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August 8, 2025 - FBI Boston: Suffolk County Sheriff Steven Tompkins is indicted for alleged extortion

Suffolk County Sheriff Steven W. Tompkins (Credit: public domain)

Sheriff Steven W. Tompkins, who serves as the Sheriff for the Suffolk County Sheriff’s Department, has been charged with extortion involving the purchase of an equity interest in a Boston-based cannabis company.

Tompkins, 67, of Boston, Mass, was indicted by a federal grand jury on two counts of Extortion Under Color of Official Right. He was taken into custody this morning in the Southern District of Florida and will have an initial appearance at 11:00 a.m. He will appear in federal court in Boston at a later date.

“Mr. Tompkins is a sitting Sheriff, responsible for over 1,000 employees, who was elected by the good people of Suffolk County. Today, he is alleged to have extorted an executive from a cannabis company, using his official position as Sheriff to benefit himself. Elected officials, particularly those in law enforcement, are expected to be ethical, honest and law abiding – not self-serving. His alleged actions are an affront to the voters and taxpayers who elected him to his position, and the many dedicated and honest public servants at the Suffolk County Sheriff’s Department. The people of Suffolk County deserve better,” said United States Attorney Leah B. Foley. “Public corruption remains a top priority for my administration and we will continue to investigate and prosecute anyone who uses their position of trust and power for their own gain.”

“From his very first day as Suffolk County Sheriff, Steven Tompkins sought to portray himself as a man of the people – a principled public servant and reformer, devoted to the cause of justice. That’s why it’s beyond disappointing that he’s now accused of gaming a system instituted in the interests of public safety and fair play. The FBI took Sheriff Tompkins into custody today for allegedly extorting $50,000 from the owner of a national cannabis retailer seeking to do business in Boston. We believe what the Sheriff saw as an easy way to make a quick buck on the sly is clear cut corruption under federal law,” said Ted E. Docks, Special Agent in Charge of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Boston Division. “The citizens of Suffolk County deserve better, not a man who is accused of trading on his position to bankroll his own political and financial future. Public servants must be held to the highest of ethical standards, and those falling short will be rooted out.”

Tompkins currently serves as the Sheriff for the Suffolk County Sheriff’s Department (SCSD). He was first appointed Sheriff in 2013, elected as Sheriff in a special election in or about 2014, and thereafter elected to successive six-year terms. As Sheriff, Tompkins oversees approximately 1,000 correctional officers and other employees responsible for operating and maintaining correctional facilities in Boston at the House of Correction and the Nashua Street Jail.

According to court documents, in 2019, the cannabis company, Company A, sought to open a retail cannabis dispensary in Boston and applied to the Massachusetts Cannabis Control Commission (CCC) for a dispensary license. To satisfy the Positive Impact Plan (PIP) requirement of the CCC, Company A entered into a partnership with the SCSD whereby the SCSD would help screen and refer graduates of its re-entry program to apply for work at Company A’s retail store.

Company A’s partnership with the SCSD was memorialized in a September 2019 letter signed by Tompkins and submitted to the CCC in its completed dispensary license application in or about March 2020.  In or about March 2021, the CCC approved a license for Company A to operate a cannabis dispensary in Boston. The CCC later approved license renewal applications for Company A in 2021, 2022 and 2023. In each of the renewal applications, Company A included its ongoing partnership with the SCSD as part of its fulfillment of the PIP requirement.

According to court documents, one of Company A’s goals was to raise capital to launch an initial public offering (IPO) and then continue its growth as a publicly traded company. Company A officials, including a company executive identified as Individual A, sought multimillion-dollar investments from institutions or other high net-worth, sophisticated investors in order to raise capital. Company A officials, including Individual A, were not looking to raise capital from the general public or small, individual investors. Beginning in or about mid-2020, Company A began preparing for an IPO of Company A stock, which included producing audited financial statements, hiring attorneys to ensure compliance with securities laws and obtaining additional financing from large scale and high net-worth investors, among other things.

It is alleged that Tompkins pressured Individual A for stock, reminding Individual A that Tompkins had helped Company A in its Boston licensing efforts. It is alleged that Individual A believed and feared that Tompkins would use his official position as Sheriff to jeopardize Company A’s partnership with the SCSD and thus imperil both the dispensary license for Company A, as well as the timing of the IPO. In fact, in October 2020, Company A asked Tompkins for an updated partnership letter to submit to the CCC for its yearly renewal of Company A’s Boston license. Within one month of signing the October 2020 SCSD partnership letter with Company A, and after increased pressure on Individual A, Tompkins allegedly obtained a pre-IPO interest in Company A stock after Individual A relented to Tompkins’s demands.

In November 2020, Tompkins allegedly wired a $50,000 payment from his retirement account to an account controlled by Individual A. Tompkins paid a pre-IPO price of approximately $1.73 per share of Company A stock (equity equivalent to 28,883 shares) and after a reverse stock split, Tompkins held approximately 14,417 shares at a price of approximately $3.46 per share.

According to court documents, in or about mid-2021, when Company A launched its IPO, the stock had a value of approximately $9.60 per share. Thus, Tompkins’s $50,000 purchase of 14,417 shares of Company A stock had appreciated to an approximate value of $138,403.

In May 2022, Company A stock decreased in value such that Tompkins’s equity interest in Company A stock was worth several thousand dollars less than the $50,000 he originally invested. However, Tompkins demanded a refund of $50,000 and, despite the decrease in the value of Tompkins’s investment, Individual A agreed to Tompkins’s demands for full repayment of $50,000.

Subsequently, from approximately May 2022 to July 2023, Individual A refunded Tompkins $50,000 investment by issuing Tompkins five checks. Allegedly in accordance with Tompkins’s wishes, Individual A wrote memos on certain checks that read “loan repayment” and “[company] expense” to disguise the nature of some of the payments: (Read more: Justice.Org, 8/8/2025)  (Archive)

August 8, 2025 - DC Circuit Court of Appeals tosses Boasberg contempt order against Trump

h/t Red State, 8/8/2025

August 9, 2025 - "Anonymous" author Miles Taylor on MSNBC: "Look, umm — uh — uh — I am — I am reasonably confident I did not commit treason"

Miles Taylor (Credit: MSNBC clipping)

“Anonymous” Author Miles Taylor PANICS that Trump Admin will *finally* arrest enemies of MAGA🚨

“Look, umm — uh — uh — I am — I am reasonably confident I did not commit treason against the — uh — United States of America.”

“Whether it’s going against me or Attorney General James or Adam Schiff — they want to go shine a light on these people and their lives and follow them as long as possible to find the traffic infraction that they can lord over them to make their lives very, very difficult.”

“And make no mistake — this is not for show.”

“The president is under enormous pressure from the MAGA base to put these people in handcuffs.”

“It’s why for years he talked about locking them up. They now want to see it. And I’m telling you — they are going to find it.”

“One of these newscasts … we’re going to be reporting sort of breathlessly that one of these people on this list has been put in handcuffs, has been picked up and is in detention.”

“We are going to cross that Rubicon during the Trump presidency. It brings me no joy to forecast that.”

August 11, 2025 - Democrat whistleblower told FBI that Adam Schiff okayed leaking classified intel to hurt Trump; also implicates Eric Swalwell as a leaker

A career intelligence officer who worked for Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee for more than a decade repeatedly warned the FBI beginning in 2017 that then-Rep. Adam Schiff had approved leaking classified information to smear then-President Donald Trump over the now-debunked Russiagate scandal, according to bombshell FBI memos that Director Kash Patel has turned over to Congress.

The FBI 302 interview reports obtained by Just the News state the intelligence staffer — a Democrat by party affiliation who described himself as a friend to both Schiff, now a California senator, and former Republican House Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes — considered the classified leaking to be “unethical,” “illegal,” and “treasonous,” but was told not to worry about it because Schiff believed he would be spared prosecution under the Constitution’s speech and debate clause.

No publicly-disclosed opinion from the Attorney General or the Solicitor General can be found making that determination as a matter of law.

But officials told Just the News that DOJ officials showed little interest in pursuing Schiff when the allegations were brought to them years ago, citing the very same excuse the lawmaker had offered.

In his most recent interview with the bureau in 2023, the whistleblower, whose name is redacted, told agents from the FBI’s St. Louis office that he personally attended a meeting at which Schiff authorized leaking classified information.

“When working in this capacity, [redacted staffer’s name] was called to an all-staff meeting by SCHIFF,” the interview report said. “In this meeting, SCHIFF stated the group would leak classified information which was derogatory to President of the United States DONALD J. TRUMP. SCHIFF stated the information would be used to indict President TRUMP.”

The whistleblower told investigators that he “stated this would be illegal and, upon hearing his concerns, unnamed members of the meeting reassured that they would not be caught leaking classified information,” the 2023 interview report stated.

The staffer made similar claims to agents in the FBI’s Washington field office as early as 2017, shortly after Trump took office for his first term.

You can read the FBI interview reports here:

Democratic HPSCI Staffer – FBI Interview Notes

Schiff did not immediately respond to a request for comment Monday.

The alleged leaks fall outside the statute of limitations for prosecution on most legal theories, but the revelations nevertheless come at a sensitive time for Schiff, who recently was referred to the Justice Department for possible prosecution for potential mortgage fraud, based on a story first written by Just the News.

Officials also said some of the DOJ officials who declined to prosecute a rash of classified leaks during the Russiagate affair remain employed in positions of power, a matter that may be of interest to lawmakers in Congress.

“For years, certain officials used their positions to selectively leak classified information to shape political narratives,” Patel told Just the News on Monday. “It was all done with one purpose: to weaponize intelligence and law enforcement for political gain.

“Those abuses eroded public trust in our institutions,” he added. “The FBI will now lead the charge, with our partners at DOJ, and Congress will have the chance to uncover how political power may have been weaponized and to restore accountability,” he said.

Schiff, who previously served as the ranking member and then chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI) before ascending to the Senate, pushed false allegations of Trump-Russia collusion for many years, and touted British ex-spy Christopher Steele’s discredited dossier — even reading multiple baseless claims from it into the congressional record in March 2017.

The whistle-blower began approaching the FBI that same year.

In one meeting, the Democratic HPSCI staffer told the FBI that retired Lt. Gen. Mike Flynn — Trump’s first national security adviser — was to be a specific focus of the committee as part of a broader effort to target Trump. The whistleblower also specifically pointed to Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., as a likely source of classified leaks, the memos state.

Punishment for duty to law instead of party loyalty

The Democratic staffer also allegedly told a former Republican colleague on the committee that he was terminated because Schiff’s staff did not believe he had adequate “party loyalty” after he raised concerns about the leaks strategy, the FBI memos show. (Read much more: Just the News, 8/11/2025)  (Archive)

August 11, 2025 - MSM claims DC violent crime is down while quoting stats that exclude entire categories of assaults

(Credit: Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

Media outlets are fact-checking President Donald Trump’s concerns about violence in Washington, D.C., by pointing to misleading crime statistics.

Trump has moved to increase federal law enforcement’s footprint in D.C.’s streets and take over the local police department after a former Trump administration staffer was assaulted by a mob during a carjacking on August 3. Legacy media outlets and Democratic lawmakers responded to Trump’s complaints about violent crime in D.C. by reporting that it decreased by 35% in 2024, citing local police data that leave out crimes such as felony and aggravated assault, thereby making D.C.’s crime problem appear better than it is since the onset of COVID-19 in 2020. (RELATED: Congress Took Over DC In The 90s — And It Worked)

D.C.’s Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) only includes homicide, sex abuse crimes, assault with a dangerous weapon and robbery in its overall “violent crime” numbers that show a decline in 2024. Aggravated assault and felony assault without the use of weapons are left out, despite D.C. law describing them as violent offenses causing bodily injury and despite the fact that aggravated assaults are increasing, according to the FBI.

“Felony Assault does not fall under the D.C. Index violent offense categories,” the MPD told the Daily Caller News Foundation without answering specific questions.

The FBI includes a broader range of assaults in its violent crime data for D.C. based on what local police provide to the bureau. Consequently, the FBI’s data show that the number of violent offenses in D.C. only decreased by 10% in 2024 and remained slightly higher than in 2018.

The FBI’s numbers also show that homicides have remained higher than pre-pandemic levels in the years since 2020, with the exception of 2021, a year when D.C. submitted incomplete data, according to Axios. Additionally, D.C. saw 12% more aggravated assaults with or without a weapon in 2024 than in 2023 and 37% more than in 2022, per the FBI. (Read more: Daily Caller, 8/11/2025)  (Archive)

August 11, 2025 - Grok AI interprets the redactions in recent FBI Notes drop on House Intel Cmte. staff leaking classified info to media

August 11, 2025 - Democrat whistleblower: Schiff was promised a CIA appointment if Hillary won

(Grok image)

(…) The Democratic whistleblower told the FBI in a December 2017 interview at his home that “the HPSCI work environment started to change around August 2016 as the U.S. presidential election approached.” He said that, during a September 2016 staff meeting, other Democratic staffers revealed they had provided “on background” information to journalists about “their impressions of Russian activity surrounding the upcoming election.”

The Democratic staffer told FBI agents during an August 2017 interview at the Bullfeathers restaurant in the nation’s capital that he was told by various HPSCI staffers in the October 2016 timeframe that if former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton won the November 2016 election, Schiff would be offered the position of CIA director. The staffer told the FBI in December 2017 that “the mood within HPSCI was indescribable” after Trump’s win, and that Schiff “was particularly upset, as he believed he would have been appointed as the Director of CIA” had Clinton won the election.  (Read more: Just the News, 8/11/2025) (Archive)

August 11, 2025 - Nearly a decade later, the unmasking scandal comes full circle

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

Devin Nunes was put under investigation in 2017 for looking into abuse of foreign intelligence surveillance programs, including by Barack Obama’s White House. New documents appear to vindicate him.

Last week, when Donald Trump’s Justice Department released notes of an FBI interview with a “whistleblower” from the Democratic staff of the House Intelligence Committee, the few media outlets to seriously cover the story focused on a grave accusation: then-Congressman Adam Schiff approved leaks of classified information in 2017 as a way “topple” the Trump administration. The document, which seemed to confirm mention of a “Committee Witness” in an Inspector General’s report last year, triggered heated denials from Schiff and fellow Democrat Eric Swalwell, who seethed that the only “real criminals” in Washington were in the White House.

Few noticed another passage deep in the report, in which the Democratic staffer described efforts to “unmask” identities of figures in Trump’s orbit. Typically, the names of Americans swept up in monitoring of suspected foreign terrorists or criminals are anonymized, and transcripts of their conversations are only available to non-intelligence personnel upon request from high-level officials. The whistleblower suggested these “unmasking” techniques had been abused by members of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, or HPSCI:

HPSCI personnel contacted [redacted] and [redacted] and requested the number of documents the agencies had related to President Trump. The staff wanted to know how many of these documents were masked. They planned to request the unmasking of the individuals and then deal with them.

The report contains other mentions of efforts by “HPSCI attorneys” to unmask the identities of unnamed figures. It’s theoretically possible that the staffer was referring in certain places to actions by Republican HPSCI staffers, but it’s unlikely that’s the case throughout, especially in the above passage. Either way, there’s reason some of the Republicans who originally looked at this issue saw in that release a piece of overdue vindication, after being denounced for investigating these very practices nearly a decade ago.

Former House Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes in 2017 was forced to recuse himself from the Russia investigation when Democrats launched a House Ethics Committee probe in response to his unmasking claims. Nunes was cleared later, but damage was done: investigation into Obama-era abuses of foreign surveillance programs ground to a near-halt, as everyone from the Washington Post to Talking Points Memo lambasted the “completely fake and stupid unmasking conspiracy theory.”

Over the years, however, evidence surfaced suggesting abuse claims were anything but conspiracy theory, and that Nunes was correct to raise an alarm about misuse of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) program. Although a Trump-appointed Special Counsel, John Bash, issued a report finding no evidence of misuse of unmasking procedures for political purposes, Trump-Russia investigators in both the Senate and the House have long believed there was more to the story, and that Bash’s report ignored significant evidence of corruption. “Not gonna lie. The Bash thing was a gut punch for us,” is how one former Republican Senate aide put it. “It sucked.”

Now the unmasking story is back in the investigative picture. According to a Justice Department spokesperson, the FISA court in June unsealed more Carter Page materials for oversight purposes, giving Russiagate investigators new documents to examine. Along with last week’s FBI whistleblower release, hopes have been reignited that the issue of using FISA to spy on Americans for political reasons will finally be re-examined, after a nearly decade-long delay.

“We pushed for years for transparency and accountability for the Russia hoax and were continually disappointed,” a Nunes-era HPSCI staffer told Racket. “But right now, some of us are feeling a strange sense of optimism that we’re not used to.”

(Read more: Matt Taibbi/Racket News, 8/19/2025)  (Archive)

August 12, 2025 - Running down the leakers: The General Flynn Leaks – “Echos Fate”

General Flynn (Credit: Dustin Franz/Getty Images)

In May 2017, the FBI’s Baltimore Field Office received a referral from FBI headquarters to open a media leak investigation into a January 13, 2017 Washington Post article by David Ignatius, which contained highly classified information concerning calls placed between Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn and Russian Ambassador:

According to a senior U.S. government official, Flynn phoned Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak several times on Dec. 29, the day the Obama administration announced the expulsion of 35 Russian officials and other measures in retaliation for the hacking. What did Flynn say, and did it undercut the U.S. sanctions?

The Logan Act (though never enforced) bars U.S. citizens from correspondence intending to influence a foreign government about “disputes” with the United States. Was its spirit violated? The Trump campaign didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

The Baltimore Field Office would conduct a full investigation – named Echos Fate – into the leak beginning May 10, 2017, assisted by the US Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia, the DOJ National Security Division, and the US Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Missouri.

It also investigated the leak of information, again to the Washington Post, in an article written by Greg Miller, Adam Entous, and Ellen Nakashima published on February 9, 2017 and entitled “Officials Say Flynn Discussed Sanctions.” That article was particularly destructive, as the leaks concerning the Flynn/Kislyak calls were alleged to be “contrary to public assertions by Trump officials”, putting Flynn on the ropes and the Trump Administration on the defensive.

Various other articles were part of Echos Fate, including:

Part of the problem with determining the identity of those who leaked the Flynn/Kislyak information was that, beginning in late December 2016, the outgoing Obama Administration made those calls a matter of routine discussion – starting with January 2017 meetings in the White House.

As documented in Peter Strzok’s notes from a January 4, 2017 meeting at the Obama White House, FBI Director James Comey brought those calls to the attention of President Obama (and VP Biden, Sally Yates, and others).

As explained by the FBI, their investigative pool was “comprised of over 167 individuals” – not including all those persons “exposed to the ECHOS FATE material through verbal briefings and discussions.” The FBI’s investigative pool was essentially unknown.

For over a year, we’ve had our own FOIA lawsuit filed against the FBI for the Flynn/Kislyak investigation – and recently received the FBI’s opening communication on ECHOS FATE, though it was much more redacted than what was just released. We’ve been informed by the Government that the Echos Fate investigative file is over 2,000 pages and has an hour of video. Production of these records will be slow – and we will be sure to post what we get.

Those 2,000 pages don’t include the thousands of documents reviewed by the FBI in its attempt to find those who leaked. But it does include over 30 interviews, described by the FBI as including those from the FBI, DOJ, and US Intelligence Community.

On our own, we were able to determine that the initial leak of the Flynn/Kislyak calls likely took place around January 5, 2017 – just one day after the White House meeting where the calls were discussed. And the leaks weren’t initially made to David Ignatius but to Adam Entous (then with the Washington Post). Entous, in a public appearance, discussed how the leaks occurred, though he didn’t give names:

“Then, my sources start whispering to me that there were all these mysterious communications between Michael Flynn, who was then the National Security Advisor designate for Trump and the Russian ambassador, Kislyak.”

Back in May 2020, we asked Entous about the Flynn leak. He responded the leak came directly from “sources [who] saw a transcript and described it to [him].”

We suspect there were a host of officials who leaked the Flynn calls – including Sally Yates or her underlings, like Mary McCord or Tashina Gauhar. After all, Entous was suspiciously familiar with Yates’s concerns about the calls:

In any event, by December 2020, the Baltimore Field Office, in concurrence with the US Attorney’s Office for DC, the US Attorney for the Eastern District of Missouri, and the FBI’s Washington Field Office, recommended that Echos Fate be closed, stating all investigative steps and methods, and all leads, had been completed or discontinued. (Read more: Techno Fog, 8/13/2025)  (Archive)

FBI Memos –  Classified Leaks Investigation

August 12, 2025 - Running down the leakers: Carter Page FISA Leaks - “Foggy Falls”

Former Trump campaign aide Carter Page in May 29, 2019. (Credit: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

On May 10, 2017, the FBI opened a leak investigation – which it called Foggy Falls – into classified materials leaked to the Washington Post concerning the Carter Page FISA applications. The article at issue, “Court Let FBI Monitor an Adviser to Trump”, was written by Ellen Nakashima, Devlin Barrett, and Adam Entous and published on April 12, 2017. Another article containing criminal leaks of classified information was published by the same authors at the Washington Post and entitled “FBI Obtained FISA Warrant to Monitor Trump Adviser Carter Page.”

These articles included specific details from the FISA applications, including Page’s alleged “contacts with Russian operatives that have not been publicly disclosed.” Omitted from the article (and the FISA applications, of course) was the fact that Page had been an intelligence source in the years before Trump’s 2016 campaign.

Focus on Adam Schiff

As part of the investigative process, the FBI looked into those who had access to the FISA application during its certification and approval, including those at the DOJ and members of Congress and their staffers, who had been provided with “read-only” copies of the FISA applications in March and April of 2017.

As part of its due diligence, the FBI sent a March 2018 memorandum to the DOJ and to the US Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia “regarding the viability of prosecution and willingness of DOJ CES and USAO-DC to prosecute.” The DOJ and DC US Attorney’s Office “never provided a written response.”

After Trump declassified redacted versions of the FISA application and the renewal applications, the FBI again sent memorandums to the DOJ and DC US Attorney’s Office “regarding the viability of prosecution and willingness of DOJ CES and USAO-DC to prosecute this matter given all classified material which served as the basis for leak has been declassified by the President.” And again, the DOJ and USAO-DC never responded.

From the recent disclosures, it appears conclusive that the DOJ and DC US Attorney’s Office were unwilling to take all investigative steps to investigate the FISA leaks to the Washington Post. Though some of the information remains redacted, it suggests that the DOJ/USAO-DC refused to subpoena records from Congress (likely those associated with Adam Schiff) and from members of the press related to the leak. Here’s the summary in full, with redactions:

The investigation wasn’t without one scalp – it appears it led to the opening of “Riding Hood”, which looked into Senate Staffer James Wolfe. A March 2020 letter from the DOJ National Security Division to the FBI concerning states:

“The investigation did identify James Wolfe, a former staffer on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, as a subject. Wolfe was interviewed and pled guilty to violating Title 18, United States Code, Section 1001 for making false statements to the FBI about his contact with members of the media.”

If you recall, Wolfe had an ongoing affair with Politico/New York Times reporter Ali Watkins (sex for access, to put it bluntly) and leaked FISA materials – rightly assumed to be pictures of a Carter Page FISA application – to Watkins. Jessie Liu, the then-US Attorney for the District of Columbia, declined to prosecute him for the disclosure of classified materials. Ali Watkins is still employed by The New York Times, by the way.

Foggy Falls was closed in May 2020. (Read more: Techno Fog, 8/13/2025)  (Archive)

FBI Memos –  Classified Leaks Investigation

August 12, 2025 - Running down the leakers: Putin Hack Leaks – "Genetic Christmas"

Adam Schiff: Soon after the Democrat took control of the House Intelligence Committee, its review of the drafting of the intelligence community assessment was classified and locked in a Capitol basement safe. (Credit: J. Scott Applewhite/AP)

On October 23, 2017, the FBI opened “Genetic Christmas” – the investigation into leaks of classified information to NBC News published in their December 14, 2016 article “U.S. Officials: Putin Personally Involved in U.S. Election Hack.” The article alleged:

U.S. intelligence officials now believe with “a high level of confidence” that Russian President Vladimir Putin became personally involved in the covert Russian campaign to interfere in the U.S. presidential election, senior U.S. intelligence officials told NBC News.

Two senior officials with direct access to the information say new intelligence shows that Putin personally directed how hacked material from Democrats was leaked and otherwise used. The intelligence came from diplomatic sources and spies working for U.S. allies, the officials said.

These conclusions by the Obama Administration would eventually be repeated in the Intelligence Community Assessment (ICA) which was provided to President Obama in early January 2017. We previously addressed the Intelligence Community’s reliance on bogus documents and whistleblower concerns about the politicization of the ICA.

As with the Flynn leak investigation, it was difficult for the FBI to determine exactly who knew about the “new intelligence” or the allegations (false) of Putin’s approval of the DNC/DCCC hack. They determined 46 FBI employees had access to the information and that there were “an unknown number of individuals, at least 15 based on names provided during interviews, who had access to the GENETIC CHRISTMAS information through verbal briefings and discussions.” The FBI also observed that US Senators were briefed on the Russian assessments on November 28, 2016 and December 9, 2016.

Thus, “the investigation revealed an unquantifiable subject pool because there is no way fully determine the scope of dissemination of the GENETIC CHRISTMAS information prior to its release.”

With the unknown subject pool and delays in witness interviews and the criminal referral (approximately 9 months after the leak), the FBI found it difficult to develop leads. Genetic Christmas was subsequently closed in February 2020.

Related to this investigation was a November 5, 2023, FBI interview of a former staffer with Congressman Adam Schiff. The staffer described a meeting with Schiff and his staff, where:

“SCHIFF stated the group would leak classified information which was derogatory to President of the United States Donald J. Trump. SCHIFF stated the information would be used to indict President Trump.”

As summarized from his interview, the former staffer was eventually informed that the DOJ would not investigate the matter further due to Congressional immunity, though there is no legal basis to conclude that leaks to the media or leaks by staffers are protected by the Constitution.

The November 2023 interview with the staffer was essentially a follow-up of other interviews with the staffer that took place beginning in August 2017, where he described how Schiff and Democrats would plan their “leaking process”, how staffers described their contacts with journalists concerning Russia and the 2016 election, and the identities of three staffers who were likely responsible for leaks. (These leaks and the DOJ’s process to obtain records of members of Congress, their staffers, and members of the media, would eventually be part of an Inspector General report, available here.)

After the 2016 election, Adam Schiff was particularly distraught, as he thought he would be appointed CIA Director under Hillary Clinton – a frightening proposition. In February 2017, hoping to create a public fervor surrounding the Trump/Russia hoax, the Democrats instructed their staffers to use their Intelligence Community sources “to gather [classified] information, which would then be made public through the media in order to compel public opinion.”

The leaks were “driven from the top” and “structured and intentional.” One of their targets was General Flynn, though their ultimate goal was trying to get Trump impeached. Democrat staffers justified leaks of classified information because they believed they were “in the middle of a constitutional crisis.” (Read more: Techno Fog, 8/13/2025) (Archive)

FBI Memos –  Classified Leaks Investigation

August 12, 2025 - Running down the leakers: The Kushner Leaks – "Sirens Lure"

Jared Kushner, 2025. (Credit: Andrea Hanks/Official White House Photo)

As part of the effort to sabotage Trump and to render ineffective his staff, there were also leaks to the Washington Post, The New York Times, and CNN targeting Jared Kushner, alleging improper and shady contacts with Russia. The FBI’s investigation into those leaks was opened in September 2017 under the name Sirens Lure.

As was the case with the other leak investigations, the FBI faced a daunting task: it initially identified “over 192 individuals in the subject pool” across various parts of the government, from the Intelligence Community to Congress.

Notably, some of the media reports concerning Kushner occurred after a “Read Room” was established for members of Congress to view classified information. House Democrats restricted access to at least one HPSCI staffer from an FBI interview “based on Speech or Debate privileges.”

This led the FBI to back-off attempts to interview other Congressional Democrat staffers. Though the FBI considered search warrants but either the FBI or the DOJ decided against that course of action. Without the capabilities to pursue the investigation further, and faced with the prospects of interviewing over 192 potential subjects (the number was likely much higher), Sirens Lures was closed in May 2021.

(Read more: Techno Fog, 8/13/2025)  (Archive)

FBI Memos –  Classified Leaks Investigation

August 13, 2025 - Victor Davis Hanson to Democrat Party: “You have been the most vicious and the most abject subverters of democracy"

PAYBACK.

Victor Davis Hanson just EXPOSED how the Left UNDERMINED democracy while pretending to defend it.

He laid out three UNDENIABLE examples.

Now they’re POWERLESS—standing atop a house of cards.

Then came one of the most BRUTAL indictments of the modern Democrat Party:

“You have been the most vicious and the most abject subverters of democracy, all for the short term gain of destroying Donald Trump.”

🧵 THREAD

Victor Davis Hanson just held a mirror up to the modern Democrat Party the reflection wasn’t flattering.

According to Hanson, their entire political strategy now hinges on a single claim: that they are “saving democracy” from Donald Trump.

But peel back the rhetoric, and the reality looks very different.

“The Democrats have a new narrative. The left in general does, that they are ‘saving democracy’ from Donald Trump, and that justifies almost any means necessary to achieve the end of destroying or preventing Donald Trump from governing effectively.”

Hanson laid out in simple terms the glaring contradiction: “The problem with all of this is they are destroying democracy to destroy Donald Trump.”

It’s not even a metaphor.

It’s a direct inversion of what they claim to stand for.

And to prove it, he walked through exactly how this mindset has played out in real-time.

Take gerrymandering.

Hanson pointed to it as a textbook example of the left projecting what they’ve already done onto their opponents.

Now that Republicans are playing by the same rules, Democrats are screaming foul.

But what’s good for the goose, is good for the gander.

“One of the issues that they are agitating is the redistricting of congressional districts in Texas, in California now,” he said.

“And the general problem that the left has is if you look at gerrymandering to make these jigsaw puzzle piece-like districts, the left is way ahead of the right.”

He pointed out that in many states where Trump won 40–50% of the vote, Republican representation in Congress doesn’t come close to matching that.

And he backed it up: “There’s been sophisticated studies of gerrymandering, and it boils down to the Republicans are short, some 6 to 10 seats in the House based on the proportion of the national vote they have received.”

So why the outrage now? Because Democrats fear losing their edge.

“The Democrats know that, but they’re angry about the Texas reapportionment and gerrymandering, and their attitude is we’ve already gerrymandered our states to the maximum. Don’t dare try to emulate us.”

When Republicans do, suddenly it’s a threat to democracy.

In response, Democrat blowhards like James Carville have doubled down on a new mantra: get tougher.

But as Hanson explained, the Democrats are already there.

“James Carville said that they have to get tougher. That’s the new mantra.”

And yet, he argued, they’ve been anything but restrained.

“Got to get tougher, got to get meaner. Cory Booker screams and yells and throws a fit about every three weeks in the Senate. Hakeem Jeffries picks up his baseball bat. There’s usually a video with the squad or representatives using the word ‘sh—’ or the F word, kind of pornographic.”

“Jasmine Crockett periodically calls Donald Trump names that are—can’t be repeated on air. But you can see the anger.”

He paused before making the point crystal clear: “They have been too tough.”

That set the stage for Hanson’s most serious charge.

The three earth-shattering scandals Democrats have orchestrated to cripple Trump weren’t just aggressive…they were unprecedented.

They make Watergate look like a tea party on the South Lawn.

“There’s been three great scandals in the 21st century,” he said.

“The first was the Russian collusion hoax that was prompted by Hillary Clinton and facilitated by the Obama administration on its way out, that almost destroyed the Trump campaign, sabotaged his transition, and ate up 22 months of his first two years.”

He continued:

“The second was the Biden, FBI and CIA—but especially the CIA and the intelligence agencies—got 51 people, former intelligence authorities, to LIE to the American people on the eve of the second debate to affect the 2020 election, and claimed, falsely, that Donald Trump was lying about the laptop of Hunter Biden.”

“That was a complete lie. It was Hunter’s laptop. We know, because the FBI had it in its possession and authenticated it.”

And then came the third.

“The great scandal,” Hanson said, “that the Democratic Party and the obsequious media knew that Joe Biden was non compos mentis, he was not cognitively able to fulfill the office of the presidency.”

He described how they hid it from the public…until it became impossible to hide.

“When he finally challenged Donald Trump to a debate and melted and before our very eyes, sort of like the Wicked Witch in The Wizard of Oz, he melted into a non-entity.”

What an image.

Maybe this could be used as a metaphor for the current state of the Democrat Party.

Melting.

Hanson broadened the lens.

He argued that when you line up the pattern of actions, from media lies to lawfare to ballot bans, one thing becomes clear: the Democrats aren’t protecting democracy.

They’ve been gutting it.

“If you look at the Democrats, they have staged three great scandals to try to destroy the Trump administration and by extension, democracy.”

Then he listed more.

Each transgression against democracy, stabbing like a dagger.

“They impeached Donald Trump twice. No one’s ever done that.”

“They tried him as a private citizen. Nobody’s ever done that.”

“They raided his home in Mar-a-Lago. That is a terrible precedent for an ex-president. No one has ever done that.”

“They tried to get him off the ballot in 25 states. No one had ever done that.”

“There were two assassination attempts during the campaign that had never happened before.”

“They tried to debunk him and make it impossible for Donald Trump to write a check, whether from Morgan Stanley or Bank of America or any bank.”

So when Carville says Democrats are now going to get tough?

They already did.

Hanson says it’s TOTAL gaslighting.

“When James Carville says, we’re going to get tough, we’re going to get really tough, and we’re going to let in Puerto Rico and Washington, DC to get four senators, or we might have to pack the court to 13 justices, I’m thinking, well, you always were going to do that.”

He went even further.

“If you had not lost the House and Senate during the Biden administration, had you had a normal president that was in control of his mental and physical abilities, then you would have not only packed the court and not only, as you promised, let in two states, but in addition, you would have gotten rid of the Electoral College by the hook and crook of the National Voter Compact.”

“And more importantly, you would have abolished the Senate.”

That’s why the Democrats’ narrative is collapsing under its own weight.

“So the problem, James Carville, and Democrats, is that you have sabotaged democracy, and you’ve done things that no one has ever done before to an oppositional candidate, presidential transition, and president.”

Now, the consequences are finally catching up with them…not because they were too soft, but because they pushed too far and failed.

They are both powerless and rudderless, lost at sea.

“You’re furious because you’re on the 40% side of every issue that’s dear to you, from the trans issue to the border issue to the crime issue, to the Green New Deal issue, to foreign policy, and you have no political power.”

“You don’t have the White House, you don’t have the Congress, you don’t have the Supreme Court.”

“And your institutional power—the media, academia, the foundation—they are under assault.”

So now, he said, they’re spinning a new story to distract from what’s really happening.

“You’ve created this completely false narrative that you have to get tough… In fact, the opposite is true, everybody.”

Then he delivered the final blow with the grace and eloquence only Hanson could bring. It was knockout punch after knockout punch.

It cut directly to the core of Democrat Party….bare for the world to see.

“You have been the most vicious and the most abject subverters of democracy all for the short term gain of destroying Donald Trump.”

“And now that’s boomeranging upon you, and you don’t like to see it happen to you, what you tried to do to Donald Trump.”

“There’s a whole vocabulary cross-culturally for what is happening to you now. It’s called payback is a ‘blank’, karma, boomerang, do unto others as you should do unto you, only eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth.”

“But this is called retribution and it’s fully earned for what you’ve done to democracy, as long as it’s legal and it’s necessary.”

“You’re angry because you’re impotent, and you created false narratives that Donald Trump is doing what you have actually done.”

“And what is that? Destroying democracy.”

Wow, that was BRUTAL, but accurate.

VDH: Democrats Betray Democracy to Stop Trump

The Left claims they’re “saving democracy” from Donald Trump—but their actions tell a different story.

Democrats have pushed some of the most brazen political scandals in modern history—from the Russia collusion hoax, to burying the Hunter Biden laptop, to hiding President Biden’s cognitive decline—all in the name of stopping Trump.

@VDHanson exposes how the Left has undermined democracy in the very process of claiming to defend it on today’s episode of “Victor Davis Hanson: In His Own Words.”

“  The problem, James Carville and Democrats, is that you have sabotaged democracy. And you’ve done things that no one has ever done before to an oppositional candidate, presidential transition, and president. And now you’re furious because you’re on the 40% side of every issue that’s dear to you—from the trans issue to the border issue, to the crime issue, to the Green New Deal issue, to foreign policy. And you have no political power. You don’t have the White House, you don’t have the Congress, you don’t have the Supreme Court. And your institutional power—the media, academia, the foundation—they are under assault.”

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(0:00) The New Narrative
(0:22) The ‘Tougher’ Mantra
(1:25) Gerrymandering and Redistricting
(3:01) The Three Great Scandals
(4:54) Unprecedented Actions Against Trump
(6:15) Democratic Frustration
(8:09) Conclusion

August 13, 2025 - The Clinton Foundation cover-up timeline the FBI didn’t want you to see

Credit where it’s due: investigative journalists John Solomon and Jerry Dunleavy at Just the News have just pulled the curtain back on one of the most brazen examples of political interference in law enforcement we’ve seen since the bad old days of J. Edgar Hoover’s private files. And, just like back then, the stakes were presidential.

Thanks to a newly declassified 2017 FBI memo—kept hidden until now—we have a play-by-play timeline of how the Obama-era Department of Justice and FBI brass ran interference for Hillary Clinton during the 2016 election, smothering a serious investigation into the Clinton Foundation while going full throttle on the Trump–Russia “Crossfire Hurricane” probe.

The memo lays out, in black and white, the internal orders to “shut it down.” That’s not my paraphrase. According to the memo, then–Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates literally told agents to stop pursuing the Clinton Foundation case—even as field offices in New York, Little Rock, and Washington believed they had enough to move forward.

Key Timeline Events

As documented by John Solomon and Jerry Dunleavy, Just the News:

  • Feb. 2016 – DOJ signals to FBI that it “would not be supportive” of investigating the Clinton Foundation.
  • Mid-Feb. 2016 – Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe orders that “no overt investigative steps” be taken without his personal approval.
  • Spring–Summer 2016 – Agents in Little Rock move to a full investigation but are denied permission to collect even basic documents.
  • June 2016 – Attorney General Loretta Lynch meets privately with Bill Clinton on the tarmac in Phoenix; both deny discussing the case.
  • July 2016 – FBI Director James Comey announces “no reasonable prosecutor” would bring a case against Clinton, effectively ending the investigation in public view.
  • Late Oct. 2016 – McCabe leaks details of the Clinton probe to The Wall Street Journal.
  • Nov. 1, 2016 – McCabe recuses himself from the case, days before the election.
  • Contrast – At the same time, the FBI opens “Crossfire Hurricane” against Trump in a matter of days based on minimal evidence.
  • 2025 – AG Pam Bondi authorizes a strike force and grand jury to investigate possible criminal conspiracies tied to the 2016 suppression.

Meanwhile, over in the Trump camp, the bureau opened a full investigation within days based on the flimsy “Australia tip” about a bar conversation involving George Papadopoulos. The Durham Report later called it “immediate.” In other words, when it was Trump, they floored the accelerator. When it was Clinton, they yanked the emergency brake. (Read more: Larry O’Connor/Substack, 8/14/2025)  (Archive)

August 13, 2025 – The Clinton Foundation cover-up timeline: FBI was investigating 19 Clinton Foundation bank accounts for campaign finance fraud before DOJ shut it down

The newly released Clinton Foundation Investigation Timeline reveals that the FBI Los Angeles Field Office was investigating 19 Clinton Foundation bank accounts for ‘campaign finance fraud’ in 2016-2017, but the investigation was shut down.

August 23, 2017

August 14, 2025 - Solomon reports there are multiple grand juries investigating conspiracy involving Clintons, Bidens and Obama administration

Megyn Kelly is joined by John Solomon, founder of “Just The News,” to discuss reports of multiple grand juries investigating alleged conspiracy involving the Clintons, Bidens, and figures in the Obama administration, the key dates in the timeline involving possible corruption, and more.

August 15, 2025 - The New York Times is pro-military coup and then calls for the destruction of the Constitution within 48 hours

Over the course of the last 48 hours, the supposed ‘paper of record’ has advocated for a military coup against Trump and called for the abolishment of the U.S. Senate and the Electoral College, and to pack the U.S. Supreme Court.

These are the people who claim to want to save Democracy? Really?

This column by two members of the Obama administration was published yesterday:

From the column:

We Used to Think the Military Would Stand Up to Trump. We Were Wrong.

By ordering 800 National Guard troops to Washington, on the pretext of an illusory crime wave, President Trump has further dragged the U.S. military into domestic law enforcement, in a move credibly perceived as an ominous “test case.” This continues what the administration started in California in June as part of the its deportation efforts.

Unfortunately, though we (and others) had hoped that the military would only respond to calls to action in American cities and states kicking and screaming, we no longer expect resistance from that institution. Once, perhaps, traditionalist officers might have leaned on protocol and refused to heed a lawless order, taking inspiration from the generals — Mark Milley and James Mattis — who resisted the uprooting of established military standards in the first Trump term.

Then today, the New York Times published this:

These are the same people who will then turn around lecture the rest of us about democracy. They are basically admitting that they can’t win unless they radically change the rules. (Read more: The Gateway Pundit, 8/15/2025)  (Archive)

August 15, 2025 - Federal Housing Director Bill Pulte refers Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook to DOJ for possible mortgage fraud

Trump Federal Housing Director Bill Pulte issues bombshell revelation that Biden-appointed Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook likely committed MORTGAGE FRAUD.

“[Jerome] Powell must look into it or he is complicit.”

“Ms. Cook: why did you designate your Atlanta Condo as your primary residence two weeks after declaring your Michigan home as your primary residence?”

Another mortgage fraud investigation may be opened. Wow.

August 16, 2025 - ActBlue money laundering operation exposed through fake home mortgages and is under investigation

MASSIVE ActBlue money laundering operation exposed through home mortgages and is now officially under investigation.

ActBlue is laundering cash through phantom real estate deals, turning thousands into hundreds of millions of dollars. You just can’t make this stuff up.

Democrats get a $200,000 home, create a fake $200,000,000 mortgage on the home and then launder the money through wire transfers.

This is just ONE layer of the Democrats enormous money laundering operation through ActBlue.

Over 400 carbon-copy donations on a single day led investigators to tons of hyper inflated property “sales” in California and Texas.

It was all made up. Multiple transfers in a single day, private cash lenders, no public loan records, and addresses that don’t exist.

The pattern mirrors classic Bank Secrecy Act violations, pumping millions into federal races around each election cycle, and is now in the Justice Department’s hands for potential charges under the Anti-Money Laundering Act of 2020.

This also ties into everything currently transpiring including the 2020 election, the fake IDs, ballots, and every NGO and non-profit, including connections to cartels, and big banks, such as TD Bank, who was already fined over $3 billion for letting dirty money be laundered through their systems completely under the radar or with proper oversight.

You wonder why they’re so desperate and begging for cash. USAID and ActBlue are two of their largest cash flow operations and they are either completely shut down or under investigation and about to be.

It’s only a matter of time.

Source: @stinchfield1776

August 17, 2025 - James Comey declares himself a ‘Swiftie’; says her music helps him oppose Trump

Former FBI Director James Comey declared himself a Taylor Swift fan, a.k.a. “Swiftie,” in a video posted to social media on Sunday, saying the pop star’s music gives him the strength to oppose President Donald Trump.

“I’m in a family’s Swiftie group chat. I know all her music, and I listen to it in my headphones when I cut the grass,” Comey said in the video, adding that his favorite songs are “All Too Well” and “Exile.”

The former FBI Director said that Swift’s music has been a major part of his family for several years as they have dealt  “with adversity and celebration,” saying that the pop star’s example has helped him to resist “bullies.”

“But I gotta be honest, it also leaves me with a strange feeling at times because I don’t want us to become like Trump and his followers,” he said. “There are far more decent, honest, kind people in America than there are mean jerks. And don’t get me wrong, we have our jerks, millions of them.”

(…) In July, the FBI launched an investigation into former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Director John Brennan and former FBI Director James Comey over their roles in the investigation surrounding President Donald Trump and Russia’s alleged collusion. (Read more: Breitbart News, 8/17/2025) (Archive)