“Prior to March 9th, 2016, the political surveillance and spy operations of the Obama administration were using the FBI and NSA database to track/monitor their opposition. However, once the NSA compliance officer began initiating an internal review of who was accessing the system, the CIA and FBI moved to create ex post facto justification for their endeavors. [Full Backstory]
After the November 8th, 2016, election everyone within the Obama network associated with the Trump surveillance operation was at risk. This is the impetus for the “Muh Russia” collusion- conspiracy narrative that was used as a mitigating shield. Within a few days after the election ODNI James Clapper and CIA Director John Brennan began pushing the Russia election interference narrative in the media.
By mid-December 2016 the Obama administration was deploying a full-court-press using their media allies to promote the Russia conspiracy. However, despite their public proclamations Clapper and Brennan were refusing to give any specifics to congress.
(Credit: Conservative Treehouse)
The hard narrative was that Russia interfered. That was the specific push from within the Obama intelligence apparatus writ large. All IC officials, sans Mike Rogers (NSA), had a self-interest in pushing this narrative; after all, it was the defensive mechanism to justify their illegal spying operation throughout 2016. This was their insurance policy.
The media was doing their part; and using the information leaked to them by those who were part of the 2016 operation(s) began battering the Trump transition team every hour of every day with questions about the Russia hacking narrative; thereby fertilizing the seeds of a collusion conspiracy.
On December 29, 2016, the IC produced, and rushed to completion, a ridiculous document to support the false-premise. This was called the Joint Analysis Report which claimed to outline the details of Russia’s involvement hacking into targeted political data base or computer systems during the election. We were introduced to “Grizzley Steepe” and a goofy claim of Russian hackers.
On the same day (12/29/16) President Obama announced a series of sanctions against Russians who were located in Maryland. This was Obama’s carefully constructed response to provide additional validity to the Joint Analysis Report. After fueling the Russia conspiracy for several weeks the Obama administration knew this action would initiate a response from both Russia and the incoming Trump administration.
On the day the JAR was released and Obama made the announcement, President-elect Donald Trump and some of his key members were in Mar-a-Lago, Florida. Incoming National Security Adviser Mike Flynn was on vacation in the Dominican Republic. As expected the Obama action spurred calls between Russian emissary Kislyak and Flynn.
The Obama IC were monitoring Kislyak communications and waiting for the contact. Additionally, it is suspected Flynn may have been under a FISA surveillance warrant which seems confirmed by the Weissmann/Mueller report. The FBI intercepted, recorded, and later transcribed the conversation.
The media continued to follow the lead from the Obama White House and Intelligence Community (writ large) fueling a narrative that any contact with the Russians was proof of collusion of some sort. In addition, the communications team of the White House, DOJ, FBI and aggregate IC began pushing a narrative surrounding the obscure Logan Act.
The ridiculous Logan Act promotion was targeted to infer that any action taken by the Trump campaign prior to taking office was interference with the political Obama Russia action, and would be evidence of collusion. That was the plan. DOJ Deputy AG Sally Yates was in charge of pushing the Logan Act narrative to the media.” (Read more: Conservative Treehouse, 4/28/2016)