“Days after Carter Page’s high-profile trip to Moscow in July 2016, the Trump campaign adviser had his first encounter with Stefan Halper, a University of Cambridge professor with CIA and MI6 contacts.
…”Page’s relationship with Halper tracks closely with the period when the Trump adviser was under heavy scrutiny from the federal government.
By the time he joined the campaign in March 2016, Page was already known to the FBI, though not because of any criminal activity. FBI agents interviewed him in 2013 as part of an investigation into a Russian spy ring operating in New York. Page said he met with one of the Russians and provided him with academic papers he had written.
The FBI put Page back on its radar at around the time he joined the Trump campaign. In late-spring 2016, top government officials, including then-Attorney General Loretta Lynch and then-FBI Director James Comey, discussed whether to alert the Trump campaign to Page’s past interactions with the Russian spy ring. But government officials decided against providing the information.
Page’s visit to Moscow, where he spoke at the New Economic School on July 8, 2016, is said to have piqued the FBI’s interest even further. Page and Halper spoke on the sidelines of an election-themed symposium held at Cambridge days later. Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and Sir Richard Dearlove, the former head of MI6 and a close colleague of Halper’s, spoke at the event.
Page was invited to the event in June by a University of Cambridge doctoral candidate.
Page would enter the media spotlight in September 2016 after Yahoo! News reported that the FBI was investigating whether he met with two Kremlin insiders during that Moscow trip.
It would later be revealed that the Yahoo! article was based on unverified information from Christopher Steele, the former British spy who wrote the dossier regarding the Trump campaign. Steele’s report, which was funded by Democrats, also claimed Page worked with Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort on the collusion conspiracy.” (Read more: Daily Caller, 5/17/2018)
Victoria Nuland, Jonathan Winer and Elizabeth Dibble (Credit: public domain)
(…) “State Department officials obtained and reviewed parts of the infamous Steele dossier by mid-July2016, well before FBI headquarters had access to the document. The U.S. embassy in London was also anearly recipient of information about former Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos that the FBI would use to justify opening its counterintelligence investigation in late July2016. And in a little-noticed Senate hearing on Wednesday, it was revealed that dossier author Christopher Steele briefed State Department officials at Foggy Bottom in October 2016.”
(…)”Three diplomats — Victoria Nuland, Jonathan Winer and Elizabeth Dibble — appear to be key to the State Department’s role in handling Trump-related Russia information.
The State Department’s involvement in the Russia matter first came to light only in December 2017, nearly a year after the publication of the Steele dossier.
That’s because Winer, a former Senate aide to former Secretary of State John Kerry, disclosed in a little-noticed MSNBC documentary that he met with Steele during the summer of 2016.
Nuland came forward to acknowledge that she received and handled information from Steele in an interview on Feb. 4. Winer then wrote an op-ed for The Washington Post on Feb. 8 asserting that he was being unfairly targeted by Nunes.
Winer and Nuland suggested in their disclosures that they determined Steele’s reports were too hot for the State Department to handle. They have both claimed they referred the information to the FBI, which was better suited to verify Steele’s still-unverified allegations.
But there is plenty of evidence that the State Department did not merely refer Trump-Russia information to the FBI.
Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr revealed in a hearing on Wednesday that State Department visitor logs showed Steele visited Foggy Bottom just weeks before the 2016 election.” (Read more: Daily Caller, 6/22/2018)
Judge Emmet Sullivan (Credit: Diego M. Radzinschi / National Law Journal
Clinton’s longtime personal lawyer David Kendall appears in court regarding Clinton’s email controversy for the first time since the issue became public in March 2015. He is opposing a request to have Clinton deposed in a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit initiated by Judicial Watch.
The judge in the case, Emmet Sullivan, has said publicly that Clinton violated government policy by doing official business on the private server. The State Department’s inspector general, Steve Linick, also concluded the same in a May 2016 report. Kendall nonetheless maintains that Clinton’s behavior “was clearly permitted and allowed” by policy. However, he admits that her server was never specifically approved by anyone at the State Department. He also argues that the reason Clinton set up and used a private email server for all her emails was “a matter of convenience.”
Sullivan doesn’t immediately decide whether Clinton should be deposed or not. However, Judicial Watch has also asked for the depositions of former State Department officials Clarence Finney and John Bentel, and Sullivan does definitively state that at least Bentel “should be deposed.” (Politico, 07/18/2016)
“Former foreign minister Alexander Downer acted without clearance from Australian officials when he contacted United States diplomats four years ago to raise concerns about potential Russian interference in the US presidential election.
Malcolm Turnbull (Credit: BBC)
A new memoir by former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull reveals that Mr Downer raised his concerns directly with the US embassy in London in July 2016 but had “no authority from Canberra” to do so.
The move was crucial to the launch of an FBI investigation into the Russian support for the election of US President Donald Trump, who dismissed the inquiry as a “witch-hunt” and ordered an inquiry into the affair.
Mr Downer, the Australian High Commissioner to the United Kingdom at the time, met Trump aide George Papadopoulos in London in May 2016 and was told the Russians had “damaging” material on Democrat candidate Hillary Clinton.
While Mr Downer mentioned this in a cable to the Department of Foreign Affairs, the information was not acted upon until he later chose to raise it with the deputy at the US embassy in London, Elizabeth Dibble.
According to Justice Department lawyers in a new court filing, on July 21, 2016, “the FBI began transferring the retrieved materials to the State Department, and will continue to transfer the retrieved materials to the State Department on a rolling basis.”
In late 2014, Clinton and her lawyers kept about 30,000 emails they deemed work related and deleted another 32,000 they deemed personal. The exact number of deleted emails that the FBI managed to recover or find from other sources has not been specified.
Some emails from Clinton aide Huma Abedin were also found, since one of her email accounts was stored on the same clintonemail.com private server as Clinton’s emails, but the number of recovered Abedin emails is unknown.
Photo captured from video of Jason Leopold’s immediate response to the results of his Clinton Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit. (Credit: Vice News)
The lawyers say they can’t estimate how long the transfer process will take. Once the State Department has the emails, those judged by the department to be work related will be made responsive to Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests. Those deemed genuinely personal may never be made public. (Politico, 7/22/2016)
The meeting takes place only one day before WikiLeaks publicly releases almost 20,000 Democratic National Committee (DNC) emails. However, when the Washington Post reports on this meeting a few days later, it will give no indication if US intelligence knew of the leak in advance and thus discussed that in the meeting or not. According to the Post, “Officials from various intelligence and defense agencies, including the National Security Council, the Department of Defense, the FBI, and the Department of Homeland Security, attended the White House meeting…” (The Washington Post, 7/24/2016)
“IRS Commissioner John Koskinen referred congressional charges of corrupt Clinton Foundation “pay-to-play” activities to his tax agency’s exempt operations office for investigation, The Daily Caller News Foundation has learned.
The request to investigate the Bill, Hillary and Chelsea Clinton Foundation on charges of “public corruption” was made in a July 15 letter by 64 House Republicans to the IRS, FBI and Federal Trade Commission (FTC). They charged the foundation is “lawless.”
The initiative is being led by Rep. Marsha Blackburn, a Tennessee Republican who serves as the vice chairwoman of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, which oversees FTC. The FTC regulates public charities alongside the IRS.
The lawmakers charged the Clinton Foundation is a “lawless ‘pay-to-play’ enterprise that has been operating under a cloak of philanthropy for years and should be investigated.” (Read more: The Daily Caller, 07/26/2016)
As part of a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit by Vice News reporter Jason Leopold, the State Department reveals more information about seven chains of 22 “top secret” emails involving Clinton. (Curiously, FBI Director James Comey mentioned on July 5, 2016 that there actually were eight “top secret” email chains, but the eighth chain is not mentioned by the department.)
The contents of the emails remain totally classified, but previous media reports indicate that most of them discussed approval for covert CIA drone strikes in Pakistan, and some of them may have identified CIA operatives working undercover.
A sample of the Vaughn Index form submitted by the State Department, in response to the Vice News Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit. (Credit: public domain)
For the first time, the department reveals which years the emails were sent and who sent and received them. All the emails were from 2011 or 2012 – the State Department began to have a say in approving CIA drone strikes in 2011. Nine of the emails were written by Clinton, and the other thirteen were written by her aide Jake Sullivan. Two were also cc’d by Sullivan to her chief of staff Cheryl Mills and/or Deputy Secretary of State William Burns.
The State Department disclosure comes in the form of a “Vaughn Index,” which is a document used by government departments in FOIA lawsuits to justify the withholding of information under various FOIA exemptions. Vaughn Indexes contain at least some information about the withheld text, to justify keeping it redacted, but this one does not. Steven Aftergood, the director of the Project on Government Secrecy at the Federation of American Scientists, says that according to government regulations, “State’s document does not fulfill the requirements for a Vaughn index.” (Vice News, 7/22/2016) (The Hill, 7/22/2016)
In HILLARY’S AMERICA, bestselling author and influential filmmaker D’Souza reveals the sordid truth about Hillary and the secret history of the Democratic Party. This important and controversial film releases at a critical time leading up to the 2016 Presidential campaign and challenges the state of American politics.
The New York Times begins a mainstream media effort to paint Trump as a Manchurian Candidate on July 22, 2016. Paul Krugman cutely disguises the slur with “Siberian Candidate” instead.
Krugman writes,
“If elected, would Donald Trump be Vladimir Putin’s man in the White House? This should be a ludicrous, outrageous question. After all, he must be a patriot — he even wears hats promising to make America great again.
But we’re talking about a ludicrous, outrageous candidate. And the Trump campaign’s recent behavior has quite a few foreign policy experts wondering just what kind of hold Mr. Putin has over the Republican nominee, and whether that influence will continue if he wins.”
A few weeks later, on August 21, 2016, Hillary Clinton’s campaign manager, Robby Mook, suggested that Donald Trump may be a “puppet” for Russia in an interview on ABC’s “This Week.”
Mook told host George Stephanopoulos, “We need Donald Trump to explain to us the extent to which the hand of the Kremlin is at the core of his campaign,” and “There are real questions being raised about whether Donald Trump himself is just a puppet for the Kremlin in this race.”
“Last week, Robby Mook, Hillary Clinton’s campaign manager, said we should ask “real questions” about whether Donald Trump “is just a puppet for the Kremlin.” By that time, Audible.com was already giving away free audiobooks of “The Manchurian Candidate,” Richard Condon’s 1959 book (transformed into a classic thriller starring Angela Lansbury and Frank Sinatra in 1962 and a worse remake with Denzel Washington and Meryl Streep in 2004) about communists controlling an American presidential candidate.”
(Credit: Salon, 8/26/2016)
Precisely a month before Election day, 2016, The Atlantic publishes an article meant to discredit Trump and present him as a “Modern Manchurian candidate serving the interests of the Kremlin.” Former Secretary of Defense and CIA Director Leon Panetta suggests Trump represents a threat to national security.
The Atlantic – October 8, 2016
Last but not least, a week to the day before the 2016 Election, Vanity Fair publishes this article on November 1, 2016:
WikiLeaks publicly releases 19,252 emails and 8,034 email attachments recently hacked from the Democratic National Committee (DNC). The emails are from seven DNC officials: Communications Director Luis Miranda (10,770 emails), National Finance Director Jordon Kaplan (3,797 emails), Finance Chief of Staff Scott Comer (3,095 emails), Finance Director Zachary Allen (1,611 emails), Finance Director of Data and Strategic Initiatives Daniel Parrish (1,472 emails), Senior Advisor Andrew Wright (938 emails) and Northern California Finance Director Robert (Erik) Stowe (751 emails). The emails are from January 2015 until May 25, 2016.
The seven DNC officials are left to right Luis Miranda (Credit: public domain), Jordan Kaplan (Credit: Facebook), Scott Comer (Credit: Linked In), Zachary Allen (Credit: Twitter), Daniel Parrish (Credit: Linked In), Andrew Wright (Credit: Linked In), Robert (Erik) Stowe (Credit: Linked In)
In announcing the release, WikiLeaks mentions this is “part one of our new Hillary Leaks series.” (WikiLeaks, 7/22/2016)
Julian Assange, head of WikiLeaks, mentioned in a June 2016 interview that other coming releases will relate to the Clinton Foundation and to Clinton’s emails (although it’s not clear how many there are or where and when they are from). It also was reported in June 2016 that the DNC computer network had been recently hacked, along with other political entities, such as the Clinton campaign. It also was suspected that the Russian government was behind the DNC hack. However, a previously unknown hacker named Guccifer 2.0 emerged and claimed to be behind the hack, and also claimed to have no ties to Russia. He furthermore claimed to have given thousands of documents to WikiLeaks.
WikiLeaks has a policy of never revealing the sources of their leaked material, and has maintained that policy for this release.
“A July 22, 2016, email exchange, among Strzok, Page, Moffa and other unidentified FBI and DOJ officials, shows that Beth Wilkinson, an attorney for several top Clinton aides during the server investigation, wanted a conference call with the DOJ/FBI and that she was “haranguing” the FBI/DOJ about the return of laptops in the FBI’s possession:
A Wilkinson Walsh attorney, emails [Redacted] FBI National Security Division Officials: We wanted to follow up on our conversation from a few days ago. We would like to schedule a time to speak with both you and [Redacted] early next week. Is there a time on Monday or Tuesday that could work on your end?
[Redacted] FBI National Security Division official emails: See below. I am flexible on Monday and Tuesday. [Redacted] can chime in with her availability. It is my understanding that Toscas [George Toscas], who helped lead Midyear Exam may have called over to Jim or Trisha [former Principal Deputy General Counsel [Trisha Anderson] regarding some high-level participation for at least the first few such calls. I am happy to discuss further but wanted to send you this so you could raise within the OGC [Office of the General Counsel] and give me a sense of scheduling options. I am around if you want to talk.
[Redacted] FBI National Security Division official writes: In the meantime, I’ll tell Hal that we will certainly schedule a call and will get back to him as to timing. Since he knows Beth [Wilkinson] personally, it could be useful to have Jim on the phone if she is going to be haranguing us re: the laptops.
[Redacted] FBI Office of the General Counsel writes: More…I guess this is [Redacted’s] rationale for why we need to have the GC on the call to discuss the fact that we will be following all of our legal obligations and FBI policies/procedures with regard to the disposition of the materials in this case.
Strzok writes: You are perfectly competent to speak to the legal obligations and FBI policy/procedures. We should NOT be treating opposing counsel this way. We would not in any other case.
Tweet posted by Guccifer 2.0 on July 22, 2016. (Credit: Guccifer 2.0 / Twitter)
Shortly after WikiLeaks publishes almost 20,000 emails from the Democratic National Committee (DNC), the hacker known as Guccifer 2.0 takes credit. His website is not updated, but he writes at his Twitter account: “@wikileaks published #DNCHack docs I’d given them!!!” (Twitter, 6/22/2016)
He has previously posted many DNC files on his own website, starting on June 15, 2016. And on that same day, he claimed that he had given “thousands of files and mails” to WikiLeaks.
Clinton campaign manager Robbie Mook (Credit: Douglas Graham / Congressional Quarterly Roll Call Group)
On July 24, 2016, Mook says, “What’s disturbing about this entire situation is that experts are telling us that Russian state actors broke into the DNC [Democratic National Committee], took all those emails, and are now leaking them out through these websites,” such as WikiLeaks. “It’s troubling that some experts are telling us this was done by the Russians for the purpose of helping [Republican presidential nominee] Donald Trump.”
Mook also apologizes for the content of some emails, which show the DNC had a bias in favor of Clinton and against Senator Bernie Sanders, despite DNC rules that it should be neutral in the Democratic primaries. (The Hill, 7/24/2016)
Trump’s campaign manager Paul Manafort calls Mook’s comments “pure obfuscation.” He adds, “What they don’t want to talk about is what’s in those emails.” (The Washington Post, 7/24/2016)
Two days later, Mook makes similar accusations about Russia. He also says, “I think the timing around our convention was not a coincidence.” WikiLeaks released 20,000 DNC emails on June 22, 2016, just three days before the start of the Democratic National Convention. (The Hill, 7/26/2016)
3/18/2022 – Hilary Clinton ok’d it and Robbie Mook began THE BIG RUSSIA LIE at the Democrat convention to take away the attention to the emails Wikileaks had published. The Clinton campaign in coordination with the Media & Democrats and working with the Deep State concocted the RUSSIA LIE and worked together to report the DISINFORMATION (lies) for years.
Wasserman Schultz announces her resignation as chair of the Democratic National Committee on Sunday, July 24, 2016. (Credit: CNN)
Just one day before the Democratic National Convention, Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D) announces she is resigning from her position as the chair of the DNC. This comes in response to WikiLeaks releasing 20,000 leaked emails from a recent hack of the DNC. The New York Times says that the emails “showed party officials conspiring to sabotage the [presidential] campaign of Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont.”
Earlier in the day, Sanders called the situation an “outrage” and called for Wasserman Schultz to step down. She announced her resignation after a private meeting with Clinton’s senior aides. The Times comments that even prior to the email leak, “Ms. Wasserman Schultz has faced a flurry of negative stories during her five-year tenure as the committee’s chairwoman… but she had resisted calls for her to quit.”
The Times also reports: “The breach of the Democratic committee’s emails… offered undeniable evidence of what Mr. Sanders’s supporters had complained about for much of the senator’s contentious primary contest with Mrs. Clinton: that the party was effectively an arm of Mrs. Clinton’s campaign.”
Donna Brazile, vice chair of the Democratic National Committee (DNC), replaces Wasserman Schultz as interim chair through the end of the November 2016 election. (The New York Times, 7/24/2016)
QUESTION: Thanks, Jake. James Reinl here from Al Jazeera. A number of Clinton campaign officials have suggested there’s a link between the email leaking and Russian state hackers. In your opinion, how strong is the evidence linking the Russian state to this? And why do you think the Kremlin would prefer a President Trump to a President Clinton?
MR SULLIVAN: We have seen multiple intelligence experts, as well as security firms, describe the attack, the cyberattack on the DNC as carried out or conducted by Russian Government-sponsored entities. You’ve heard that now increasingly from experts who have deep experience in both the cyber domain and in the particular behavior of Russian-backed cyber actors. And I have to say that this is not a new phenomenon that Russia would interfere in the elections of other countries. It is a new watershed if it is borne out to, in fact, be the case. And the FBI has just today said that it is launching an investigation, so we will see as time goes on what gets proven.
But if it is indeed the case that Russia was behind this hack, this would be a new watershed. This would be Russia interfering in the American presidential election, which is deeply alarming and completely unacceptable if it bears out to be true.
In terms of why Russia would want to do this, I’m not going to stand up here and speculate today nor reach any definitive conclusions of any kind, but I will say this: Hillary Clinton’s position on supporting our allies in Europe, Hillary Clinton’s position on energy security for Europe, Hillary Clinton’s position on advancing human rights and democracy around the world may not sit too well with certain actors in the Kremlin. I will leave it to you to look at Donald Trump’s position on these various issues – his position on NATO, his position on Vladimir Putin – and judge for yourself what the answer to your question is.
All I can tell you is a number of very credible, experienced experts have drawn this link, it is consistent with behavior we have seen, and now let’s see what the facts bear out. But all Americans – Democrat, Republican, or Independent – if it turns out to be the case that Russia is doing this, needs to stand together and say we will not tolerate this kind of behavior.
“On April 19th, a judge in New York grudgingly agreed that someone may have tampered with Alba Guerrero’s voter registration. Judge Ira Margulis changed his decision from moments earlier that Guerrero would be denied the right to vote in New York’s Democratic primary, after evidence emerged that Guerrero’s signature had been forged, switching her to Republican without her knowledge or consent. Had she not been willing to take several hours to appear before a judge that day, Alba would not have been able to vote for Senator Bernie Sanders. Video evidence available online confirms the forgery.
Ms. Guerrero states: “It just boggles my mind that it could happen that easily to so many people and without them even knowing that they are being manipulated like that…I never would have thought something like that could happen.” Guerrero was more than willing to have her story included in Democracy Lost. She added, “This is a problem that obviously has gone for too long and with no consequence.”
A forged legal document cannot be attributed to an unfortunate mistake or a clerical error. Someone intentionally tampered with Alba Guerrero’s voter registration.
Another New York resident, Chloe Pecorino, attempted to register as a first-time voter by submitting the relevant paperwork to the Department of Motor Vehicles in Brooklyn more than a week before the March 25th, 2016 deadline. Attempts to verify her registration status online were unsuccessful. On the day of New York’s presidential primary, Chloe still had not been registered as a Democrat, despite persistent efforts, including more than a dozen calls and emails, the evidence of which spans fifteen pages in Exhibit A of Election Justice USA’s initial New York lawsuit. On the day of the primary, Chloe took several hours to appear before a judge in an attempt to vote normally. Despite ample evidence of attempts to register before the deadline in good faith, the judge denied her request. As a consequence, Chloe was forced to cast her vote for Senator Sanders using an affidavit ballot. As can be seen immediately below, Chloe’s affidavit ballot was declared invalid, like so many others.”
“The Federal Bureau of Investigation has launched a probe into the hacking of the Democratic National Committee’s emails, the bureau announced Monday.
“The FBI is investigating a cyber intrusion involving the DNC and are working to determine the nature and scope of the matter,” the agency said in a statement. “A compromise of this nature is something we take very seriously, and the FBI will continue to investigate and hold accountable those who pose a threat in cyberspace.”
The publication of the approximately 20,000 emails showed a DNC favorable to Hillary Clinton over Bernie Sanders, leading Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz to announce her resignation on Sunday, effective at the end of the party’s convention this week.” (Read more: Politico, 7/25/2016)
The 2016 Democratic Party presidential primaries and caucuses were a series of electoral contests organized by the Democratic Party to select the 4,051 delegates to the Democratic National Convention held July 25–28 and determine the nominee for President of the United States in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. The elections took place within all fifty U.S. states, the District of Columbia, and five U.S. territories and occurred between February 1 and June 14, 2016. (Wikipedia)
Protesters at the 2016 Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia. (Credit: Michael Nigro / Truthdig)
Highlights of the 2016 Democratic National Convention:
For those following the increasingly curious case against General Mike Flynn, events take another unusual turn today. Congressional investigators have shared a set of unredacted text messages between FBI Agent Peter Strzok and his cohort DOJ Attorney Lisa Page which reveal a personal friendship between Agent Strzok and Flynn’s initial presiding judge Rudolph Contreras.
On November 30th, 2017, Mike Flynn signed a guilty plea; ostensibly admitting lying to investigators. The plea was accepted by Judge Rudolph Contreras; who is also a FISA court judge. Six days later,December 7th, 2017, Judge Contreras “was recused” from the case without explanation.
The case was reassigned to DC District Judge Emmet Sullivan. The Contreras recusal always seemed sketchy. The key question was: if the conflict existed on December 7th, wouldn’t that same conflict have existed on November 30th, 2017?
Apparently DOJ lawyer Lisa Page was unaware that “Rudy” was a FISA court judge until July 25th, 2016, when she posited a question to her small group co-conspirator FBI agent Peter Strzok.
Today questions about the conflict seem to have been answered. Text messages between Peter Strzok and Lisa Page reveal the FBI agent and Judge Contreras were close personal friends.
Contreras was appointed to the FISA Court court in May 2016. The FISA court approved a Title-1 Surveillance Warrant against Trump campaign aide Carter Page on October 26th, 2016, essentially placing the entire Trump campaign under FBI surveillance. That surveillance was then used against incoming National Security Adviser Michael Flynn.
The FBI agent questioning Michael Flynn in January 2017 was Peter Strzok. The judge presiding over the sketchy Flynn plea, an outcome of that interview, was Strzok’s friend Judge Rudolph “Rudy” Contreras. Therein lies the conflict.” (Read more: Conservative Treehouse, 3/16/2018)
Jennifer Palmieri and Hillary Clinton (Credit: The Associated Press)
“At the Democratic convention in Philadelphia last summer, Jake Sullivan and I took to our golf carts one afternoon to make the rounds of the television networks’ tents in the parking lot of the Wells Fargo Center. It is standard for presidential campaign staffers to brief networks on what to expect during that night’s session. But on this day, we were on a mission to get the press to focus on something even we found difficult to process: the prospect that Russia had not only hacked and stolen emails from the Democratic National Committee, but that it had done so to help Donald Trump and hurt Hillary Clinton.
(…) “Now that Trump is president, though, the stakes are higher, because the Russian plot succeeded. The lessons we campaign officials learned in trying to turn the Russia story against Trump can help other Democrats (and all Americans) figure out how to treat this interference no longer as a matter of electoral politics but as the threat to the republic that it really is.
(…) “Without anyone knowing about the FBI’s interest, it was difficult to bring appropriate attention to the Russia issue and Trump’s curious pro-Putin bent. The week after the convention, we sought out credible national security voices to sound alarms. I was surprised by the enthusiasm with which some, such as former acting CIA director Michael Morell, jumped into the fray. When I worked in the Obama White House, people in national security positions had been uneasy making broad public arguments, particularly about political matters. Not this time. They were so concerned about the situation that, to me, the language they used to describe the threat they believed Russia and Trump posed was shocking. I remember my jaw dropping as I sat in our Brooklyn campaign headquarters and read the op-ed Morell submitted to the New York Times in early August, in which he shared his view that Russia had probably undertaken an effort to “recruit” Trump and that the Republican nominee had become an “unwitting agent of the Russian Federation.”
(…) “We sought moments for Clinton and Tim Kaine, her running mate, to talk about Russia when we knew they would be on live television and couldn’t be edited. The debates offered the best opportunity, and Clinton took advantage, culminating with her famous line calling Trump Putin’s “puppet ” in the third one. It was tough deciding how much of her time to devote to the issue. We were in a Catch-22: We didn’t want her to talk too much about Russia because it wasn’t what voters were telling us they cared about — and, frankly, it sounded kind of wacky. At the same time, we understood the issue would never rise to the front of voters’ minds if we weren’t driving attention to it. It was already pretty clear they weren’t going to hear much about it in the press.
On Oct. 7, I thought the Russia story would finally break through. We were at a debate prep session in Westchester County, N.Y., when the director of national intelligence and the secretary of homeland security put out a joint statement saying that the U.S. intelligence community was “confident” that not only had the Russian government hacked Democrats’ emails, but “Russia’s senior-most officials” were probably directing their release to influence the election. Incredible. Finally, here was the break we had been waiting for. I was on a conference call with my colleagues to discuss our response when someone said: “Hey, Palmieri. There’s an ‘Access Hollywood’ video that just got released.” Literally minutes later, WikiLeaks put out the first batch of John Podesta’s stolen Gmail. And that was that. The rest is history.” (Read more: The Washington Post, 3/24/2017)
The FBI has been investigating the hack of the DNC and related political entities for months. For instance, the FBI warned the Clinton campaign they were the target of hacking attacks in March 2016. However, this is the first public admission of an investigation. An FBI spokesperson says the bureau will “investigate and hold accountable those who pose a threat in cyberspace.” This announcement comes three days after WikiLeaks publicly posted almost 20,000 emails from the DNC.
Emblem of the Glavnoje Razvedyvatel’noje Upravlenije (GRU) (Credit: public domain)
The Washington Post reports that according to unnamed ” individuals familiar with the investigation,” the FBI is focusing on the Russian military intelligence agency, known as the Glavnoje Razvedyvatel’noje Upravlenije or GRU, and looking into if it was responsible for giving the emails to WikiLeaks. However, it is believed that the Russian Federal Security Service, known as the Federal’naya Sluzhba Bezopasnosti or FSB, broke into the DNC’s computers as well.
The FBI wants to determine with certainty whether the Russian government passed the emails to WikiLeaks. This is likely to involve other US intelligence agencies, such as the NSA and the CIA, which potentially could intercept communications or gather intelligence overseas.
If it is definitively proven that the Russians are responsible, then the US would have to consider what to do next. The Post comments, ” Responses could range from a diplomatic wrist slap or warning to countermeasures.” In 2014, Sony Pictures was hacked, and there were reports that the government of North Korea was responsible. The US government imposed economic sanctions on North Korea in response. President Obama also signed an executive order enabling US officials to impose economic sanctions in response to significant hacking attacks. (The Washington Post, 7/25/2016)
Former CIA director Michael Hayden (Credit: Luis M. Alvarez / The Associated Press)
Hayden says that if the Russian government is behind the recent leaks of Democratic National Committee (DNC) emails by WikiLeaks, this would mean “they’re clearly taking their game to another level. It would be weaponizing information. You don’t want a foreign power affecting your election. We have laws against that.”
Hayden was appointed head of the NSA by President Bill Clinton and then he was later appointed head of the CIA by President George W. Bush. (The Washington Post, 7/25/2016)
Wikileaks cartoon that accompanied the DNC documents release. (Credit: Latoff / Wikileaks)
In an interview with NBC News, Wikileaks leader Julian Assange won’t say who gave WikiLeaks the Democratic National Committee (DNC) emails they have recently made public, as the group has a policy to never reveal their sources.
However, Assange discourages the widespread speculation that the emails come from hackers linked to the Russian government. Assange suggests that the DNC’s security was so weak that it could have been hacked by multiple groups. He also insists, “The emails that we have released are different sets of documents to the documents of those [that] people have analyzed.”
A hacker or hacking group going by the name of Guccifer 2.0 claims to have given the emails to WikiLeaks, but WikiLeaks has not confirmed this.
A WikiLeaks representative also comments, “Our publication of leaked DNC emails and the many DNC hacks over the last two years are separate incidents and should not be conflated.” (The Daily Beast, 7/26/2016)
“Leaked emails show the Democratic National Committee scrambled this spring to conceal the details of a joint fundraising arrangement with Hillary Clinton that funneled money through state Democratic parties.
But during the three-month period when the DNC was working to spin the situation, state parties kept less than one half of one percent of the $82 million raised through the arrangement — validating concerns raised by campaign finance watchdogs, state party allies and Bernie Sanders supporters.
The arrangement, called the Hillary Victory Fund, allowed the Clinton campaign to seek contributions of hundreds of thousands of dollars to attend extravagant fundraisers including a dinner at George Clooney’s house and a concert at Radio City Music Hall featuring Katy Perry and Elton John. That’s resulted in criticism for Clinton, who has made opposition to big money in politics a key plank in her campaign platform.
Clinton’s allies have responded publicly by arguing that the fund is raising big money to boost down-ballot Democratic candidates by helping the 40 state parties that are now participating in the fund.
But privately, officials at the DNC and on Clinton’s campaign worked to parry questions raised by reporters, as well as Sanders’ since-aborted campaign, about the distribution of the money, according to a cache of hacked emails made public late last week by WikiLeaks.” (Read more: Politico, July 26, 2016)
Two days after US Intel learns of Clinton’s plan, an ecstatic Hillary celebrates at the conclusion of the Democratic National Convention where she accepted the nomination on Thursday, July 28, 2016. (Credit: Ben Lowy/ Time)
Director of National Intelligence, John Ratcliffe, writes a letter to Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham, with the following declassified information:
CNN’s Matthew Chance interviews Julian Assange over a video link on July 26, 2016. (Credit: CNN, Moscow)
Assange is vague on details about future releases. He is asked by CNN about reports that the Russian government might be behind the recent hack of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) computer network. WikiLeaks has a policy of never revealing its sources, and Assange maintains that policy by refusing to confirm or deny anything. He says, “Perhaps one day the source or sources will step forward and that might be an interesting moment. Some people may have egg on their faces. But to exclude certain actors is to make it easier to find out who our sources are.”
He additionally says that Clinton and other Democratic officials are using the specter of Russian involvement to distract from the content of the emails. “It raises questions about the natural instincts of Clinton that when confronted with a serious domestic political scandal, she tries to blame the Russians, blame the Chinese, et cetera. Because if she does that while in government, it could lead to problems.” (CNN, 7/27/2016)
The New York Times claims this is according to unnamed “federal officials who have been briefed on the evidence.” But these officials are uncertain if the hack is part of “fairly routine cyberespionage” or part of an effort to manipulate the 2016 US presidential election. The DNC (Democratic National Committee) emails were published by WikiLeaks on July 22, 2016, causing political turmoil for Democrats and resulting in the resignation of Debbie Wasserman Schultz, from her position as DNC chair.
The federal investigation, involving the FBI and other intelligence agencies began in April 2016, when the hack was first detected. It has concluded that the Russian Federal Security Service (Federal’naya Sluzhba Bezopasnosti or FSB) entered the DNC’s computer network in the summer of 2015. (This corresponds with previous reports of a hacking by a Russian group known as Cozy Bear or APT 29.) The Rusian Main Intelligence Directorate (Glavnoje Razvedyvatel’noje Upravlenije or GRU) independently penetrated the same network later. (This corresponds with previous reports of a hacking by a Russian group known as Fancy Bear or APT 28.) Investigators believe the GRU has been playing a larger role in publicly releasing the emails.
The Times says the intelligence community’s conclusion puts pressure on President Obama to publicly accuse Russia of orchestrating the hacking, which could negatively impact the diplomatic relationship between the US and Russia in general. (The New York Times, 7/26/2016)
“There were reporters calling me over the summer saying, ‘Hey, we have reports of Carter Page meeting with Russian officials, giving them a wink and a nod, indicating that WikiLeaks should release the documents’ which they did.” — Evelyn Farkas (12/15/16)pic.twitter.com/cinEV69rPa
— Monsieur in the Gulag (@MonsieursGhost) April 13, 2021
His reaction to Paletta is pretty funny:
“Diveykin, huh? Never heard of him. Better call everyone in my rolodex to see if I can figure out who he is.” pic.twitter.com/eYpaZQ2eOL
President Obama is asked if Russia could be behind hacks that led to 20,000 Democratic National Committee (DNC) emails getting released by WikiLeaks. He says the FBI is still investigating but also “experts have attributed this to the Russians.”
Obama (left) is interviewed by Today’s Savannah Guthrie on July 26, 2016. (Credit: NBC)
He adds, “What we do know is is that the Russians hack our systems. Not just government systems, but private systems. But you know, what the motives were in terms of the leaks, all that — I can’t say directly. What I do know is that Donald Trump has repeatedly expressed admiration for Vladimir Putin.”
Asked if he’s suggesting that Russian leader Vladimir Putin could be motivated to help Trump win the November 2016 election, Obama replies, “I am basing this on what Mr. Trump himself has said. And I think that — Trump’s gotten pretty favorable coverage — back in Russia.” (Politico, 7/26/2016)
He stops stopped short of accusing Russia of trying to manipulate the election, but says “anything’s possible.” He also claims that “on a regular basis, [the Russians] try to influence elections in Europe.” (The New York Times, 7/26/2016)
On July 26, 2016, President Obama signed Presidential Policy Directive 41, United States Cyber Incident Coordination, “setting forth principles governing the Federal Government’s response to any cyber incident, whether involving government or private sector entities.” Issued following high-profile attacks such as the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) breach in 2015 and the recent breach of the Democratic National Committee’s (DNC’s) email system, the directive addresses a number of cyber-related issues, including defining various types of cyber incidents as well as departmental roles and responsibilities in responding to such events. The directive defines a cyber incident as an event occurring on or conducted through a computer network that actually or imminently jeopardizes the integrity, confidentiality, or availability of computers, information or communications systems or networks, physical or virtual infrastructure controlled by computers or information systems, or information resident thereon. A significant cyber incident is one that is likely to result in demonstrable harm to the national security interests, foreign relations, or economy of the United States or to the public confidence, civil liberties, or public health and safety of the American people. Five operating principles are articulated in the response plan:
shared responsibility among individuals, government, and the private sector in protecting networks from attack,
risk-based response,
respecting affected entities,
unity of effort, and
enabling rapid restoration and recovery.
The directive also proscribes a five-level cyber incident severity schema for assessing the severity of cyberattacks, similar to the Department of Homeland Security’s color-
“On July 26, 2016, after WikiLeaks disseminated the D.N.C. e-mails, Steele filed yet another memo, this time claiming that the Kremlin was “behind” the hacking, which was part of a Russian cyber war against Hillary Clinton’s campaign. Many of the details seemed far-fetched: Steele’s sources claimed that the digital attack involved agents “within the Democratic Party structure itself,” as well as Russian émigrés in the U.S. and “associated offensive cyber operators.”
Neither of these claims has been substantiated, and it’s hard to imagine that they will be. But one of the dossier’s other seemingly outlandish assertions—that the hack involved “state-sponsored cyber operatives working in Russia”—has been buttressed. According to Special Counsel Mueller’s recent indictment of thirteen Russian nationals, Kremlin-backed operatives, hiding behind fake and stolen identities, posed as Americans on Facebook and Twitter, spreading lies and fanning ethnic and religious hatred with the aim of damaging Clinton and helping Trump. The Kremlin apparently spent about a million dollars a month to fund Internet trolls working round-the-clock shifts in a run-down office building in St. Petersburg. Their tactics were similar to those outlined in Steele’s Charlemagne investigation, including spreading falsehoods designed to turn voters toward extremism. The Russian operation also involved political activism inside the U.S., including the organizing of bogus pro-Trump rallies.” (Read more: The New Yorker, 3/12/2018)
Guccifer 2.0 is a hacker who claims he broke into the Democratic National Committtee (DNC) computer network and then gave the emails he found to WikiLeaks. He also claims to be an East European with no connection to Russia.
However, the cybersecurity research group ThreatConnect claims to have new evidence linking Guccifer 2.0 to an Internet server in Russia and to a digital address that has been linked to previous Russian online scams. They conclude that Guccifer 2.0 is actually an “apparition created under a hasty Russian [denial and deception] campaign” to influence political events in the US.
Their report concludes, “Maintaining a ruse of this nature within both the physical and virtual domains requires believable and verifiable events which do not contradict one another. That is not the case here.” For instance, Guccifer 2.0 claims to have broken into the DNC network in the summer of 2015 using a software flaw that didn’t exist until December 2015.
Furthermore, the Guccier 2.0 entity is “a Russia-controlled platform that can act as a censored hacktivist. Moscow determines what Guccifer 2.0 shares and thus can attempt to selectively impact media coverage, and potentially the election, in a way that ultimately benefits their national objectives.” (The Daily Beast, 7/26/2016)
Trump speaks during a news conference at Trump National Doral on July 27, 2016, in Tampa, Florida. (Credit: Evan Vucci / The Associated Press)
In a press conference, Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump says about Russia and Clinton’s emails, “By the way, if they hacked, they probably have her 33,000 emails. I hope they do. They probably have her 33,000 emails that she lost and deleted.”
He also addresses the country directly: “Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you can find the 33,000 emails that are missing. I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press.”
Trump is then asked by NBC News reporter Katy Tur, “Do you have any qualms about asking a foreign government, Russia, China, anybody, to interfere, to hack into a system of anybody’s in this country?”
He replies, “It’s up to the president. Let the president talk to them. Look, here’s the problem, here’s the problem, Katy. He has no respect-”
Tur interrupts him to say, “You said, ‘I welcome them to find those 30,000 emails-‘”
But Trump then interrupts her to say, “Well, they probably have them. I’d like to have them released.”
Tur asks, “Does that not give you pause?”
He replies, “Nope, gives me no pause. If they have them, they have them.”
Later in the day, Trump posts an additional comment on Twitter: “If Russia or any other country or person has Hillary Clinton’s 33,000 illegally deleted emails, perhaps they should share them with the FBI!”
Clinton’s senior policy adviser Jake Sullivan issues a critical statement in response to Trump’s comments: “This has to be the first time that a major presidential candidate has actively encouraged a foreign power to conduct espionage against his political opponent. This has gone from being a matter of curiosity and a matter of politics, to being a national security issue.” (Talkingpointsmemo.com, 7/27/2016)
Also later in the day, Trump spokesperson Jason Miller says that “clearly saying” Russia should share emails with the FBI. “To be clear, Mr. Trump did not call on, or invite, Russia or anyone else to hack Hillary Clinton’s email today.” (The Hill, 7/27/2016)
The next day, Trump calls the suggestion that Russia is trying to help him by leaking the emails is a “joke.” He also says that when he said he hoped Russian hackers found Clinton’s emails and shared them with the FBI, he was only “being sarcastic.” (The Hill, 7/28/2016)
Donald Trump addresses a news conference in Miami, FL on July 27, 2016. (Credit: CNBC)
“Former CIA Director Leon Panetta blasted Donald Trump Wednesday night from the stage of the Democratic National Convention, calling his recent comment that Russia should “find” Hillary Clinton’s emails “irresponsible” and “inconceivable.”
Panetta’s comments were largely disrupted by the crowd chanting “No more war,” but he continued his remarks.
Earlier Wednesday, Trump urged Russian agents to “find” Clinton’s emails and release them, an unprecedented move by a candidate for president encouraging such a foreign breach.
“Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing,” the GOP presidential nominee said at a news conference in Miami on Wednesday. “I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press.”
Trump was referring to the ongoing controversy surrounding the private server Clinton used while secretary of state.” (Read more: NPR, 7/27/2016)
The following day, the New York Times reports Trump was encouraging Russia and “essentially urging a foreign adversary to conduct cyberespionage against a former secretary of state.” (Read more: New York Times, 7/28/2016)
The Washington Post reports that “Intelligence officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss an issue under investigation, said there is little doubt that agents of the Russian government hacked the Democratic National Committee [DNC], and the White House was informed months ago of [Russia’s] culpability.” However, days after WikiLeaks posted almost 20,000 DNC emails, the Post adds, “The intelligence community, the officials said, has not reached a conclusion about who passed the emails to WikiLeaks.”
Former NSA director Keith Alexander, testifying before Congress in 2013. (Credit: The Associated Press)
One unnamed US official says, “We have not drawn any evidentiary connection to any Russian intelligence service and WikiLeaks — none.”
Former NSA Director Keith Alexander says, “Determining with confidence who was behind it — if the Russians were the hackers, seeing them pass that data to WikiLeaks — is probably much more difficult than attributing it to the initial hacker. That’s a tough one — especially because there are different ways of passing that information, not all electronic.”
Furthermore, even if Russia is behind the leaks to WikiLeaks, the motivation is unclear. A key question is if Russia is attempting to influence the November 2016 US presidential election. Michael Hayden, former director of both the NSA and the CIA, states, “Frankly, I don’t think they’re motivated by thinking they can affect the election itself.” He thinks the Russians may be flexing their muscles “to demonstrate that they can — not necessarily to make [Donald] Trump win or Hillary [Clinton] lose.”
Leo Taddeo (Credit: Twitter)
Leo Taddeo, a former FBI agent who worked with cybersecurity operations, says, “This is not [Russian leader Vladimir] Putin trying to help Trump. I think they were messaging Hillary Clinton, telling her that they can get in the way of her election if she doesn’t show some flexibility in her position toward them.”
Representative Adam Schiff (D) believes that if Russia is ultimately responsible, the Obama administration “should make it known publicly and forcefully. Even if they’re not able to lay out the evidence because it would disclose sources and methods, they should make the attribution.” (The Washington Post, 7/27/2016)
Director of National Intelligence James Clapper (Credit: public domain)
Clapper says the US government is not “quite ready yet” to “make a public call” about who is responsible for the hacking on the Democratic National Committee’s (DNC) computer network that resulted in almost 20,000 emails being released by WikiLeaks. However, he hints that one of “the usual suspects” is likely to blame. He also says, “We don’t know enough [yet] to … ascribe a motivation, regardless of who it may have been.”
Yahoo News reports that there is a vigorous debate inside the Obama administration about whether to publicly blame the Russian government for the hacking. One unnamed senior law enforcement official says the Russians are “most probably” involved, but investigation is ongoing.
Clapper is said to be amongst a faction who is resisting publicly blaming the Russians, since it is the kind of activity that intelligence agencies regularly engage in, including the US at times. Clapper also publicly comments, “[I’m] taken aback a bit by … the hyperventilation over this,” He adds in a sarcastic tone, “I’m shocked somebody did some hacking. That’s never happened before.” (Yahoo News, 7/29/2016)
“Peter Strzok and Lisa Page’s texts shine a highly redacted light on how the Trump-Russia investigation began.
It was July 31, 2016. Just days earlier, the Obama administration had quietly opened an FBI counterintelligence investigation of Russian cyber-espionage — hacking attacks — to disrupt the 2016 election. And not random, general disruption; the operating theory was that the Russians were targeting the Democratic party, for the purpose of helping Donald Trump win the presidency.
FBI special agent Peter Strzok was downright giddy that day.
The Bureau had finally put to bed “Mid Year Exam.” MYE was code for the dreaded investigation of Hillary Clinton’s improper use of a private email system to conduct State Department business, which resulted in the retention and transmission of thousands of classified emails, as well as the destruction of tens of thousands of government business records. Strzok and other FBI vets dreaded the case because it was a go-through-the-motions exercise: Everyone working on it knew that no one was going to be charged with a crime; that Mrs. Clinton was going to be the next president of the United States; and that the FBI’s goal was not to be tarnished in the process of “investigating” her — to demonstrate, without calling attention to the suffocating constraints imposed by the Obama Justice Department, that the Bureau had done a thorough job, and that there was a legal rationale for letting Clinton off the hook that might pass the laugh test.
That mission was accomplished, Strzok and his colleagues believed, with Director James Comey’s press conference on July 5, outlining the evidence and recommending against charges that “no reasonable prosecutor” would bring. Now, having run the just-for-show interview of Hillary Clinton on July 2 — long after Comey’s press statement that there would be no charges was in the can — Strzok was on the verge of a big promotion: to deputy assistant director of counterintelligence.
Even better: Now, he was working a real case — the Trump-Russia case. He was about to fly to London to meet with intelligence contacts and conduct secret interviews.
Not so secret, though, that he could contain himself.
As was his wont several times a day, Strzok texted his paramour, Lisa Page, the FBI lawyer in the lofty position of counsel to Deputy Director Andrew McCabe — which made Page one of the relative handful of Bureau officials who were in on the new probe. Late Sunday night, as he readied for his morning flight, Strzok wrote to Page, comparing the investigations of Clinton and Trump.
“And damn this feels momentous. Because this matters. The other one did, too, but that was to ensure that we didn’t F something up. This matters because this MATTERS.
Christopher Steele and Bruce Ohr (Credit: public domain)
“Judicial Watch announced today it received 339 pages of heavily redacted records from the U.S. Department of Justice which reveal that former Associate Deputy Attorney General Bruce Ohr remained in regular contact with former British spy and Fusion GPS contractor Christopher Steele after Steele was terminated by the FBI in November 2016 for revealing to the media his position as an FBI confidential informant.
The records show that Ohr served as a go-between for Steele by passing along information to “his colleagues” on matters relating to Steele’s activities. Ohr also set up meetings with Steele, regularly talked to him on the telephone and provided him assistance in dealing with situations Steele was confronting with the media.
The timeframe for the requested records is January 1, 2015, to December 7, 2017.
The emails between Bruce Ohr and Steele were heavily redacted, including some of the dates they were sent and received.
On Friday, July 29, 2016, Steele emails Bruce Ohr about a meeting that is to include Bruce’s wife Nellie Ohr, who then worked for Fusion GPS, at the Mayflower Hotel:
Steele: Dear Bruce,
Just to let you know I shall be in DC at short notice on business from this PM till Saturday eve, staying at the Mayflower Hotel. If you are in town it would be good to meet up, perhaps for breakfast tomorrow morn? Happy to see Nellie too if she’s up for it. Please let me know. Best, Chris
Ohr: Dear Chris –
Nice to hear from you! Nellie and I would be up for breakfast tomorrow and can come into town. What would be a good time for you? Bruce
Steele: Thanks Bruce.
On me at the Mayflower Hotel, Conn Ave NW at 0900 should work but I’ll confirm the time for definite this eve if I may. Looking forward to seeing you. Chris
Ohr: Sounds good, but we won’t let you pay for breakfast! I’ll wait for your confirmation on time. Bruce
Steele: Let’s do 0900 then. See you in the lobby. Chris
Ohr: Very good. See you at 900.
On Saturday, July 30, 2016, Steele sends his thanks to Bruce Ohr for the meeting, “Great to see you and Nellie this morning:”
Ohr: Great to see you and Nellie this morning Bruce. Let’s keep in touch on the substantive issues/s. Glenn [Fusion GPS co-founder Glenn Simpson] is happy to speak to you on this if it would help. Best, Chris
On Friday, September 16, 2016, Steele and Ohr begin planning a meeting in the Capital Hilton:
Steele: Dear Bruce,
I hope you are well. I am probably going to visit Washington again in the next couple of weeks on business of mutual interest. I would like to see you again in person and therefore to coordinate diaries. So when are you planning to be in town please? Thanks and Best, Chris
P.S. I don’t think I have up to date cell or landline phone numbers for you. Grateful if you could send met them.
Ohr: Hi Chris –
It would be great to see you I DC. I’ll be out of town Sept 19-21 but should be here the rest of the time. My numbers are office 202 307 2510 and cell [Redacted] Let me know what works best for you.
Steele: Dear Bruce,
I have now arrived in DC and am staying at the Capital Hilton, 1101 16th Street NW. I don’t know my client-related programme yet but am keen to meet up with you. Might we provisionally say breakfast on Friday morn or even tomorrow morn if necessary? Look forward to hearing back from you. Best, Chris
Ohr: Hi Chris
Would tomorrow for breakfast still work for you? My calendar is pretty good tomorrow morning, not so good on Friday. An early breakfast Friday, say 8 am?, would work too. Should I come to your hotel? Bruce
Steele: Thanks Bruce.
0800 on Friday would still be better for me, at the hotel. More useful to all I think, after my scheduled meetings tomorrow. Thanks, Chris
Ohr: Chris –
Perfect. I’ll see you Friday at your hotel at 8 am. Bruce
(…) “Page contradicts Ohr’s testimony regarding when she first knew about former British spy Christopher Steele’s dossier. She claims in her testimony that she did not know about the dossier in August 2016, however, Ohr’s testimony reveals that he delivered Steele’s information to the bureau shortly after meeting with Steele. In fact, he met with former Deputy Director Andrew McCabe and specifically, Page at the bureau to deliver the information.
(Clipped from Lisa Page testimony to the House Oversight Committee on July 13, 2018)
Ohr reveals this during an exchange with then-Chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Trey Gowdy, R-SC.
“Why? Why did you meet with them,” asks Gowdy.
“To pass the latest information that I had received,” Ohr responds.
“How did you find out who to meet with? Who did you call to find out,” questions Gowdy.
Ohr explains that prior to that meeting with McCabe and Page he had met with Steele on July 30, 2016.
“After the July 30th meeting with Chris Steele, I wanted to provide the information he had given me to the FBI. I reached out for Andrew McCabe, at that time, Deputy Director of the FBI and somebody who had previously led the organized crime, Russian organized crime squad in New York and who I had worked with in the past, and asked if he could meet with me,” he said. “I went to his office to provide the information, and Lisa Page was there. So I provided the information to them. And some point after that, I think, I was given Peter Strzok, or somehow put in contact with Peter Strzok.”
Gowdy then asks when exactly did Ohr meet Strzok and Page.
“I don’t recall the exact date,” Ohr says. “I’m guessing it would have been in August since I met with Chris Steele at the end of July, and I’m pretty sure I would have reached out to Andrew McCabe soon afterwards.” (Read more: Sarah Carter, 3/13/2019)(Lisa Page transcript)
An independent researcher on Twitter who goes by the pseudonym, UndercoverHuber, went a step further and read Strzok and Page’s text messages on July 30, 2016, just a few hours after Page and McCabe met with Ohr and received the first bit of information from Christopher Steele on the Clinton/DNC/Steele dossier:
(…) Ohr’s testimony: “I went to his [McCabe’s] office to provide the information”
“Lisa Page was there”
“So I provided the information to them”
(After that Ohr is put in touch with Strzok, running the Trump/Russia case.)
The investigation was opened the next day, July 31, 2016.
Or at least it was *marked* July 31. Here’s Strzok texting to Page about exactly what “good faith date” they can put on the “LHM” (Letter Head Memo) for the opening case file for the Trump/Russia case.
Bruce Swartz (l) Andrew Weissmann (c) and Zainab Ahmad (Credit: Flickr/Jeff Mitchell, Reuters/public domain)
“Details about Justice Department official Bruce Ohr’s meetings with the author of the salacious anti-Trump dossier were shared by Ohr with his expansive circle of contacts inside the department — including senior FBI leadership and officials now assigned to Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation.
Ohr gave a closed-door transcribed interview last August [2018] sharing details of his 2016 meetings with British ex-spy Christopher Steele, who authored the dossier later used to secure a surveillance warrant for a Trump campaign aide. The interview was part of the Republican-led House Oversight and Judiciary Committee probes.
In a series of questions about his meetings with Steele, including one on July 30, 2016, and who he shared the information with, Fox News has confirmed the Ohr transcript stated: “Andy McCabe, yes and met with him and Lisa Page and provided information to him. I subsequently met with Lisa Page, Peter Strzok, and eventually (an FBI agent). And I also provided this information to people in the criminal division specifically Bruce Swartz, Zainab Ahmad, Andrew Weissmann.” (Read more: Fox News, 1/16/2019)
“Within the massive assembly of documents, emails, text messages, congressional testimony and portions of media reports a clear timeline emerged. Part of that timeline was based on the fact that certain events had to have taken place – at specific times – in order to reconcile the downstream activity.
The key point of the graphic, which ran counter to all MSM reporting, was a trail of circumstantial evidence showing Bruce Ohr had to have been in contact with Christopher Steele much earlier than anyone realized. SEE BELOW:
A new report today from John Solomon backs up this timeline with the first-hand testimony of DOJ Official Bruce Ohr.
(…) “For much of the past year, many in Congress have labored under the notion that Ohr, then the No. 4 Department of Justice (DOJ) official, began assisting the FBI’s probe into Russia election collusion only after Trump won the 2016 election.
Lawmakers’ belief was rooted in reports showing Ohr’s first documented interview with FBI agents occurred in November 2016, and in testimony from Fusion GPS founder Glenn Simpson, who mentioned Ohr’s involvement in the probe as starting after Thanksgiving 2016.
But now, based on Ohr’s own account in a closed-door congressional interview and other contemporaneous documents, congressional investigators have learned that Ohr made his first contact with the FBI about Trump-Russia collusion evidence in late July and early August 2016. And his approach was prompted by information he got from his friend, the former British intelligence agent Steele.
Ohr’s account to Congress and his contemporaneous notes show he had multiple contacts with Steele in July 2016. One occurred just before Steele visited the FBI in Rome, another right after Steele made the contact.
A third contact occurred July 30, 2016, exactly one day before the FBI and its counterintelligence official, Peter Strzok, opened the Trump probe officially.
Steele met with Ohr and Ohr’s wife, Nellie, in a Washington hotel restaurant for breakfast. At the time, Nellie Ohr and Steele worked for the same employer, Simpson’s Fusion GPS opposition research firm, and on the same project to uncover Russia dirt on Trump, according to prior testimony to Congress.
(…) “According to my sources, Ohr called then-FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabethe same day as his Steele breakfast and met with McCabe and FBI lawyer Lisa Page on Aug. 3 to discuss the concerns about Russia-Trump collusion that Steele had relayed.
Ohr disclosed to lawmakers that he made another contact with the FBI on Aug. 15, 2016, talking directly to Strzok.
Within a month of Ohr passing along Steele’s dirt, the FBI scheduled a follow-up meeting with the British intelligence operative — and the path was laid for the Steele dossier to support a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant to surveil Trump campaign aide Carter Page.
Just as important, Ohr told Congress he understood Steele’s information to be raw and uncorroborated hearsay, the sort of information that isn’t admissible in court. And he told FBI agents that Steele appeared to be motivated by a “desperate” desire to keep Trump from becoming president.” (Read more:The Hill, 9/6/2018)
This account by congressional sources to Solomon about the testimony of Bruce Ohr matches our prior research. It was the initial chapters of the Steele Dossier, a work product of both Nellie Ohr and Christopher Steele, that were given to Bruce Ohr, who then subsequently relayed that information to the FBI (McCabe, Page and Strzok) without disclosing the conflict within the source material coming from his wife.
♦Here’s how it comes together: Nellie Ohr started working for Glenn Simpson (Fusion GPS) in/around October or November of 2015. Nellie Ohr had “contractor access” to the FISA database (NSA and FBI) as a result of her prior and ongoing clearance relationship with the CIA and open source research group.
It was Nellie’s original 2015 political opposition research that Glenn Simpson was pitching and selling as political opposition research to any interested purchaser.
Several months later, when it became clear that Donald Trump was the likely GOP candidate who would win the primary (March/April 2016), Hillary Clinton signed-on to purchase the opposition research from Glenn Simpson and Fusion GPS.
Keep in mind, simultaneous to this moment in March and April 2016, NSA Director Admiral Mike Rogers intervened to stop contractor access to the FISA-702(16)(17) database. From the time Nellie Ohr began working for Fusion GPS in November 2015, through April 2016 there were thousands of unlawful database queries and extractions; 85% of them were unlawful.
Now, Nellie and Glenn Simpson had a problem. They needed to have a way to launder unlawfully extracted FISA search results. Nellie Ohr was familiar with Christopher Steele from her husband Bruce’s prior working relationship with Steele in the FIFA corruption case.
So Fusion GPS (Glenn Simpson and Nellie Ohr) reached out to Christopher Steele. As a former intelligence officer, and conveniently not in the U.S. (plausible deniability improves), Steele could then receive the Nellie research, wash it with his own research from ongoing relationships with Russian Oligarch Oleg Deripaska,… here comes the hookers and pee tapes….and begin packaging it as the “dossier”.
When you understand what was going on, some of the irreconcilable issues surrounding the dossier make sense. [Example Here] This is the Big Effen Deal.
The unlawful FISA extracted intelligence/research was laundered through the use of the dossier. The information was then cycled back to Bruce Ohr, thereby using Christopher Steele to remove Nellie’s fingerprints from the origination. That’s why Bruce Ohr never initially told the FBI -the end user of the dossier- about his wife working for Fusion GPS and Glenn Simpson.
Bruce Ohr meets with Christopher Steele, receives the laundered intelligence product within the dossier, informs Andrew McCabe and Lisa Page and then passes the intelligence information along to FBI Agent Peter Strzok.
Does this explain now why Glenn Simpson, Chris Steele, Nellie Ohr and Bruce Ohr were having breakfast together on July 30th, 2016?
Through this process, what few recognize is that much of the material inside the Steele Dossier is actually research intelligence material unlawfully extracted from the FBI and NSA database; most likely in majority an assembly by Nellie Ohr.
This explains why Paul Wood said: “I have spoken to one intelligence source who says Mueller is examining ‘electronic records’ that would place Cohen in Prague.” Likely Mueller has Nellie’s database research mistake on Michael Cohen, and he got it from Christopher Steele.
Remember the New York Times article, right before the testimony by Bruce Ohr, where the intelligence community was trying to say that Nellie Ohr had nothing to do with the Dossier? (screen grab below)
Remember that ridiculous attempt to distance Nellie Ohr from the dossier?
Now do you see why the intelligence community needed to try, via their buddies in the New York Times, to cloud the importance of Nellie Ohr?
Kim Strassel – (…) Congressional sources tell me that Mr. Ohr revealed Tuesday that he verbally warned the FBI that its source had a credibility problem … Mr. Ohr said, moreover, that he delivered this information before the FBI’s first application to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court for a warrant against Trump aide Carter Page, in October 2016. (Wall Street Journal, 8/30/2018)
Of course Bruce Ohr delivered it before October 21st, 2016. He gained the foundational material from Chris Steele in June and July 2016, passed it along to Peter Strzok, and his wife was key in providing Steele the source information.
This is also why Bruce Ohr never put his wife’s income source on his annual compliance forms. Nellie Ohr’s income was an outcome of her database access.
“Deputy FBI Director Andy McCabe and his legal counsel Lisa Page were in possession of the key Steele dossier allegations on Sat Jul 30 2016, one day BEFORE the FBI opened an investigation into Trump on Sun Jul 31 2016.
(…) Ohr’s testimony: “I wanted to provide the information he [Steele] had given me to the FBI”
And “I reached out to McCabe”
Page/McCabe/Ohr met on a Saturday at the office at very short notice, with Ohr coming almost straight from the Steele meeting to meet with the Deputy Director of the FBI and his legal counsel.
Sounds…unusual/urgent?
(…) Ohr’s testimony: “I went to his [McCabe’s] office to provide the information”
“Lisa Page was there”
“So I provided the information to them”
(After that Ohr is put in touch with Strzok, running the Trump/Russia case.)
The investigation was opened the next day, July 31, 2016.
Or at least it was *marked* July 31. Here’s Strzok texting to Page about exactly what “good faith date” they can put on the “LHM” (Letter Head Memo) for the opening case file for the Trump/Russia case.
“On July 30, 2016, Bruce and Nellie Ohr met with Steele and an unknown associate of Steele’s. Almost immediately, Ohr would initiate a meeting with FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe to detail his conversation with Steele. Also present at the meeting was McCabe’s counsel, FBI lawyer Lisa Page, who would play a key role in the counterintelligence investigation into the Trump campaign.” (The Epoch Times, 1/14/2019)
Clinton holds a press conference on August 5, 2016 and explains how she may have “short-circuited” during her interview with Chris Wallace a few days earlier. (Credit: Fox News)
In a Fox News interview with Chris Wallace, she says, “There were discussions and decisions made to classify retroactively certain emails.” She also claims that FBI Director James “Comey said my answers were truthful and consistent,” with what she said in the past.
She adds, “I was communicating with over 300 people in my emails. They certainly did not believe and had no reason to believe what they were sending was classified.” (The Hill, 7/31/2016)
However, on July 5, 2016, Comey clearly stated, “From the group of 30,000 [Clinton] emails returned to the State Department in 2014, 110 emails in 52 email chains have been determined by the owning agency to contain classified information at the time they were sent or received.” (Federal Bureau of Investigation, 7/5/2016)
Clinton’s comments are heavily criticized in the media. So five days later, on August 5, 2016, she says she may have “short circuited” and she and Wallace might have been “talking past each other.” (Fox News, 8/5/2016)
“On July 31st, 2016 the FBI opened a counterintelligence investigation against the Trump campaign. They did not inform congress until March 2017. •At the beginning of August (1st-3rd)2016 FBI Agent Peter Strzok traveled to London, England for interviews with UK intelligence officials. •On August 15th, 2016 Peter Strzok sends a text message to DOJ Lawyer Lisa Page describing the “insurance policy“, needed in case Hillary Clinton were to lose the election.
Recently there has been a great deal of interest in the origination OF the 2016 FBI counterintelligence operation, and how the FISA court was later used to gain Title-1 surveillance warrant against U.S. person Carter Page; part of that operation.
Specifically, House Intelligence Committee Devin Nunes has asked about a redacted name within the “EC”, which has led to the DOJ and FBI claiming to release the name would compromise the individual.
All of these inquires, and refusals, center around the origination authority for the FBI Counterintelligence operation. The origination led to the FISA warrant. Remember that.
Chairman Nunes sent Main Justice a classified letter asking questions. DOJ responded saying they would not comply with providing information (letter) The Washington Postclaimed Nunes was looking for information on an FBI/DOJ ‘source’: “a U.S. citizen who has provided intelligence to the CIA and FBI.” Additionally, this “source” was later also described by WaPo as a witness for Robert Mueller’s ongoing investigation.
Speaker of the House Paul Ryan said the Nunes inquiry was appropriate. With Ryan’s support, Chairman Nunes threatened to hold Attorney General Jeff Sessions in contempt of congress for non-compliance with valid congressional oversight. DOJ responded saying they’d like a private meeting. Yesterday that meeting took place. Outcome? Sketchy.
In addition to everyone here, Wall Street Journal Author Kimberly Strassel also smells the familiar aroma of a cover-up deployed by administrative state officials inside the DOJ and FBI. The DOJ is refusing to allow public inquiry into the source John Brennan used to create the “EC”. Additionally, the Deep State media advocates, writ large, are working furiously to attack Chairman Devin Nunes for his inquires.
Obviously the compliant media, Democrats, and second-tier DOJ/FBI officials don’t want anyone to discover the source of the 2016 counterintelligence operation against the Trump campaign. Their defensive shield is to claim national security, and ambiguous/undefined threats to ‘sources and methods‘ if CIA Director Brennan’s “source”, was identified.
Well, you know what happens next. Internet researchers smell blood in the Deep State swamp…. People start digging into the details.
Here’s what is already known about the source from leaks: •a “top secret intelligence source” of the FBI and CIA, •who is a U.S. citizen and who was •involved in the Russia collusion probe. Revealing the source “might damage international relationships. This suggests the “source” •may be overseas, •have ties to foreign intelligence, or both.”
“I believe I know the name of the informant, but my intelligence sources did not provide it to me and refuse to confirm it. It would therefore be irresponsible to publish it.”
Consider me irresponsible.
The needle on my give-a-damn-meter broke off around the time the Page/Strzok texts were published. The intelligence apparatus is still actively trying to destroy a constitutionally elected president. The IC and their co-dependents within the FBI and DOJ are the ones hiding information to protect themselves. Sunlight is the best disinfectant.
Some brilliant research was already assembled by various people who have looked deeply into this story {HERE and HERE and HERE and HERE} the trail is transparent and Brennan’s FBI/CIA source appears is quite obvious. I’m just going to connect their well-researched dots.
Remember the Peter Strzok trip to London? The source of John Brennan’s “EC” is likely FBI and CIA operative Stefan Halper a foreign policy expert and Cambridge professor with connections to the CIA and its British counterpart, MI6.
There are about two dozen check-references to identify who the ‘source’ was in providing the underlying intelligence to CIA Director John Brennan; who then wrote the “EC” for the FBI; which started the 2016 Counterintelligence Operation.
Stefan Halper checks off every single box: √Currently overseas. √Current/Former CIA operative. √Current/Former source for FBI. √Anti-Trump motive. √Formerly put together this exact type of operation. √Connections to UK spies/intel community/politicians. √Connection to Australian spies/intel community. √Connection to Alexander Downer. √Political operative. √Wanted Clinton to win the 2016 election. √Connects to Carter Page. √Connects to George Papadopoulos. √Connects to John Brennan. ETC.
Two months ago Chuck Ross of The Daily Caller took a deep dive on how Stefan Halper interacted with George Papadopoulos and Carter Page. Halper was way too sketchy, and he was trying to initiate contacts with low-level Trump campaign aides. [SEE HERE]
THE DAILY CALLER – Two months before the 2016 election, George Papadopoulos received a strange request for a meeting in London, one of several the young Trump adviser would be offered — and he would accept — during the presidential campaign.
The meeting request, which has not been reported until now, came from Stefan Halper, a foreign policy expert and Cambridge professor with connections to the CIA and its British counterpart, MI6.
Halper’s September 2016 outreach to Papadopoulos wasn’t his only contact with Trump campaign members. The 73-year-old professor, a veteran of three Republican administrations, met with two other campaign advisers, The Daily Caller News Foundation learned. (Please Keep Reading)
Stefan Halper posesses a very specific set of skills from all of his prior work within politics and the intelligence community. Halper was in contact with every official and entity in the set-up; and Halper was in the right places at the times when all of these set-up meetings and issues took place.
So, what did he do?
Simple, his job was to locate then dirty-up anyone he could convince: 1) to meet with him; 2) engage in his requests, and 3) engage contacts he set up. Halper was setting up a classic operation to use unknown “useful idiots” to give the appearance of Russian allies/actors.
Halper provided the underlying imaging, the optics needed for the “EC” referral; which Brennan then used to trigger James Comey; who originated the FBI Counterintelligence Operation.
The fraudulent origin, in combination with the October FISA warrant needed for surveillance gathering, would drive the insurance policy that Peter Strzok described to Lisa Page.
Neither Carter Page nor George Papadopoulos would need to be an active participant in the scheme. They could be simply (UI) useful idiots. Hence:
(…) Papadopoulos questioned Halper’s motivation for contacting him, according to a source familiar with Papadopoulos’ thinking. That’s not just because of the randomness of the initial inquiry but because of questions Halper is said to have asked during their face-to-face meetings in London.
According to a source with knowledge of the meeting, Halper asked Papadopoulos: “George, you know about hacking the emails from Russia, right?” (more)
Some people have called Page and/or Papadopoulos “moles”, but that’s really not what it appears they were. The better description is “tools”. Once Stefan Halper dirtied them up, they gave the appearance of being involved in a vast Russian conspiracy.
It was the appearance that mattered in order to generate the foundation for: the counterintelligence operation; and the subsequent FISA surveillance warrant; and the Vast Russian Conspiracy narrative; and ultimately the post-election Special Counsel investigation. In total, this was the Peter Strzok “Insurance Policy“.
As House Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes has begun working backward; and with the Inspector General looking at the ‘small group’ operatives and publicizing the motives; the deep state operatives inside the DOJ and FBI obviously don’t want sunlight going all the way back to the individual(s) at the beginning of the operation. There is a risk there. Hence, they try to hide behind ‘National Security compromise’ etc, and an ideological media willing to assist in keeping it all hidden.
Chairman Nunes has requested the documents be unredacted to the HPSCI. The DOJ/FBI are claiming if they unredact the originating documents, they will likely be leaked by congress and compromise the sources therein.
Additionally, Chairman Nunes published the HPSCI Report on Russian Active Measures; and in doing so the DOJ and FBI redacted his report for the public. Nunes objected to the redactions.
In part of the report the HPSCI describes the origin of the FBI 2016 Counterintelligence Operation. The DOJ and FBI redacted the paragraph where Nunes outlined who was targeted at the start.
If my analysis is accurate, there were FOUR initial targets of the FBI counterintelligence operation who were connected to the Trump campaign. Here’s what I think those redactions are hiding:
The DOJ didn’t redact Carter Page because he was already ‘outed’ in the House FISA memo. However, I believe the current DOJ redactions are hiding George Papadopoulos, Paul Manafort and Rick Gates.
Those would be the July 2016 targets outlined by the originating EC (electronic communication) from John Brennan when the FBI Counterintelligence operation began.
Peter Strzok testifies on FBI and Department of Justice actions during the 2016 Presidential election in a House Joint committee hearing on Capitol Hill July 12, 2018. (Credit: Chip Somodavilla/Getty Images)
“Late last week the FBI document that started the Trump-Russia collusion fiasco was publicly released. It hasn’t received a lot of attention but it should, because not too long from now this document likely will be blown up and placed on an easel as Exhibit A in a federal courtroom.
(…) To the untrained eye, the FBI document that launched Crossfire Hurricane can be confusing, and it may be difficult to discern how it might be inadequate. To the trained eye, however, it is a train wreck. There are a number of reasons why it is so bad. Two main ones are offered below (if you would like to follow along, the document is here):
First, the document is oddly constructed. In a normal, legitimate FBI Electronic Communication, or EC, there would be a “To” and a “From” line. The Crossfire Hurricane EC has only a “From” line; it is from a part of the FBI’s Counterintelligence Division whose contact is listed as Peter Strzok. The EC was drafted also by Peter Strzok. And, finally, it was approved by Peter Strzok. Essentially, it is a document created by Peter Strzok, approved by Peter Strzok, and sent from Peter Strzok to Peter Strzok.
On that basis alone, the document is an absurdity, violative of all FBI protocols and, therefore, invalid on its face. An agent cannot approve his or her own case; that would make a mockery of the oversight designed to protect Americans. Yet, for this document, Peter Strzok was pitcher, catcher, batter and umpire.
In addition, several names are listed in a “cc” or copy line; all are redacted, save Strzok’s, who, for some reason, felt it necessary to copy himself on a document he sent from himself to himself.
(…) Second, the Crossfire Hurricane case was opened as a Foreign Agent Registration Act (FARA) investigation. A FARA investigation involves a criminal violation of the law – in this case, a negligent or intentional failure to register with the U.S. government after being engaged by a foreign country to perform services on its behalf – that is punishable by fines and imprisonment. It is rarely investigated.
(…) Ultimately, there was no attempt by Strzok to articulate any factors that address the elements of FARA. He couldn’t, because there are none. Instead, there was a weak attempt to allege some kind of cooperation with Russians by unknown individuals affiliated with the Trump campaign, again, with no supporting facts listed.
What this FBI document clearly establishes is that Crossfire Hurricane was an illicit, made-up investigation lacking a shred of justifying predication, sprung from the mind of someone who despised Donald Trump, and then blessed by inexperienced leadership at the highest levels who harbored their own now well-established biases.” (Read more: The Hill, 5/27/2020)(Archive)
“After news broke that the Democratic National Committee had been hacked, a group of prominent computer scientists went on alert. The group of individuals, led by a Hillary supporter, started snooping around the Trump Tower computers to allegedly see if these servers had also been hacked.
This group was led by Indiana University professor, Jean Camp. Professor Camp, according to Circa, was a staunch Hillary supporter:
“A respected computer scientist who raised concerns about a possible connection between President Trump and a Russian bank is an unabashed Hillary Clinton supporter who made multiple small donations to the Democrat’s presidential campaign around the time she and her colleagues surfaced the allegations.”
Some techies uncovered that the Trump Tower servers began to be bombarded with the same exact invalid look-up requests that use the words “trump” and “alfa” together, which were automatically placed in the servers’ log file by the server. The New York Times reports computer logs showed that two servers at Alfa Bank sent more than 2,700 “look-up” messages to the Trump servers.
At about the same time, the FBI received a complaint from “cyber experts” about a possible Trump-Alfa Bank connection, which led the FBI to investigate a Trump-Alfa Bank connection. According to the New York Times:
“In classified sessions in August and September of 2016, intelligence officials also briefed congressional leaders on the possibility of financial ties between Russians and people connected to Mr. Trump. They focused particular attention on what cyber experts said appeared to be a mysterious computer back channel between the Trump Organization and the Alfa Bank, which is one of Russia’s biggest banks and whose owners have longstanding ties to Mr. Putin.”
At about the same time that the FBI began its investigation, Christopher Steele began pushing the now-debunked claim that Trump was connected to Alfa Bank. In mid-September Steele submitted his memos, and at least one of these included the Trump-Alfa Bank connection. Steele submitted these memos to the press and to the FBI.
We know that the FBI received a copy because at this time the FBI sought and received a FISA warrant related to a Russia-linked bank, using the Steele dossier as evidence. This is the only plausible piece of evidence that the FBI could have used. Before this time, the FBI was turned down by the FISA court but on this occasion, a warrant was granted. (As McCabe said: The FISA warrants would not have been granted without the Steele dossier.)
The FBI had no other evidence on the Trump – Russia bank connection and as time went by they had no additional evidence. The New York Times then reported:
“Law enforcement officials say that none of the investigations so far have found any conclusive or direct link between Mr. Trump and the Russian government. And even the hacking into Democratic emails, F.B.I. and intelligence officials now believe, was aimed at disrupting the presidential election rather than electing Mr. Trump.”
Glenn Simpson (l) Christopher Steele (c) and Bruce Ohr (Credit: Washington Examiner)
“Hundreds of pages of previously unreported emails and memos provide the clearest evidence yet that a research firm, hired by Hillary Clinton’s campaign and the Democratic National Committee (DNC) to find dirt on and defeat Donald Trump, worked early and often with the FBI, a Department of Justice (DOJ) official and the intelligence community during the 2016 presidential election and the early days of Trump’s presidency.”
(…) “Ohr’s own notes, emails and text messages show he communicated extensively with Steele and with Fusion GPS founder Glenn Simpson. Those documents have been turned over in recent weeks to investigative bodies in Congress and the DOJ, but not reviewed outside the investigative ranks until now.
They show Ohr had contact with Steele in the days just before the FBI opened its Trump-Russia probe in summer 2016, and then engaged Steele as a “confidential human source” assisting in that probe.
They also confirm that Ohr later became a critical conduit of continuing information from Steele after the FBI ended the Brit’s role as an informant.
“B, doubtless a sad and crazy day for you re- SY,” Steele texted Ohr on Jan. 31, 2017, referencing President Trump’s firing of Sally Yates for insubordination.
Steele’s FBI relationship had been terminated about three months earlier. The bureau concluded on Nov. 1, 2016, that he leaked information to the news media and was “not suitable for use” as a confidential source, memos show.
The FBI specifically instructed Steele that he could no longer “operate to obtain any intelligence whatsoever on behalf of the FBI,” those memos show.
Yet, Steele asked Ohr in the Jan. 31 text exchange if he could continue to help feed information to the FBI: “Just want to check you are OK, still in the situ and able to help locally as discussed, along with your Bureau colleagues.”
“I’m still here and able to help as discussed,” Ohr texted back. “I’ll let you know if that changes.”
Steele replied, “If you end up out though, I really need another (bureau?) contact point/number who is briefed. We can’t allow our guy to be forced to go back home. It would be disastrous.” Investigators are trying to determine who Steele was referring to.”
This is the only known photo of Joseph Pientka (far left) found in the Washingtonian and dated in 2007. (Credit: Vincent Ricard)
(…) In a report released in December by Horowitz on the FBI’s FISA abuse during its investigation into the Trump campaign, the role of an unidentified FBI supervisory special agent (SSA)—described in Horowitz’s report as “SSA 1”—was featured prominently throughout. The description of events and dates match the public information on Pientka’s actions, and on Dec. 13, Pientka was confirmed by Fox News as being “SSA 1.”
The inspector general report noted that all the participating members of the FBI’s Crossfire Hurricane team were selected by Strzok, Pientka, and “the Intel Section chief,” who is almost certainly intelligence analyst Jonathan Moffa, who, according to July 16, 2018, testimony from Lisa Page, worked on both the Clinton and Trump investigations with Strzok.
On page xviii of the inspector general report, it was disclosed that Pientka was running the FBI’s counterintelligence investigation into the Trump campaign as its supervisor. Pientka also was the agent who provided defensive briefings to the Trump and Clinton campaigns in August 2016.
“We learned during the course of our review that in August 2016, the supervisor of the Crossfire Hurricane investigation, SSA 1 [Pientka], participated on behalf of the FBI in a strategic intelligence briefing given by Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) to candidate Trump and his national security advisors, including Michael Flynn, and in a separate strategic intelligence briefing given to candidate Clinton and her national security advisors,” the report states.
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), during congressional testimony given by Horowitz, noted that the FBI used this meeting as an opportunity to effectively spy on the Trump campaign and gather further information—a characterization that Horowitz agreed with. Horowitz also said in his testimony he was concerned about this practice:
Sen. Graham: “So when we get defensively briefed tomorrow, would it be okay for FBI agents to open up 302s on what we said?”
Mr. Horowitz: “We have very significant concerns about that.”
Horowitz noted in his report that Pientka was specifically selected to “provide the FBI briefings, in part, because Flynn, who was a subject in the ongoing Crossfire Hurricane investigation, would be attending the Trump campaign briefing.”
Just prior to this defensive briefing, on Aug. 1, 2016, Strzok and Pientka “traveled to the European city to interview the FFG [Friendly Foreign Government] officials who met with Papadopoulos in May 2016.” The IG report noted that “during the interview they learned that Papadopoulos did not say that he had direct contact with the Russians.”
It also appears that Pientka was in charge of selecting the Confidential Human Sources (CHS) that were used against George Papadopoulos, Carter Page, Paul Manafort, and Flynn:
“In determining how to use CHSs in the Crossfire Hurricane investigation, SSA 1 and the case agents told the OIG that they focused their CHS operations on the predicating information and the four named subjects,” the inspector general report states.
The report describes “a consensually recorded meeting in August 2016 between Carter Page and an FBI CHS.” The IG noted that Pientka and “Case Agent 1 told the OIG that this meeting was important for the investigation.” But it appears that important information from this meeting was left out of the Page FISA application.
In footnote 197, the IG noted that “Page’s comment about his lack of a relationship with Manafort was relevant to one of the allegations in the Steele reporting that was relied upon in the Carter Page FISA applications, but information about the August 2016 CHS meeting was not shared with the OI attorneys handling the FISA applications until June 2017.” (Read more: The Epoch Times, 12/30/2019)(Archive)
Former Australian Ambassador to the UK, Alexander Downer (Credit: public domain)
“The FBI investigation into the Trump campaign’s ties to Russia was originally known as “Crossfire Hurricane” before it was widely known to the public and even the bureau itself, officials told The New York Times.
The case, named after a Rolling Stones lyric, was used by only the small group of agents sent to interview the Australian ambassador to the United Kingdom, who had evidence of possible collusion between Russia and a Trump adviser.
Five agents embarked to London in the summer of 2016 for a rare interview with the diplomat after deliberations between American and Australian officials, where they gathered information that would provide the basis for the Russia probe that is still ongoing.
The Times previously reported that a young foreign policy aide on the Trump campaign, George Papadopoulos, revealed he knew of hacked Democratic Party emails to Australian Ambassador Alexander Downer over late-night drinks in London.
Downer reportedly notified U.S. intelligence officials of his run-in with Papadopoulos after the emails, which contained damaging information about 2016 Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton just as the aide had said, began to leak to the public.
From there, the tight group of FBI agents went forward in interviewing Trump associates, which was kept secret for fear of leaks that could sway the campaign.
The official look into the Trump campaign reportedly began just days after the bureau closed its investigation into Clinton for her use of a private email server while serving as secretary of State.” (Read more: The Hill, 5/16/2018)
“President Barack Obama’s White House kept three key officials in the dark about bombshell Russia intelligence received in early August of 2016 from CIA Director John Brennan until after the presidential election in November.
The three officials held the top roles focusing on Russia, cybersecurity, and intelligence programs at the National Security Council. Their exclusion is likely to raise new questions about the Obama administration’s involvement in the origins of the investigation of the Trump campaign that evolved into the probe by special counsel Robert Mueller.
Michael Daniel (l), Celeste Wallander (c), and Brett Holmgren
The Obama administration coordinated a series of so-called “small group” meetings in response to Brennan’s intelligence, but excluded three officials who would usually be involved in high-profile work on the topics: White House Cybersecurity Coordinator Michael Daniel, Senior Director for Russia and Eurasia Celeste Wallander, and Senior Director for Intelligence Programs Brett Holmgren.
The exclusion of the officials was first documented in the third volume (pdf) of the Russia report by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, which noted that “several NSC officials who would normally be included in discussions of importance … were neither included in the discussions nor exposed to the sensitive intelligence until after the election.” (Read more: The Epoch Times, 5/17/2020)(Archive)
(…) Researchers, including British political analyst Chris Blackburn, have used open sources to show that Mifsud was a well-known figure in Western academic, diplomatic, and intelligence circles. Blackburn, whose research has previously focused on Islamic terrorist groups, has worked with senior leaders within global intelligence agencies. He told RealClearInvestigations that Mifsud’s known contacts suggest he’s not a Russian spy – or he is one of the most successful in history.
“Shortly after the FBI opened its counterintelligence probe based on the Papadopoulos information on July 31, the lead agent on the case, FBI Deputy Director of Counterintelligence Peter Strzok, went to London to investigate.
Claire Smith (Credit: public domain)
“A counter-intelligence officer would first look at someone’s most frequent contacts,” says Blackburn. “So when Strzok gets to London in early August to look into the Papadopoulos meeting with Mifsud, he would’ve found that one of his most notable contacts is Claire Smith.”
Smith is a prominent British diplomat whose biography describes her as an envoy with 25 years of experience and “expert in managing the complexities of global business practices.” Her postings included Beijing and Islamabad.
She worked with Mifsud at three different institutions—the London Academy of Diplomacy, University of Stirling, and Link Campus University in Rome. Blackburn believes that Smith’s working relationship with Mifsud is an important piece of evidence. “She was on the United Kingdom’s Joint Intelligence Committee,” says Blackburn. “It’s a very significant institution in the UK’s intelligence community, answering directly to the prime minister.”
For eight years, until April 2017, Smith was also a member of Britain’s security vetting appeals panel, which, according to its website, is “an independent avenue of appeal for Civil Service staff and contractors whose security clearance has been refused or withdrawn.”
“Smith was vetting UK government employees,” says Blackburn. “So how could she have missed that her colleague Joseph Mifsud was actually a Russian spy? She continued to work alongside him. She got her picture taken with him.”
If it’s true the professor was working with Russian intelligence, says Blackburn, “he was in place to recruit anyone he was training, in Rome or London. Effectively, Mifsud would have been a talent spotter for Russian intelligence.”
Moreover, explains Blackburn, if Mifsud proved to be a spy, he would’ve compromised a number of high-level European intelligence and diplomatic officials the professor worked with in London and Rome. They include Gianni Pittella, an Italian senator who was previously a member of the European Parliament, where he headed the Socialists and Democrats alliance, one of the Parliament’s most important left-wing blocs.
“Joseph is my dear friend,” Pittella told the Italian press in November after news of Mifsud’s alleged involvement in the Russiagate scandal spread. Pittella was a visiting lecturer when Mifsud was director of the London Academy of Diplomacy and is on the Link Campus Foundation’s board.
Link offers degrees in strategic studies and “diplomatic science.” Blackburn says that among the students who attend Link are police officers from around Europe, especially Italy, Malta, and eastern European countries, as well as a large contingent from Brazil. Link’s president is the former Italian interior minister, Vincenzo Scotti, who is alleged to have told Mifsud to hide. (Read more: RealClearInvestigations, 5/26/2018)(Archive)
John Brennan and Barack Obama (Credit: Pete Souza/White House)
“Early last August, an envelope with extraordinary handling restrictions arrived at the White House. Sent by courier from the CIA, it carried “eyes only” instructions that its contents be shown to just four people: President Barack Obama and three senior aides. [The aides names were revealed in a video within linked article. They are: Avril Haines, Denis McDonough and Susan Rice.]A
Inside was an intelligence bombshell, a report drawn from sourcing deep inside the Russian government that detailed Russian President Vladimir Putin’s direct involvement in a cyber campaign to disrupt and discredit the U.S. presidential race.
But it went further. The intelligence captured Putin’s specific instructions on the operation’s audacious objectives — defeat or at least damage the Democratic nominee, Hillary Clinton, and help elect her opponent, Donald Trump.”
(…) “The material was so sensitive that CIA Director John O. Brennan kept it out of the President’s Daily Brief, concerned that even that restricted report’s distribution was too broad. The CIA package came with instructions that it be returned immediately after it was read. To guard against leaks, subsequent meetings in the Situation Room followed the same protocols as planning sessions for the Osama bin Laden raid.
It took time for other parts of the intelligence community to endorse the CIA’s view. Only in the administration’s final weeks in office did it tell the public, in a declassified report, what officials had learned from Brennan in August — that Putin was working to elect Trump. (Read more: Washington Post, 6/23/2017)
“Text messages between former FBI officials Peter Strzok and Lisa Page debating how much information to share with the Justice Department about a London meeting — days after the bureau opened its initial Russia investigation — are drawing fresh scrutiny as alleged surveillance abuse and the probe’s origins are investigated by three separate probes, Fox News has learned.
On Aug. 3, 2016, Strzok wrote, “I think we need to consider the lines of what we disclose to DOJ. For example, the last stipulation notes we will not disclose [the] identifies outside the FBI. I think you might argue the unauthorized disclosure might (reasonably) be expected to cause exceptionally grave damage to US national security…”
A clipping of a Strzok /Page text with words written in. “DCM” stands for Deputy Chief of Mission.
In an earlier discussion on Aug. 2, 2016, Strzok reported he had a “good meeting.” Page warned, “Make sure you can lawfully protect what you sign. Just thinking about congress, foia [Freedom of Information Act], etc. I’m sure it’s fine. I just don’t know how protection of intel-type stuff works in that context.”
Fox News has learned some of the words and names that were redacted in the string of Strzok-Page messages; they are included below.
The New York Times was first to report lengthy details about the 2016 meeting in question, when the FBI “dispatched a pair of agents to London on a mission so secretive that all but a handful of officials were kept in the dark.” The report said this assignment included questioning Australian Ambassador Alexander Downer. Downer’s information about then-Trump campaign aide George Papadopoulos helped lay the foundation for the FBI’s counterintelligence probe – which later grew into former Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation.
House Republicans, continuing to probe the texts, have considered August 2016 a pivotal month. They have been looking closely at these exchanges, and how long before the August meeting Downer reported the Papadopoulos information.” (Read more: Fox News, 7/03/2019)
Avril Haines appears on MSNBC with Andrea Mitchell in August, 2018, to discuss President Trump’s abuse of power after removing former CIA director Brennan’s security clearance. (Credit: MSNBC screenshot)
“Inside was an intelligence bombshell, a report drawn from sourcing deep inside the Russian government that detailed Russian President Vladimir Putin’s direct involvement in a cyber campaign to disrupt and discredit the U.S. presidential race.
But it went further. The intelligence captured Putin’s specific instructions on the operation’s audacious objects — defeat or at least damage the Democratic nominee, Hillary Clinton, and help elect her opponent, Donald Trump.” —The Washington Post
As a result of this, Director Brennan created a secret task force at the Central Intelligence Agency’s Headquarters, which was composed of several dozen analysts from the Central Intelligence Agency, the National Security Agency and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
The Working Group reported to two different groups.
President Barack Obama and less than 14 senior United States Government officials.
A team of operations specialists at the Central Intelligence Agency, the National Security Agency and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Also in early August 2016 — presumably the same week — agents at the Federal Bureau of Investigation met with Attorney General Loretta Lynch, where they questioned her about a letter they had received in early March 2016 from a foreign source, supposedly written by Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz to Leonard Benardo of the Open Society Foundations regarding the Midyear Exam investigation.
During this meeting, the agents offered to give Attorney General Lynch a “defensive briefing”. Shortly after this, the Federal Bureau of Investigation concluded that the Benardo letter was an unreliable document.
President Obama ordered his aides to determine ways to retaliate or deter against the Russian Government through three steps:
Gain a high-confidence assessment from the United States intelligence agencies on Russia’s role and intent.
Check vulnerabilities in state-run election systems.
Seek bipartisan support from Congressional leaders for a statement condemning Moscow and urging states to accept federal assistance.
Obama meets with Kathryn Ruemmler (l), Lisa Monaco (c), and Susan Rice. (Credit: White House Flickr photo by Pete Souza)
The same week, Rice, Haines and Lisa Monaco convened meetings in the White House Situation Room, which would later be referred to as “Deputies Meetings”. These meetings were initially attended by:
Director John Brennan, Central Intelligence Agency
Director James Clapper, Office of the Director of National Intelligence
Director James Comey, Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation
Attorney General Loretta Lynch, United States Department of Justice
As time passed, another Cabinet member joined the Deputies Meetings: Vice President Joe Biden.
The Deputies Meetings needed to defend against any potential leaks, and therefore followed the same protocols taken during the planning stages of the raid of Osama bin Laden.
At a later time, agendas were directly sent to Cabinet secretaries, including Secretary John Kerry and Secretary Ashton Carter. When an agenda was received, their subordinates were ordered never to open the envelopes. Further to this, some agendas were withheld until the participants had arrived in the Situation Room and sat down.
Ordinarily, a video feed from the White House Situation Room is fed into various National Security Council offices to allow senior aides to view the events with zero sound. However, during the Deputies Meetings, the video feeds were switched off.
One of these Deputies Meetings was hosted by Haines, where the attendees of the meetings argued that any deliberative attempt to strike back against Russia would become a tool of propaganda for President Vladimir Putin, while another was concerned about the potential effect any action may have on Election Day 2016.
Haines would later note she was “very concerned” during this time about the potential of Russians gaining influence within the Trump campaign, although she apparently remained unaware of the existence of the Crossfire Hurricane investigation. (Read more: Conservative Treehouse, 4/29/2019)
John Brennan (Credit: Pablo Martinez Monsivais/The Associated Press)
“Brennan first alerts the White House to the Putin intelligence and later briefs Obama in the Oval Office convened a secret task force at CIA headquarters composed of several dozen analysts and officers from the CIA, the NSA and the FBI.
The unit functioned as a sealed compartment, its work hidden from the rest of the intelligence community. Those brought in signed new non-disclosure agreements to be granted access to intelligence from all three participating agencies.
They worked exclusively for two groups of “customers,” officials said. The first was Obama and fewer than 14 senior officials in government. The second was a team of operations specialists at the CIA, NSA and FBI who took direction from the task force on where to aim their subsequent efforts to collect more intelligence on Russia.” (Read more: Washington Post, 6/23/2017)
Stone gives a speech to the Southwest Broward Republican Organization on August 8, 2016. (Credit: Nydia B. Stone)
In a public appearance, Republican strategist Roger Stone is asked to predict what “October surprise” Wikileaks leader Julian Assange may reveal about Clinton that could influence the November 2016 presidential election. WikiLeaks released a batch of hacked emails from the Democratic National Committee (DNC) in July 2016 and hinted at more releases to come.
Stone replies, “Well, it could be any number of things. I actually have communicated with Assange. I believe the next tranche of his documents pertain to the Clinton Foundation, but there’s no telling what the October surprise may be.”
Stone was an official consultant to the Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump until August 2015, and has remains a prominent surrogate and confidant for Trump. (Talkingpointsmemo.com, 8/7/2016)
However, Stone’s prediction will be proven wrong when WikiLeaks begins posting thousands of Clinton campaign manager John Podesta’s private emails on October 7, 2016. But Stone will post a Tweet on August 21, 2016 that may have predicted that.
Julian Assange seems to suggest on Dutch television program Nieuwsuur that Seth Rich was the source for the Wikileaks-exposed DNC emails and was murdered.
“National security adviser Susan Rice, deputy national security adviser and former deputy director of the CIA under Brennan, Avril Haines, and White House homeland-security adviser Lisa Monaco convened meetings in the Situation Room to weigh the mounting evidence of Russian interference and generate options for how to respond. At first, only four senior security officials were allowed to attend: Brennan, Clapper, Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch and FBI Director James B. Comey. Aides ordinarily allowed entry as “plus-ones” were barred.
Gradually, the circle widened to include Vice President Biden and others. Agendas sent to Cabinet secretaries — including John F. Kerry at the State Department and Ashton B. Carter at the Pentagon — arrived in envelopes that subordinates were not supposed to open. Sometimes the agendas were withheld until participants had taken their seats in the Situation Room.”
(…) “They were concerned that any pre-election response could provoke an escalation from Putin. Moscow’s meddling to that point was seen as deeply concerning but unlikely to materially affect the outcome of the election. Far more worrisome to the Obama team was the prospect of a cyber-assault on voting systems before and on Election Day.
They also worried that any action they took would be perceived as political interference in an already volatile campaign. By August, Trump was predicting that the election would be rigged. Obama officials feared providing fuel to such claims, playing into Russia’s efforts to discredit the outcome and potentially contaminating the expected Clinton triumph.
Before departing for an August vacation to Martha’s Vineyard, Obama instructed aides to pursue ways to deter Moscow and proceed along three main paths: Get a high-confidence assessment from U.S. intelligence agencies on Russia’s role and intent; shore up any vulnerabilities in state-run election systems; and seek bipartisan support from congressional leaders for a statement condemning Moscow and urging states to accept federal help.” (Read more: Washington Post, 6/23/2017)
“It was the most damaging of all the damaging texts exchanged between FBI officials Peter Strzok and Lisa Page. On Aug. [9], 2016, in the second week of the Trump-Russia investigation on which both were working, Page texted Strzok to say, “He’s not ever going to become president, right? Right?!” Strzok responded, “No. No he won’t. We’ll stop it.”
(…) “The Justice Department gave Congress Page’s “not ever going to become president” text months ago, when it produced thousands of texts to Hill investigators. But lawmakers — and the public — did not learn of the explosive second part of the exchange — Strzok’s “We’ll stop it” answer — until last Thursday, when Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz’s report on the Clinton email investigation was that given to Congress.
Why wasn’t that given to Congress?” House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., asked on Fox Newsthe day the Horowitz report was released. “Why did I find out about that today at noon?”
(…) “There had been a flaw in the FBI’s collection system, Horowitz said. Searching for the missing texts, Horowitz took possession of Strzok’s and Page’s phones and “undertook a series of steps to seek to exploit, to extract the missing text messages from the phones.” (Read more: Washington Examiner, 6/20/2018)
Cheryl Mills, Clinton’s former chief of staff at the State Department, was deposed in May 2016 as part of a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit by Judicial Watch. At that time, she refused to answer some questions, citing attorney-client privilege. Judge Emmet Sullivan worked out a compromise to have Mills answer some questions in writing to prevent further litigation, and Mills’ written answers are made public by Judicial Watch on this day.
This written testimony shows that shortly after the hacker known as Guccifer broke into the email account of Clinton confidant Sid Blumenthal and publicy revealed Clinton’s private email address in March 2013, Mills was worried about the potential impact this coud have on Clinton’s private email server. Mills discussed this with Clinton’s computer techician Bryan Pagliano. Clinton’s email address was changed, but it is still unknown if any other security measures were taken. (Politico, 8/10/2016)
Seth Rich (l) and Julian Assange (Credit: public domain)
“A persistent American lawyer has uncovered the undeniable fact that the FBI has been continuously lying, including giving false testimony in court, in response to Freedom of Information requests for its records on Seth Rich. The FBI has previously given affidavits that it has no records regarding Seth Rich.
A Freedom of Information request to the FBI which did not mention Seth Rich, but asked for all email correspondence between FBI Head of Counterterrorism Peter Strzok, who headed the investigation into the DNC leaks and Wikileaks, and FBI attorney Lisa Page, has revealed two pages of emails which do not merely mention Seth Rich but have “Seth Rich” as their heading. The emails were provided in, to say the least, heavily redacted form.
Before I analyse these particular emails, I should make plain that they are not the major point. The major point is that the FBI claimed it had no records mentioning Seth Rich, and these have come to light in response to a different FOIA request that was not about him. What other falsely denied documents does the FBI hold about Rich, that were not fortuitously picked up by a search for correspondence between two named individuals?
To look at the documents themselves, they have to be read from the bottom up, and they consist of a series of emails between members of the Washington Field Office of the FBI (WF in the telegrams) into which Strzok was copied in, and which he ultimately forwarded on to the lawyer Lisa Page.” (Read much more: Craig Murray, 1/28/2020)(Archive)
(…) “As most people outside of solitary confinement know, the whole “Russian collusion” investigation began with the premise that Russia hacked the DNC, but considerable evidence suggests that the DNC emails were downloaded by someone inside the DNC — like Mr. Rich — and then provided to Wikileaks.
Rather than re-invent the wheel, I’ve copied and pasted my letter to U.S. Attorney John Durham, U.S. Attorney Richard Donoghue, and Inspector General Michael Horowitz:
Mr. Durham, Mr. Donoghue and Mr. Horowitz:
I wish to file a criminal complaint regarding false statements made by FBI Section Chief David M. Hardy in two affidavits [click here and here] filed in the FOIA case identified above [i.e., Ty Clevenger v. U.S. Department of Justice, et al., Civil Action No. 18-CV-01568]. I requested FBI records pertaining to Seth Rich, who allegedly was the source of Democratic National Committee emails published by Wikileaks in 2016 (rather than Russian hackers). In the affidavits (attached to the email version of this letter), Mr. Hardy testified that his office conducted a reasonable search, and it found no responsive records.
New evidence proves otherwise, and it appears that Mr. Hardy has perpetrated a fraud on the court. Judicial Watch recently published documents that it obtained in response to a FOIA request for communications between former FBI agent Peter Strzok and former FBI attorney Lisa Page and I would direct your attention to pages 123-125. In those pages, you will find a heavily-redacted email discussion regarding Mr. Rich. Note that the header on those emails is “Seth Rich.” (Read more: Ty Clevenger/Lawflog, 1/27/2020)(Archive)
“Somma is reported to be an FBI counterintelligence agent referred to as “Case Agent 1” in the IG report.
The report said that “Case Agent 1” was “primarily responsible for some of the most significant errors and omissions” in the FBI’s applications for surveillance orders on Page.
Somma played a role in several key developments in the investigation. He opened the case file on Page, he first proposed surveillance on the Trump aide, and was the FBI handler for Stefan Halper, a longtime confidential human source who was tasked with meeting Page and George Papadopoulos.
Somma also took part in a January 2017 interview with the primary source for Christopher Steele, the former British spy whose dossier was a key aspect of the FISA applications.
The IG reported identified six areas where Somma withheld information from the investigation.
He failed to disclose exculpatory statements that Page and Papadopoulos made to Halper during secretly recorded conversations before the 2016 election. He also received information from the CIA in August 2016 that Page had a longstanding relationship with the spy agency. The IG report says that Somma did not divulge that information to others at the FBI.
Somma also withheld information that Steele’s source divulged in the January 2017 interview that undercut key allegations in the dossier. The FBI relied heavily on the document to obtain spy warrants against Page.
The Steele source said that Steele embellished or misinterpreted information that was in the dossier. He said that he provided Steele with information that was based on “rumor and speculation,” but that Steele passed it along as fact in the dossier.” (Read more: The Daily Caller, 6/22/2020)(Archive)
In a CNN interview, Rudy Giuliani criticizes FBI Director James Comey’s July 5, 2016 announcement to not recommend indicting Clinton. “I believe the decision was so wrong, I can’t understand how he came to that conclusion. I don’t believe he did it for bad reasons, because I think he is a good man. But the decision perplexes me. It perplexes [former Assistant FBI Director James] Kallstrom, who worked for him. It perplexes numerous FBI agents who talk to me all the time. And it embarrasses some FBI agents.” (CNN, 8/11/2016)
Giuliani is a former US attorney, former mayor of New York City, and a frequent media surrogate for the Trump campaign. The Daily Beast will note that Giuliani “spent decades of his life as a federal prosecutor and then mayor working closely with the FBI, and especially its New York office. One of Giuliani’s security firms employed a former head of the New York FBI office, and other alumni of it.” Furthermore, his former law firm has long been general counsel to the FBI Agents Association (FBIAA), which represents 13,000 former and current agents. (The Daily Beast, 11/2/2016)
The Daily Beast reports that cybersecurity experts believe the hacker or hackers who stole emails from the DNC (Democratic National Committee) are behind a website known as DCLeaks. The site went public in June 2016 to little media attention. But the site contains emails from hundreds of Republican and Democratic US politicans, including staffers to Republican Senators John McCain and Linsey Graham, plus staffers to former Republican Repesentative Michelle Bachmann. An unnamed “an individual close to the investigation of the Democratic Party hacks” says the evidence is growing that both parties have been targeted. “Everyone is sweating this right now. This isn’t just limited to Democrats.”
Senators John McCain (left) and Linsey Graham (right) (Credit: Kevin Lamarque / Reuters)
The cybersecurity company ThreatConnect has been investigating the recent hacks of US political targets, and they call DCLeaks a “Russian-backed influence outlet.” In particular, they have linked it to Fancy Bear (a.k.a. APT 28), a hacking group also accused of hacking the DNC, an believed by many to be working for the Russian government. “DCLeaks’ registration and hosting information aligns with other Fancy Bear activities and known tactics, techniques, and procedures.” They also claim that the hacker or hacking group known as Guccifer 2.0, who claims to be behind the hacking of the DNC emails that WikiLeaks publicly posted in July 2016, is linked to DCLeaks.
The Daily Beast reports that “researchers, at ThreatConnect and elsewhere, also now believe that Guccifer 2.0 was WikiLeaks’ source and that the group is acting as a front for the Russian government.” (The Daily Beast, 8/12/2016)
In late 2014, Clinton sorted her emails into what she and her lawyers deemed work-related and personal, and then deleted over 31,000 of the “personal” emails. In the FBI investigation into her emails that concluded in July 2016, it was reported that “several thousand” of the personal emails were recovered or found through other people having copies, and many of these actually were work-related.
In a court filing, the State Department reveals that it is planning to release all of the emails it decides are work-related. The emails will be given to Judicial Watch, who have a number of on-going Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuits related to Clinton’s emails. However, it is unknown just how many emails were recovered and how many of those are work-related. It also is unknown how soon they will be released. Republican National Committee (RNC) chair Reince Priebus urges the department to release the emails before the November 2016 presidential election. (The Hill, 8/16/2016)
Debbie Wassermann Schultz accidentally tells the truth for the first time about their push to anoint Hillary Clinton as the Democratic Party’s presidential nominee.
“Handwritten ledgers show $12.7 million in undisclosed cash payments designated for Mr. Manafort from Mr. Yanukovych’s pro-Russian political party from 2007 to 2012, according to Ukraine’s newly formed National Anti-Corruption Bureau. Investigators assert that the disbursements were part of an illegal off-the-books system whose recipients also included election officials.
(…) The papers, known in Ukraine as the “black ledger,” are a chicken-scratch of Cyrillic covering about 400 pages taken from books once kept in a third-floor room in the former Party of Regions headquarters on Lipskaya Street in Kiev. The room held two safes stuffed with $100 bills, said Taras V. Chornovil, a former party leader who was also a recipient of the money at times. He said in an interview that he had once received $10,000 in a “wad of cash” for a trip to Europe.
A page from the “black ledger,” released by Ukraine’s National Anti-Corruption Bureau. This page does not include Mr. Manafort’s name.
“This was our cash,” he said, adding that he had left the party in part over concerns about off-the-books activity. “They had it on the table, stacks of money, and they had lists of who to pay.”The National Anti-Corruption Bureau, which obtained the ledger, said in a statement that Mr. Manafort’s name appeared 22 times in the documents over five years, with payments totaling $12.7 million. The purpose of the payments is not clear. Nor is the outcome, since the handwritten entries cannot be cross-referenced against banking records, and the signatures for receipt have not yet been verified.
“Paul Manafort is among those names on the list of so-called ‘black accounts of the Party of Regions,’ which the detectives of the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine are investigating,” the statement said. “We emphasize that the presence of P. Manafort’s name in the list does not mean that he actually got the money, because the signatures that appear in the column of recipients could belong to other people.”
The accounting records surfaced this year, when Serhiy A. Leshchenko, a member of Parliament who said he had received a partial copy from a source he did not identify, published line items covering six months of outlays in 2012 totaling $66 million. In an interview, Mr. Leshchenko said another source had provided the entire multiyear ledger to Viktor M. Trepak, a former deputy director of the domestic intelligence agency of Ukraine, the S.B.U., who passed it to the National Anti-Corruption Bureau.” (Read more: New York Times, 8/14/2016) (Archive)
John Brennan (l) and Robert Hannigan. (Credit: Agence France Presse/Getty Images)
(…) “Steele believed that the Russians were engaged in the biggest electoral crime in U.S. history, and wondered why the F.B.I. and the State Department didn’t seem to be taking the threat seriously. Likening it to the attack on Pearl Harbor, he felt that President Obama needed to make a speech to alert the country. He also thought that Obama should privately warn Putin that unless he stopped meddling the U.S. would retaliate with a cyberattack so devastating it would shut Russia down.
Steele wasn’t aware that by August, 2016, a similar debate was taking place inside the Obama White House and the U.S. intelligence agencies. According to an article by the Washington Post, that month the C.I.A. sent what the paper described as “an intelligence bombshell” to President Obama, warning him that Putin was directly involved in a Russian cyber campaign aimed at disrupting the Presidential election—and helping Trump win. Robert Hannigan, then the head of the U.K.’s intelligence service the G.C.H.Q., had recently flown to Washington and briefed the C.I.A.’s director, John Brennan, on a stream of illicit communications between Trump’s team and Moscow that had been intercepted. (The content of these intercepts has not become public.) But, as the Post noted, the C.I.A.’s assessment that the Russians were interfering specifically to boost Trump was not yet accepted by other intelligence agencies, and it wasn’t until days before the Inauguration that major U.S. intelligence agencies had unanimously endorsed this view.”
(…) “In early September, 2016, Obama tried to get congressional leaders to issue a bipartisan statement condemning Russia’s meddling in the election. He reasoned that if both parties signed on the statement couldn’t be attacked as political. The intelligence community had recently informed the Gang of Eight—the leaders of both parties and the ranking representatives on the Senate and House Intelligence Committees—that Russia was acting on behalf of Trump. But one Gang of Eight member, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, expressed skepticism about the Russians’ role, and refused to sign a bipartisan statement condemning Russia. After that, Obama, instead of issuing a statement himself, said nothing.
Steele anxiously asked his American counterparts what else could be done to alert the country. One option was to go to the press. Simpson wasn’t all that worried, though. As he recalled in his subsequent congressional testimony, “We were operating under the assumption at that time that Hillary Clinton was going to win the election, and so there was no urgency to it.” (Read more: The New Yorker, 3/12/2018)
In early July 2016, Republicans formally asked the Justice Department to open an investigation into whether Clinton committed perjury with some of her comments while speaking before Congress in October 2015.
Representative Bob Goodlatte (Credit: Twitter)
On August 15, 2016, Representatives Bob Goodlatte (R), chair of the Judiciary Committee, and Jason Chaffetz (R), chair of the Oversight Committee, write a letter to Channing Phillips, the US attorney for the District of Columbia. The letter points out four comments Clinton made in her Congressional testimony that they believe contradicts what the FBI learned during their Clinton email investigation.
They write: “The four pieces of sworn testimony by Secretary Clinton described herein are incompatible with the FBI’s findings. We hope this information is helpful to your office’s consideration of our referral.”
In her testimony, Clinton claimed that none of the material she sent or received via her personal email account was marked as classified. But the FBI later determined that at least three emails contained classified markings, although they were apparently done in error.
Clinton claimed her lawyers went through each of her emails individually before deciding to delete them or not. However, the FBI has since claimed this is not so.
She said all of her work-related emails were given back to the State Department in December 2014, but thousands of other work-related emails have since been found.
She claimed she only used one server while secretary of state, but the FBI says the server was replaced more than once.
Earlier in the month, the Justice Department told Goodlatte and Chaffetz that it is reviewing information “and will take appropriate action as necessary.”
The Hill comments that the “letter is a sign that Republicans are committed to pressuring the Justice Department to act against Clinton, even after it notably declined to prosecute her for mishandling classified information,” and that Republicans “also appear to be making a public case for an indictment, perhaps building off widespread unease with the decision not to prosecute…” (The Hill, 8/16/2016)
“Two FBI officials who worked on Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation exchanged text messages last year in which they appear to have discussed ways to prevent Donald Trump from being elected president.
“I want to believe the path you threw out for consideration in Andy’s office — that there’s no way [Trump] gets elected — but I’m afraid we can’t take that risk,” FBI counterintelligence official Peter Strzok wrote in a cryptic text message to Lisa Page, an FBI lawyer and his mistress.
“It’s like an insurance policy in the unlikely event you die before you’re 40,” Strzok wrote in the text, dated Aug. 15, 2016.
“Jeh Johnson, the homeland-security secretary, was responsible for finding out whether the government could quickly shore up the security of the nation’s archaic patchwork of voting systems. He floated the idea of designating state mechanisms “critical infrastructure,” a label that would have entitled states to receive priority in federal cybersecurity assistance, putting them on a par with U.S. defense contractors and financial networks.
On Aug. 15, Johnson arranged a conference call with dozens of state officials, hoping to enlist their support. He ran into a wall of resistance.
The reaction “ranged from neutral to negative,” Johnson said in congressional testimony Wednesday.
Brian Kemp, the Republican secretary of state of Georgia, used the call to denounce Johnson’s proposal as an assault on state rights. “I think it was a politically calculated move by the previous administration,” Kemp said in a recent interview, adding that he remains unconvinced that Russia waged a campaign to disrupt the 2016 race. “I don’t necessarily believe that,” he said.
Stung by the reaction, the White House turned to Congress for help, hoping that a bipartisan appeal to states would be more effective.” (Read more: Washington Post, 6/23/2017)
David Kendall, (r), sits behind Hillary Clinton during a House hearing of the Select Committee on Benghazi, on October 22, 2015. (Credit: Diego M. Radzinschi/The National Law Journal)
“Judicial Watch announced today it received 218 pages of disgraced former FBI officials Peter Strzok-Lisa Page emails which show then-FBI General Counsel James Baker instructing FBI officials to expedite the release of FBI investigative material to Hillary Clinton’s lawyer, David Kendall in August 2016. Kendall and the FBI’s top lawyer discussed specifically quickly obtaining the “302” report of the FBI/DOJ interview of Mrs. Clinton.
(…) OnAugust 16, 2016, at 10:02 p.m.Baker emails then-Associate Deputy Director David Bowdich; Michael Steinbach, former executive assistant director for national security; former Acting Assistant Director Jason V. Herring; former FBI lawyer Lisa Page; former Principal Deputy General Counsel Trisha Anderson; Michael Kortan, FBI assistant director for public affairs, now retired; James Rybicki, former chief of staff to Comey; and others to inform them that he “just spoke” with Clinton’s lawyer Kendall, who requested documents from the FBI. Baker says he told Kendall he would “need to submit a request.” Baker tells them, “I said we would process it expeditiously.”
“I just spoke with David Kendall … I conveyed our view that in order to obtain the documents [FBI investigative material] they are seeking they need to submit a request pursuant to the Privacy Act and FOIA. I said they could submit a letter to me covering both statutes. They will send it in the morning. I said that we would process it expeditiously. David asked us to focus first on the Secretary’s 302 [FBI interview report]. I said OK. [Redacted] We will have to focus on this issue tomorrow and get the 302 out the door as soon as possible and then focus on the rest of the stuff.”
The following day, August 17, 2016, Kendall sent a FOIA/Privacy Act request on “behalf of former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton” to the FBI’s top lawyer with a request for “expeditious processing.” Baker passes this request to Bowdich, Steinbach, Herring, Page, Anderson:
In my view, we need to move as quickly as possible on this, but pursuant to David’s oral request last night, we should focus first on Secretary Clinton’s 302…. Is the end of this week out of the question for her 302?
In a follow-up email exchange, the same day, Anderson arranged for Herring, Page, former FBI Assistant Director and head of the Office of Congressional Affairs Gregory Brower, Strzok and others to “coordinate a plan for processing and releasing” Clinton’s 302, though one official reminds others that they should process the request “consistent” with other requests.
Then, in an August 21, 2016, email exchange Baker tells his people that he would “alert” Kendall shortly before Clinton’s 302 was to be posted on the FBI’s FOIA Vault webpage. On September 2, 2016, the FBI announced the release of Clinton’s interview documents.
Finally, on August 24, 2016, the acting FBI FOIA unit chief said he sees “no problem” with giving Hillary’s attorney a heads up before her records were posted to the Vault.” (Read more: Judicial Watch, 6/03/2019)
Included in the DOJ’s motion to dismiss the criminal charges against General Flynn, Exhibit 2 is the official filing and opening of the Crossfire Razor investigation. Of note, the investigation is categorized as a sensitive investigation matter (SIM) because it was during the middle of the 2016 general election campaign.
The documents include the FBI’s summary of the interview of Clinton on July 1, 2016, known as a 302.
The State Department wanted to review the 302 interview summaries first, but the FBI ignored that request. On July 7, 2016, FBI Director James Comey said when it came to documents relating to the FBI’s Clinton investigation, he was committed to delivering to Congress “everything I can possibly give you under the law and to doing it as quickly as possible.”
Representative Adam Schiff (Credit: Michael Buckner / Getty Images)
Representative Adam Schiff (D) criticizes the move. “With the exception of the classified emails that had been found on the private server, I can see little legitimate purpose to which Congress will put these materials. Instead, as the now-discredited Benghazi Committee demonstrated, their contents will simply be leaked for political purposes. This will neither serve the interests of justice nor aid Congress in its responsibilities and will merely set a precedent for the FBI to turn over closed case files whenever one party in Congress does not like a prosecutorial decision. This has been done in the name of transparency, but as this precedent chills the cooperation of other witnesses in the future, I suspect the Department of Justice will later come to refer to it by a different name — mistake.”
The documents can be seen by members of Congress, but they are not allowed to publicly reveal any of it. An FBI spokesperson says, “The material contains classified and other sensitive information and is being provided with the expectation it will not be disseminated or disclosed without FBI concurrence.”
However, Senator Charles Grassley (R), chair of the judiciary committee, says, “On initial review, it seems that much of the material given to the Senate today, other than copies of the large number of emails on Secretary Clinton’s server containing classified information, is marked ‘unclassified/for official use.’ The FBI should make as much of the material available as possible.”
Clinton campaign spokesperson Brian Fallon also wants to see the material publicly release, saying, “This is an extraordinarily rare step that was sought solely by Republicans for the purposes of further second-guessing the career professionals at the FBI. We believe that if these materials are going to be shared outside the Justice Department, they should be released widely so that the public can see them for themselves, rather than allow Republicans to mischaracterize them through selective, partisan leaks.” (Politico, 8/16/2016)
(…) Among the most significant of the newly declassified documents is a memorandum written by FBI agent Joe Pientka III, the case agent on Trump-Russia. It was Pientka who, at the FBI’s New York City headquarters on August 17, 2016, purported to brief Trump and two top campaign surrogates — the aforementioned General Flynn and then–New Jersey governor Chris Christie, who was slated to run the transition if Trump won.
In reality, Pientka and the FBI regarded the occasion not as a briefing for the Republican presidential nominee but as an opportunity to interact with Donald Trump for investigative purposes. Clearly, the Bureau did that because Trump was the main subject of the investigation. The hope was that he’d blurt things out that would help the FBI prove he was an agent of Russia.
The Obama administration and the FBI knew that it was they who were meddling in a presidential campaign — using executive intelligence powers to monitor the president’s political opposition. This, they also knew, would rightly be regarded as a scandalous abuse of power if it ever became public. There was no rational or good-faith evidentiary basis to believe that Trump was in a criminal conspiracy with the Kremlin or that he’d had any role in Russian intelligence’s suspected hacking of Democratic Party email accounts.
You didn’t have to believe Trump was a savory man to know that. His top advisers were Flynn, a decorated combat veteran; Christie, a former U.S. attorney who vigorously investigated national-security cases; Rudy Giuliani, a legendary former U.S. attorney and New York City mayor who’d rallied the country against anti-American terrorism; and Jeff Sessions, a longtime U.S. senator with a strong national-defense track record. To believe Trump was unfit for the presidency on temperamental or policy grounds was a perfectly reasonable position for Obama officials to take — though an irrelevant one, since it’s up to the voters to decide who is suitable. But to claim to suspect that Trump was in a cyberespionage conspiracy with the Kremlin was inane . . . except as a subterfuge to conduct political spying, which Obama officials well knew was an abuse of power.
So they concealed it. They structured the investigation on the fiction that there was a principled distinction between Trump himself and the Trump campaign. In truth, the animating assumption of the probe was that Trump himself was acting on Russia’s behalf, either willfully or under the duress of blackmail. By purporting to focus on the campaign, investigators had the fig leaf of deniability they needed to monitor the candidate.
Just two weeks before Pientka’s August 17 “briefing” of Trump, the FBI formally opened “Crossfire Hurricane,” the codename for the Trump-Russia investigation. The Bureau also opened four Trump-Russia subfiles, related to Trump campaign officials Paul Manafort, Carter Page, George Papadopoulos and Flynn.
There was no case file called “Donald Trump” because Trump was “Crossfire Hurricane.” The theory of Crossfire Hurricane was that Russia had blackmail information on Trump, which it could use to extort Trump into doing Putin’s bidding if Trump were elected. It was further alleged that Russia had been cultivating Trump for years and was helping Trump’s election bid in exchange for future considerations. Investigators surmised that Trump had recruited Paul Manafort (who had connections to Russian oligarchs and pro-Russia Ukrainian oligarchs) as his campaign manager, enabling Manafort to use such emissaries as Page to carry out furtive communications between Trump and the Kremlin. If elected, the theory went, Trump would steer American policy in Russia’s favor, just as the Bureau speculated that Trump was already corruptly steering the Republican party into a more pro-Moscow posture.” (Read more: National Review, 8/01/2020)(Archive)
“Newly declassified internal Federal Bureau of Investigation documents prove the top U.S. law enforcement agency used a so-called defensive briefing of the Trump campaign in 2016 to spy on and collect information about Donald Trump himself. The new documents, which are just the latest in a string of declassifications regarding the FBI operation to spy on the Trump campaign and later the Trump administration, detail the FBI’s attempts to use a briefing ostensibly meant to warn the Trump campaign about foreign intelligence threats to spy on the Trump campaign itself.
(…) In one of the documents declassified and released on Wednesday, FBI supervisory Special Agent Joe Pientka wrote that he deliberately used the briefing to “actively listen for topics or questions” from Trump “regarding the Russian Federation.” Rather than provide the Trump campaign a specific warning that certain campaign principals were being targeted by Russian intelligence, the FBI instead gave a general, non-specific warning that foreign intelligence services might eventually target the campaign.
Pientka’s written summary of the briefing noted that Trump, Michael Flynn, and former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie were the only three Trump campaign members in attendance. Christie’s attendance had not previously been disclosed. The August 17, 2016 meeting came the day after the FBI opened a formal counterintelligence investigation against Flynn and just two days after FBI counterintelligence official Peter Strzok texted his former lover, FBI attorney Lisa Page, about an “insurance policy” he had designed to keep Trump from becoming president.
(…) Pientka was excoriated in a report from the Department of Justice (DOJ) Office of Inspector General (OIG) for his behavior during the FBI’s spy operation against the Trump campaign. Pientka told the OIG that he designed the August 17 meeting to “gain assessment and possibly have some level of familiarity with [Flynn].”
According to the OIG report, Pientka “was selected to provide the FBI briefings, in part, because Flynn, who was a subject in the ongoing Crossfire Hurricane investigation, would be attending the Trump campaign briefing.”
Pientka told the OIG that he was selected to attend on behalf of the FBI so he could “record” or “overhear” from Trump, Flynn, or Christie “any kind of admission” that they were colluding with the Russian government to steal the election from Hillary Clinton. Pientka also added that he wanted to get a baseline impression of Flynn’s “overall mannerisms” in case he needed to later use that information against him.” (Read more: The Federalist, 7/23/2020)(Archive)
Reuters reports that the foundation has recently hired the cybersecurity company FireEye to investigte and combat hacking after seeing indications of possible hacking. This is according to two unnamed “sources familiar with the matter.”
No stolen emails or documents from the foundation have been made public so far. However, one of the sources plus two unnamed US security officials say that hackers appear to have used “spear phishing” techniques to gain access to the foundation’s network, in the same way they’ve hacked the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and other political targets. (Reuters, 8/18/2016)
Earlier in the day, Reuters reported from several sources that it is likely the Clinton Foundation’s computer network has been recently hacked. But the foundation says, “We have no evidence Clinton Foundation systems were breached and have not been notified by law enforcement of an issue.”
Reuters also reported the foundation recently hired the cybersecurity company FireEye to combat hacking. The foundation has not responded to this. (Politico, 8/18/2016)
An August 18, 2016, email from FBI Assistant Director for Counterintelligence Bill Priestap to Strzok, Moffa and a FBI official (identity redacted), asking if they “happen to know when Clinton will receive the brief? And where will it occur, and which two people has she designated to receive it with her?”
Strzok replies, “She has not designated her people and no date is set. I believe brief will be HVRA [the FBI’s Hudson Valley Resident Agent] or WPRA [FBI’s White Plains Resident Agent].”
Further on in the email exchange, the unidentified FBI official from the Washington field office writes, “There is no additional or new info as of this morning when I checked with the DNI scheduler. There is a policy that briefs will not be provided a week prior to a debate. If the other candidate does not ID people soon, there was talk that they may not be able to do them. That’s all I know at this time.”
Strzok forwards the exchange to Lisa Page and says, “And now we’ve got sources in dni <smiley emoji>.”
Page replies, “Yup, I knew the same. Just hadn’t shared yet.”
Strzok responds, “What?! You holding out? <wink emoji>”
Page replies, “Time, dude. Time.”
Strzok responds, “I know, dudette. Hence, the <wink emoji>. Same realization of shit, haven’t even told you about Trump brief…”
The DOJ’s Inspector General report on “Crossfire Hurricane” describes the FBI’s use of a national security briefing to the Trump campaign in August 2016 to try to further its investigation by planting an agent in the room:
[W]e learned during the course of our review that in August 2016, the supervisor of the Crossfire Hurricane investigation, SSA 1, participated on behalf of the FBI in a strategic intelligence briefing given by Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) to candidate Trump and his national security advisors, including Michael Flynn, and in a separate strategic intelligence briefing given to candidate Clinton and her national security advisors. The stated purpose of the FBI portion of the briefing was to provide the recipients “a baseline on the presence and threat posed by foreign intelligence services to the National Security of the U.S.” However, we found that SSA 1 was selected to provide the FBI briefings, in part, because Flynn, who was a subject in the ongoing Crossfire Hurricane investigation, would be attending the Trump campaign briefing.
“The Trump campaign announced Manafort was resigning from the campaign, nearly 5 months after he joined.
“I am very appreciative for his great work in helping to get us where we are today, and in particular his work guiding us through the delegate and convention process,” Trump said in a statement. “Paul is a true professional and I wish him the greatest success.”
The Trump campaign provided no reason for Manafort’s resignation. But in the days immediately leading up to the announcement, the New York Times reported investigators were looking into $12.7 million in undisclosed cash payments to Manafort from former Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych, and the Associated Press reported he helped a pro-Russian party in Ukraine funnel money to lobbying firms in Washington, D.C.
“I think my father didn’t want to be distracted by whatever things Paul was dealing with,” Trump’s son Eric told Fox News after the resignation. “Paul was amazing, and, yes, he helped us get through the primary process, he helped us get through the convention. He did a great job with the delegates. But, again, my father didn’t want to have the distraction looming over the campaign.”
Shortly before Manafort’s resignation, Steve Bannon and Kellyanne Conway, now senior advisers to the White House, were brought on as the campaign’s chief executive and campaign manager, and ultimately led Trump to an unexpected victory in November. (Fortune, 3/22/2017)
If the “Ukraine meddled in 2016 is Russian propaganda” claim is right, time to cancel your subscription to the Financial Times and get the FBI on their case. The article is dated August 28, 2016.
(…) “In 2016, Serhiy Leshchenko, a Ukrainian member of parliament and an anti-corruption activist (who got embroiled in his own corruption scandal), coordinated the release of a handwritten ledger. The document purported to show off-the-book payments made to Manafort from the Party of the Regions — the political arm of the Viktor Yanukovich, the Ukrainian President who had been overthrown in a coup-type revolt by a much more western-friendly political faction. The ledger itself was released by NABU, a Ukrainian government anti-corruption organization set up as result of prodding by the Obama Administration and which was run with the backing and financial support of the FBI.
(As an aside: NABU — which also got embroiled into its own political corruption scandal — also happens to be at the heart of an internal Ukrainian political fight that sucked in ex-Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch. But that’s a different and complicated story. And then there’s the weird angle of the FBI being so closely involved with NABU at a time when this Ukrainian anti-corruption agency decided to involve itself in an American election.)
Anyway, Leshchenko — a foreign politician — made clear that his objective at the time was to kill off Trump’s candidacy. That’s a direct admission of meddling. As Oleksiy Kuzmenko has documented so well, Leshchenko repeated this statement in various ways in both English and Ukrainian over and over again.
Lev Golinkin explained in The Nationa few months ago that the release of that ledger by Leshchenko and NABU was an important event — and a direct intervention in the election. “The story rocked the 2016 election, given Manafort’s position as head of Trump’s campaign. The Hillary Clinton campaign immediately seized on it as proof that Manafort—and therefore Trump—was tied to Yanukovych and the Kremlin,” he wrote. “Manafort was ousted based on handwritten pieces of paper—the story would’ve never gone anywhere without NABU and Leshchenko’s vouching for the ledger’s authenticity. That’s as direct as it gets.”
But three years later, this episode has been wiped from the collective memory of our media and political establishment. What used to be fact is now smeared as either a pro-Trump rightwing conspiracy theory or Russian propaganda — and probably both. But saying that it didn’t happen doesn’t change the historical record.” (Read more: The Grayzone, 11/23/2019) (Archive)
“…Biden and Poroshenko laugh together over the release of information against former Trump campaign advisor Paul Manafort. The famous ‘black ledger’ allegedly showed off-the-books payments to Manafort from former Ukrainian President Yanukovych. The ‘black ledger’ was later found to be fabricated; however, the information was used to begin investigations into Manfort; he was forced to resign from Trump’s team prior to the election.
In the tape below, Biden and Poroshenko can be heard laughing about the incident.
“During a telephone conversation, Poroshenko said one phrase that could cost Biden the entire presidential race, as well as serve as the beginning of an investigation into Ukraine’s interference in the electoral process with the support of the Democratic Party.
According to Poroshenko, taking adviser Yanukovych Manfort to Trump’s team was a bad idea: “And one more thing, just as a joke. We published documents of the former Party of Regions. As I understand it, one of Mr. Trump’s key advisers, Paul Manafort, resigned today … As for me, it was a bad idea to take Advisor Yanukovych to Trump’s team. ”
Poroshenko clearly said: “we published.” This is important, as it can be evidence that it was Poroshenko who led the intervention operation.
We will be back in May 2016. Then the former People’s Deputy Sergei Leshchenko published material on the “black bookkeeping” of the Party of Regions, on the basis of which the total cost of political needs of the Yanukovych clan settled to more than $ 66 million. The materials also turned out to be the name of Paul Manafort.”
Judge Emmet Sullivan, District Court for the District of Columbia, (Credit: Diego M. Radzinschi / The National Law Journal)
Judicial Watch has been seeking to have Clinton deposed as part of a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit involving her emails. However, US District Court Judge Emmet Sullivan rules: “Judicial Watch’s argument that a deposition is preferable in this case because of the ability to ask follow-up questions is not persuasive. Given the extensive public record related to the clintonemail.com system, a record which Judicial Watch has acknowledged
Judicial Watch will be able to anticipate many follow-up questions. For those follow-up questions that Judicial Watch is unable to anticipate, it can move this Court for permission to serve additional interrogatories.”
Sullivan notes that due to legal precedents applicable to current and former Cabinet officials, he should only require Clinton to appear at a deposition if “exceptional circumstances” justify it.
Sullivan says he is still intent on finding out why Clinton’s private server was set up and whether there were other reasons beyond Clinton’s public claim of “convenience.” He also says it is important that she at least answer questions in writing about this because depositions of Clinton’s staff had shown that “her closest aides at the State Department do not have personal knowledge of her purpose in using the [server].”
Politico notes, “Technically, it is still possible one of several other judges considering similar cases could issue such an order [for Clinton to be deposed in person], but the clock may run out soon on efforts to force such an appearance in advance of the November [presidential] election.”
Judicial Watch also asked for the depositions of former State Department officials Clarence Finney and John Bentel.
Sullivan rejects the deposition of Finney, despite the fact that Finney’s job was to organize responses to FOIA requests. However, he does order the future deposition of Bentel. It has been reported that Bentel blocked other department employees from raising questions about Clinton’s use of her server. (Politico, 8/19/2016)
Roger Stone writes on Twitter, “Trust me, it will soon be [John] Podesta’s time in the barrel.” (Twitter, 8/21/2016) Stone is a Republican strategist and confidant of Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, while Podesta is Clinton’s campaign chair.
On October 7, 2016, Stone’s Tweet will take on new meaning when WikiLeaks begins posting thousands of Podesta’s private emails.
Several days later, Podesta will cite this Tweet and then claim “it’s a reasonable assumption, or at least a reasonable conclusion, that Mr. Stone had advance warning and the Trump campaign had advance warning” about the WikiLeaks release. (The Washington Post, 10/11/2016)
However, Stone will claim that the Tweet was in reference to a separate story he was working on that would accuse Podesta of possible criminal wrongdoing. But he will also say that he has had “back-channel communications” with WikiLeaks leader Julian Assange through a mutual friend. (CBS Miami, 10/12/2016)
“Hillary Clinton’s campaign manager said Sunday there are serious questions about whether Donald Trump is a “puppet” for Russia.
“We now need Donald Trump to explain to us the extent to which the hand of the Kremlin is at the core of his own campaign,” Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook said on ABC’s This Week. “There’s a web of financial interests that have not been disclosed. And there are real questions being raised about whether Donald Trump himself is just a puppet for the Kremlin in this race.”
Mook said that the departure of former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort from the campaign last week “doesn’t mean that the Russians have been pushed out of this campaign.”
Manafort resigned Friday amid reports about his business dealings with Ukrainian leaders aligned with Russia. Those reports involved allegations of millions of dollars in cash payments and secret lobbying efforts in the U.S. Manafort has denied the allegations.
“The hand of the Kremlin has been at work in this (Trump’s) campaign for some time,” Mook said. “It’s clear that they are supporting Donald Trump.” (Read more: USA Today, 8/21/2016)
Representative Lamar Smith (Credit: public domain)
Representative Lamar Smith (R), chair of the Committee on Science, Space and Technology, issues subpoenas for Platte River Networks, which managed Clinton’s server from May 2013 until August 2015; Datto, Inc., which made back-up copies of the server; and SECNAP, which carried out threat monitoring of the network connected to Clinton’s server. Smith wants documents from the companies by September 9, 2016, after they declined to voluntarily produce them. Congressional committees requested information since August and November 2015, to no avail. The companies had been threatened with subpoenas on July 12, 2016.
Smith comments, “Companies providing services to Secretary Hillary Clinton’s private email account and server are not above the law.” He claims the information he is seeking is “critical to… informing policy changes in how to prevent similar email arrangements in the future.”
Smith is working with Senator Ron Johnson (R), chair of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee. They are looking for information about breaches or potential breaches, and documents that detail the scope of the work of each company. (The Washington Post, 8/22/2016)
Representative Jason Chaffetz (Credit: The Associated Press)
Representative Jason Chaffetz (R), chair of the House Oversight Committee, has started looking over the documents the FBI gave to Congress several days earlier. He complains about the “high level of redactions.”
He says: “Hillary Clinton is out there saying there’s not very much sensitive information in there, that she didn’t trade in sensitive classified information. It’s so sensitive and so classified that even I as the chairman of the Oversight Committee don’t have the high level of clearance to see what’s in those materials. I think the documents are overly classified. We’re going to call on the FBI this week to give us a version where there’s non-classified, the unclassified material, and the classified material redacted so that that could be out there in the public. I think that’s the right thing to do.”
He adds that he is not accusing the FBI of protecting Clinton, but “A lot of this that they claim is classified is just flat-out embarrassing. There’s nothing classified about it, it’s just embarrassing. It’s a lot of immature name-calling, stuff like that.”
Chaffetz also says that when he asked the FBI to provide a second copy of the documents in a classified setting, he was given documents that are “different.” “So we have a second set of documents that’s now different. When you turn them page by page, they’re different. I don’t know why that happened.” He is trying to resolve the issue. (Politico, 8/22/2016)
During the FBI’s Clinton email investigation, the FBI found some of Clinton’s over 31,000 deleted emails from when she was secretary of state. At the conclusion of the investigation in July 2016, FBI Director James Comey said the FBI “discovered several thousand work-related emails,” but is it uncertain exactly how many of these emails were found, either work-related or personal. The FBI has given the State Department a CD containing the found emails, and the department has said it will publicly release all the work-related ones.
US District Judge James Boasberg (Credit: Diego M. Radzinschi / National Law Review)
In a court hearing presided by US District Judge James Boasberg on this day, it is revealed that the CD contains around 14,900 emails. Boasberg orders the State Department to review the emails for public release in response to various Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuits by Judicial Watch. However, it is still unclear if any of these are duplicates of the 30,000 Clinton emails already publicly released. Furthermore, it is unknown how many of the found deleted emails are personal and how many are work-related (aside from Comey’s vague “several thousand” emails comment).
In addtion, the FBI has given the State Department seven other CDs: one contains classified documents related to Clinton, another contains emails returned by Clinton, and the other five contain materials from other people that was retrieved by the FBI.
State Department spokesperson Mark Toner says, “We can confirm that the FBI material includes tens of thousands of non-record (meaning personal) and record materials that will have to be carefully appraised at State. State has not yet had the opportunity to complete a review of the documents to determine whether they are agency records or if they are duplicative of documents State has already produced through the Freedom of Information Act.”
Regarding the CD of Clinton emails, Toner says, “We still don’t have a full sense of how many of the 14,900 are new. Granted, that’s a healthy number there, so there’s likely to be quite a few.”
Republican National Committee (RNC) chair Reince Priebus comments, “The process for reviewing these emails needs to be expedited, public disclosure should begin before early voting starts, and the emails in question should be released in full before Election Day.” (Politico, 8/22/2016) (The Washington Post, 8/22/2016)
On September 23, 2016, it will be revealed that 5,600 of the 14,900 recovered emails are deemed work-related.
Cyber attacks on such media organizations have been “detected in recent months,” and are being investigated by the FBI and other US agencies. CNN reports, “Investigators so far believe that Russian intelligence is likely behind the attacks and that Russian hackers are targeting news organizations as part of a broader series of hacks that also have focused on Democratic Party organizations,” according to unnamed US officials.
Little has been publicly revealed about the media attacks except for the attacks on the New York Times. The Times says their email services are outsourced to Google and they have no evidence that their computer networks have been compromised. CNN claims that individual reporters have been targeted, not entire networks, but it is unclear how many were targeted or how many had their email accounts breached.
CNN further reports, “US intelligence officials believe the picture emerging from the series of recent intrusions is that Russian spy agencies are using a wave of cyber attacks, including against think-tanks in Washington, to gather intelligence from a broad array of non-governmental organizations with windows into the US political system. News organizations are considered top targets because they can yield valuable intelligence on reporter contacts in the government, as well as communications and unpublished works with sensitive information…” (CNN, 8/23/2016)
The Associated Press is less definitive about who might be responsible, saying that an unnamed US official claims the FBI is looking into whether Russian intelligence agencies are responsible for the hacking attempts. (The Associated Press, 8/23/2016)
When WikiLeaks head Julian Assange is asked if this information could be a “game-changer” in the election, he replies, “I think it’s significant. You know, it depends on how it catches fire in the public and in the media.”
He also says, “I don’t want to give the game away, but it’s a variety of documents, from different types of institutions that are associated with the election campaign, some quite unexpected angles, some quite interesting, some even entertaining.” (Reuters, 8/24/2016)
Since late 2014, when Clinton and her lawyers deleted over 31,000 of Clinton’s emails from when she was secretary of state, it has been unclear if the emails were simply deleted or “wiped,” meaning deliberate steps were taken to make sure they couldn’t be recovered later.
Trey Gowdy appears with Martha MacCallum on Fox News on August 25, 2016. (Credit: Fox News)
In an interview, Representative Trey Gowdy (R) says that, “[Clinton] and her lawyers [Cheryl Mills, David Kendall, and Heather Samuelson] had those emails deleted. And they didn’t just push the delete button; they had them deleted where even God can’t read them. They were using something called BleachBit. You don’t use BleachBit for yoga emails or bridemaids emails. When you’re using BleachBit, it is something you really do not want the world to see.”
BleachBit Logo (Credit: public domain)
BleachBit is computer software whose website advertises that it can “prevent recovery” of files. Politico notes that if Gowdy is correct, this would be “further proof that Clinton had something to hide in deleting personal emails from the private email system she used during her tenure as secretary of state.” It is not explained how Gowdy might know this, but his comments come only a few days after the FBI gave raw materials about their Clinton email investigation to Congress. (Politico, 8/25/2016)
Gowdy’s claim contradicts what FBI Director James Comey said on July 5, 2016 when he announced that he would not recommend charging Clinton with any crime. At that time, Comey stated, “we found no evidence that any of the additional work-related emails were intentionally deleted in an effort to conceal them. Our assessment is that, like many email users, Secretary Clinton periodically deleted emails or emails were purged from the system when devices were changed.” (Federal Bureau of Investigation, 7/5/2016)
Within hours of Gowdy’s comments, BleachBit updates their website to say: “Last year when Clinton was asked about wiping her email server, she joked, ‘Like with a cloth or something?’ It turns out now that BleachBit was that cloth, according to remarks by Gowdy.” The website also notes, “As of the time of writing BleachBit has not been served a warrant or subpoena in relation to the investigation. … The cleaning process [of our program] is not reversible.” (BleachBit, 8/25/2016)
On September 2, 2016, the FBI’s final report on their Clinton email investigation will be released, and it will be revealed that BleachBit was used on Clinton’s server in late March 2015. (Federal Bureau of Investigation, 9/2/2016)
“The C.I.A. told senior lawmakers in classified briefings last summer that it had information indicating that Russia was working to help elect Donald J. Trump president, a finding that did not emerge publicly until after Mr. Trump’s victory months later, former government officials say.”
(…) “The former officials said that in late August — 10 weeks before the election — John O. Brennan, then the C.I.A. director, was so concerned about increasing evidence of Russia’s election meddling that he began a series of urgent, individual briefings for eight top members of Congress, some of them on secure phone lines while they were on their summer break.
It is unclear what new intelligence might have prompted the classified briefings. But with concerns growing both internally and publicly at the time about a significant Russian breach of the Democratic National Committee, the C.I.A. began seeing signs of possible connections to the Trump campaign, the officials said. By the campaign’s final weeks, Congress and the intelligence agencies were racing to understand the scope of the Russia threat.
In an Aug. 25 briefing for Harry Reid, then the top Democrat in the Senate, Mr. Brennan indicated that Russia’s hackings appeared aimed at helping Mr. Trump win the November election, according to two former officials with knowledge of the briefing.
The officials said Mr. Brennan also indicated that unnamed advisers to Mr. Trump might be working with the Russians to interfere in the election. The F.B.I. and two congressional committees are now investigating that claim, focusing on possible communications and financial dealings between Russian affiliates and a handful of former advisers to Mr. Trump. So far, no proof of collusion has emerged publicly.” (Read more: New York Times, 4/06/2017)
“A few months after Joe Biden forced the firing of Ukraine’s chief prosecutor, his son’s company Burisma Holdings courted the replacement with a promise to bring him to Washington to meet with Hillary Clinton’s campaign in the final weeks of the 2016 election, newly released State Department memos reveal.
Burisma’s effort to woo — through its Democrat-tied U.S. lobbying firm — newly installed Ukraine Prosecutor-General Yuriy Lutsenko raised concerns at the highest levels of the U.S. embassy in Kiev, where officials tried to talk the prosecutor out of the trip given the fact he was overseeing a probe of the gas company.
“Lutsenko now likely not to go to DC with Blue Star,” senior State official George Kent wrote then-Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch in September 2016 after talking with Lutsenko about the bad optics of the trip.
“He got the drift,” Kent added. “Not ideal timing, little receptive audience and wrong facilitator. He said he’d figure out a better time when there would be more traction/better audience.” (Read more: Just the News, 11/01/2020)(Archive)
Clinton does a call-in interview with Mika Brzezinski on August 26, 2016. (Credit: MSNBC)
Clinton is asked by MSNBC journalist Mika Brzezinski, “Are you certain that there are no emails or foundation ties to foreign entities that will be revealed that could perhaps permanently impact your presidential prospects?”
Clinton replies, “Mika, I am sure, and I am sure because I have a very strong foundation of understanding about the foundation—not to have a play on words—that the kind of work the foundation has done which attracted donors from around the world is work that went right into providing services to people.” (Politico, 8/26/2016)
“Judicial Watch announced today it received 191 pages of emails between former FBI official Peter Strzok and former FBI attorney Lisa Page which include an August 26, 2016, email in which Strzok says that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, in her interview with the FBI about her email controversy apologized for “the work and effort” it caused the bureau and said she chose to use it “out of convenience” and that “it proved to be anything but.”
Strzok said Clinton’s apology and the “convenience” discussion were “not in” the FBI 302 report which summarized the interview.
(…) The new records include an August 26, 2016, email from CNN’s Even Perez to Michael Kortan, the FBI’s assistant director for public affairs, saying: “Do you know if Gowdy is right that the FBI didn’t ask Clinton about her intent? And is that weird?”
Kortan forwards the email to Strzok, saying, “The question of the day …”
Strzok replies to Kortan, “I know, I was getting increasingly irritated at Gowdy last night. I don’t know the basis for him saying that. We certainly asked her. She said she did it for convenience because she wanted one system for email. We also asked those close to her – Abedin and Mills specifically – who said the same thing.
“[Redacted] but we can find the references in the 302 which discuss it.
“Though not in the 302, at the end of the interview she apologized for the work and effort it created for the FBI. She said words to the effect of, I’m sorry this has caused so much work and expenditure of resources by the FBI. I chose to use my own server out of convenience; it proved to be anything but.”
Strzok forwarded the exchange to Page, saying, “Need to nip this in the bud.”
On August 27, 2016, Senate minority leader, Harry Reid, responds to Brennan’s recent briefing by writing a letter to FBI director, James Comey, expressing concerns that Trump is an “unwitting agent” of the Kremlin and that Russia is attempting to influence the presidential election. He then requests that the F.B.I. open an investigation.
Just one month earlier, former Secretary of State Colin Powell suggested that Clinton had shot herself in the foot by not apologizing immediately and by dragging out her email controversy.
A sample of Colin Powell’s leaked emails published by DCLinks.com. (Credit: public domain)
The Intercept later highlights an email Powell writes on August 28, 2016 which states, “HRC could have killed this two years ago by merely telling everyone honestly what she had done and not tie me to it.”
Powell says he tried to put an end to the matter by meeting with Cheryl Mills earlier that month. Instead, he writes, “I told her staff three times not to try that gambit. I had to throw a mini tantrum at a Hampton’s [sic] party to get their attention. She keeps tripping into these ‘character’ minefields.”
The emails reveal Powell isn’t shy about sharing his frustrations over the Clinton campaign’s attempt to “blur the lines between Clinton’s private email server and Powell’s AOL account,” according to the Intercept. He suggests to dozens of reporters and producers who emailed him to read his book, “It Worked for Me: In Life and Leadership,” in which he devoted an entire chapter to his efforts to revamp the State Department’s IT system.”
Powell also argues, when he arrived at the State Department, the information technology system was extremely outdated. The Intercept will conclude, “[U]nlike Clinton, Powell never set up a private server. Instead, he used his personal AOL [AmericaOnline] account, on a server maintained by AOL, and used a government computer for classified communications.” (The Intercept, 09/13/16)
The hacker website DCLeaks.com will publish Colin Powell’s hacked emails on September 13, 2016.
Anthony Weiner and Huma Abedin at home with their son in 2013. (Credit: Elinor Carucci / NY Magazine)
Huma Abedin, a top aide to Clinton, announces that she is separating from her husband Anthony Weiner, and is pursuing a divorce from him. This will later have an important impact on the FBI’s Clinton email investigation. Weiner was a Democratic Congressperson until 2011 when he resigned due to a sexting scandal – sending sexual texts to other women that were made public. Another sexting scandal involving him ended his 2013 campaign to be mayor of New York City. Abedin’s announcement comes one day after yet more new sexting by Weiner is made public, this time allegedly to a 15-year-old girl. (The New York Times, 8/29/2016)
On October 28, 2016, FBI Director James Comey will announce that the FBI’s Clinton email investigation will be at least partially reopened due to thousands of Abedin’s emails found on a computer used by both Weiner and Abedin that was seized by the FBI as part of their unrelated investigation into Weiner’s sexting with the underaged girl.
“In a letter to the F.B.I. director, James B. Comey Jr., Mr. Reid wrote that the threat of Russian interference “is more extensive than is widely known and may include the intent to falsify official election results.” Recent classified briefings from senior intelligence officials, Mr. Reid said in an interview, have left him fearful that President Vladimir V. Putin’s “goal is tampering with this election.”
(…) “Mr. Reid’s accusation that Russia is seeking not only to influence the election with propaganda but also to tamper with the vote counting goes significantly beyond anything the Obama administration has said in public.
While intelligence agencies have told the White House that they have “high confidence” that Russian intelligence services were behind the hacking of the Democratic committee, the administration has not leveled any accusations against Mr. Putin’s government. Asked about that in the interview, Mr. Reid said he was free to say things the president was not.
But Mr. Reid argued that the connections between some of Donald J. Trump’s former and current advisers and the Russian leadership should, by itself, prompt an investigation. He referred indirectly in his letter to a speech given in Russia by one Trump adviser, Carter Page, a consultant and investor in the energy giant Gazprom, who criticized American sanctions policy toward Russia.
“Trump and his people keep saying the election is rigged,” Mr. Reid said. “Why is he saying that? Because people are telling him the election can be messed with.” Mr. Trump’s advisers say they are concerned that unnamed elites could rig the election for his opponent, Hillary Clinton.
Mr. Reid argued that if Russia concentrated on “less than six” swing states, it could alter results and undermine confidence in the electoral system. That would pose challenges, given that most states have paper backups, but he noted that hackers could keep people from voting by tampering with the rolls of eligible voters.” (Read more: New York Times, 8/29/2016)
“In early October 2016, news broke that a contractor for the National Security Agency (NSA) had been arrested over the possible theft of state secrets. Since then, little media attention has been given to what the U.S. government has called the largest theft of classified information in U.S. history, or the man allegedly behind it.
Initially arrested in August 2016 — after terabytes upon terabytes of classified information were discovered at his home, information that was taken over a period of two decades — Harold T. Martin III has been held in pre-trial detention ever since. Martin, who worked for the same government contractor as NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, has yet to enter into a plea agreement for the 20 felony counts he faces, as government prosecutors have struggled to build a strong case against him. Yet, unlike in the cases of Snowden and other alleged leakers awaiting trial like Reality Winner, the press coverage of Martin’s case has been scarce.
The lack of coverage stems in part from the fact that the government has struggled to build its case against Martin, who was initially nicknamed the “second Snowden,” as it remains unclear what Martin did with the estimated 50 terabytes of data – a cache nearly 20 times greater than the Panama Papers.
(…) According to court documents, Martin’s case is just as complex as the man himself, making it difficult to ascribe his intent. For one thing, Martin’s habit of taking government documents home remained undetected for over 20 years – even after tightening of security following the Snowden leaks – and he extensively used “sophisticated encryption, anonymization, and virtual machine technologies” to hide his actions online.
He also possessed “remote data storage accounts” as well as “encrypted communication and cloud storage apps installed on his mobile device.” Federal prosecutors have also asserted that Martin “was in possession of a sophisticated software tool which runs without being installed on a computer and provided anonymous internet access, leaving no digital footprint.” And they have asserted that Martin “communicated online with others in languages other than English, including Russian” via an encrypted connection.
In addition, Martin’s cache of documents, stored at his home and in his car, were accompanied by “handwritten notes [that] also include descriptions of the most basic concepts associated with classified operations, as if the notes were intended for an audience outside of the Intelligence Community unfamiliar with the details of its operations.”
Martin was also heavily armed, a fact that was apparently unknown to his wife, who was shocked when the FBI removed 10 firearms from his residence, including an AR-style tactical rifle and a shotgun with a flash suppressor. Only two of the weapons were registered.
He also initially lied to authorities about the thefts of the documents, only admitting his unauthorized removal of the documents when confronted with examples of the classified information found in his possession.
There is also evidence suggesting that Martin may not be as “apolitical” as his defense has sought to portray him. Court documents reveal that he often complained about the NSA’s incompetence, claiming in one letter that his co-workers were “missing most of the basics in security practice.” In addition, Martin — who served in Operation Desert Storm — was deeply affected by his experiences in the military and, according to a former mentor, showed an “intense personal and professional interest in the post-traumatic stress disorder.”
However, the most compelling evidence that there is more to this case is how Martin’s theft of classified documents was discovered. According to The New York Times, federal investigators stumbled upon Martin’s trove of documents, investigating him only after uncovering a comment Martin had posted online – the contents of which are still unknown – made him a prime suspect in the “Shadow Brokers” leak.” (Read more: Whitney Webb, 3/20/2018)
US District Judge Amit Mehta (Credit: public domain)
US District Court Judge Amit Mehta is presiding over a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit initiated by Judicial Watch regarding the public release of information relating to the 2012 terrorist attack in Benghazi, Libya. The FBI recently gave the State Department almost 15,000 previously unknown Clinton emails, so Mehta wants to know if any of them relate to Benghazi.
State Department spokesperson John Kirby says, “Using broad search terms, we have identified approximately 30 documents potentially responsive to a Benghazi-related request. At this time, we have not confirmed that the documents are, in fact, responsive, or whether they are duplicates of materials already provided to the department by former Secretary Clinton in December 2014.” The department says it will need until the end of September 2016 to review the 30 or so emails and redact any classified information in them.
However, Mehta doesn’t understand why it would take the department so long to process so few emails. He orders the department to return in a week to try to justify the processing time.
Starting in mid-2014, Clinton was specifically asked for all her emails related to Benghazi, months before she was asked for all her work-related emails in general. The Benghazi-related emails were the first of her emails to be released, in early 2015.
Jason Miller, senior communications adviser for Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, says, “Clinton swore before a federal court and told the American people she handed over all of her work-related emails. If Clinton did not consider emails about something as important as Benghazi to be work-related, one has to wonder what is contained in the other emails she attempted to wipe from her server.” (The Hill, 8/30/2016)
On August 30, 2016, former FBI Director James Comey emails then-Assistant Director Andrew McCabe, copying Page, James Baker, Priestap and James Trainor with the subject line “WH” and said “Both meetings went well and I was well prepared.… I will need an update briefing on [redacted] next week. As you might imagine, there was great interest in what each of us is doing on that front and in understanding what more we can do and the obstacles we see.” Page forwards the email to Strzok, who replied, “Thanks. Bill asked me as I was leaving if I thought it should be in CD [Counterintelligence Division]. Guessing this prompted it. I said yes then described and endorsed Allies reorganization idea.” (Judicial Watch, 2/21/2020)(Archive)
“On 31 August 2016, the hacker (or hackers) operating under the name Guccifer 2.0 (previously associated with a number of breaches of Democratic National Committee material) released a controversial document that purportedly outlined recommended practices for Democratic candidates’ engaging with the Black Lives Matter movement in 2015.
A number of documents supposedly accessed from the computer of House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi were posted to Guccifer 2.0’s blog, among them a 19 November 2015 memo to Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) workers from staffer Troy Perry:
Presidential candidates have struggled to respond to tactics of the Black Lives Matter movement. While there has been little engagement with House candidates, candidates and campaign staff should be prepared. This document should not be emailed or handed to anyone outside of the building. Please only give campaign staff these best practices in meetings or over the phone.
In a sub-section of that document, DCCC staffers were advised to offer limited invitations for meetings with Black Lives Matter activists and not to “offer support for concrete policy positions” about the movement:
Tactics
Meet with Local Activists
° If approached by BLM activists, campaign staff should offer to meet with local activists. Invited BLM attendees should be limited. Please aim for personal or small group meetings.
° Listen to their concerns
° Don’t offer support for concrete policy positions
° Frontline district staff should meet with activists
Provide a Point Person
Always provide a campaign contact person for BLM activists. It is important to let activists know the campaign wants to engage in an open dialogue.
In response to the leaked documents, DCCC national press secretary Meredith Kelly said in a statement that:
The DCCC highly respects and values the leadership of the Black Lives Matter movement. In less than two years, BLM has evolved from three words into a political force that is changing and waking our nation. At the DCCC, we highly encourage our candidates to not only embrace the importance of this movement, but to meet with and listen to community activists to partner social change.
We will not allow this hacking to distract from our common goals nor disparage the BLM movement. We continue to welcome further engagement with activists and BLM leaders nationwide.
The Black Lives Matter movement expressed disappointment with the contents of the revealed material in a statement posted to Facebook and Twitter:
We are disappointed at the DCCC’s placating response to our demand to value all Black life. Black communities deserve to be heard, not handled. People are dying.
Whether Republican, Democrat or otherwise, our elected officials have an ethical and democratic responsibility to make legislation that reflects the needs of their constituents. That includes Black people facing life-threatening challenges because of racist, failed policies.
We demand, and are fighting every day for, a radical transformation of American democracy where all Black lives are valued.
Prominent Black Lives Matter activist Deray Mckesson published a tweet questioning whether the DNCC’s stance had changed since November 2015:
The DNCC memo re: the movement highlights a serious lack of attention to issues related to black people. Has their view changed since 2015?
Fellow activist Shaun King also tweeted a criticism:
In the leaked memo, the Democratic Party instructs politicians how to be polite with #BlackLivesMatter activists without actually helping. — Shaun King (@ShaunKing) August 31, 2016
The DCCC acknowledged Guccifer 2.0’s Black Lives Matter document leak, but the DCCC has not yet issued any official comment on the content of the leak (or any dispute of its authenticity), and Nancy Pelosi has so far declined to comment.
On August 31, 2016, a redacted FBI General Counsel official asks Strzok and Page if they should respond to a Washington Times article that asserts that the FBI found “hundreds, and likely thousands, of violations of the Federal Records Act” by Clinton in her non-government email server use. Strzok’s immediate reply is redacted. Strzok ends up asking for the article to be sent to him. (Judicial Watch, 2/21/2020)(Archive)
“In late summer, the professor met with Trump campaign co-chairman Sam Clovis for coffee in Northern Virginia, offering to provide foreign-policy expertise to the Trump effort. In September, he reached out to George Papadopoulos, an unpaid foreign-policy adviser for the campaign, inviting him to London to work on a research paper.”
(…) “In late August 2016, the professor reached out to Clovis, asking if they could meet somewhere in the Washington area, according to Clovis’s attorney, Victoria Toensing.
“He said he wanted to be helpful to the campaign” and lend the Trump team his foreign-policy experience, Toensing said.
Clovis, an Iowa political figure and former Air Force officer, met the source and chatted briefly with him over coffee, on either Aug. 31 or Sept. 1, at a hotel cafe in Crystal City, she said. Most of the discussion involved him asking Clovis his views on China.
“It was two academics discussing China,” Toensing said. “Russia never came up.”
The professor asked Clovis if they could meet again, but Clovis was too busy with the campaign. After the election, the professor sent him a note of congratulations, Toensing said.
Clovis did not view the interactions as suspicious at the time, Toensing said, but now is unsettled that the professor never mentioned his contacts with other Trump aides.” (Read more: Washington Post, 5/18/2018)
Although the FBI’s Clinton email investigation was closed in July 2016, the FBI’s Clinton Foundation investigation continues, though it never has had grand jury backing and thus no subpoena power.
Clinton speaks at the 10th Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) annual meeting in September, 2014. (Credit: Mark Lennihan / The Associated Press)
The email investigation uncovered many thousands of emails on non-government computers belonging to Clinton and some of her aides, and many of these same people had obvious roles with the Clinton Foundation. As a result, sometime in September 2016, Clinton Foundation investigators ask to have access to the emails found in the Clinton email investigation.
But that request is rejected by prosecutors at the Eastern District of New York. According to the Wall Street Journal, “Those emails were given to the FBI based on grants of partial immunity and limited-use agreements, meaning agents could only use them for the purpose of investigating possible mishandling of classified information. Some FBI agents were dissatisfied with that answer, and asked for permission to make a similar request to federal prosecutors in Manhattan, according to people familiar with the matter.”
However, Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe allegedly tells them no and says they can’t “go prosecutor shopping.”
In early October 2016, a different FBI investigation will find emails belonging to Clinton aide Huma Abedin on a previously unknown computer, leading to a different legal issue about sharing information between various FBI investigations.
It appears the FBI’s Clinton Foundation investigation still has not been given access to the possibly relevant emails found by the Clinton email investigation. (The Wall Street Journal, 10/30/2016)
Russian President Vladimir Putin says in an interview about accusations of Russian government in the hacking of Democratic National Committee (DNC) emails: “Listen, does it even matter who hacked this data? The important thing is the content that was given to the public …. There’s no need to distract the public’s attention from the essence of the problem by raising some minor issues connected with the search for who did it. … But I want to tell you again, I don’t know anything about it, and on a state level Russia has never done this.”
However, an internal probe conducted by CrowdStrike Inc. traced the source of the hack to two Russian hacking groups connected with Russian intelligence, “Cozy Bear” and “Fancy Bear.”
James Lewis (Credit: public domain)
James Lewis, a cybersecurity expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, claims that Russia has engaged in state hacking in the past and that Putin’s denials are “not credible.”
Putin continues: “You know how many hackers there are today? They act so delicately and precisely that they can leave their mark — or even the mark of others — at the necessary time and place, camouflaging their activities as that of other hackers from other territories or countries. It’s an extremely difficult thing to check, if it’s even possible to check. At any rate, we definitely don’t do this at a state level.” (Bloomberg News, 9/1/2016)
Guccifer, whose real name is Marcel-Lehel Lazar, pled guilty in a US court to two charges earlier in the year, eliminating the need for a trial. He admitted to targeting over 100 Americans over a 14-month period. When he broke into the email account of Clinton confidant Sid Blumenthal in March 2013, he publicly exposed Clinton’s private email address for the first time.
Guccifer has been cooperating with US officials, but federal prosecutors sought a maximum penalty of four and a half years anyway. US District Judge James Cacheris imposes sentence only three months short of that, saying a tough penalty is needed to deter future hacking. Furthermore, while Guccifer confessed, he showed no remorse.
He had already been sentenced to a seven year prison term for hacking in Romania, and was extradited to the US to face charges there. The Romanian government has asked that he be immediately returned to Romania to finish serving his time there. Then, in 2018, he would be sent back to the US to serve his US prison sentence. (The Washington Post, 9/1/2016)
Lisa Monaco (Credit: Geert Vanden Wijngaert/The Associated Press)
“In early September, Johnson, Comey and Monaco arrived on Capitol Hill in a caravan of black SUVs for a meeting with 12 key members of Congress, including the leadership of both parties.
The meeting devolved into a partisan squabble.
“The Dems were, ‘Hey, we have to tell the public,’” recalled one participant. But Republicans resisted, arguing that to warn the public that the election was under attack would further Russia’s aim of sapping confidence in the system.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) went further, officials said, voicing skepticism that the underlying intelligence truly supported the White House’s claims. Through a spokeswoman, McConnell declined to comment, citing the secrecy of that meeting.
Key Democrats were stunned by the GOP response and exasperated that the White House seemed willing to let Republican opposition block any pre-election move.
On Sept. 22, two California Democrats — Sen. Dianne Feinstein and Rep. Adam B. Schiff — did what they couldn’t get the White House to do. They issued a statement making clear that they had learned from intelligence briefings that Russia was directing a campaign to undermine the election, but they stopped short of saying to what end.
A week later, McConnell and other congressional leaders issued a cautious statement that encouraged state election officials to ensure their networks were “secure from attack.” The release made no mention of Russia and emphasized that the lawmakers “would oppose any effort by the federal government” to encroach on the states’ authorities.” (Read more: Washington Post, 6/23/2017)
(…) “In essence, Christopher Steele was interested in getting Oleg Deripaska a new VISA to enter the U.S. Steele was very persistent on this endeavor and was soliciting Bruce Ohr for any assistance. This also sets up a quid-pro-quo probability where the DOJ/FBI agrees to remove travel restrictions on Deripaska in exchange for cooperation on ‘other matters.’
Now we skip ahead a little bit to where Deripaska gained an entry visa, and one of Oleg Deripaska’s lawyers and lobbyists Adam Waldman was representing his interests in the U.S. to politicians and officials. In May of 2018, John Solomon was contacted by Adam Waldman with a story about how the FBI contacted Deripaska for help in their Trump Russia investigation in September of 2016.
(Credit: Conservative Treehouse)
Keep in mind, this is Waldman contacting Solomon with a story.
Waldman told Solomon a story about how his client Oleg Deripaska was approached by the FBI in September of 2016 and asked for help with information about Paul Manafort and by extension Donald Trump. Within the backstory for the FBI and Deripaska was a prior connection between Robert Mueller and Deripaska in 2009.
Again, as you read the recap, remember this is Waldman contacting Solomon. Article Link Here – and my summary below:
♦In 2009 the FBI, then headed by Robert Mueller, requested the assistance of Russian billionaire Oleg Deripaska in an operation to retrieve former FBI officer and CIA resource Robert Levinson who was captured in Iran two years earlier. The agent assigned to engage Deripaska was Andrew McCabe; the primary FBI need was financing and operational support. Deripaska spent around $25 million and would have succeeded except the U.S. State Department, then headed by Hillary Clinton, backed out.
♦In September of 2016 Andrew McCabe is now Deputy Director of the FBI, when two FBI agents approached Deripaska in New York – again asking for his help. This time the FBI request was for Deripaska to outline Trump’s former campaign manager Paul Manafort as a tool of the Kremlin. Deripaska once hired Manafort as a political adviser and invested money with him in a business venture that went bad. Deripaska sued Manafort, alleging he stole money. However, according to the article, despite Deripaska’s disposition toward Manafort he viewed the request as absurd. He laughed the FBI away, telling them: “You are trying to create something out of nothing.”
This story, as told from the perspective of Adam Waldman, Deripaska’s lawyer/lobbyist, is important because it highlights a connection between Robert Mueller and Oleg Deripaska; a connection Mueller and the DOJ/FBI never revealed on their own.
I wrote about the ramifications of the Solomon story HERE. Again, hopefully most will review; because there’s a larger story now visible with the new communication between Christopher Steele and Bruce Ohr.
It is likely that Oleg’s 2016 entry into the U.S. was facilitated as part of a quid-pro-quo; either agreed in advance, or, more likely, planned by the DOJ/FBI for later use in their 2016 Trump operation; as evidenced in the September 2016 FBI request. Regardless of the planning aspect, billionaire Deripaska is connected to Chris Steele, a source for Chris Steele, and likely even the employer of Chris Steele.
The FBI used Oleg Deripaska (source), and Oleg Deripaska used the FBI (visa).
Here’s where it gets interesting….
In that Mayarticle John Solomon reports that Deripaska wanted to testify to congress last year (2017), without any immunity request, but was rebuked. Who blocked his testimony?
(…) “Now, think about this…. Yes, with Oleg Deripaska in the picture there was indeed Russian meddling in the 2016 election; only, it wasn’t the type of meddling currently being sold. The FBI/DOJ were using Russian Deripaska to frame their Russian conspiracy narrative. It is almost a certainty that Deripaska was one of Chris Steeles sources for the dossier.
Now, put yourself in Deripaska’s shoes and think about what happens AFTER candidate Donald Trump surprisingly wins the election.
All of a sudden Deripaska the asset becomes a risk to the corrupt Scheme Team (DOJ/FBI et al); especially as the DOJ/FBI then execute the “insurance policy” effort against Donald Trump and eventually enlist Robert Mueller.
It is entirely possible for a Russian to be blackmailing someone, but it ain’t Trump vulnerable to blackmail; it’s the conspiracy crew within the DOJ and FBI. Deripaska now has blackmail material on Comey, McCabe and crew.
After the 2017 (first year) failure of the “insurance policy” it now seems more likely President Trump will outlive the soft coup. In May 2018, Oleg tells Waldman to call John Solomon and tell him the story from a perspective favorable to Deripaska.
As the story is told, in 2017, Oleg [Deripaska] was more than willing to testify to congress…likely laughing the entire time. But the corrupt participants within congress damned sure couldn’t let Deripaska testify. Enter corrupt (SSCI) Vice-Chairman, Mark Warner:
Senator Mark Warner (l) and Senator Richard Burr confer at a Senate Intelligence Committee meeting. (Credit: public domain)
The Russians (Deripaska) really do have leverage and blackmail…but it ain’t over Trump. Oleg has blackmail on Comey, McCabe and conspiracy crew. Oleg Deripaska must be kept away from congress and away from exposing the scheme.
Guess who else must be controlled and/or kept away from congress?
Julian Assange.
Assange has evidence the Russians didn’t hack the DNC.
Between Deripaska’s first-hand knowledge of the DOJ/FBI work on both the Dossier and the DOJ/FBI intention for his use as a witness; and Julian Assange’s first-hand knowledge of who actually took the DNC email communication…well, the entire Russian narrative could explode in their faces.
You can almost hear the corrupt U.S. intelligence officials calling their U.K. GCHQ partners in Britain and yelling at them to do something, anything, and for the love of God, shut down Assange’s access to the internet STAT. Yeah, funny that.
Now, who moves into position to control Julian Assange?
BREAKING: US Senate Intelligence Committee calls editor @JulianAssange to testify. Letter delivered via US embassy in London. WikiLeaks’ legal team say they are “considering the offer but the conditions must conform to a high ethical standard”. Also: https://t.co/pPf0GTjTlppic.twitter.com/gQIUstbGbq
Apparently the SSCI wants to interview WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, in a closed session. Signed by none-other than our corrupt-o-crats Richard Burr and Mark Warner. Yeah, funny that.
Lest anyone need a reminder, the most corrupt part of congress is the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI). The SSCI is the center of the deepest part of the Deep State swamp. The SSCI never, ever, E.V.E.R…does anything that does not protect and advance the self-interest of the corrupt Washington DC professional political class.” (Read much more: Conservative Treehouse, 8/10/2018)
The FBI’s 47-page final report on its Clinton email investigation and the FBI’s 11-page summary of its July 2016 interview with Clinton are publicly released. However, both are heavily redacted. The last third of the final report is entirely redacted.
A Secret Service agent stands guard while two other agents close a gate after a Secret Service vehicle arrived at the home of Clinton in Washington, DC, July 2, 2016. (Credit: Cliff Owen / The Associated Press)
The Washington Post notes, “Ordinarily internal documents from FBI investigations are not made public. However, [FBI Director James] Comey has said the unusually high profile case warranted more robust public disclosures than is standard.”
It is believed both reports were finished just prior to when Comey gave a public speech on July 5, 2016, stating that he wouldn’t recommend any indictments in this case. Clinton’s interview occurred only three days prior to this.
The New York Times, the Washington Post, and many other newspapers make the release of the two documents the main headline.
The Post comments, “Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and her staffers employed an informal and sometimes haphazard system for exchanging and storing sensitive information and were at times either unaware or unconcerned with State Department policy…” (The Washington Post, 9/2/2016)
The Times comments: “The documents provided a number of new details about Mrs. Clinton’s private server, including what appeared to be a frantic effort by a computer specialist to delete an archive of her emails even after a congressional committee had requested that they be preserved.”
This is a reference to the revelation that Platte River Networks (PRN) employee Paul Combetta confessed to deleting and then wiping all of Clinton’s emails off her server in late March 2015, despite him being aware of a Congressional order to preserve them. This had been entirely unknown prior to the publication of the report. (The New York Times, 9/2/2016)
The following are other key findings in the FBI documents, as pointed out by the Times or the Post:
A snippet from the FBI report released on September 2, 2016. (Credit: public domain) The opening paragraph of the FBI’s summary on Clinton’s interview, released on September 2, 2016. (Credit: public domain)
Clinton defended her handling of the private server by repeatedly saying that she deferred to the judgment of her aides.
She regarded emails containing classified discussions about planned drone strikes as “routine.” (In fact, such discussions make up most of her “top secret” emails.)
She said she did not recall receiving any emails “she thought should not be on an unclassified system.” Furthermore, she “could not recall anyone raising concerns with her regarding the sensitivity of the information she received at her email address.” (In fact, she sent or received over 2,000 emails later deemed classified, including at least 22 at the “top secret” level.)
She emailed Colin Powell a day after she was sworn into office to ask him about his use of a personal email account when he was secretary of state. Powell warned her to “be very careful” because if she used her BlackBerry for official business, those emails could become “official record[s] and subject to the law.”
Some of her closest aides were aware she used a private email address but didn’t know she had set up a private server. (However, this is actually contradicted by other evidence.)
The front page of the FBI’s final report, released on July 2, 2016. (Credit: public domain)
She regularly brought her BlackBerry into a secure area near her office where it was prohibited, according to three of her aides. However, one aide said it was only stored there, not used.
She used 13 BlackBerrys to send emails. The FBI was unable to recover any of them. Two aides said “the whereabouts of Clinton’s devices would frequently become unknown once she transitioned to a new device.”
The FBI wrote that “investigative limitations, including the FBI’s inability to obtain all mobile devices and various computer components associated with Clinton’s personal email systems, prevented the FBI from conclusively determining” whether her emails had been successfully hacked.
Shortly after she left office, a laptop was made to contain back-up copies of all her emails. However, it got lost in transit.
According to the Post, Clinton claimed she “did not know much about how the government classified information. For instance, she said she did not pay attention to the difference between levels of classification, like ‘top secret’ and ‘secret,’ indicating she took ‘all classified information seriously.'” And when she was shown an email with the (C) marking, which is commonly used by the department to indicate classified information, she didn’t recognize the marking.
The Post also notes, “she repeatedly told agents she could not recall important details or specific emails she was questioned about.” (The Washington Post, 9/2/2016)
In the FBI’s report on the Clinton email investigation, which is released on this day, it is revealed: “To date, the FBI has recovered from additional data sources and reviewed approximately 17,448 unique work-related and personal emails from Clinton’s tenure [as secretary of state] containing Clinton’s hdr22@clintonemail.com email address that were not provided by [Clinton’s law firm] Williams & Connolly as part of Clinton’s production to the FBI, including emails from January 23, 2009 through March 18, 2009.”
The report also mentions that at least some of the emails going back to the time from before March 2009, when Clinton’s first server was replaced by another one, were recovered from the first back-up of all the data on Clinton’s third server, made on June 29, 2013. That was shortly after this new server was turned on and all the data from the previous server was transferred to it.
Clinton has claimed that she kept 30,068 emails from when she was secretary of state, and deleted the other 31,830 as personal. The FBI claims they had trouble recovering all the deleted ones, because an employee of Platte River Networks, the company that managed Clinton’s servers from June 2013 onwards, used a computer program to wipe the server clean in March 2015. (Federal Bureau of Investigation, 9/2/2016)
It isn’t clear how many of the 17,448 recovered emails come from the June 29, 2013 back-up and how many come from other sources, such as the inboxes of people who sent and received emails from Clinton, or FBI efforts to recover the wiped emails. The FBI also doesn’t mention how many of the recovered emails are work-related. It was reported on July 21, 2016 that the FBI gave about 14,900 of Clinton’s recovered emails to the State Department, and the department has promised to make all the work-related ones public. But it isn’t clear why the 17,448 and 14,900 numbers differ by about 2,500 emails.
Hours after the FBI’s summary of Clinton’s July 2016 FBI interview is released, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump says: “Hillary Clinton’s answers to the FBI about her private email server defy belief. I was absolutely shocked to see that her answers to the FBI stood in direct contradiction to what she told the American people. After reading these documents, I really don’t understand how she was able to get away from prosecution.” (The Washington Post, 9/2/2016)
The FBI Clinton email investigation’s final report, released on this day, states, “FBI investigation and forensic analysis did not find evidence confirming that Clinton’s email server systems were compromised by cyber means.” (Elsewhere in the report, it is mentioned that one email account on the server appears to have been broken into by hackers.)
A generic sample of what an attempted hack would look like in the log data. (Credit: public domain)
But the report goes on to state, “The FBI’s inability to recover all server equipment and the lack of complete server log data for the relevant time period limited the FBI’s forensic analysis of the server systems. As a result, FBI cyber analysis relied, in large part, on witness statements, email correspondence, and related forensic content found on other devices to understand the setup, maintenance, administration, and security of the server systems.”
Elsewhere in the report, it is noted that the FBI was unable to recover any of 13 the BlackBerry mobile devices Clinton used while or shortly after her tenure as secretary of state, a laptop containing a back-up of her emails was lost, the server most recently containing her emails was wiped with BleachBit software, the server used for her first two months in office was also lost, hard drive back-ups made were also lost, and so on. (Federal Bureau of Investigation, 9/2/2016)
At the conclusion of the FBI’s investigation on July 5, 2016, FBI Director James Comey said there was no “direct evidence” Clinton’s email account had been successfully hacked. But the next day, the New York Times reported, “both private experts and federal investigators immediately understood his meaning: It very likely had been breached, but the intruders were far too skilled to leave evidence of their work.”
After the FBI releases the FBI’s Clinton email investigation final report and the summary of Clinton’s FBI interview, there are different political reactions.
Brian Fallon (left) Reince Priebus (right) (Credits: (CNN and NBC News)
Clinton doesn’t immediately comment after the reports are released. However, the Clinton campaign claims she is pleased the documents have been made public.Her spokesperson Brian Fallon says, “While her use of a single email account was clearly a mistake and she has taken responsibility for it, these materials make clear why the Justice Department believed there was no basis to move forward with this case.” (The Washington Post, 9/2/2016)
By contrast, Reince Priebus, chair of the Republican National Committee (RNC), calls the documents “a devastating indictment of her judgment, honesty and basic competency.” He adds that her responses in her FBI interview “either show she is completely incompetent or blatantly lied to the FBI or the public. Either way it’s clear that, through her own actions, she has disqualified herself from the presidency.” (The New York Times, 9/2/2016)
The FBI Clinton email investigation’s final report, released on this day, details how many of Clinton’s emails were deemed classified, and when, and at what level. This data is according to FBI and Intelligence Community (IC) classification reviews, which is different from a State Department review mentioned below:
81 email chains containing approximately 193 individual emails were classified at the “confidential,” “secret,” and “top secret” levels at the time the emails were drafted on unclassified systems and sent to or from Clinton’s personal server.
Of the 81 email chains classified at the time they were sent, 68 remain classified.
Twelve of these email chains, classified at the “confidential” or “secret” levels, were not included in the over 30,000 emails turned over by Clinton in December 2014. Apparently, no “top secret” emails were in this category.
Thirty-six of the 81 email chains were classified at the “confidential” level.
Thirty-seven of the chains were at the “secret” level.
Eight of the chains were at the “top secret” level.
Out of the eight “top secret” chains, seven chains contained information associated with a Special Access Program (SAP), and three email chains contained Sensitive Compartmented Information (SCI). One “top secret”/SCI email was later downgraded to a current classification of “secret.”
Thirty-six of the 81 classified email chains were determined to be Not-Releasable to Foreign Governments (NOFORN) and 2 were considered releasable only to Five Allied partners (FVEY) – the US, Britain, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand.
Sixteen of the email chains, classified at the time the emails were sent, were downgraded in current classification by Intelligence Community (IC) agencies.
By contrast, the State Department’s FOIA process identified 2,028 emails currently at the “confidential” level and 65 currently at the “secret” level, for a total of 2093 emails.
The FBI report further notes: “Of these emails, FBI investigation identified approximately 100 emails that overlapped with the 193 emails (80 email chains) determined through the FBI classification review to be classified at the time sent. All except one of the remaining 2,093 emails were determined by the State FOIA process to be ‘confidential’, with one email determined to be ‘secret’ at the time of the FOIA review. State did not provide a determination as to whether the 2,093 emails were classified at the time they were sent.”
It is unclear why the FBI and IC numbers are so different from the State Department numbers when it comes to “confidential” level emails. The FBI and IC identified 36 of the 81 email chains were classified at the “confidential” level, while the State Department identified 2,028 emails at the “confidential” level. And while one cannot compare email chains to emails, all 81 classified emails chains only contained 193 individual emails, so the 36 “confidential” chains must contain fewer emails than that.
Furthermore, the FBI found an additional 17,000 emails to the over 30,000 work-related emails Clinton gave to the State Department, and it appears these largely haven’t been analyzed. It hasn’t even been reported how many of them are work-related. (Federal Bureau of Investigation, 9/2/2016)
The FBI’s Clinton email investigation final report, released on this day, mentions: “Clinton’s immediate aides, to include [Cheryl] Mills, [Huma] Abedin, [Jake] Sullivan, and [redacted] told the FBI they were unaware of the existence of the private server until after Clinton’s tenure at [the State Department] or when it became public knowledge. (Federal Bureau of Investigation, 9/2/2016)
Huma Abedin (left) (Credit: Melissa Golden / Redux) Cheryl Mills (right) (Credit: Stephen Crowley / New York Times)
However, emails from when Clinton was secretary of state indicate otherwise, at least for Mills and Abedin:
Abedin had an email account on Clinton’s server that she often used. On February 27, 2010, she sent an email to Justin Cooper, a Bill Clinton aide helping to manage the server, “HRC [Clinton] email coming back—is server okay?” Cooper replied, “UR [You are] funny. We are on the same server.” These emails were sent to Mills as well.
On January 9, 2011, Cooper sent Abedin an email mentioning that he “had to shut down the server” due to a hacking attack.. He sent her another email later in the day, saying he had to shut it down again.
On August 30, 2011, State Department Executive Secretary Stephen Mull emailed Mills, Abedin, and two others, informing them that he was trying to give Clinton a State Department-issued Blackberry “to replace her personal unit which is malfunctioning… possibly because of [sic] her personal email server is down.” Abedin sent an email in reply, and a discussion in person apparently followed.
The FBI’s final report also indicates that Abedin was instrumental in the creation of the server. “At the recommendation of Huma Abedin… in or around fall 2008, [Cooper] contacted Bryan Pagliano… to build the new server system and to assist Cooper with the administration of the new server system.” (Federal Bureau of Investigation, 9/2/2016)
A FBI report released on this day will mention: “The FBI investigation determined Clinton contributed to discussions in four email chains classified as ‘confidential’, three email chains classified as ‘secret’/NOFORN, and four email chains classified as ‘top secret’/ SAP.” (“SAP” stands for “Special Access Programs.”)
However, FBI classification is wildly different from State Department classification when it comes to “confidential” emails, with the FBI deeming 36 email chains of around 100 emails or less classified at that level, compared to the State Department deeming 2,028 individual emails classified at that level.
Furthermore, the FBI puts emails where Clinton asked aides to print out emails as different from replies that added to discussions. The FBI identified 67 times where Clinton forwarded emails for printing at either the “confidential” or “secret” levels. (Federal Bureau of Investigation, 9/2/2016)
A snippet from a graphic created by the Washington Post, indicating the number of emails written by Clinton that were deemed classified. (Credit: Washington Post)
By contrast, a March 2016Washington Post analysis concluded that 104 of all the emails deemed classified were written by Clinton. Presumably, they used the State Department definition of which ones were classified (since it was the only one publicly available at the time), and they were measuring individual emails instead of email chains. Furthermore, the Post noted that at least some of Clinton’s comments were deemed classified in three-fourths of these 104 emails, so presumably these were not emails where she just asked fo print-outs. (The Washington Post, 3/5/2016)
In the FBI Clinton email investigation’s final report, released on this day, more is revealed about the three Clinton email chains containing at least one paragraph with the “(C)” marking. This indicates the presence of information classified at the “confidential” level.
The report adds that there actually were eight emails in the three email chains. “The emails contained no additional markings, such as a header or footer, indicating that they were classified.”
Kofi Annan (Credit: Jean-Marc Ferré / United Nations
At least one email from two of the email chains have been publicly released. One was sent to Clinton by her aide Monica Hanley on April 8, 2012, regarding a phone call between Clinton and Malawi president Joyce Banda. The second email was sent to Clinton by Hanley on August 2, 2012, regarding a phone call between Clinton and United Nations/Arab League Joint Special Envoy for Syria Kofi Annan. The FBI report indicates both email chains are currently unclassified.
The third email chain is more mysterious. The FBI report doesn’t mention when it was sent, or by whom, of what its contents are. However, the State Department “confirmed through the FOIA review process that [this chain] contains information which is currently classified at the ‘confidential ‘level.” This email has not been found in the over 30,000 work-related emails Clinton gave to the State Department, even though the “confidential” classification clearly indicates it is work-related.
Finally, the State Department hasn’t provided a determination if any of the three emails were classified at the time they were sent. (Federal Bureau of Investigation, 9/2/2016)
In the FBI’s Clinton email investigation final report released on this day, the FBI discusses the at least 179 “intelligence memos” Clinton confidant Sid Blumenthal emailed to Clinton. Media reports indicate that some memos were accurate and some were totally inaccurate, but none of them were vetted by any US government official, because Blumenthal was and is a private citizen with no security clearance sending the emails directly to Clinton.
An email in which Clinton wanted Sullivan to send a Blumenthal email to Obama, without mentioning who it was from. (Credit: public domain)
According to the FBI report, “Clinton often forwarded the memos to [her aide Jake] Sullivan, asking him to remove information identifying Blumenthal as the originator and to pass the information to other State employees to solicit their input. According to emails between Clinton and Sullivan, Clinton discussed passing the information to the White House, other [US government] agencies, and foreign governments.”
However, the report also mentions that the FBI was unable to determine if any of the memos were actually sent to such recipients, because the State Department didn’t give the FBI any of Sullivan’s emails sent to anyone other than Clinton. (Federal Bureau of Investigation, 9/2/2016) (Department of State, 2/29/16)
(…) “The new records also include a September 2, 2016, email that Comey forwards containing a press release issued that day by Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA), in which Grassley criticized the FBI for not publicly releasing many unclassified records related to the Clinton email-server investigation, as demanded by Congress. In his cover note responding to Grassley’s charge, Comey tells his top aides, “To be great is to be misunderstood.” (Judicial Watch, 2/11/2019)
“Halper first contacted Papadopoulos by email. In a Sept. 2, 2016, message sent to Papadopoulos’s personal email account, he offered the Trump aide $3,000 to write a policy paper on issues related to Turkey, Cyprus, Israel and the Leviathan natural gas field. Halper also offered to pay for Papadopoulos’s flight and a three-night stay in London.
Papadopoulos accepted the proposal, flew to England, and met with Halper and one of his assistants. He delivered the paper electronically Oct. 2 and received payment days later, according to documents TheDCNF reviewed.”
(…) “Papadopoulos questioned Halper’s motivation for contacting him, according to a source familiar with Papadopoulos’ thinking. That’s not just because of the randomness of the initial inquiry but because of questions Halper is said to have asked during their face-to-face meetings in London.
According to a source with knowledge of the meeting, Halper asked Papadopoulos: “George, you know about hacking the emails from Russia, right?”
Papadopoulos told Halper he didn’t know anything about emails or Russian hacking, the source said and spoke on the condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the investigations into Russian meddling in the 2016 campaign. The professor did not follow up on the line of inquiry.
(…) “Halper’s activities are all the more eye-catching because Papadopoulos and Page are central figures in the Russia investigation. Papadopoulos, 30, pleaded guilty in October 2017 to lying to the FBI about contacts he had during the campaign with Russian nationals and a London-based professor with links to the Russian government.
That professor, Joseph Mifsud, told Papadopoulos in April 2016 he learned the Russians had possession of “thousands” of Clinton-related emails. That conversation would later spark the FBI’s investigation into Russian interference in the presidential campaign. It is not known whether Papadopoulos told anyone on the Trump campaign about Mifsud’s remarks.” (Read more: The Daily Caller, 3/25/2018)
“The conversation at a London bar in September 2016 took a strange turn when the woman sitting across from George Papadopoulos, a Trump campaign adviser, asked a direct question: Was the Trump campaign working with Russia?
The woman had set up the meeting to discuss foreign policy issues. But she was actually a government investigator posing as a research assistant, according to people familiar with the operation. The F.B.I. sent her to London as part of the counterintelligence inquiry opened that summer to better understand the Trump campaign’s links to Russia.
The American government’s affiliation with the woman, who said her name was Azra Turk, is one previously unreported detail of an operation that has become a political flash point in the face of accusations by President Trump and his allies that American law enforcement and intelligence officials spied on his campaign to undermine his electoral chances. Last year, he called it “Spygate.”
Ms. Turk went to London to help oversee the politically sensitive operation, working alongside a longtime informant, the Cambridge professor Stefan A. Halper. The move was a sign that the bureau wanted in place a trained investigator for a layer of oversight, as well as someone who could gather information for or serve as a credible witness in any potential prosecution that emerged from the case.
A spokesman for the F.B.I. declined to comment, as did a lawyer for Mr. Halper, Robert D. Luskin. Last year, Bill Priestap, then the bureau’s top counterintelligence agent who was deeply involved in the Russia inquiry, told Congress during a closed-door hearing that there was no F.B.I. conspiracy against Mr. Trump or his campaign.
The London operation yielded no fruitful information, but F.B.I. officials have called the bureau’s activities in the months before the election both legal and carefully considered under extraordinary circumstances. They are now under scrutiny as part of an investigation by Michael E. Horowitz, the Justice Department inspector general. He could make the results public in May or June, Attorney General William P. Barr has said. Some of the findings are likely to be classified.” (Read more: The New York Times, 5/02/2019)
George Papadopoulos describes in his House testimony, how undercover CIA asset/FBI informant Stefan Halper introduces him to ‘Azra Turk.’ He also suggests she may be from Turkey.
On the same day the NYT article is published, George Papadopoulos appears on the Tucker Carlson Show to respond:
https://youtu.be/ewA34BJAKmI?t=512
(…) “Email traffic reviewed by TheDCNF shows that Papadopoulos exchanged emails with Turk, Halper and Halper’s wife.
Papadopoulos has described Turk as a “honeypot,” a spy term used to describe a situation where sex is used to lure targets of intelligence operations. Papadopoulos told TheDCNF that Turk, an attractive blonde, flirted heavily with him and attempted to make contact after the London meeting back in the States.
“I’m stunned by the come-hither tone of Azra Turk and her classic honeypot act,” Papadopoulos wrote in his tell-all, “Deep State Target.”
According to Papadopoulos, both Halper and Turk asked him whether he knew about Russian hacks of Democrats. Papadopoulos says he had knowledge of Russian hacking operations, and conveyed that to the two covert agents.
Papadopoulos says that he did not meet again with Turk, in part because he suspected she was working with foreign intelligence agencies. He has recently said he believes that Turk, who spoke little English during the London meetings, has links to the CIA and Turkish intelligence.” (Read more: The Daily Caller, 5/3/2019)
“An FBI lawyer texted a bureau agent that then-President Obama “wants to know everything we’re doing” — a message that a Senate committee suggested could refer to the federal investigation of Hillary Clinton’s emails.
The messages shared between attorney Lisa Page and her lover and bureau colleague Peter Strzok were released Wednesday by the Senate Homeland Security Committee, which provides oversight of the bureau, and is chaired by GOP Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin.
In one exchange, Page wrote to Strzok in September, 2016 about prepping FBI Director James Comey on talking points for an update he was planning to give Obama that said: “potus wants to know everything we’re doing.”
“We received 38 pages of records from the State Department revealing that Ukraine Prosecutor-General Yuriy Lutsenko was offered “high-level” access to Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign by the same lobbying firm that represented Burisma Holdings.
This came to light in an email from George Kent, then-U.S. Deputy Chief of Mission to Ukraine and current Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs. The email was to then-Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch.
The offer was made by Karen Tramontano, who was an assistant to President Clinton and deputy White House Chief of Staff. She is the CEO of Blue Star Strategies, a Democrat lobbying firm that was hired by Burisma Holdings to combat corruption allegations.
In the same 2016 email, Kent stated that he responded to Lutsenko by recommending that he not take the offer due to corruption concerns with Burisma and the Clinton Foundation.
(…) The records include a September 3, 2016, email from Kent to Yovanovitch and other colleagues which details that Lutsenko informed him that he was pitched high-level access to Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign by Blue Star Strategies. The email’s subject line is “Lutsenko now likely not to go to DC with Blue Star, other Ukr issue comments.” The email says:
[Lutsenko] confirmed he had been pitched by Blue Star, not sought them out. He said he honestly didn’t know how Blue Star was to get paid – he didn’t have funds – and that some BPP MP [Petro Poroshenko’s Solidarity Party member of Parliament] that we probably didn’t know “and that’s good” ([redacted]??) had introduced them to him. Blue Star CEO Tramontano’s pitch was that she could gain him access to high levels of the Clinton campaign (GPK note: she was Podesta’s deputy as deputy COS the last year of Bill Clinton’s tenure), and that was appealing – to meet the possible next Presidential Chief of Staff.
Later in the same email, Kent added that he suggested that Lutsenko not take that offer because Blue Star represented Burisma. Kent also mentioned corruption concerns related to the Clinton Foundation and Podesta:
In connection to Blue Star, I noted their representation of Burisma/Zlochevsky, mentioned the various money flows from Ukraine to lobbyists that had been prominently int he news this past month, whether Manafort/Klueyev via Brussels to Podesta Group and Weber/Mercury, Yanu’s Justice Minister Lavrynovych to Skaden/arps-and Greg Craig – and Pinchuk to Clinton Foundation, and the media attention being paid at present to the Kyiv/Washington gravy train….
…and he got the drift. Not ideal timing, little receptive audience, and wrong facilitator. He said he’d figure out a better time when there would be more traction/better audience.
This email is inconsistent with Yovanovitch’s October 2019testimony under oath before the U.S. House of Representatives in the Trump impeachment inquiry that she knew very little about Burisma Holdings and the long-running corruption investigation against it stating, “it just wasn’t a big issue.”
This smoking gun email ties Hunter Biden’s Burisma’s lobbying operation to an influence-peddling operation involving the Clinton campaign during the 2016 election. This further confirms the Obama-Biden-Deep State targeting of President Trump was to cover-up and distract from their own corruption. (Read more: Judicial Watch, 12/17/2020)(Archive)
US President Obama and Russian President Vladimir Putin meet at the G-20 summit in China.
Obama and Putin have a pull-aside meeting at the G20 Summit in China on September 5, 2016. (Credit: Hamari Web)
When Obama is questioned by reporters about accusations that Russia has been behind the hacking of US political entities, he answers: “I will tell you’ve had problems with cyber intrusions from Russia in the past and from other countries in the past.”
He adds, “the goal is not to duplicate in the cyber area the cycle of escalation,” and his intent is “instituting some norms so that everybody’s acting responsibly.” (The Hill, 9/5/2016)
Clinton holds an in-flight press conference on September 5, 2016. (Credit: Andrew Harnik / The Associated Press))
Clinton comments about allegations of Russian hacking of US political entities: “I’m really concerned about the credible reports about Russian government interference in our elections … The fact that our intelligence professionals are now studying this, and taking it seriously… raises some grave questions about potential Russian interference with our electoral process.”
Clinton voices suspicions that Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump’s could be colluding with Russia: “We’ve never had the nominee of one of our major parties urging the Russians to hack more… I think it’s quite intriguing that this activity has happened around the time Trump became the nominee… I often quote a great saying that I learned from living in Arkansas for many years: If you find a turtle on a fence post, it didn’t get there by itself.” (Politico, 9/5/2016)
Paul Ryan, the Republican Speaker of the House, complains how the report was released on the Friday afternoon before a three-day weekend. “It’s like the most buried time you could ever put out a story. I’m surprised. I can’t believe that they would do what is such a patently political move. It makes them look like political operators versus law enforcement officers.” (CNN, 9/6/2016)
One day later, FBI Director James Comey responds with a statement defending the timing of the release.
Documents obtained by this website suggest that the Directors of the Clinton Foundation and the Clinton Foundation HIV/Aids Initiative Inc may have falsified a merger agreement and backdated documents by more than 12 months to deceive the IRS, donors and others about the Foundation’s HIV activities.
In 2005 ,the William J. Clinton Foundation (31-1580204) and the Clinton Foundation HIV Aids Initiative Inc (20-0921629) (CHAI) were separate legal entities and thus required to lodge individual IRS returns. Each operated as a 501(c)(3) charitable tax exempt foundation.
The CHAI was incorporated as a non-profit in Arkansas on 24 March 2004. It applied on that same day for a licence to operate in the State of Massachusetts from its head office at 225 Water Street Quincy. It was registered as a corporation licensed to operate in Massachusetts on 4 May 2004.
CHAI was granted 501(c)(3) tax exempt status and its 2004 and 2005 IRS Form 990 annual returns quoted the exempt purpose
THE ORGANIZATION IS A SUPPORTING ORGANIZATION OF THE WILLIAM J. CLINTON PRESIDENTIAL FOUNDATION, AND WILL CARRY OUT ONE OF THE FOUNDATION’S PROGRAMS TO BRING HIGH QUALITY MEDICAL CARE AND TREATMENT TO PEOPLE LIVING WITH HIV/AIDS AND TO IMPROVE HEALTH SYSTEMS IN RESOURCE POOR AREAS AND COUNTRIES .
To bring care and treatment and improve systems.
The distribution of pharmaceuticals was not an approved tax exempt purpose, there is a stated specific prohibition against a grant of tax exemption for pharmaceutical distribution published at the IRS website here:
IRC 501(c)(3) requires an organization to be both “organized” and “operated” exclusively for one or more IRC 501(c)(3) purposes. If the organization fails either the organizational test or the operational test, it is not exempt. Reg. 1.501(c)(3)–1(a)(1).
The organizational test concerns the organization’s articles of organization or comparable governing document. The operational test concerns the organization’s activities. A deficiency in an organization’s governing document cannot be cured by the organization’s actual operations. Likewise, an organization whose activities are not within the statute will not qualify for exemption by virtue of a well written charter. Reg. 1.501(c)(3)–1(b)(1)(iv).
In Federation Pharmacy Services, Inc. v. Commissioner, 625 F.2d 804 (8th Cir. 1980), aff’g 72 T.C. 687 (1979), the appellate court held that a nonprofit pharmaceutical service was not exempt as a charitable organization because it was operated for the substantial commercial purpose of providing pharmacy services to the general public. Although it provided special discount rates for handicapped and senior citizens in its area, it was not committed to providing any drugs below cost or free to indigent persons. Therefore, although its services did improve health in the area, it was primarily a commercial venture operated in competition with other area pharmacies.
The Clinton Foundation, if it admits to the CHAI Inc at all, purports to have merged the 1st CHAI entity into the Clinton Foundation effective at 31 December 2005.
If it had done so, the CHAI Inc would have ceased on that day to exist. As the non-surviving entity in a merger it would have been dissolved and prohibited from further trading.
On 22 February 2006 Bill Clinton signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Australian Government as signatory for the Clinton Foundation HIV Aids Initiative Inc.
On 9 June 2006 Auditors BKD LLP wrote to the directors of the Clinton Foundation:
On the same date it wrote a further letter to include within its audit any and all available supplementary information.
The Clinton Foundation lodged its IRS 990 return electronically shortly after the Audit Report.
Nowhere did it mention any intention to merge, nor were any articles or agreements to effect a merger at 31 December referred to.
It noted that the Clinton HIV/Aids Initiative Inc was related to the Foundation, as it had done in the previous year, it also told the IRS there had been no dissolutions or terminations etc during the 2005 year.
Worryingly for the CHAI, the Foundation provided commentary about CHAI operations that should have immediately triggered a tax audit and recision of tax exemption.
THE CLINTON FOUNDATION HIV/AIDS INITIATIVE (CHAI) EXPANDED ITS PROCUREMENT CONSORTIUM, WHICH OBTAINS LIFE-SAVING AIDS MEDICINES FOR OVER 50 DEVELOPING NATIONS AT A SUBSTANTIALLY REDUCED PRICE.
There are no CHAI Inc’s 2004 or 2005 year returns filed at the Clinton Foundation. There is no merger agreement exhibited. Until today, I am not aware of any public commentary or publication of the agreement or the 990 CHAI return. The files had been successfully disappeared.
I now have a copy of all of that material from the filing at the time.
Around the time the Clinton Foundation audit report and 990 filing were completed, the CHAI Inc asked for an extension of time to lodge its IRS 990 return – to 15 August 2006. That extension is automatically approved as a right.
On 31 July 2006 the CHAI Inc was still operating as a separate legal entity. It held itself out as a legal contracting entity to the Australian Government which entered into these contracts with it on the following dates.
Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade – Australian Aid Program
Category:
Health administration services
Contract Period:
14-Aug-2006 to 31-Dec-2010
Contract Value (AUD):
$15,127,586.10
Supplier Name:
CLINTON FOUNDATION HIV/AIDS INITIATIVE
Supplier Details
Name:
CLINTON FOUNDATION HIV/AIDS INITIATIVE
Postal Address:
225 WATER STREET
On 8 July 2006 the CHAI asked for its second extension of time to get its financial house in order for the IRS, this time seeking an extension out to 15 November 2006.
The Clinton Foundation HIV/Aids Initiative Inc was active in Papua New Guinea immediately after the contract with the Australian Government was executed.
The PNG Clinton operations sought the incorporation of a legal entity in Papua New Guinea styled after the CHAI Inc in the US.
Almost 9 months after the Clinton Foundation now tries to have us believe the CHAI Inc was merged out of existence, here it is incorporating a new corporate entity in Papua New Guinea.
If that entity had in fact ceased to operate upon the effective date the Clinton Foundation gives for the merger, 31 December 2005, almost 9 months previous, why wouldn’t the Clinton Foundation name alone be the only logical choice for the corporate person in PNG.
On 23 August 2006 this advertisement appeared in the PNG newspaper.
On 24 August 2006 the Clinton Foundation HIV/Aids Initiative – PNG Inc was incorporated.
Meanwhile, plans were apparently being made for the time machine that would take the directors of the Clinton Foundation and the CHAI back to the last recorded board meetings in 2005 where their due diligence and other conditions precedent to the merger were given the due consideration.
Notwithstanding the absence of any corresponding material in the Clinton Foundation’s 2005 filing which had already been locked in after the 9 June 2006 Audit Report, the CHAI filed its 2005 IRS 990 on 13 November 2006 and it wasn’t quite in sync with the 2005 merger-free head Foundation. That uncomfortable fact for the crooks might help explain the disappearance of these papers until now.
Here’s the date stamp for the avoidance of doubt and establishment of provenance.
Ira and the boys had some sort of problem in 2006 that apparently made it desirable for the CHAI Inc and its 501(c)(3) details to disappear.
But to do that effective 31 December 2005, Ira would have to find the agreements they signed at the time. Or someone would have to forge them. And if they did that, they should also go to jail, go directly to jail, not pass go and not collect several hundred million drug dollars.
I know that our expert readers will pore over these papers. Our readers amaze me with the details they pick up and pass on.
It’s the little things like any subscript writing in the bottom left hand corner leaving a tell tale trace from the word processor that might just establish the exact time the paper met the printer.
Here’s the freshly emerged Merger Agreement purportedly signed pre the merger date during 2005.
The Australians were still dealing with the entity they’d contracted with, the CHAI Inc. With that being the case, it’d make sense for Bill and Ira not to make waves. Not to do the right thing as required under the law and dissolve the non-surviving entity, the CHAI Inc.
Cause that’s what happened. Ira and Bill’s slush funds never die, they just fade away.
The CHAI Inc had this bank account in Massachusetts, along with its head office.
And the CHAI in its headquarter state of Massachusetts didn’t have the good manners to advise its headquarters regulator about the merger.
Because eventually Secretary Galvin and the crew got sick and tired of no returns, no information and no word about the fading jaded CHAI In and its problems.
When I was in the Mergers and Acquisitions caper it was a truism that there are no mergers, there’s only acquisitions – ie there’s a surviving party and the non-surviving party is consumed into it.
When a corporate entity is being merged it’s like being pregnant. A corporation can’t be a little bit merged, that would be an asset sale or an asset contribution from the balance sheet of a surviving entity.
That’s what Clinton and the boys did. Stripped the CHAI Inc bare, disadvantaged its creditors and any contracting party like the Australian Government that looked to it for performance and left it to wallow dead in the water.
In 2008 Clinton HIV/AIDS Initiative Inc was dissolved by regulators for failure to comply with financial reporting legislation
The entity’s license to operate was revoked by authorities in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts by an order published on 31 March 2008, taking operative effect from 31 December 2007.
Here is a copy of the extract:
I wrote to the Massachusetts authorities in February, 2016
I am an Australian Journalist reporting on our government’s contributions to certain charitable entities in the United States.
I am interested in the revocation of the certificate of incorporation issued to Clinton Foundation HIV/Aids Initiative Incorporated.
ENDS
Later that day an officer of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts Mr Howard Cutter replied, stating:
The entity was dissolved by our office for failure to file annual reports in consecutive years.
While memories of the CHAI lingered it was useful to get some value out of that brand.
Apparently the Clinton Foundation doesn’t care about passing off or misleading or deceptive conduct, because it now tells all and sundry that the CHAI, the Clinton Health Access Initiative was the real deal all along.
Its history goes back to 2002. Even though in its 2009 incorporation it was presented to the authorities as a cleanskin, avoiding all the messy shit that a successor organisation in a Magaziner/Clinton transmission of business see popping up like ticking bombs left to surprise the unwary.
You can see what they were up to in this MOU executed in PNG.
Bill Clinton and Australian officials in CHAI multi-million $$$ fraud and coverup
CHAI is the acronym used by the Clinton Foundation and its supporters in the Australian Government to describe the Clinton Health Access Initiative.
Bill Clinton and the Australian Government don’t like to be reminded about the CHAI’s predecessor, also known as the CHAI. That’s because CHAI #1 flouted the law to such an egregious extent that it was deregistered by US authorities.
Clinton’s criminal conduct in CHAI #1 didn’t stop the Australian Government from sending him money. Individuals within the Australian Government even rewrote publications and changed records to help Clinton during his coverup.
Here’s what the Clinton Foundation says about the CHAI on its website today – note the first line “The Clinton Health Access Initiative, Inc”.
The Clinton Health Access Initiative Inc was not founded in 2002. That claim is false and misleading in a material sense in that it conceals the existence of a predecessor organisation which Clinton called the CHAI.
Here are the CHAI’s biggest donors. Note the “Cumulative Donations by Donor” and “Donor’s Name”. Let there be no mistake, our government is donating our money into a slush fund operated by Bill and Hillary.
Here is a screen shot from the Clinton Foundation’s 2009 website about the CHAI
This wasn’t just a name, the Clinton HIV/AIDS Initiative Inc was a US incorporated entity with employees and trading operations and some very illegal conduct awaiting explanation.
I’ll come back to the Clinton HIV/Aids Initiative Inc and the cover up later.
In 2006 the Australian Government’s Foreign Minister Alexander Downer signed an MOU with Clinton as detailed in this screen grab from a 2007 DFAT website.
By the latter half of 2010 someone in the Gillard Government saw fit to change the record as detailed in this screen grab from the AUSAID website from 2010/11. Where the original wording recorded a partnership with the William J Clinton Foundation, the revised 2010 version restated it as a partnership with the Clinton Health Access Initiative.
This matters because beyond the direct contracts we were buying drugs from Clinton’s operating company. Those drug dealings involved illegal activities. The new Clinton Health Access Initiative Inc had no involvement in the dealings that brought Clinton, Ranbaxy and their criminal cohort unstuck. Australia is reported to have purchased in excess of $100M in pharmaceuticals under the partnership with the William J. Clinton Foundation. Someone has gone to some length to clean out the records of those transactions but we will find them, it’s just a matter of when.
(note my request to DFAT re the $100M in pharmaceutical purchases under the agreement, I have been told I’ll have a response by COB Thursday)
Here is the signature block for Clinton’s signature on the 2006 MOU
He signed only for the HIV/Aids Initiative and as you’ll see in the next part of this report it was a separate entity and there have been considerable efforts to conceal its existence – some of those cover-up attempts will no doubt expose certain individuals to criminal prosecutions.
Here are the DFAT reported contracts with the Clinton Foundation HIV/Aids Initiative Inc.
2008/2009 contracts
2009/10 contracts
2010-2011
Note that by 2011 the Clinton Health Access Initiative was recorded as the contracting party for the Indonesian contract. (Michael Smith News, 9/06/2016)(Archive) h/t @seacaptim
Clinton is accompanied by traveling press secretary Nick Merrill (l) and director of communications Jennifer Palmieri (r), and listens to a question from a member of the media, Sept. 6, 2016. (Credit: The Associated Press)
“When a reporter aboard Clinton’s campaign plane asked if Putin is using cyberwarfare to help elect Trump, Clinton said “I’m not going to jump to conclusions.” She then proceeded to jump away.
She said recent events aren’t mere coincidence. “I often quote a great saying that I learned from living in Arkansas for many years: ‘If you find a turtle on a fence post, it didn’t get there by itself.’ ” She then added, in case anyone didn’t get her point, that “I think it’s quite intriguing that this activity has happened around the time Trump became the nominee.”
She said that Trump “has generally parroted what is a Putin/Kremlin line.” Etc., etc.
(…) But a casual glance at the timeline shows how fanciful such speculation is. Russians reportedly breached the DNC’s servers back in June 2015. [The DNC lawsuit and Crowdstrike report the servers were breached in July, 2016.] That was long before anyone took Trump’s campaign seriously.
Also, the fact that the DNC had been hacked was publicly announced in June 2016 — more than a month before Trump had said anything about Russia and Hillary’s emails. And the first item released from that hack was the DNC’s opposition research file on Trump.
At the time, nobody claimed Russia was trying to elect Trump, since the first release wasn’t exactly flattering to him. In fact, the Washington Postreported that the DNC hack was part of a broader effort by Russians to target both political parties.
“The intrusion into the DNC was one of several targeting American political organizations. The networks of presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump were also targeted by Russian spies, as were the computers of some Republican political action committees, U.S. officials said,” the Post article stated.
The request comes in the form of a letter from Representative Jason Chaffetz (R), chair of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, to Channing Phillips, the US attorney for the District of Columbia. It asks the Justice Department to “investigate and determine whether Secretary Clinton or her employees and contractors violated statutes that prohibit destruction of records, obstruction of congressional inquiries, and concealment or cover up of evidence material to a congressional investigation.”
Although the FBI ended its Clinton email investigation in July 2016 without recommending an indictment of Clinton or anyone else, newly revealed evidence indicates Platte River Networks (PRN) employee Paul Combetta deleted and wiped all of Clinton’s emails in March 2015. He had communications with Clinton’s lawyers just days before and after the deletions, but the FBI was unable to determine what was said in those communications, possibly due to an assertion of attorney-client privilege. (Salon, 9/6/2016)
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton is introduced during a campaign stop Friday, Jan. 22, 2016, in Rochester, N.H. ((Credit: /Matt Rourke/The Associated Press))
(…) “Hillary compromised classified materials representing the full range of American espionage: human intelligence or HUMINT from CIA, signals intelligence or SIGINT from NSA, and imagery intelligence or IMINT from NGA.
Of those 81 classified email chains, the FBI assessed that 37 of them included Secret information while eight included Top Secret information. Worse, seven email chains included Special Access Program or SAP information, which is tightly protected by the Intelligence Community and shared on a restricted, need-to-know basis only.
Three more email chains contained Sensitive Compartmented Information or SCI, which was almost certainly SIGINT from NSA. SCI always requires special protection and handling. In fact, you’re only allowed to access it inside a specially-built Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility, a SCIF (pronounced “skiff”) in spy-speak. Any exposure of SCI brings severe penalties—at least if you’re not named Clinton.
It’s nice to see the FBI finally confirm just how much highly classified information got exposed here, but I reported this many months ago from Intelligence Community sources, including that Hillary’s “unclassified” emails included Top Secret SAP information from CIA and Top Secret SCI information from NSA.
Which leads to a troubling matter: What the FBI did not mention in its big data dump on EmailGate.
As I told you in this column back in January, Hillary emails included very highly classified intelligence from NSA. In early June 2011, the secretary of state received a long email from her longtime friend and factotum Sid Blumenthal regarding Sudan. This was an astonishingly detailed assessment of high-level political and military machinations in that country, specifically inside information about coup plotting.
This explosive information was timely and deep in the weeds on Sudanese happenings. It’s difficult to see how Blumenthal—a lawyer and Washington fixer, no sort of Africa hand or James Bond—got his hands on such juicy intelligence. As I’ve noted, “Blumenthal’s information came from a top-ranking source with direct access to Sudan’s top military and intelligence officials, and recounted a high-level meeting that had taken place only 24 hours before.” How did Sid obtain this amazing scoop for Hillary?
If Hillary Clinton becomes our next president, we can be certain that her trusty sidekick Sid Blumenthal will have an important role in her White House.
Not to mention that, in terms of verbiage and format, Blumenthal’s email read exactly like classified NSA reporting, as anybody acquainted with our SIGINT would immediately recognize. As one veteran agency official told me back in January, Blumenthal’s email was NSA information with “at least 90 percent confidence.”
Which was no coincidence, since an NSA investigation subsequently determined that Blumenthal’s Sudan assessment was derived from their reporting—in some cases, verbatim. As I reported in March, NSA concluded that Blumenthal’s Sudan report came from four different agency SIGINT reports, all classified Top Secret/SCI. Then it got worse:
At least one of those reports was issued under the GAMMA compartment, which is an NSA handling caveat that is applied to extraordinarily sensitive information (for instance, decrypted conversations between top foreign leadership, as this was). GAMMA is properly viewed as a SIGINT Special Access Program, or SAP, several of which Clinton compromised in another series of her “unclassified” emails.
NSA had no doubt that Blumenthal somehow got his hands on some of their “crown jewels” information. “It’s word-for-word, verbatim copying,” an agency official of them explained. “In one case, an entire paragraph was lifted from an NSA report” that was classified Top Secret/SCI. To add to the mystery, Sid emailed Hillary his “personal” assessment on Sudan only hours after some of those classified NSA reports were issued.
Somehow Sid Blumenthal—who in 2011 was not working for the U.S. government in any capacity and had not held security clearances in a decade—was reading above-top-secret NSA reports just hours after they appeared in tightly restricted GAMMA channels.” (Read more: The Observer, 9/06/16)
Representative Jason Chaffetz (R), chair of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, writes a letter to Platte River Networks (PRN), the computer company that managed Clinton’s private server since June 2013. Chaffetz warns that one PRN employee, Paul Combetta, could face federal charges for deleting and wiping Clinton’s emails from her server in March 2015. That’s because the House Benghazi Committee had issued a formal order to preserve such records earlier in the month, and Combetta confessed in a later FBI interview that he knew about the order before he made the deletions.
In the letter, Chaffetz says a recent FBI report about the deletions “raises questions to whether [Combetta] violated federal statutes that prohibit destruction of evidence and obstruction of a Congressional investigation.”
Additionally, Combetta took part in conference calls with Clinton’s lawyers just days before and after the deletions, but the FBI was unable to determine what was said in those communications, possibly due to an assertion of attorney-client privilege. In the letter, Chaffetz wants an explanation from PRN how Combetta could refuse to talk to the FBI about the conference calls if the only lawyers involved were Clinton’s. (Salon, 9/6/2016)
The letter is released to CNN on the same day, and publicly published in full. Addressing his decision not to recommend the indictment of Clinton, Comey writes, “At the end of the day, the case itself was not a cliff-hanger; despite all the chest-beating by people no longer in government, there really wasn’t a prosecutable case.”
CNN also reports that over the past several weeks, “Comey has met with groups of former FBI agents as part of his routine visits to field offices around the country. In at least one recent such meeting, according to people familiar with the meeting, former agents were sharply critical of the FBI’s handling of the Clinton probe and particularly the decision to not recommend charges against Clinton. Comey gave the meeting participants a similar answer about the case not being a cliff-hanger.” (CNN, 9/7/2016)
A later CNN article will identify the particularly contentious meeting as taking place in Kansas City. (CNN, 11/2/2016)
In the letter, Comey also defends his decision to release the FBI’s final report on the investigation (with significant redactions). That was a highly unusual move, because that usually only happens after an indictment or conviction. He makes a particular point to defend the timing of the report’s release, as it came out on a Friday afternoon just before the three-day Labor Day weekend.
He concludes the letter: “Those suggesting that we are ‘political’ or part of some ‘fix’ either don’t know us, or they are full of baloney (and maybe some of both).” (CNN, 9/7/2016) (CNN, 9/7/2016)
On September 6, 2016, House Speaker Paul Ryan complains how the report was release on the Friday afternoon before a three-day weekend.
The next day, FBI Director James Comey writes a letter to FBI staff that is immediately published in full by CNN. In it, he asserts that the review process allowing the report’s public release was finished on a Friday morning, September 2, 2016, so he published it later that same day.
He goes on to say, “I almost ordered the material held until [the next] Tuesday because I knew we would take all kinds of grief for releasing it before a holiday weekend, but my judgment was that we had promised transparency and it would be game-playing to withhold it from the public just to avoid folks saying stuff about us. We don’t play games. So we released it Friday. We are continuing to process more material and will release batches of documents as they are ready, no matter the day of the week.” (CNN, 9/7/2016) (CNN, 9/7/2016)
A former newspaper editor and publisher. He has written for USA Today, The Saturday Evening Post, the Los Angeles Times Syndicate, OMNI magazine, and has also produced the syndicated radio program, Health News. He has written 22 books and two documentary videos.
According to Still, during last year’s presidential campaign at the Commander-In-Chief Forum on September 7, 2016, moderator Matt Lauer went “off script” and asked Hillary about her using an illegal, private email-server when she was secretary of state. (See “Hillary Clinton wore an ear phone at Commander-in-Chief Forum”)
According to Bill Still’s source — an unnamed “NBC associate producer of the forum” — Hillary was so enraged that, after the forum, she went into a ballistic melt-down, screaming at her staff, including a racist rant at Donna Brazile, calling Brazile a “buffalo” and “janitor”. Brazile recently turned against Hillary — now we know why.
This is the NBC associate producer’s account of what happened:
“Hillary proceeded to pick up a full glass of water and throw it at the face of the assistant, and the screaming started.
She was in a full meltdown and no one on her staff dared speak with her — she went kind of manic and did not have any control over herself at that point. How these people work with this woman is amazing to me. She really didn’t seem to care who heard any of it.
You really had to see this to believe it. She came apart — literally unglued. She is the most foul-mouthed woman I’ve ever heard. And that voice at screech level — awful!
She screamed she’d get that fucking Lauer fired for this. Referring to Donald Trump, Clinton said, ‘If that fucking bastard wins, we all hang from nooses!Lauer’s finished, and if I lose, it’s all on your heads for screwing this up.’
Her dozen or more aides were visibly disturbed and tried to calm her down when she started shaking uncontrollably as she screamed to get an executive at Comcast, the parent company of NBC Universal, on the phone. Then two rather large aides grabbed her and helped her walk to her car.”
Bill Still said:
“Matt Lauer was massively criticized for the rest of the week on air by the Clinton campaign and the rest of the MSM as having conducted ‘an unfair and partisan attack on Clinton’. Calls were made to The New York Times, The Washington Post, Huffington Post and Twitterexecutives, with orders to crush Matt Lauer. One staffer on the Clinton campaign told the NBC staff that they all fear Clinton’s wrath and uncontrollable outbursts, and one described Hillary as ‘an egotistical psychopath’.
Since Hillary does not allow any staff to have cell phones when she is in their presence, no footage is available.
Interim DNC chairman Donna Brazile, the first black woman to hold the position, was singled out by Hillary during the rant. She screamed at Donna, ‘I’m so sick of your face! You stare at the wall like a brain-dead buffalo, while letting that fucking Lauer get away with this! What are you good for, really? Get the fuck to work janitoring this mess, do I make myself clear?’
A female NBC executive said Donna Brazile looked at Mrs. Clinton and never flinched, which seemed to enrage Hillary all the more. The executive continued: ‘It was the most awful and terrible and racist display. Such a profane meltdown I have ever witnessed from anyone, and I will never forget it. That woman should never see the inside of the Oval Office, I can tell you that. She was unhinged and just continued to verbally abuse everyone. She was out of control.’”
Director of National Intelligence, John Ratcliffe, writes a letter to Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham, with the following declassified information:
DNI releases a copy of the intelligence referral to Comey and Strzok on October 6, 2020:
(…) The declassification comes after Ratcliffe, last week, shared newly-declassified information with the Senate Judiciary Committee which revealed that in September 2016, U.S. intelligence officials forwarded an investigative referral on Hillary Clinton purportedly approving “a plan concerning U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump and Russian hackers hampering U.S. elections” in order to distract the public from her email scandal.
That referral was sent to Comey and then-Deputy Assistant Director of Counterintelligence Peter Strzok.
“The following information is provided for the exclusive use of your bureau for background investigative action or lead purposes as appropriate,” the CIA memo to Comey and Strzok stated.
“This memorandum contains sensitive information that could be source revealing. It should be handled with particular attention to compartmentation and need-to-know. To avoid the possible compromise of the source, any investigative action taken in response to the information below should be coordinated in advance with Chief Counterintelligence Mission Center, Legal,” the memo, which was sent to Comey and Strzok, read. “It may not be used in any legal proceeding—including FISA applications—without prior approval…”
“Per FBI verbal request, CIA provides the below examples of information the CROSSFIRE HURRICANE fusion cell has gleaned to date,” the memo continued. ““An exchange [REDACTED] discussing US presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s approval of a plan concerning US presidential candidate Donald Trump and Russian hackers hampering US elections as a means of distracting the public from her use of a private email server.”
James Comey (Credit: Cliff Owen/The Associated Press)
(…) Ratcliffe also declassified on Tuesday portions of a formal CIA investigative referral sent on Sept. 7, 2016, to fired former FBI Director James Comey and fired former counterintelligence official Peter Strzok asking them to investigate the Clinton campaign’s anti-Trump collusion smear operation in light of Russia’s knowledge of the plan and the likelihood it could be tainted by deliberate Russian disinformation. Rather than act on the CIA investigative referral in the same manner they had launched a full-blown counterintelligence investigation of the Trump campaign, Strzok and Comey refused to initiate an investigation.
“Per FBI verbal request, CIA provides the below examples of information the CROSSFIRE HURRICANE fusion cell has gleaned to date,” the memo states. “An exchange [REDACTED] discussing US presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s approval of a plan concerning US presidential candidate Donald Trump and Russian hackers hampering US elections as a means of distracting the public from her use of private e-mail server.”
The cover note of the memorandum stated that the information within was provided to the FBI “for the exclusive use of your Bureau for background, investigative action, or lead purposes, as appropriate.”
There is no evidence the FBI ever took any action to ensure that Russian knowledge of Clinton’s plans did not lead to infiltration of that campaign’s operation by Russian intelligence agents. The CIA referral, specifically its reference to a “CROSSFIRE HURRICANE fusion cell,” suggests that the Obama administration’s anti-Trump investigation may not have been limited to the FBI, but may have included the use of CIA assets and surveillance capabilities, raising troubling questions about whether the nation’s top spy service was weaponized against a U.S. political campaign.
The CIA referral declassified and released by Ratcliffe shows that it was personally addressed to both Comey and Strzok. Because the CIA does not have legal authority to police domestic matters, it informed the FBI of the agency’s concerns about potential Russian knowledge of Clinton campaign’s plan to smear Trump as a Russian asset, especially given the FBI’s ongoing counterintelligence investigation of the Trump campaign. Not only did the FBI refuse to investigate whether the Russians were using the Clinton campaign to interfere in the 2016 national election, but Comey also claimed last week that he knew nothing whatsoever about the CIA investigative referral.” (Read more: The Federalist, 10/06/2020)(Archive)
The New York Times reveals that the Platte River Networks (PRN) employee mentioned in a recently released FBI report who deleted and then wiped Clinton’s emails from her private server in March 2015 is named Paul Combetta. Furthermore, at some unknown point during the investigation, the FBI gave him an immunity deal. This is “according to a law enforcement official and others briefed on the investigation.”
It was reported in March 2016 that Clinton computer technician Bryan Pagliano got an immunity deal, but Combetta’s deal stayed secret. Even the FBI’s Clinton email investigation final report, released on September 2, 2016, makes no mention of it. The report also redacted every mention of Combetta’s name, but the Times says “the law enforcement official and others familiar with the case identified the employee as Mr. Combetta.”
Clinton spokesperson Brian Fallon says the deletions by Combetta have already been “thoroughly examined by the FBI prior to its decision to close out this case.”
However, many questions remain, including why Combetta got immunity and when. He was interviewed by the FBI twice, and his answers in his second interview sometimes directly contradict his answers in his first interview, meaning he had to have lied to the FBI at least once, which is a felony. In his second interview also admitted to deleting Clinton’s emails despite being aware of a Congressional order to preserve her emails, which would suggest an admission of additional crimes.
Fallon also comments, “As the FBI’s report notes, neither Hillary Clinton nor her attorneys had knowledge of the Platte River Network employee’s actions. It appears he acted on his own and against guidance given by both Clinton’s and Platte River’s attorneys to retain all data in compliance with a congressional preservation request.”
The House Oversight Committee has asked PRN employees, including Combetta, to appear at a committee hearing on September 13, 2016, about how the email deletions and other matters. (The New York Times, 9/8/2016)
The Denver Post’s editorial board publishes an editorial on September 8, 2016, entitled “A fishy story in Platte River Networks’ purge of Clinton e-mails.” It focuses on Platte River Networks (PRN) employee Paul Combetta’s FBI interview and his deletion and wiping of Clinton’s emails with a program “wonderfully named BleachBit.”
The editorial mentions Combetta’s “sudden remembrance” to delete the emails, and a subsequent conference call between PRN officials and a “longtime Clinton aide and personal lawyer.” When the FBI eventually attempted to investigate the conference call, they were met with Combetta’s claim of attorney-client privilege. The editorial states, “That just looks awful. So [it’s] little wonder the Republican chairman of the House committee investigating Clinton’s e-mail arrangement — Utah’s Jason Chaffetz — has asked federal prosecutors to investigate whether she or others were involved in the decision to destroy those emails following the preservation order.”
The Post argues “the information from the [FBI’s] summary of its investigation doesn’t sit well. It’s reasonable to ask why the FBI didn’t look deeper. It’s reasonable to ask why [Combetta] would act if, as the logic of the cover story must argue, the emails were simply personal notes about yoga appointments and being a grandmother.”
The editorial agrees with Chaffetz’s call for the Justice Department “to investigate and determine whether Secretary Clinton or her employees and contractors violated statutes that prohibit destruction of records, obstruction of congressional inquiries and concealment of cover-up of evidence material to a congressional committee.” It closes by saying, “something about this story feels whitewashed — or maybe bleached out is the better term for it now.” (The Denver Post, 9/8/2016)
FBI acting legislative affairs officer Jason Herring testifies before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.
He is asked by Representative Jason Chaffetz (R), chair of the committee, to promise to hand over all of the FBI interview summaries, known as 302s, in unredacted form.
Herring says he can’t do that, and suggests that Chaffetz should file a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, just like any private citizen can.
Committee member Representative Trey Gowdy (R) later complains, “Since when did Congress have to go through FOIA to obtain 302s?”
Chaffetz serves the FBI a subpoena during a House Oversight and Government Affairs Committee hearing on September 9, 2016. (Credit: ABC News)
Chaffetz replies to Henning, “You don’t get to decide what I get to see. I get to see it all.” Then he brings out a subpoena. He sends it to the witness table where Henning is sitting, and says, “I’ve signed this subpoena. We want all the 302s… and you are hereby served.”
In fact, Chaffetz’s committee has some of the 302s already, but all “personally identifiable information” has been redacted from them. The committee wants to know more about the role of Paul Combetta in deleting and the wiping all of Clinton’s emails from her personal server, but since Combetta is a Platte River Networks (PRN) employee and not a government employee, much information about what he did has been redacted.
Representative Carolyn Maloney (Credit: Andrew Burton / Getty Images)
Representative Carolyn Maloney (D), a member of the committee, claims the obstacle to Chaffetz seeing the redactions actually is the House Intelligence Committee, not the FBI. Chaffetz has asked House Intelligence chair Representative Devin Nunes (R) for access to the unredacted versions, but no vote on that request has been taken or scheduled yet.
However, Senator Charles Grassley (R), chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, also complains about how the FBI is not letting his committee see unredacted documents from the investigation. “The FBI is trying to have it both ways. At the same time it talks about unprecedented transparency, it’s placing unprecedented hurdles in the way of Congressional oversight of unclassified law enforcement matters. It turned over documents, but with strings attached. … The Senate should not allow its controls on classified material to be manipulated to hide embarrassing material from public scrutiny, even when that material is unclassified.” (Politico, 9/12/2016)
Two other Congressional committees formally asked the Justice Department on September 9, 2016 for the full FBI interviews of Combetta and other PRN employees. (US Congress, 9/9/2016)
The editorial states: “Ms. Clinton’s emails have endured much more scrutiny than an ordinary person’s would have, and the criminal case against her was so thin that charging her would have been to treat her very differently. … Anyone who claims that Ms. Clinton should be in prison accuses, without evidence, the FBI of corruption or flagrant incompetence.”
The editorial concludes: “Ms. Clinton is hardly blameless. She treated the public’s interest in sound record-keeping cavalierly. A small amount of classified material also moved across her private server. But it was not obviously marked as such, and there is still no evidence that national security was harmed. … There is no equivalence between Ms. Clinton’s wrongs and Mr. Trump’s manifest unfitness for office.” (The Washington Post, 9/8/2016)
Representative Jason Chaffetz (R), the chair of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, orders two Platte River Networks (PRN) employees and three others to testify before a Congressional hearing, on September 13, 2016. PRN is the company that managed Clinton’s private server. The following people are ordered to appear:
Those subpoenaed to appear before the House Oversight committee are from left to right: Paul Combetta, Bryan Pagliano, Justin Cooper and Alex McChord and Bill Thornton. (Credits: public domain)
Paul Combetta. He is a PRN employee. On September 8, 2016, the New York Times revealed that Combetta deleted and wiped Clinton’s emails from her private server, and he also got an immunity deal from the Justice Department as part of the FBI’s Clinton email investigation. Congressional committees issued subpoenas for PRN interviews on August 22, 2016, after asking without coersion since September 2015.
Bill Thornton. He also is a PRN employee. The FBI’s final report indicated two PRN employees worked on Clinton’s server, so it seems probable he is the other one.
Bryan Pagliano. He managed Clinton’s server until PRN took over. He was previously subpoenaed by the House Committee on Benghazi, but he pleaded the Fifth. However, he cooperated with the FBI after also getting an immunity deal.
Justin Cooper. He is a member of Bill Clinton’s staff and helped Pagliano manage the server.
On September 09, 2016, Trey Gowdy appears on Fox News with Martha MacCallum to discuss the immunity deal given to Paul Combetta. (Credit: Fox News)
Representative Trey Gowdy (R) comments about a New York Times article from the day before that revealed Platte River Networks employee Paul Combetta was not only the person who deleted and wiped Clinton’s emails, but was the person who got an immunity deal from the FBI.
Gowdy says there are two types of immunity Combetta could have received: use and transactional. “If the FBI and the Department of Justice gave this witness transactional immunity, it is tantamount to giving the triggerman immunity in a robbery case.”
Gowdy, who is a former federal prosecutor, says that Combetta “destroyed official public records” despite a subpoena and preservation order from lawmakers for the documents. He adds that he is “stunned” because “It looks like they gave immunity to the very person you would most want to prosecute.” (Fox News, 9/9/2016)
Cheryl Mills was Clinton’s chief of staff while Clinton was secretary of state, then she was hired to be one of Clinton’s lawyers in 2013, setting up a potential conflict of interest between her different roles. In April 2016, she was interviewed by the FBI, but refused to answer certain questions, claiming attorney-client privilege.
Ronald J. Sievert (Credit: public domain)
Ronald J. Sievert, a former assistant director at the Justice Department and member of the department’s National Security Working Group, said the FBI easily could have gone to court to challenge Mills’ privilege claim. But that didn’t happen.
Mills also was allowed to attend Clinton’s July 2016 FBI interview as one of Clinton’s lawyers, even though she directly participated in many of the matters being discussed by Clinton when Mills was in her chief of staff role.
Sievert comments, “There seems universal agreement among those of us who know the law that no regular US government employee could get away with this.” (The New York Post, 9/9/2016)
This is according to an interview with WikiLeaks leader Julian Assange. “We have tens of thousands, possibly as many as a hundred thousand, pages of documents of different types, related to the operations that Hillary Clinton is associated with.”
This WikiLeaks cartoon has been prominently featured on the WikiLeaks website. (Credit: Latuff / WikiLeaks)
WikiLeaks released almost 20,000 Democratic National Committee (DNC) emails just before the July Democratic presidential convention. He says regarding new releases, “There are some, several … in response to the DNC publications, a lot of people have been inspired by the impact, and so they have stepped forward with additional material.”
He adds, “It’s quite a complex business to sort things, to index them, make sure they’re presentable, to see what the top initial angles are that come out. We’re a small shop. We’re here around the clock. We understand quite much the time pressures that people have, and how significant it is to try and get that out. We worked like hell to get the DNC publication out before the DNC, the day before the DNC.”
“I am very confident we’re going to get this material out before, long before, the day of the [November 2016 presidential] election.” (The Washington Examiner, 9/8/2016)
Clinton presidential running mate Tim Kaine, associates Trump and Russia with the DNC hack during a CBS This Morning interview on September 9, 2016.
Yet, according to the New York Times and details provided in the DNC’s lawsuit against Russia and the Trump campaign, Russia’s alleged cyberattack on the DNC began just weeks after Trump announced his candidacy for president in June 2015.
Senator Charles Grassley (R), chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, speaks in the Senate about difficulties he is having with the FBI’s selective release of information regarding the FBI’s Clinton email investigation.
Senator Charles Grassley takes to the Senate floor on September 12, 2016. (Credit: Public domain)
He points out that the FBI has taken the unusual step of releasing the FBI’s final report and Clinton interview summary. “However, its summary is misleading or inaccurate in some key details and leaves out other important facts altogether.”
He says there are dozens of completely unclassified witness reports, but even some Congressional staffers can’t see them “because the FBI improperly bundled [them] with a small amount of classified information, and told the Senate to treat it all as if it were classified.”
He says the normal procedure is for documents to have the classified portions marked. Then the unclassified portions can be released. But in defiance of regulations and a clear executive order on how such material should be handled, “the FBI has ‘instructed’ the Senate office that handles classified information not to separate the unclassified information.”
He points in particular to recently revealed news that Paul Combetta, an employee of the company (Platte River Networks) that managed Clinton’s private server from June 2013 onwards, deleted and wiped all of Clinton’s emails from the server in March 2015. Grassley claims “there is key information related to that issue that is still being kept secret, even though it is unclassified. If I honor the FBI’s ‘instruction’ not to disclose the unclassified information it provided to Congress, I cannot explain why.”
He also says, “Inaccuracies are spreading because of the FBI’s selective release. For example, the FBI’s recently released summary memo may be contradicted by other unclassified interview summaries that are being kept locked away from the public.”
He says he has been fighting the FBI on this, but without success so far, as the FBI isn’t even replying to his letters. (US Senate, 9/13/2016) (YouTube, 9/13/2016)
Lawyers for Bryan Pagliano, the State Department employee who managed Clinton’s server when she was secretary of state, indicate he will plead the Fifth Amendment yet again. He was given a subpoena to speak before a Congressional hearing the next day, on September 13, 2016.
Pagliano refused to speak before a Congressional inquiry in September 2015, refused to take questions for a State Department inspector general’s report published in May 2016, pled the Fifth when he was deposed in a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit in June 2016, and only took part in the FBI’s Clinton investigation after agreeing to an immunity deal.
Mark MacDougall (Credit: Akin Gump)
Pagliano’s five lawyer team, led by Mark MacDougall, claim: “Any effort to require Mr. Pagliano to publicly appear this week and again assert his Fifth Amendment rights before a committee of the same Congress, inquiring about the same matter as the Benghazi Committee, furthers no legislative purpose and is a transparent effort to publicly harass and humiliate our client for unvarnished political purposes.”
Justin Cooper, a Bill Clinton aide who helped Pagliano manage the server, reportedly has indicated that he will answer questions in the hearing. (The Washington Post, 9/12/2016)
The next day, Pagliano will fail to appear before the Congressional hearing at all.
In comments during a Congressional hearing relating to Clinton’s use of a private server, Representative Jason Chaffetz (R) comments about Clinton’s server manager Bryan Pagliano, “[I]t’s our understanding [that] Mr. Pagliano worked in the I.T. department at the State Department nearly four years yet virtually every single email Mr. Pagliano had has suddenly disappeared. There’s something like less than 20 emails…”
Bryan Pagliano’s empty chair at the hearing. (Credit: CSpan)
Chaffetz also says, “Mr. Pagliano is important because he was receiving a paycheck from the Clintons but failed to disclose that on his financial forms. We’d like to give him an opportunity to answer that question. We also believe he entered into an immunity agreement. You’d think somebody would sing like a songbird if you got immunity from the FBI. What are you afraid of?”
Pagliano cannot answer the question because he fails to attend the hearing, despite a Congressional subpoena to do so. (US Congress, 9/13/2016)
It has been reported that the .pst file containing all of Pagliano’s State Department emails has been lost.
The FBI Clinton email investigation’s final report failed to mention the issue of Pagliano’s lost emails or how many of his emails the FBI had or found. (Federal Bureau of Investigation, 9/2/2016)
On September 12, 2016, a deadline to respond to a subpoena issued by a Congressional committee passed. Three companies involved in the management of Clinton’s private server had been given the subpoena, and one – Datto, Inc. – responded in time with documents, while the other two – Platte River Networks (PRN) and SECNAP, Inc. – did not.
The next day, Representative Lamar Smith (R) comments in a related Congressional hearing, “just this morning… SECNAP’s [legal] counsel confirmed to my staff that the Clinton’s private LLC [Clinton Executive Service Corp.] is actively engaged in directing their obstructionist responses to Congressional subpoenas.” (US Congress, 9/13/2016)
Clinton’s lawyer will later confirm that he is prohibiting SECNAP from fully complying with a subpoena.
The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee holds a public hearing related to the management of Clinton’s private server. Four people associated with the management of Clinton’s private server had been served by Congressional subpoenas on September 8, 2016 to force them to testimony:
Paul Combetta (left) Bill Thornton (center) Justin Cooper (right) (Credit: CSpan)
Bryan Pagliano, a former State Department employee who managed Clinton’s server while she was secretary of state. He defies the subpoena by failing to appear at all.
Justin Cooper, a former Bill Clinton aide who helped Pagliano manage the server. He does answer questions for nearly two hours at the hearing.
Paul Combetta, a Platte River Networks (PRN) employee, which managed the server from June 2013 until at least late 2015. He deleted and then wiped all of Clinton’s emails from her server. He fails to answer any questions and pleads the Fifth instead.
Bill Thornton, another PRN employee who managed the server with Combetta. He also to answer any questions and pleads the Fifth instead.
Pagliano’s lawyers have complained the hearing is politically biased and he will continue to refuse to participate. He has also failed to cooperate with another Congressional committee in 2015, a State Department inspector general’s investigation, and a deposition in a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit.
Representative Jason Chaffetz (R) says of Pagliano’s refusal to appear: “He made the decision not to be here and there are consequences for that. … We’ll look at the full range of options. If anybody is under any illusion I’m going to let go of this and let it sail off into the sunset they are very ill-advised.” However, he doesn’t specify what the penalties might be. (The Associated Press, 9/13/2016) (US Congress, 9/13/2016)
Austin McChord, the CEO of Datto, Inc., was also scheduled to appear, but there is no mention of him. Presumably, he is rescheduled for another hearing.
Justin Cooper appears before the House Oversight and Government Affairs Committee on September 13, 2016. (Credit: Alex Wong / Getty Images)
Justin Cooper worked with Bryan Pagliano to manage Clinton’s private server while she was secretary of state. But while Pagliano was a State Department employee, Cooper was an aide to former President Bill Clinton as well as a Clinton Foundation employee. When Cooper testifies before a Congressional committee on this day, he is asked by Representative Jason Chaffetz (R) if he had a security clearance while he was helping to manage the server.
He replies, “No, I did not have a security clearance.”
He mentions that he worked in the White House from 2000 to 2001, but he is not asked if he had a security clearance in those years. However, he mentions that he wasn’t involved in handling classified information at that time.
Chaffetz also asks him, “You had access to the server the entire time you were working for the Clintons?”
He answers, “Yes I had access to the server.”
He also mentions that both he and Pagliano had remote access, which means they could have accessed Clinton’s emails over the Internet at any time. (US Congress, 9/13/2016)
Curiously, the FBI Clinton email investigation’s final report, released earlier inSeptember 2016, doesn’t mention Cooper’s lack of a security clearance. Nor is it mentioned in the summary of Clinton’s July 2016 FBI interview, which is made public in early September 2016 as well, if Clinton knew Cooper had no security clearance when she hired him and continued to pay him for managing the server. (Federal Bureau of Investigation, 9/2/2016)
Cooper shakes hands with Representative Chaffetz after the hearing. (Credit: CSpan)
Justin Cooper worked with Bryan Pagliano to manage Clinton’s private server while she was secretary of state. When Cooper testifies before a Congressional committee on this day, he is asked by Representative Jason Chaffetz (R), “[H]ow many people had access to the server?”
He replies, “There were two people who had some administrative rights, myself and Mr. Pagliano. I can’t off the top of my head tell you exactly how many users there were over the lifetime of the server, but it was less than 20 people.”
He also mentions, “The only remote access login to the server was for myself and Mr. Pagliano.”
At other points in his testimony, he says that most of the users were members of former President Bill Clinton’s staff and/or Clinton Foundation employees. Cooper doesn’t have a security clearance and its probable that most of the others with access to the server don’t have security clearances either. (US Congress, 9/13/2016)
In July 2016, FBI Director James Comey claimed that Clinton gave between three and nine people without a security clearance access to the server, but he may be defining “access” in a different manner than Cooper.
On September 13, 2016, hacked emails belonging to former Secretary of State Colin Powell appear on a website known as DCLeaks.com. It is unclear who owns the DCLeaks website, which only appeared on the Internet a few months earlier. They are known for previously publishing hacked emails belonging to prominent Democrats and Republicans, including General Philip M. Breedlove, the former commander of NATO forces in Europe, and George Soros, a wealthy backer of liberal causes. It is also reported to have ties to Guccifer 2.0, who in turn has been accused of having links to the Russian government.
Colin Powell (Credit: Paul Morigi / Getty Images)
Powell’s aide Peggy Cifrino states, “We are confirming that General Powell has been hacked and that they are his emails. We have no further comment at this time.” The dates of Powell’s hacked emails range from June 24, 2014 to as recently as August 29, 2016.
Some of the emails are first reported by BuzzFeed and the Intercept, followed by many other prominent mainstream news sources.
The New York Times reports, “A hack of Mr. Powell’s email this week has ripped away the diplomatic jargon and political niceties to reveal his unvarnished disdain of Donald J. Trump as a ‘national disgrace,’ his personal peeves with Hillary Clinton and his lingering, but still very raw, anger with the Republican colleagues with whom he so often clashed a decade ago.” (New York Times, 09/14/16)
“Two months before the 2016 election, George Papadopoulos received a strange request for a meeting in London, one of several the young Trump adviser would be offered — and he would accept — during the presidential campaign.
The meeting request, which has not been reported until now, came from Stefan Halper, a foreign policy expert and Cambridge professor with connections to the CIA and its British counterpart, MI6.
(…) According to a source with knowledge of the meeting, Halper asked Papadopoulos: “George, you know about hacking the emails from Russia, right?”
Papadopoulos told Halper he didn’t know anything about emails or Russian hacking, said the source, who spoke on the condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the investigations into Russian meddling in the 2016 campaign. The professor did not follow up on the line of inquiry.
Halper first contacted Papadopoulos by email. In a Sept. 2, 2016, message sent to Papadopoulos’s personal email account, he offered the Trump aide $3,000 to write a policy paper on issues related to Turkey, Cyprus, Israel and the Leviathan natural gas field. Halper also offered to pay for Papadopoulos’s flight and a three-night stay in London.
The Connaught Hotell (Credit: public domain)
Papadopoulos accepted the proposal, flew to England, and met with Halper and one of his assistants. He delivered the paper electronically Oct. 2 and received payment days later, according to documents TheDCNF reviewed.
(…) Papadopoulos and Halper met several times during the London trip, including at the Connaught Hotel and the Travellers Club — a classic 19th century club foreign diplomats and politicians frequent. Halper’s research assistant — a Turkish woman named Azra Turk — also met with Papadopoulos. The Connaught Hotel meeting was scheduled for Sept. 13, 2016, and the Travellers Club conclave was two days later.
While discussing the policy paper Papadopoulos was to write, Halper made an out-of-left-field reference to Russians and hacked emails, according to a source with direct knowledge of Papadopoulos’s version of events.
Joel Melstad, spokesperson for the of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), says, “ODNI is not leading an [intelligence community]-wide damage assessment and is not aware of any individual IC element conducting such formal assessments.”
Most of the above “top secret” emails sent or received on Clinton’s server related to the US drone program in Pakistan. According to the Washington Free Beacon, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper “agreed with security officials who argued against the need to carry out the damage assessment. Intelligence officials argued in internal discussions that since many details of the drone missile program targeting terrorists were disclosed in earlier leaks unrelated to Clinton’s use of a personal email server, gauging the damage done by her conduct would be difficult, and possibly unnecessary.”
However, “Other officials said Clapper’s decision appeared based on political considerations and was an effort to avoid embroiling American intelligence agencies in charges they were attempting to influence the outcome of Clinton’s bid for the White House.”
Representative Mike Pompeo (Credit: Politico)
A June 2014 counterintelligence directive, ICD-732, states that “damage assessments shall be conducted when there is an actual or suspected unauthorized disclosure or compromise of classified national intelligence that may cause damage to US national security.”
Representative Mike Pompeo (R) says, “FBI Director [James] Comey has made clear that there was highly classified and sensitive information on Secretary Clinton’s personal server. It is imperative that [a damage assessment] be conducted to determine what harm to American national security may have occurred and, just as importantly, to prevent the massive mishandling of sensitive materials from ever happening again.”
Angelo Codevilla (Credit: public domain)
Angelo Codevilla, a former US intelligence officer, says, “Common sense, the intelligence community’s standard practice, as well as a 2014 directive, require assessing the damage done by any such compromise.” She also asserts that Comey’s “vague and evasive” comments regarding Clinton’s handling of classified information confirm that a significant number of secrets were compromised.
Michelle Van Cleave (Credit: public domain)
Michelle Van Cleave, a former national counterintelligence executive, similarly asserts, “Whenever there is a significant compromise of national security information, as the FBI’s report confirms happened here, it is essential to conduct an assessment of the damage in order to protect plans, programs, or lives that may be at risk.” There have been reports that Clinton’s emails revealed the names of some undercover CIA officers as well.
Kenneth deGraffenreid (Credit: The Institute of World Politics)
Kenneth deGraffenreid, a former deputy national counterintelligence executive, says, “Intelligence agencies hate conducting damage assessments that could show people that somebody did something wrong, or improper, or did it poorly. They never want that known. It’s a bureaucracy that does one thing: protects itself.”
He says Congress should force the intelligence community to conduct the damage assessment, since it will find no political advantage in doing it voluntarily.
However, the Free Beacon reports, “Congressional sources said the House and Senate intelligence oversight committee are reluctant to require the damage assessment since it would codify in writing the false claim that no damage was caused to the drone program by the compromise of secrets by Clinton and her aides.” (The Washington Free Beacon, 9/14/2016)
Hillary Clinton (L) is applauded by Brookings Institution President Strobe Talbott before she delivers remarks about the Obama administration’s national security strategy at the Brookings Institution May 27, 2010 in Washington, DC. (Credit: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
“Christopher Steele, the author of the infamous anti-Trump dossier, disclosed information from his Trump-Russia investigation to a longtime Clinton crony because of his position on a State Department advisory board, according to court documents filed on Tuesday.
According to the court filing, Steele told a court in the United Kingdom on Aug. 1 that he provided Strobe Talbott, the Clinton insider, with anti-Trump research because of his position on the Foreign Affairs Policy Board, an independent advisory board set up in 2011 by then-Sec. of State Hillary Clinton.
(…) The Steele document was revealed on Tuesday in a lawsuit filed by three Russian bankers who have sued Steele in the U.K. and U.S. over the dossier. A Sept. 14, 2016 memo in the dossier alleges links between the founders of the bank, Alfa Bank, and the Kremlin. They have sued Steele and Fusion GPS for defamation.
Steele disclosed the link to Talbott in response to a series of questions posed in the U.K. ligation.
(…) Talbott also has a familial link to another dossier that was handled by Steele and Winer. Talbott’s brother-in-law is Cody Shearer, a longtime Clinton fixer who conducted a private investigation of his own into Trump during the campaign.
Shearer’s dossier contains some allegations similar to Steele’s report, including that Russians had blackmail material on Trump. Shearer passed his report to Winer through Sidney Blumenthal, another longtime Clinton insider. Winer then shared the Shearer memos with Steele, who provided them to the FBI.” (Read more: The Daily Caller, 12/11/2018)
Below is a list of the first 12 of the Dossier reports that have become available to the public.
1) Report 80, dated June 20, 2016
2) Report 86, dated July 26, 2015 (twenty-fifteen)
3) Report 94, dated July 19, 2016
4) Report 95, undated, but apparently written in late July 2016
5) Report 97, dated July 30, 2016
6) Report 100, dated August 5, 2016
7) Report 101, dated August 10, 2016
8) Report 102, dated August 10, 2016
9) Report 105, dated August 22, 2016
10) Report 111, dated September 14, 2016
11) Report 112, dated September 14, 2016
12) Report 113, dated September 14, 2016
According to the Horowitz report, the first time when FBI Headquarters received any of those Dossier reports was on September 19, 2016. That delivery comprised just six Dossier reports — 80, 94, 95, 100, 101, and 102 (Horowitz page 100). On that date, therefore, the series included a particular four-report gap — Reports 96, 97, 98 and 99. On some later, unknown date, Report 97 too was delivered to FBI Headquarters.
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In this blog, I have speculated that all these 12 reports (except Reports 80 and 86) were delivered unofficially to the FBI Counterintelligence Chief promptly after their publication dates. For example, Report 94 was delivered to that Chief within a few days of its publication date — July 19 — but its delivery was not recorded according to FBI procedures. Report 94 was delivered officially — recorded according to FBI procedures — on September 19. On that official delivery date, however, the Counterintelligence Chief already had possessed the report unofficially since mid-July.
The reason for the abnormal delivery of Dossier reports was to enable the FBI to deny its knowledge of some of the reports.
For example, Steele finished writing Report 94 (and assigned that number to the report) on July 19. Within a few days, that report was delivered to the Counterintelligence Chief, but that delivery was not recorded according to FBI procedures.
By a different delivery method, Report 94 was delivered on July 28 to the Chief Division Counsel FBI New York Field Office (NYFO) — not to FBI Headquarters. This delivery to the NYFO was recorded according to FBI procedures. On July 28, therefore, the FBI could no longer deny that the FBI — in particular, the FBI NYFO — had received Report 94, but it still could deny that FBI Headquarters had received it. (When the NYFO received any Dossier reports, the NYFO simply hid them in a safe until further instructions were received from from FBI Headquarters.)
Later, in mid-September, someone decided that the current situation allowed Report 94 to be delivered officially to FBI Headquarters. This belated delivery was recorded in accordance with FBI procedures on September 19. From this latter date forward, FBI headquarters would have to acknowledge that it had been informed about Report 94.
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The delivery of Report 97 was different. Like Report 94, it was delivered to the Counter-intelligence Chief promptly and unofficially. However, Report 97 was not delivered to the NYFO. Therefore, the FBI created no record at all that Report 97 had been delivered to any FBI office at all. Officially, Report 97 was delivered to the FBI the first time on September 19. Until that latter date, the FBI avoided creating any record indicating any FBI knowledge of the existence of Report 97.
I speculated in a previous blog article that the FBI might be more embarrassed by Report 97 (than, for example, by Report 94), because Report 97 indicated that Christopher Steele was obtaining information from sources with inside knowledge about Trump’s election-campaign staff. In particular, Report 97 claimed to be based partially on reports from “a Russian émigré figure close to the Republican US presidential candidate Donald Trump’s campaign team”. That phrase — which eventually might cause the public to suspect that the FBI was collecting information from inside Trump’s campaign staff — might have caused the decision in July 2016 to not send Report 97 to the NYFO.
By mid-September, however, the situation had changed. Now the FBI Headquarters was trying to overcome objections to its application for a FISA warrant in order to collect information about Trump’s supporters. Therefore, FBI Headquarters now had to receive officially some Dossier reports. In particular, Reports 97 now seemed to FBI Headquarters to be more useful than problematical. After all, the Russian émigré reported the following (emphasis added):
Speaking in confidence to a trusted associate in late July 2016, a Russian émigré figure close to the Republican US presidential candidate Donald TRUMP’s campaign team commented on the fallout from publicity surrounding the Democratic National Committee (DNC) e-mail hacking scandal. The émigré said there was a high level of anxiety within the TRUMP team as a result of various accusations levelled [sic] against them and indications from the Kremlin that President PUTIN and others in the leadership thought things had gone too far now and risked spiralling [sic]out of control.
Continuing on this theme, the émigré associate of TRUMP opined that the Kremlin wanted the situation to calm but for ‘plausible deniability’ to be maintained concerning its (extensive) pro-TRUMP and anti-CLINTON operations. S/he therefore judged that it was unlikely these would be ratcheted up, at least for the time being.
However, in terms of established operational liaison between the TRUMP team and the Kremlin, the émigré confirmed that an intelligence exchange had been running between them for at least 8 years. Within this context PUTIN’s priority requirement had been for intelligence on the activities, business and otherwise, in the US of leading Russian oligarchs and their families. TRUMP and his associates duly had obtained and supplied the Kremlin with this information.
Finally, the émigré said s/he understood the Kremlin had more intelligence on CLINTON and her campaign but he did not know the details or when or if it would be released. As far as ‘kompromat’ (compromising information) on TRUMP were concerned, although there was plenty of this, he understood the Kremlin had given its word that it would not be deployed against the Republican presidential candidate given how helpful and co-operative his team had been over several years, and particularly of late.
In mid-September, FBI Headquarters foresaw a need to use this information in order to obtain a FISA warrant. Therefore, FBI Headquarters belatedly arranged for Report 97 to be received in accordance with FBI procedures. Keep in mind, though, that the Counterintelligence Chief actually had received Report 97 already in July.” (Read more: Mike Sylvester, 10/10/2021)(Archive)(Copy of dossier saved to this website)
A new John Solomon article today, based on an interview with Russian billionaire Oleg Deripaska, is essentially confirming a May 2018article where it was presumed that Oleg had hired Christopher Steele at the same time Steele was working with Nellie Ohr and Fusion GPS to write the Trump dossier. Here’s the interview:
The report on the FBI contacting Oleg Deripaska in September 2016 for help to structure a narrative of Russian involvement in the Trump Campaign via Paul Manafort has some ramifications.
♦In 2009 the FBI, then headed by Robert Mueller, requested the assistance of Russian billionaire Oleg Deripaska in an operation to retrieve former FBI officer and CIA resource Robert Levinson who was captured in Iran two years earlier. The agent assigned to engage Deripaska was Andrew McCabe; the primary FBI need was financing and operational support. Deripaska spent around $25 million and would have succeeded except the U.S. State Department, then headed by Hillary Clinton, backed out.
♦In September of 2016 Andrew McCabe is now Deputy Director of the FBI, when two FBI agents approached Deripaska in New York – again asking for his help. This time the FBI request was for Deripaska to outline Trump’s former campaign manager Paul Manafort as a tool of the Kremlin. Deripaska once hired Manafort as a political adviser and invested money with him in a business venture that went bad. Deripaska sued Manafort, alleging he stole money. However, according to the 2018article, despite Deripaska’s disposition toward Manafort he viewed the request as absurd. He laughed the FBI away, telling them: “You are trying to create something out of nothing.”
Was the DOJ/FBI trying to use Deripaska to frame candidate Donald Trump? Was this part of their 2016 insurance policy?
John Solomon reports that Deripaska wanted to testify to congress in 2017, without any immunity request, but was rebuked. Who blocked his testimony?
(…) Did Robert Mueller omit any mention of Oleg Deripaska from his 2017 Manafort indictment purposefully? Was Deripaska’s denial of any information about Manafort actually Brady material that Mueller and Weissmann intentionally kept from Manafort’s defense team? And/or was Robert Mueller hoping to hide his prior professional work relationship with Deripaska?” (Read more: Conservative Treehouse, 7/02/2019)
Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama (Credit: public domain)
While Clinton was secretary of state, she exchanged 18 emails with President Obama from her private email account. All information about these emails has remained classified. But some details are finally released due to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit by Vice News.
All of the emails were exchanged between May 18, 2012 and January 31, 2013. Obama sent eight emails to Clinton, and the other ten were from Clinton to Obama. None of the emails appear to contain highly sensitive or classified information, but instead are thank you notes, holiday greetings, and the like.
All of the emails were withheld under presidential privilege and privacy act and deliberative process exemptions to the FOIA. The new details are formally submitted in what is called a Vaughn Index, a document prepared for FOIA lawsuits in which government departments justify the withholding of information. (Vice News, 09/15/16) (Vicc News, 09/15/16)
In February 2016, it was reported there were 19 emails between Clinton and Obama, not 18. It is unclear if the Vaughn Index is missing one or if the report of 19 emails was off by one.
A Wall Street Journal editorial entitled “The FBI’s Blind Clinton Trust” elicits a September 15, 2016 letter to the editor response from Richard W. Beckler, former Chief of the Criminal Fraud Section of the U.S. Department of Justice.
Richard Beckler (Credit: Bracewell Law)
Beckler writes, “Decisions to prosecute are made by the Justice Department. It is absolutely not the job of the FBI to make prosecutorial decisions. FBI Director James Comey didn’t bother to attend Hillary Clinton’s interview, though he was acting as the ostensible decision maker in the case. One would think he would want to test the witness’s credibility in person. This was clearly no ordinary case and demanded his close attention.”
Furthermore, despite what Comey says, “the FBI doesn’t need to get a referral from Congress to investigate [Clinton’s] false statements to Congress.” He claims, “the FBI’s 302 reports (handwritten notes by FBI agents during investigations) recorded by the FBI should have been turned over to Congress immediately and in their entirety.”
Beckler continues, “Contrary to the [Justice Department]’s normal policy of announcing names of the prosecution team, Mr. Comey hasn’t told anyone who the ‘career’ [Justice Department] attorneys were who supervised the FBI investigation. They have never been named.”
He concludes, “After this long drawn-out FBI inquiry, why did Mr. Comey rush to make his determination and recommendation barely three days after the actual interview took place?” (Wall Street Journal, 09/15/16)
On September 16, 2016, Twitter user Katica@GOPpollanalyst sends a message to Jeffrey Marty via his Twitter page which is a parody account for a fictitious congressional member named Rep. Steven Smith@RepStevenSmith. Katica had recently discovered posts to the Internet forum Reddit by someone using the name “stonetear,” and had deduced through various clues that this person actually is Paul Combetta, the Platte River Networks (PRN) employee who has managed Clinton’s private server since June 2013.
Katica then sends Marty a copy of stonetear’s Reddit post that was written on July 24, 2014, and includes a request for advice about “stripping out” the email address of a “VERY VIP” email account.
A photo of stonetear’s request for help on July 24, 2016, found by Katica and later archived by Redditors. (Credit: Katica / Twitter)
Marty replies, “NO WAY!!!!! That’s HUGE.”
Jeffrey Marty (Credit: Daily Caller)
Marty will later explain in a news article, “After a lot of discussion about the potential fallout of this decision, Katica and I decided the ‘stonetear’ information had to be released. Late Sunday night [September 18, 2016], we tweeted the (then-live) short link to the Reddit ‘VERY VIP’ post and four screenshots to Katica’s 2,000 followers, followed by an immediate re-tweet of her post to my 16,000 followers.”
Many interested people then begin finding and archiving all of Combetta’s Reddit posts, as well as other traces he’d left on the Internet using the “stonetear” alias. In the process, more evidence is found that “stonetear” and Paul Combetta are one and the same.
Within hours after the story breaking in various media outlets, including US News and World Report, “stonetear” is caught deleting all of his Reddit posts. The deletions are captured on video as they happen and are posted to YouTube. By September 20, 2016, a Congressional committee demands Combetta submit to recorded interviews by September 23, 2016 to explain these Reddit posts, as well as the deletions, or he will face another subpoena. (Daily Caller, 09/22/16)
Victoria Nuland and Jonathan Winer (Credit: public domain)
“Judicial Watch and The Daily Caller News Foundation today released 84 pages of documents, including a September 2016 email exchange between then-Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland and Special Coordinator for Libya Jonathan Winer, a close associate of dossier author Christopher Steele, discussing a “face-to-face” meeting on a “Russian matter.”
(In June 2016 Nuland permitted a meeting between Steele and the FBI’s legal attaché in Rome. Nuland told CBS News that the State Department knew about the Steele dossier by July 2016.)
According to an op-ed Winer wrote for The Washington Post in 2018, also in September 2016, “Steele and I met in Washington and discussed the information now known as the “dossier… I prepared a two-page summary and shared it with Nuland, who indicated that, like me, she felt that the secretary of state needed to be made aware of this material.”
A September 17, 2016, email exchange between Nuland and Winer – that was classified in the interest of national defense or foreign policy – discusses the political situation in Libya, but also brings up a “Russian matter:”
From: Nuland, Victoria J Sent: Saturday, September 17, 2016 1:31 PM To: Winer, Jonathan Subject: Re. Libya Update
In ny face to face?
From: Winer, Jonathan Sent: September 17, 2016 at 1:56:05 PM EDT To: Nuland, Victoria J Subject: Re: Libya Update
Yes that was [sic] be good.
From: Nuland, Victoria J Sent: Saturday, September 17, 2016 1:58 PM To: Winer, Jonathan Subject: Re. Libya Update
Good. I’ll reach out when im there Sunday. [Redacted]
Other emails show senior State Department personnel using unsecure BlackBerrys to transmit classified information even after the Clinton email scandal became public.” (Read more: Judicial Watch 7/18/2019)
Michael Sussmann (l) and James Baker (Credit: Perkins Coie/public domain)
“On September 19, 2016, DNC/Clinton Campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann met with FBI General Counsel James Baker, where Baker was provided with data and “white paper” purporting to show covert communications (since proven to be bogus) between Russian Alfa Bank and the Trump Organization.
Special Counsel John Durham has just provided evidence that the night before – on September 18, 2016 – Sussmann sent Baker this text:
As it turns out, Sussmann was billing the Clinton Campaign for his work on the Alfa Bank hoax. This text from Sussmann to Baker is damning for Sussmann’s case, proving Sussmann’s efforts at deceiving a top official at the FBI about his clients, and demonstrating how Sussmann tried to convince Baker he was there to supposedly do the right thing. (Read more: Techno Fog/Substack, 4/05/2022) (Archive)
A photo captured of Combetta deleting his posts on Reddit, as it was happening. (Credit: updatedblubber)
YouTube member “updatedblubber” posts a video claiming it is a live recording of Platte River Networks (PRN) employee Paul Combetta deleting ‘stonetear’s posts on Reddit. The deletion occurs in the morning of September 19, 2016, within hours after news that the Reddit posts of “stonetear” really belong to Combetta break into the mainstream.
Later on the same day, Representative Lamar Smith (R), chairman of the House Science, Space and Technology Committee, writes a letter to PRN attorney Ken Eichner, expressing his concern about the deletion of the Reddit posts. Smith adds, “Given these concerns, the committee requests that you provide dates for the prioritized interview requests, as well as dates for the remaining Platte River Networks employees, by noon on Friday, September 23, 2016. If you fail to provide dates certain for each of the transcribed interviews, the committee will consider issuing subpoenas for depositions.” (YouTube, 09/19/16) (Representative Lamar Smith, 09/19/16)
In the hours following the discovery of the “stonetear” Reddit account, internet sleuths discover the following reasons “stonetear” is an online alias for PRN employee Paul Combetta:
1. On July 24, 2014 ‘stonetear’ posted a request for help on Reddit, asking for help stripping the email address from a VIP’s (VERY VIP) client’s archived emails. The day before, Clinton’s lawyers sent some of Clinton’s emails so they could begin sorting them.
2. On December 10, 2014, ‘stonetear’ asked for advice from Reddit users on how to implement a 60-day email “purge” policy. It is also reportedly near the same time that Clinton told her lawyer Cheryl Mills she didn’t need her “personal” emails, resulting in Mills telling those managing Clinton’s server to delete them.
Another sample captured of Combetta as ‘stonetear’ asking Reddit users for help. (Credit: Reddit)
3. The inactive website combetta.com is registered to the email address stonetear@gmail.com in a search of domain registration information using the service whois.com.
4. This Facebook photo is captioned by a friend of Combetta and refers to him as “Stone Tear.”
Paul Combetta is referred to as “Stonetear” by a friend in this FB photo. (Credit: Facebook)
5. An account for a person named Paul Combetta on the web bazaar Etsy also has the username ‘stonetear.’
6. Platte River Networks (PRN) has stated Combetta is their only employee who lives in Rhode Island. ‘Stonetear’ claims to live in Rhode Island in his posts on Reddit.
7. A website publicizing a help file for the video game Betrayal at Krondor thanks Combetta and shows his email address is stonetear@gmail.com
A photo capture from the website Krondor, thanking Combetta for his help with an internet game and includes stonetear@gmail.com as his email address. (Credit: public domain)
8. Moreover, Stonetear@gmail.com has a Google Account profile picture that looks like Combetta.
A captured shot of Combetta’s ‘stonetear’ Gmail account with photo included. (Credit: public domain)
FBI Director James Comey will later confirm that Paul Combetta is “stonetear” in his testimony to the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee on September 28, 2016. (CSpan 01:27:39, 09/28/2016)
US District Court Judge Richard Leon criticizes the State Department over what he calls “foot-dragging” regarding Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests relating to Clinton’s tenure as secretary of state.
US DC District Court Judge Richard Leon (Credit: public domain)
Leon warns Justice Department lawyers, “You have a client that, to say the least, is not impressing the judges on this court, myself included. … It is in your client’s interest to start being more obviously cooperative. The State Department is at risk of being perceived as obstreperous. [They] need to get with the program.”
The hearing is due to a FOIA lawsuit trying to force the release of documents on whether Clinton and her aides were trained to handle classified information. The State Department propose a deadline of October 17, 2016 to produce about 450 unclassified documents relating to the issue sought by the Daily Caller.
However, Leon orders the department to process and release of the records by October 10, 2016. (Politico, 09/19/16)
Representative Mark Meadows (Credit: public domain)
Representative Mark Meadows (R) of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee is reviewing a Reddit post that suggests an IT (Internet technology) specialist who worked on Hillary Clinton’s private server asked for advice on how to alter the contents of “VERY VIP” emails. Meadows is the chairman of the panel’s Government Operations subcommittee.
Reddit users uncovered a two-year-old post from an account they believe belongs to Paul Combetta, a Platte River Networks employee who helped manage Clinton’s private server. Meadows says, “the Reddit post issue and its connection to Paul Combetta is currently being reviewed by [my] staff and evaluations are being made as to the authenticity of the post. If it is determined that the request to change email addresses was made by someone so closely aligned with the Secretary’s IT operation as Mr. Combetta, then it will certainly prompt additional inquiry.”
Representative Jason Chaffetz (R), chair of the same House committee, has issued a criminal referral to the US attorney for the District of Columbia. The referral asks that the Justice Department investigate whether Clinton or her aides were involved in the decision to delete the emails while they were under subpoena and a request for preservation of records. (The Hill, 09/19/16)
“Former FBI General Counsel James Baker met with the Democratic party’s top lawyer, Michael Sussmann, to discuss the ongoing investigation by the bureau into the Trump campaign’s alleged ties with Russia. This meeting happened prior to the FBI’s initial warrant to spy on short-term campaign volunteer Carter Page, sources close to the investigation have told SaraACarter.com. Moreover, information provided by Baker, who gave extensive testimony Wednesday to lawmakers behind closed doors, coincides with the House Intelligence Committee’s final Russia report that suggests Sussmann was also leaking unverified information on the Trump campaign to journalists around the same time he met with Baker, according to the report and sources close the investigation.
These sources say this new information from Baker exposes the bureau’s failure to inform the secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) that the evidence used to spy on Page was partisan and unverified. It further reveals the extensive role and close connection Sussmann, a cybersecurity and national security lawyer with Perkins Coie, had with the now-embattled research firm, Fusion GPS. The Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton Campaign retained Fusion GPS through Perkins Coie during the 2016 election to investigate alleged ties between the Trump campaign and Russia. Fusion GPS then hired former British spy, Christopher Steele, who compiled the unverified dossier during the summer and fall of 2016. In 2017, this reporter first published that Baker was purportedly under a Department of Justice criminal investigation for allegedly leaking classified national security information to the media. At the time, the bureau would not comment on Baker and would not confirm or deny any investigation. Baker, who resigned from the bureau in May, was the FBI’s top counsel and a close advisor to former Director James Comey.
James Baker (Credit: CSpan2)
In 2016, the Clinton campaign and the DNC paid $9.1 million to the law firm, according to reports. Sussmann, however, is also connected to CrowdStrike. CrowdStrike is the private cybersecurity that was retained by Perkins Coie for the DNC to investigate the breach of its server after it was discovered that it had been hacked in April 2016. Although the FBI has conducted its own investigation into the breach of the server the Democratic National Committee never gave the FBI permission to access the server itself.
“These parallels between the law firm and CrowdStrike also need to be investigated,” said a former FBI official familiar with the security firm. “All of these connections aren’t coincidences and it smells to high heaven.”
According to lawmakers, he explained in detail how the Russia probe was handled by bureau officials in an “abnormal way” and detailed his meeting with Sussmann. Fox Newsfirst reported Baker’s testimony quoting Rep. Mark Meadows (R-NC) who said, “some of the things that were shared were explosive in nature.” Meadows, who attended the deposition of Baker, told SaraACarter.com he would not elaborate on the specifics of the interview, but said, “Mr. Baker’s testimony provided a number of new facts that needed further exploration.” Meadows expects more information in the future and follow-up interviews.
Baker was forthcoming about what he knew and what took place during the investigation, multiple sources said. The information regarding the meeting between Baker and Sussmann would indicate that the FBI was more than likely aware that the law firm was hired by the DNC to investigate alleged connections between the Trump campaign and Russia, but withheld that information from the secret FISC when it sought the warrant to spy on short-term campaign volunteer Page in October.” (Read more: Sara Carter, 10/03/2018)
Jeff Carlson of themarketswork.com pinpoints the possible date of Sussman and Baker’s meeting in the footnotes of a House Intelligence Committee report, to September 2016.
“In the House Intelligence Committee’s final Report on Russian Active Measures, mention is made of a meeting between James Baker and an unknown party in footnote 43, on page 57. This is a particularly heavily redacted portion but the following details are available:
“In September 2016 [redacted] shared similar information in a one-on-one meeting with FBI General Counsel James Baker. HPSCI, Executive Session of [redacted], Dec. 18, 2017. Around the same time as his meeting with FBI, [redacted] shared the information with journalists, [redacted] of Slate, who published an article at the end of October. HPSCI, Executive Session of [redacted] Dec. 18, 2017; [redacted] “Was a Trump Server Communicating With Russia?,” Slate, Oct. 31, 2016. Candidate Clinton promoted the [redacted] article to her social media followers the same day it was published.” (Intelligence.house (pdf)
“On Sept. 19, FBI General Counsel James Baker met with Perkins Coie partner Michael Sussmann, who had sought out the meeting. Baker told Congressional lawmakers in an Oct. 3, 2018, testimony—a transcript of which was reviewed for this article—that Sussmann presented him with “a stack of material I don’t know maybe a quarter inch half inch thick something like that clipped together, and then I believe there was some type of electronic media, as well, a disk or something.”
The information that Sussmann gave to Baker was related to what Baker described as “a surreptitious channel of communications” between the Trump Organization and “a Russian organization associated with the Russian Government.”
Baker was describing alleged communications between Alfa Bank and a server in the Trump Tower. These allegations, which were investigated by the FBI and proven to be false, were widely covered in the media.
Baker’s testimony also shows that Sussmann was speaking with the media at the same time he had approached Baker, who noted that Sussmann had also provided the info to the media and had told him that “the New York Times was aware of this.”
Baker testified that the FBI approached The New York Times and convinced them to hold off on their reporting while the FBI investigated Sussmann’s information.” (Read more: Epoch Times, 1/24/2019)
“One of the co-founders of the opposition research firm that commissioned the Steele dossier was in contact with a State Department official in the days before a news article was published laying out allegations contained in the salacious anti-Trump report.
Emails obtained by The Daily Caller News Foundation show that Glenn Simpson, an executive at Fusion GPS, contacted Jonathan Winer, who then served as State’s special envoy for Libya, on Sept. 19 and Sept. 22, 2016. That was days ahead of the publication of a Yahoo! Newsarticle that was the first story to cite information gathered by Christopher Steele, the former British spy who authored the dossier.
Winer, a longtime aide to former Secretary of State John Kerry, was a source for that article, which laid out Steele’s allegations about Carter Page, a former Trump campaign adviser who would become the target of FBI surveillance.
The emails, which were obtained through a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed on TheDCNF’s behalf by Judicial Watch, show for the first time that Simpson had direct contact with a State Department official.
The emails do not mention the dossier or Steele, but they do show that Simpson was desperate to speak with Winer, a Democratic attorney who also served in the State Department during the Clinton administration.
Simpson, a former Wall Street Journal reporter, sent an email on Sept. 19, 2016 asking Winer if he was in town.
Former assistant secretary of state Victoria Nuland speaks during a news conference in Kiev, Ukraine, April 27, 2016. (Credit: Valentyn Ogirenko/Reuters)
(…) Congressional investigators have looked into Winer and the State Department’s role in handling the Steele information and other intelligence used in the FBI investigation of the Trump campaign. Republicans have long been puzzled over information that flowed through Foggy Bottom prior to making its way to FBI investigators.
Victoria Nuland, who served as assistant secretary of state for European and Eurasian Affairs, approved a July 5, 2016, meeting between FBI Agent Michael Gaeta and Steele in Rome. Fusion GPS had hired Steele just weeks earlier to investigate President Donald Trump’s possible ties to Russia. The ex-MI6 officer wrote his first of 17 dossier memos on June 20, 2016. That document alleged that the Kremlin had blackmail material on Trump. (Read more: The Daily Caller, 3/04/2019)
Representative Lamar Smith (R), chair of the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, issues a subpoena to FBI Director James Comey for documents and information related to the security of former Clinton’s private email account and server. The committee requested these documents in a September 9, 2016 letter. Comey has yet to turn over any of the requested documents. The subpoena orders him to provide the documents by September 26, 2016.
Smith’s committee has jurisdiction to evaluate the “way in which Executive Branch departments and agencies and private entities can improve their cybersecurity.” (US Congress, 9/20/2016)
The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee holds a classified hearing with Peter Kadzik, the Justice Department’s assistant attorney general for legislative affairs, to discuss document requests. Although the hearing is held behind closed doors, Politico will report on what takes place several days later.
Peter Kadzik (Credit: Molly Riley / The Associated Press)
Republicans believe the hearing is necessary because their request for a completely unredacted copy of the FBI’s Clinton investigation report has gone unanswered. They also have questions about the immunity deals the department handed out during the Clinton email investigation, and want to know who else besides Bryan Pagliano and Paul Combetta (both managers of Clinton’s private servers) received legal protection, who agreed to the immunity deals, and whether the deals require recipients to cooperate with other investigative bodies.
Politico writes, “Kadzik wouldn’t say. A Democratic source said he could not answer the questions because Republicans had only asked for the information a few hours earlier in a letter to the Justice Department, and the answers weren’t fully researched.”
Kadzik’s refusal to answer their questions doesn’t go over well with Republicans, and according to one Republican source, “the meeting deteriorate[s] from there.” Another Republican threatens a public hearing where Kadzik would have to testify if he fails to provide the information requested, and in effect dares him to say that “Congress [isn’t] entitled to it.”
The Justice Department will deliver the unredacted copies of the immunity agreements for Pagliano and Combetta on September 22, 2016, and the immunity agreements for former State Department officials Cheryl Mills, Heather Samuelson, and John Bentel will be provided the following day. (Politico, 09/23/2016)
Imran Awan (Credit: Bonnie Jo Mount/Washington Post)
“The Department of Justice found “no evidence” that former Democratic IT aide Imran Awan violated cybersecurity laws, prosecutors said Thursday, but the House of Representatives’ internal watchdog reported that the Pakistani native made “unauthorized access” to congressional servers.
Prosecutors said police interviewed approximately 40 witnesses, reviewed relevant communications and examined a number of related devices, but couldn’t find anything they could charge Imran with regarding cybersecurity. Details of the investigation were included in a plea deal with Imran surrounding unrelated bank fraud.
But a pair of presentations by House Inspector General Theresa Grafenstine detail a number of rules Imran and his family allegedly broke surrounding cybersecurity rules. The watchdog is a past chair of ISACA, an international IT association.
Grafenstine found that Imran made “unauthorized access” to congressional servers in a way that suggested he was trying to “conceal” his activity and that his unusual activity suggested a server could be used for “nefarious purposes.”
A source allowed The Daily Caller News Foundation to review and transcribe the IG’s PowerPoint presentation, but was not given a copy for fear that metadata could reveal the source’s identity.
Bryan Pagliano, who managed Clinton’s server when she was secretary of state, recently was served a subpoena to testify before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. But instead of pleading the Fifth, as two others did, he failed to appear altogether. The committee holds another hearing on this day, and he fails to appear again. As a result, the committee immediately votes on party lines, 19 to 15, to recommend that the House of Representatives hold him in contempt of Congress.
Representative Jason Chaffetz (R), chair of the committee, says, “Subpoenas are not optional. Mr. Pagliano is a crucial fact witness in this committee’s investigation of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s use of a private server to conduct government business.”
After a required two day wait time, the resolution can be voted on by the entire House to be adopted.
Democrats on the committee argue repeatedly that the move is a politically motivated abuse of power meant to influence the November 2016 presidential election.
A letter by Pagliano’s lawyer Mark McDougall to the committee similarly claims that efforts to force Pagliano to testify show a “naked political agenda” with “no valid legislative aim.” McDougall says Pagliano is ready to appear behind closed doors, but will not appear in public. (The Hill, 9/22/2016) (Politico, 9/22/2016)
Researcher, @MonsieursGhost, raises some very interesting points about when Peter Strzok and Lisa Page could clearly see Alfa Bank, Carter Page, and the dossier unfold into a Steele “influence” operation that was coordinating with the Clinton campaign.
Something has always bothered me about FBI’s treatment of Alfa-Fraud. Here is a short thread (developing) on irregularities and weirdness:
1) Horowitz reports FBI receives Alfa-related memo 112 on 11/6. Where does he get this date? FBI internal memo says it received 10/26… pic.twitter.com/0JJyBDEVKG
On same day Strzok learns Sussman AlfaBank info is
dodgy, @Isikoff story about @carterwpage breaks.
Small Team *knows* source is Steele, causing @petestrzok to admit that Dossier is an “influence” operation (!!) …”as well as” something that might have information value .😬 pic.twitter.com/QTftOJLAwV
“The FBI, Justice Department and a federal surveillance court were all apparently unaware that the Sept. 23, 2016article, written by Michael Isikoff, was based on the infamous and unverified Steele dossier. Numerous reporters, pundits and even a former CIA Moscow station chief have also been fooled into thinking that Isikoff’s article corroborated parts of the dossier.
The confusion is due in part to Isikoff’s report, which was published at Yahoo! News.
A veteran reporter who has worked inside the Beltway for decades, Isikoff used vague sourcing in his Carter Page article. He also failed to disclose that his information was the fruit of an anti-Trump opposition research campaign funded by Democrats.
He also did not acknowledge that his source — former British spy Christopher Steele — had already given the FBI the information he used in the article.”
(…) “Isikoff met Steele in September 2016 at a Washington, D.C. hotel. The pair were introduced by Glenn Simpson, the founder of Fusion GPS and an “old friend” of Isikoff. The opposition research firm had been hired by the Clinton campaign and DNC to investigate Donald Trump. Fusion hired Steele to look into Trump’s ties to Russia.”
(…) “He did not disclose that Steele, his source, had provided information about Page to the FBI, sparking the very same investigation that Isikoff would confirm in his reporting. Steele began sharing information with the Bureau in July 2016. He provided updates on his findings through the summer and into Fall 2016.
And instead of referring to Steele as a private investigator, which he was, Isikoff described Steele as the more official sounding “well-placed Western intelligence source.”
Isikoff also withheld Steele and Simpson’s political affiliations even though he acknowledged on Friday that he was aware that the pair were working for Democrats. Isikoff did say that he was unaware that Simpson was working for the Clinton campaign and DNC.” (Read more: The Daily Caller, 2/05/2018)
Clinton’s personal lawyer David Kendall sends a letter to House Science, Space and Technology Committee chair Representative Lamar Smith (R), complaining about a recent Congressional subpoena to the computer company SECNAP, Inc., which assisted with the security of Clinton’s private server from 2013 onwards.
David Kendall (Credit: Williams & Connolly)
Kendall writes, “The subpoena … is overbroad. We have no objection to the production of documents related to the SECNAP security device used in connection with the server that … hosted Secretary Clinton’s emails from her tenure as secretary …. We do object, however, to the production of SECNAP documents and security information regarding security equipment that was used by CESC [Clinton Executive Security Corp.] after the prior server was provided to the FBI, and thus, never hosted Secretary Clinton’s work-related emails.”
Kendall continues, “Documents regarding this equipment are likely to contain sensitive information related to security of the current network and/or server. Because these documents are unrelated to the Committee’s investigation and contain sensitive security information, I respectfully object to the portion of the subpoena seeking their production.”
Because SECNAP was hired by CESC, a Clinton family company, they want approval from Clinton’s lawyers regarding cooperation with government authorities. (Politico, 09/23/16)
“U.S. intelligence officials are seeking to determine whether an American businessman identified by Donald Trump as one of his foreign policy advisers has opened up private communications with senior Russian officials — including talks about the possible lifting of economic sanctions if the Republican nominee becomes president, according to multiple sources who have been briefed on the issue.
The activities of Trump adviser Carter Page, who has extensive business interests in Russia, have been discussed with senior members of Congress during recent briefings about suspected efforts by Moscow to influence the presidential election, the sources said. After one of those briefings, Senate minority leader Harry Reid wrote FBI Director James Comey, citing reports of meetings between a Trump adviser (a reference to Page) and “high ranking sanctioned individuals” in Moscow over the summer as evidence of “significant and disturbing ties” between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin that needed to be investigated by the bureau.
Some of those briefed were “taken aback” when they learned about Page’s contacts in Moscow, viewing them as a possible back channel to the Russians that could undercut U.S. foreign policy, said a congressional source familiar with the briefings but who asked for anonymity due to the sensitivity of the subject. The source added that U.S. officials in the briefings indicated that intelligence reports about the adviser’s talks with senior Russian officials close to President Vladimir Putin were being “actively monitored and investigated.”
A senior U.S. law enforcement official did not dispute that characterization when asked for comment by Yahoo News. “It’s on our radar screen,” said the official about Page’s contacts with Russian officials. “It’s being looked at.” (Read more: Yahoo News, 9/23/2016)
US District Judge James Boasberg (Credit: public domain)
US District Judge James Boasberg orders the State Department to finish publicly releasing about 1,000 pages of Clinton’s emails recovered by the FBI by November 4, 2016, just four days before the US presidential election. When Clinton turned over 55,000 pages of emails in December 2014, that totaled 30,000 emails, so if the same ratio holds, that would mean between 500 and 600 emails. Due to an on-going Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit by Judicial Watch, the State Department will release 350 pages of emails by October 7, 350 pages by October 21, and another 350 by November 4. After that, it will produce 500 pages a month.
In late July 2016, the FBI gave the State Department 15,000 emails that had been recovered by the FBI out of Clinton’s 31,000 deleted. For the first time, it is revealed that about 9,400 of these have been deemed purely personal by the department, which means they will not ever be publicly released. That means there are about 5,600 work-related emails to be reviewed and released. But roughly half of those may be largely duplicates of emails that have already been released. For instance, Clinton was often send emails to aides she wanted printed out for later reading, and would merely comment “Please print,” or she would forward an email to an aide without comment.
It is estimated only about 10 percent of the Clinton work-related emails recovered by the FBI will be made public before the election. Tom Fitton, president of Judicial Watch, complains, “The public deserves to know what is in those emails, well before November 8, and the State Department should not continue dragging its feet on producing them.” (The New York Times, 9/23/2016)
Representative Jason Chaffetz (R), chair of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, claims the Justice Department was “handing out immunity deals like candy” in the Clinton email investigation. Chaffetz claims the Justice Department “exempted key physical evidence from any potential criminal case against the aides.”
According to Chaffetz, three former Clinton aides – Cheryl Mills, Heather Samuelson, and John Bentel – were granted immunity deals in exchange for their cooperation. Mills was Clinton’s chief of staff and then has been one of her lawyers Samuelson was a State Department aide and then also has been a Clinton lawyer. Bentel was director of the department’s Office of Information Resources Management (IRM).
The Justice Department provided copies of the immunity agreements to the House Oversight Committee this week, under seal. The information was then leaked to the Associated Press.
Mills “gave federal investigators access to her laptop on the condition that what they found couldn’t be used against her.” It is believed the same happened to Samuelson. Bentel apparently refused to be interviewed by the FBI until he got an immunity deal.
This brings the total number of people who were granted immunity as part of the FBI’s investigation to at least five. It has previously been reported that Bryan Pagliano and Paul Combetta were given immunity for their cooperation with the FBI. (The Associated Press, 09/23/16)
“Less than a week after Stefan Halper was outed as the FBI informant who infiltrated the Trump campaign, public records reveal that the 73-year-old Oxford University professor and former U.S. government official was paid handsomely by the Obama administration starting in 2012 for various research projects.
A longtime CIA and FBI asset who once reportedly ran a spy-operation on the Jimmy Carter administration, Halper was enlisted by the FBI to spy on several Trump campaign aides during the 2016 U.S. election. Meanwhile, a search of public records reveals that between 2012 and 2018, Halper received a total of $1,058,161 from the Department of Defense.
Halper’s contracts were funded through four annual awards paid directly out of the Pentagon’s Office of Net Assessment (ONA). Established as the DoD’s “internal think tank” in 1973 by Richard Nixon (whose administration Halper worked for), the ONA was run by foreign policy strategist Andrew Marshall from its inception until his 2015 retirement at the age of 93, after which he was succeeded by current director James H. Baker.
Halper’s most recent award was noted recently by Trump supporter Jacob Wohl, which piqued the interest of internet researchers who continued the analysis.
According to the Website USASPENDING.gov, the payments to Halper are for “RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT IN THE SOCIAL SCIENCES AND HUMANITIES (2012),” “RESEARCH AND STUDIES – THE YEAR 2030, (2014)”, “RUSSIA-CHINA RELATIONSHIP STUDY. (2015),” and “INDIA AND CHINA ECON STUDY (2016).”
The most recent award to Halper for $411,575 was made in two payments, and had a start date of September 26, 2016 – three days after a September 23Yahoo! News article by Michael Isikoff about Trump aide Carter Page, which used information fed to Isikoff by “pissgate” dossier creator Christopher Steele. The FBI would use the Yahoo! article along with the unverified “pissgate” dossier as supporting evidence in a FISA warrant application for Page.” (Read more: Zero Hedge, 5/21/2019)
“A Trump-supporting Pentagon analyst was stripped of his security clearance by Obama-appointed officials after he complained of questionable government contracts to Stefan Halper, the FBI informant who spied on the Trump presidential campaign.
Adam Lovinger, a 12-year strategist in the Pentagon’s Office of Net Assessment, complained to his bosses about Halper contracts in the fall of 2016, his attorney, Sean M. Bigley, told The Washington Times.”
“Daniel Silverberg, then-House Democratic Whip Steny Hoyer’s national security adviser, coordinated “work on Russia dossier materials provided by Christopher Steele” with Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland and Special Envoy for Libya Jonathan Winer, according to newly released documents made public June 12 by Judicial Watch.
A series of emails between Sept. 26, 2016, and Dec. 10, 2016, demonstrate that Winer shared “Russia-related information” he obtained from Steele—whom he described as his “old O friend”—with Nuland, who then shared it with Silverberg.
Winer delayed a previously scheduled meeting with the State Department’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR) in order to share the information with Nuland, according to Judicial Watch.
Multiple references in the emails to additional telephone calls and other contacts with unnamed or redacted parties, as well as discussion of “a possible working group meeting,” suggest an active response by Silverberg to the Steele dossier information he was provided by Nuland and Winer.”
John Carlin (Credit: Diego M. Radzinschi/The National Law Journal)
John Carlin was an Assistant Attorney General – and Head of the Department of Justice’s National Security Division (NSD).
On September 27, 2016, Carlin announced his resignation. He formally left the NSD on October 15, 2016. Carlin had been named Acting Assistant Attorney General in March 2013 and was confirmed in the spring of 2014.
Carlin had previously served as chief of staff to then-FBI Director Robert S. Mueller.
Carlin was replaced with Mary McCord – who would later accompany Acting Attorney General Sally Yates to see White House Counsel Don McGahn regarding General Michael Flynn.
Carlin announced his resignation exactly one day after he filed the Government’s proposed 2016 Section 702 certifications. His signature can be found on page 31.
This filing would be subject to intense criticism from the FISA Court following disclosures made by NSA Director Rogers. Significant changes to the handling of raw FISA data would result.
Section 702 is part of the broader FISA Act and permits the government to target for surveillance foreign persons located outside the United States for the purpose of acquiring foreign intelligence information.
Instead of issuing individual court orders, Section 702 requires the Attorney General and the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) to provide the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) with annual certifications that specify categories of foreign intelligence information the government is authorized to acquire pursuant to Section 702.
The Attorney General and the Director of National Intelligence must also certify that Intelligence Community elements will follow targeting procedures and minimization procedures that are approved by the FISC as part of the annual certification.
The National Security Division and Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) are jointly required to routinely review all Intelligence Agency U.S. person queries of content to ensure the Section 702 queries satisfy the legal standard.
The NSD – with notice to the ODNI – is required to report any incidents of Agency noncompliance or misconduct to the FISA Court.
Again, John Carlin was Head of the NSD.
At the time Carlin’s sudden resignation went mostly unnoticed.
But there was more to the story.
Here is the official explanation as provided by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence:
After submitting its 2016 Certifications in September 2016, the Department of Justice and ODNI learned, in October 2016, about additional information related to previously reported compliance incidents and reported that additional information to the FISC. The NSA also self-reported the information to oversight bodies, as required by law. These compliance incidents related to the NSA’s inadvertent use of U.S. person identifiers to query NSA’s “upstream” Internet collection acquired pursuant to Section 702.
On October 24, 2016, the government orally apprised the Court of significant non-compliance with the NSA’s minimization procedures involving queries of data acquired under Section 702 using U.S. person identifiers. The full scope of non-compliant querying practices had not been previously disclosed to the Court. Two days later, on the day the Court otherwise would have had to complete its review of the certifications and procedures, the government made a written submission regarding those compliance problems…and the Court held a hearing to address them.
A federal search warrant was obtained on September 26, 2016, for Weiner’s iPhone, iPad, and laptop computer. The FBI obtained these devices the same day. The search warrant authorized the government to search for evidence relating to the following crimes: transmitting obscene material to a minor, sexual exploitation of children, and activities related to child pornography.
On page 303 of this report, the case agent, being the only one that had the authority to release the laptop, stated his concerns over no one contacting him:
“The crickets I was hearing was really making me uncomfortable because something was going to come crashing down….And my understanding, which is uninformed because…I didn’t work the Hillary Clinton matter. My understanding at the time was I am telling you people I have private Hillary Clinton emails, number one, and BlackBerry messages, number two. I’m telling you that we have potentially 10 times the volume that Director Comey said we had on the record. Why isn’t anybody here? Like, if I’m the supervisor of any CI squad in Seattle and I hear about this, I’m getting on with headquarters and saying, hey, some agent working child porn here may have [Hillary Clinton] emails. Get your ass on the phone, call [the case agent], and get a copy of that drive, because that’s how you should be. And that nobody reached out to me within, like, that night, I still to this day, I don’t understand what the hell went wrong.”
Anthony Weiner was released from prison on February 17, 2019 and sent to a halfway house in Brooklyn, New York. Huma Abedin still works side-by-side with Hillary Clinton on her illegally-run ‘Onward Together’ 501(c)(4) political organization. Til this day, what is on that laptop, remains a mystery. (Read more: CoreysDigs, 4/11/2019)(Archive)
(Timeline editor’s note: We have also never seen any of Hillary or Huma’s Blackberry messages.)
The cyber division of the FBI. (Credit: public domain)
(…) “Only a few hours after the New York office of the FBI took possession of the Weinerlaptop, on September 26, 2016, the FBI computer expert discovered it contained more than 140,000 emails involving Hillary Clinton. They were from multiple domain names: State.gov, Clintonemail.com, ClintonFoundation.org, HillaryClinton.com and Blackberry devices. The agent had what he told the inspector general was an “oh shit moment” — recognizing that he had found evidence important to the most important investigation — and he immediately reported it up the chain.
According to the inspector general’s report of June 14, specifically Chapters IX-XI, the treasure “trove” of emails covered Mrs. Clinton’s entiretenure as Secretary of State.
(…) “Indeed, according to the inspector general, 39 high-ranking FBI agents knew of it, along with the New York office and people in the New York U.S. Attorney’s office. The New York FBI informed them all during a secure video-conference on September 28 — chaired by Andrew McCabe.
One agent said the announcement of finding hundreds of thousands of Clinton emails on Weiner’s laptop was “like dropping a bomb in the middle of the meeting.”
The New York agent Sweeney followed up with two calls to McCabe later that evening — after McCabe did not call him as promised.
So . . . what did McCabe, Comey and Strzok do? They sat on it until police officers in New York and FBI agents in New York threatened to expose them. (Read more: The Daily Caller, 6/20/2018)
The DOJ’s NSD maintains oversight of the intelligence agencies’ use of Section 702 authority. The NSD and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) jointly conduct reviews of the intelligence agencies’ Section 702 activities every 60 days. The NSD—with notice to the ODNI—is required to report any incidents of agency noncompliance or misconduct to the FISA court.
Instead of issuing individual court orders, Section 702 requires the Attorney General and the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) to provide the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) with annual certifications that specify categories of foreign intelligence information the government is authorized to acquire, pursuant to Section 702.
John Carlin (Credit: PBS)
The Attorney General and the DNI must also certify that Intelligence Community agencies will follow targeting procedures and minimization procedures that are approved by the FISC as part of the certification.
On Sept. 26, 2016, NSD head John Carlin filed the government’s proposed 2016 Section 702 certifications. Carlin knew the general status of Rogers’s compliance review. The NSD was part of the review.
In his filing, Carlin failed to disclose a Jan. 7, 2016, inspector general report that was highly critical of agency controls for monitoring query compliance. Carlin also failed to disclose the FBI’s use of private contractors and Rogers’s ongoing compliance review.
On Sept. 27, 2016, the day after he filed the annual certifications, Carlin announced his resignation, which would become effective on Oct. 15, 2016.
On Oct. 4, 2016, a standard follow-up court hearing was held (Page 19), with Carlin present. Again, he made no disclosure of FISA abuse or other related issues. This lack of disclosure would be noted by the court later in the April 2017 ruling:
“The government’s failure to disclose those IG and OCO reviews at the October 4, 2016 hearing [was ascribed] to an institutional “lack of candor.”
When FBI Director James Comey answers questions before a House Judiciary Committee public hearing, two of the committee members ask him key questions about Paul Combetta, the Platte River Networks (PRN) employee who helped manage Clinton’s private server.
Darrell Issa (Credit: Jeff Malet)
Representative Darrell Issa (R) asks: “Director, I have a lot of concerns but one of them refers to Reddit. At the time that the Department of Justice at your behest, or your involvement, gave Paul Combetta immunity, did you do so knowing about all of the posts he had on Reddit…?”
Comey replies: “I am not sure sitting here. My recollection is and I’ll check this and fix it if I am wrong, that we had some awareness of the Reddit posts, I don’t know whether our folks had read them all or not. We had a pretty good understanding of what we thought he had done, but that is my best recollection.”
Issa then asks: “OK, in the last week, [Combetta] has been deleting [his] Reddit posts. Is that consistent with preserving evidence? … You know, I guess my question to you is, is he destroying evidence relevant to Congressional inquiries? And I will answer it for you: yes he is. And what are you going to do about it?”
Comey answers, “That’s not something I can comment on.”
Bob Goodlatte (Credit: Jacquelyn Martin / The Associated Press)
Later in the same hearing, committee chair Representative Bob Goodlatte (R), similarly asks: “Paul Combetta, with PRN, posted to Reddit, asking how to strip out a VIP’s, very VIP email address from a bunch of archived email. … This clearly demonstrates actions taken to destroy evidence by those operating Sec Clinton’s private server and by her staff. … [W]as the FBI aware of this Reddit post prior to offering Mr. Combetta immunity on May 3, 2016?”
Comey responds, “I am not sure. I know that our team looked at it. I don’t know whether they knew about it before then or not.” (House Judiciary Committee, 09/28/2016)
In a House Judiciary Committee hearing, Comey comments on a July 2014 Reddit post by Paul Combetta, a Platte River Networks employee who helped manage Clinton’s private server.
Comey says, “Our team concluded that what he was trying to do was when they produced emails not have the actual address but have some name or placeholder instead of the actual dot-com address in the ‘From:’ line.” As a result, the FBI believes Combetta was not engaged in a secret cover-up when he used his “stonetear” alias on the Reddit website to ask for a tool that could delete Clinton’s email address throughout a large file.
However, Republican lawmakers believe Combetta’s Reddit post reveals an effort to hide Clinton’s emails from investigators. For example, committee chair Bob Goodlatte (R) says he believes it was “obviously part of a cover-up. … This clearly demonstrates an action to destroy evidence by people operating Clinton’s private server and her staff.” (Politico, 09/28/2016)
Appearing before the House Judiciary Committee, Representative Tom Marino (R) asks FBI Director James Comey why he made immunity deals with key figures in the Clinton email investigation instead of using subpoena power. In particular, he wants to know why deals were made to get access to the laptops of Clinton’s lawyers Cheryl Mills and Heather Samuelson.
Comey replies, “Anytime you’re talking about the prospect of subpoenaing a computer from a lawyer, it involves the lawyer’s practice of law, you know you’re getting into a big Megillah.”
Marino, who was a district attorney and US attorney before being elected to Congress, then asks, “I understand that, clearly. Why did you not decide to go to an investigative grand jury? It would have been cleaner, it would have been much simpler, and you would have had more authority to make these witnesses testify. Not the target, but the witnesses testify. That seems the way to go, Director. We’ve done it thousands of times. This was just too convoluted.”
Comey replies, “Again, I need to steer clear of talking about grand jury use in a particular matter. In general, in my experience, you can often do things faster with informal agreements, especially when you’re interacting with lawyers. In this particular investigation, the investigative team really wanted to get access to the laptops that were used to sort these emails. Those are lawyers’ laptops. That is a very complicated thing. I think they were able to navigate it pretty well to get us access.”
Later in the hearing, Comey adds that the investigation “couldn’t be concluded professionally without doing our best to figure out what was on those laptops. So, getting the laptops was very important to me and to the investigative team.” (Politico, 11/1/2016) (C-SPAN, 9/28/2016)
In contradiction to his answer on this day, in April 2016, he said of the investigation, “The urgency is to do it well and promptly. And ‘well’ comes first.” And in May 2016, he said “I don’t tether to any external deadline” to finish the investigation, such as the Democratic convention in July 2016.
In a surprising moment during FBI Director James Comey’s testimony to the House Judiciary Committee, he defends the character and integrity of the FBI officials who took part in the FBI’s Clinton investigation.
FBI Director Comey defends his agents before the House Oversight Committee. (Credit: CSpan)
Representative Sheila Jackson-Lee (D) asks, “The foot soldiers, your agents on the ground, you take issue with whether or not they were compromised or they were adhering to somebody elses message. Is that what you’re saying?”
Comey answers, “You can call us wrong, but don’t call us weasels. We are not weasels. We are honest people and … whether or not you agree with the result, this was done the way you want it to be done.”
Politico describes the impassioned moment, “The normally stoic FBI chief grew emotional and emphatic as he rejected claims from Republican lawmakers that the FBI was essentially in the tank for Clinton when it recommended that neither she nor any of her aides be prosecuted in connection with the presence of classified information on Clinton’s private email server. He acknowledged he has ‘no patience’ for such allegations.”(Politico, 09/28/2016)
FBI Director James Comey testifies to House Oversight Committee about the FBI’s handling of the investigation of 2016 Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton’s use of private email servers while serving as secretary of state.
QUESTION: Thanks, Jake. James Reinl here from Al Jazeera. A number of Clinton campaign officials have suggested there’s a link between the email leaking and Russian state hackers. In your opinion, how strong is the evidence linking the Russian state to this? And why do you think the Kremlin would prefer a President Trump to a President Clinton?
On July 26, 2016, President Obama signed 
By Andrew C. McCarthy
Stefan Halper checks off every single box: √Currently overseas. √Current/Former CIA operative. √Current/Former source for FBI. √Anti-Trump motive. √Formerly put together 
(…) Among the most significant of the newly declassified documents is a 
“We received 
