, and I, as the guy who ran the Russiagate investigation on House Intel, had never heard of Charles Dolan. That’s a little shocking for someone who was supposed to have been given all of the FBI, all of the DOJ, all of the intelligence community information regarding how the FISA was obtained, how the Steele dossier was procured, and everything. That just goes to show you that the FBI and DOJ failed to comply with congressional, valid congressional subpoenas we issued for documents because had they produced everything, they would’ve produced the documents that John Durham found, but at least thankfully he’s on the case.
Why it’s highlighting is because it seems that the Russiagate investigation and the criminal enterprise that John Durham is unfolding starts, and begins, and ends with Hillary Clinton and her campaign. That becomes more and more true as we reveal more and more information.
Charles Dolan is another example. A former Clinton operative, a former Clinton Campaign advisor, a former ally of hers in the State Department is now been shown to be an individual who… We don’t know if it was at the behest of the Clinton Campaign, but it stretches credulity to say otherwise was feeding information on behalf of the Clinton Campaign to Christopher Steele for their false dossier that was falsely presented by the FBI, and I believe knowingly so to get a FISA warrant on then candidate Trump.
So, yet, another member of the Clinton Campaign or Clinton World was shown to be involved in this corrupt… I don’t know what even there’s a new word for it or not, but this, I want to say, criminal enterprise and that was Sussmann indictment. Then, we move on to Danchenko and our latest pleading from John Durham this past Friday night.
Mr. Jekielek: What struck me as I was looking at this, and I want to thank our friend Techno Fog for actually drawing attention to this because I didn’t know it had come down, was how did this actually happen because Danchenko did drop his previous counsel, retain this new counsel. Did this counsel approach him? Did he approach them? The other question is like, is there a possibility that this could facilitate an information flow that… an unexpected information flow?
Mr. Patel: You’re right. I mean, we’ll get into the last bit of it later. Basically, what you have at least optically is the Clinton Campaign nested into Danchenko camp and his representation. So all the information John Durham turns over in discovery, they could conceivably give over to Hillary Clinton. We’ll circle back to that in more detail and why it is a problem.
You raised a point that’s very interesting. Danchenko was represented by someone else, and then at some point in time, these folks came along and said, “We’re going to represent you.” Now, what’s the nature of that? Are they doing it pro bono? Is someone else paying that fee? Because as someone who’s been subpoenaed by Congress, I can tell you from my personal experience, it’s expensive to hire lawyers to do that kind of work.
Igor Danchenko is criminally indicted in federal court. It’s even more expensive to do that kind of work. Maybe he’s a wealthy individual and can retain whatever counsel he wants, but the reason I became a public defender, and then later a prosecutor was because of one of the most important rights in our constitution is the right to counsel. It’s not just any counsel, it’s the right to counsel of your choosing if you can so afford, and if you can’t, then the public defenders come in. At least you’re provided great representation that way.
Igor Danchenko has now chosen his counsel, but there are some rules in the constitution and as interpreted by the Supreme Court that talk about conflicts of interest. We’ll get into all that, and that’s what this latest pleading is all about.
Igor Danchenko has this new set of lawyers or a relatively new set of lawyers who have come in, and they have for years, as best as I can tell, represented the Hillary Clinton Campaign, who was at the heart of and instigated the entire Russiagate conspiracy. So it’s problematic for many, many, many reasons, and there are a number of legal hurdles that the court must adjudicate properly in order to satisfy both the Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Amendments of the constitution and the Canon of Ethics, which we’ll get into too, which govern how lawyers are to behave before a federal judge.
Mr. Jekielek: You hear about conflict of interest a lot on television, right, right, and so forth.
Mr. Patel: Yeah.
Mr. Jekielek: But from what I understand, right, we’re not just looking at actual demonstrated conflicts of interest. These are conflicts of interest that may exist that…
Mr. Patel: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Mr. Jekielek: Right?
Mr. Patel: Look, and it applies to judges too. The same rules, the ethics apply for conflicts apply to judges as they do to lawyers that are appearing before the judge. For instance, many of these federal judges come from private law firms, deep private law firm backgrounds who represented some big Fortune 500 companies, some high-wealth individuals.
If they later became a judge, that judge has to recuse himself for matters forever relating to that company that his private law firm represented in the past or that he or she himself represented in the past even in peace not because there is an actual conflict of interest, but just because there could be. I’ve appeared before federal judges who have recused themself on situations like that.
Actually, I don’t think we’ve ever talked about this, but when we first subpoenaed the bank records of Fusion GPS, when we were running the Russiagate investigation in the fall of 2017, I believe, we had to go to federal court to get those records. The first judge in that cycle after a month or two recused herself from the proceedings, and that’s because there was a conflict of interest. Now, she doesn’t have to disclose to us what that conflict was.
We’re only left to guess that it might have to do with… and she came from a big law firm in her past, and it might have to do with a client or an institution they represent. So it happens. It happens in major cases. It happens in cases you don’t hear about. It happens to judges, but in this instance, it’s not about the judge. It’s about the lawyer, lawyers.
Mr. Jekielek: So what are these potential conflicts of interest here? I mean, it would be bizarre if information were able to flow in this direction as we just mentioned.
Mr. Patel: Yeah. There’s many, and the rules are governed by not just the law and the constitutions we talked about, but the Canon of Ethics, and they require that any prosecution and defense attorney have a free set of conflict events or be conflict-free with certain stipulations. What they’re saying is… In this instance, John Durham’s pleading is saying… because there’s a Supreme Court case that governs this.
The prosecution has a duty to affirmatively inform the court of a possible conflict of interest, and that’s what John Durham has done in this case. He, John Durham, is saying through his pleading that we think the individuals that now represent Igor Danchenko, who also represent the Hillary Clinton Campaign could have numerous conflicts of interest, not just the information flow.
So he laid out some of them, and it’s not up to the prosecution to investigate those on their own. They can request assistance, and I think appropriately did so to the judge because the judge has wider latitude to talk to defense counsel and even go what we call ex parte if need be, and that’s just to bring in defense counsel alone. So it’s not to divulge the defense of the defendant, which is to remain private. That’s never have to be divulged to the prosecution. So the judge has a little more leeway in how he investigates the potential conflict of interest.
But John Durham has now put these terms on notice that he should take those matters and those inquiries, and see where they lead. Namely, the number one thing that comes to my mind in terms of whether there’s a potential conflict of interest is witnesses, right?
These guys who represent Danchenko, who represent the Hillary Clinton Campaign. How many people in the Hillary Clinton Campaign universe do they represent? Did they represent five years ago, four years ago, three years ago? Is Igor Danchenko going to call one of those people as a witness in his trial? That’s a potential conflict of interest.
I don’t know Igor Danchenko’s defense. Only he and his attorneys do. Are those lawyers going to be shaded by their past representation of some of these said witnesses in their current representation of Danchenko? Are they going to be biased because they previously had a relationship with one of the witnesses that could be called? It’s not necessary that that witness has to be called. Is the government going to call one of those witnesses?
Let’s put the defense aside wholly. Is John Durham saying, “I might call witnesses A, B, and C,” and you represented A and B, and now you represent the defendant? It’s a potential conflict of interest, which basically… What the judge has to safeguard against is a reversible error, and a conflict of interest and a potential conflict of interest is almost… Once it’s established, it’s an automatic reversal.
So if he was convicted and this matter wasn’t adjudicated properly, the appeals court would look at it and say, “Why didn’t anyone look at this conflict of interest?” Which is why it’s so critical at this juncture for him to adjudicate. We can get it, about how you deal with an actual conflict of interest, but the witness thing is just one example for me of the possible conflicts. You brought up information sharing, and we can get into that too.
Mr. Jekielek: Well, okay. So let’s do it.
Mr. Patel: So it sounds pretty nefarious, right? But let’s be real with our audience. The entire Russiagate investigation, the Steele dossier, Hillary Clinton Campaign’s involvement in it, paying Perkins Coie $10 million, hiring Christopher Steele, paying him six figures, getting false information all the while informing the Clinton Campaign of what they were doing through their attorneys as we now know through the Michael Sussmann indictment who represented the Hillary Clinton Campaign.
That’s another possible conflict. Michael Sussman is indicted by the special counsel. He represented the Hillary Clinton Campaign. Did these lawyers that are representing Danchenko have anything to do with Michael Sussmann in the past? I don’t know the answer to that, but that’s another potential conflict of interest.
But what’s of greater note is that this information has cascaded down from the Hillary Clinton Campaign for four, five years now. Have these lawyers just nested themselves into a defendant that’s been charged so they can funnel information back to the Hillary campaign?
Now, that sounds pretty nefarious, but after everything we’ve proven and shown, I wouldn’t put it past them, and that’s why this judge has to adjudicate this matter now and appropriately. Can you imagine a scenario where lawyers for defendants where they’re not in his best interest, which is what is required by the constitution, but were being paid by someone to do that representation? Then, all the discovery, all the evidence that John Durham has to turn over so that the defendant’s rights are under the constitution are upheld, they take some of that information and leak it to the press. They go around and give it back to Hillary Clinton or her campaign, and that campaign uses it and puts it in the media.
It’s no surprise, and we’ll get into this as soon as well that Hillary Clinton is all of a sudden back in the news. So it’s raising a lot of questions. I don’t think there is anything… I don’t ever think there’s anything like a coincidence in these types of cases, and I think this judge… We should follow this. This judge has to deal with this matter. He doesn’t have to divulge how he deals with it or the details he deals with it, but he has to make a decision, and there has to be what we call a waiver by the defendant, and that’s a process.
Mr. Jekielek: So interesting, and so are there any other… these conflicts of interest that Durham outlined? I think there were others.
Mr. Patel: Well, the other one that’s actually… maybe it’s more prescient than the one we’ve talked about. I mean, this is crazy. It’s like all in one case. The other one is that John Durham quietly in his pleading basically told the world we’ve known the whole time. We’ve been saying, you and I, on this show.
The Hillary Clinton Campaign is being investigated by John Durham. So he’s telling the judge, “Not only am I not done with my special counsel investigation I’ve indicted clients with. I’ve indicted Sussmann. I’ve indicted Danchenko. I’ve told the world about Charles Dolan, Fusion GPS, Christopher Steele, Mark Elias, who used to represent the Hillary Clinton Campaign, the corrupt activities of the FBI, but I’m now also telling you, judge, I’m looking into the Hillary Clinton Campaign’s conduct and involvement in the production of the Steele dossier.”
That’s a massive conflict of interest. Even if John Durham doesn’t indict anyone in the Hillary Clinton Campaign, what John Durham is saying is, “Judge, I’m looking at it. I’ve been looking at it. I don’t know what I’m going to find. Are one of the people I’m looking at the Hillary Clinton Campaign connected to this law firm?” I’ll take it one step further. Is he looking at one of the lawyers who represented the Hillary Clinton Campaign?
People might say that’s a super far stretch, but we now know that Michael Sussmann, a lawyer for Hillary Clinton, has already been indicted for his conduct during the Russiagate hoax. So I don’t put it past him. I don’t know these lawyers. I don’t know that they’ve done that, but John Durham would be the only one that knows the answer to that question, and what he’s saying is those roads may lead to them or clients they represented. So you have the money angle, the information angle, the investigative angle, and we haven’t even gotten to the defendant’s constitutional rights, which I think trump all of those.
Mr. Jekielek: So, well, I think we do need to get to those. I mean, you’re laying it out perfectly here. Right? Now, why is that the most important thing here? That’s very…
Mr. Patel: I mean, maybe I’m biased because of my time as a public defender, but what you’re supposed to do as a defense attorney is execute due process and stand up when your client has been charged with whatever they’ve been charged with. He’s afforded that right. Not at 50% or 70%, but 100%, and not just one day, but from beginning to end. He has to have that right. Otherwise, it could be a reversible error in the appellate courts because they’ll say counsel was ineffective as we call it.
If there’s a finding of ineffectiveness or a conflict because of ineffectiveness, it’s a reversal, and then he gets to go all over again, but I also believe that that’s the whole point of our justice system. That’s why it’s different from 90% plus of the world’s judicial systems. We have a system in place where everyone gets the counsel they’re choosing, and if they can’t afford one, there’s a public defender service to afford them that sort of representation that the constitution demands.
The defendant in this case, and the Supreme Court, again, adjudicated this, he has to be made aware of all these conflicts not just by his own attorneys, but by the prosecution and possible inquiry by the judge to further develop some of the lines that, in this case, John Durham has laid out for the court.
Only after the defendant has been made aware, all of those potential conflicts, the witnesses, the money, the bias, where the investigation is going. Then, the judge in open court has to ask the defendant if he wants to, even knowing all that information, stick with his lawyers. So he has to make what’s called the Knowing Intelligent and Intentional Waiver of a conflict of interest.
All three of those have to be met. So he can only do that if he’s been informed of the conflicts and the potential conflicts in their entirety, and then he has to go into open court and say, “Judge, I’ve reviewed all of that information,” and because the constitution speaks directly to this that is he is allowed his counsel of choosing, and I agree with this. If he knows about all of it and still wants to go with them, that should be his right. But what John Durham is saying is, “I don’t know if he knows about all of that.”
Plus, what John Durham is saying is, “I don’t know all of the information because I’m still investigating the Clinton Campaign. You, the judge, can talk to the lawyers outside of the prosecution’s presence. You can talk to the lawyers and the defendant outside of the prosecution’s presence. You, the judge, can call in witnesses and say, ‘I’ve been notified of a possible conflict of interest from your firm, or this organization, or this individual I hear might be indicted. I want to know the details so I can advise the defendant in this case of those details. So he can make that knowing and intentional waiver.’” (Full interview: Kash’s Corner, 12/24/2021) (Archive)