**New** (Paul) Friday Insider Notes
- By Cris_Ard
- The West Zone
- 61 Replies
TigerIllustrated - Friday Insider Notes
With the NCAA Dead Period starting Monday, a busy month of recruiting visits will come to a close this weekend.
clemson.rivals.com
Titanic Sub Tourism Expedition - You Tuber Who Went on OceanGate Expedition to see Titanic
- By marcuslos
- House Of Politics & Off-Topics
- 0 Replies
Titanic Sub Tourism Expedition - You Tuber Who Went on OceanGate Expedition to see Titanic
www.triond.net
Titanic Sub Tourism Expedition - You Tuber Who Went on OceanGate Expedition to see Titanic
Titanic Sub Tourism Expedition - You Tuber Who Went on OceanGate Expedition to see Titanic
Hunter Biden pleads guilty
- By nytigerfan
- House Of Politics & Off-Topics
- 24 Replies
There are two justice systems in the US! Oh wait...
www.foxnews.com
Hunter Biden agrees to plead guilty to federal tax charges
Hunter Biden is expected to plead guilty in the years-long federal investigation into his tax affairs, Fox News Digital has confirmed.
Top 10 Hunter Biden bombshells from IRS whistleblower testimonies
- By TigerGrowls
- House Of Politics & Off-Topics
- 4 Replies
Nice current summary.
justthenews.com
"The purposeful exclusion of the 2014 and 2015 years sanitized the most substantive criminal conduct and concealed material facts," Shapley stated.
By Ben Whedon and Nicholas Ballasy
Updated: June 22, 2023 - 7:52pm
Two IRS whistleblowers who worked on the Hunter Biden tax investigation testified to the House Committee on Ways and Means in recent weeks attesting to the Department of Justice's hamstringing of U.S. Attorney David Weiss and his ability to pursue the case.
Biden reached a deal with the DOJ earlier this week to plead guilty to two tax charges and a gun violation that could potentially be dismissed. The DOJ is recommending he receive no prison time.
Gary Shapley, who led the IRS agents working on the case, initially came forward alleging that political officials had intervened to prevent the bringing of charges against the first son and that Weiss lacked sufficient authority to do so on his own. After Shapley came forward, the DOJ removed his entire team from the case.
One of his subordinate agents, who remains unidentified, has since come forward to corroborate most of Shapley's claims. The pair testified to the committee in separate interviews, revealing the extent to which the DOJ hampered the case.
File
Whistleblower 1 Transcript_Redacted.pdf
File
Whistleblower 2 Transcript_Redacted.pdf
Here are the top 10 takeaways from their testimonies:
Prosecutors resisted IRS efforts to ramp up the investigation before the election
The unnamed whistleblower recounted disagreements between the IRS whistleblowers on the case and the prosecutors about taking aggressive steps to pursue the investigation.
"So one of the first disagreements I recall between the IRS investigators and the prosecutors was the idea of going overt," he said. "When we work criminal tax investigations, there's an IRS policy in place that we need to interview the subject within 30 days of elevating the investigation."
The agent insisted that he lobbied heavily for the case to "go overt" as a means of putting Hunter on notice and to preserve relevant materials, but was overruled, allegedly due to concerns that it would compromise evidence on the FBI side of the case.
"I was overruled during multiple meetings almost to the point that I couldn't bring it up anymore to the attorneys, and they would get visually upset with me. And I was continually being told that we had to stay covert to preserve potential evidence from the FBI side of the investigation," he continued. "So we did not end up going overt and conducting interviews until after the 2020 election on December 8th, 2020, after I continually pushed the issue at various meetings."
Shapley indicated that the team had prepared documentation to support more aggressive investigative efforts in April 2020, including interviews and searches, but that career DOJ officials "dragged their feet" on the IRS pursuing them.
"By June 2020, those same career officials were already delaying overt investigative actions. This was well before the typical 60- to 90-day period when DOJ would historically stand down before an election. It was apparent that DOJ was purposely slow-walking investigative actions in this matter," he said.
DOJ repeatedly squashed search warrants
Shapley's testimony detailed materials suggesting the IRS ought to seek a search warrant for the Biden estate in Delaware and that Assistant United States Attorney Lesley Wolf had agreed there was probable cause. She did however, reportedly agree that much of the needed evidence would be in the Bidens' guest house but that they would never get approval for such a search.
He further contended that the prosecutors wanted to remove Hunter Biden's name from the search warrants and document requests, and that a DOJ tax line attorney had insisted doing so would produce "most" of the relevant data. Shapley expressed incredulity that the DOJ would regard "most" as a sufficient target for an investigative effort.
Wolf, he said, informed him in early September that the DOJ's Office of Enforcement Operations was sitting on a search warrant for "emails for Blue Star Strategies."
Acting Deputy Attorney General Richard Donoghue on September 4th, 2020, ordered that the DOJ cease all overt investigative activities due to the upcoming election. The DOJ typically stands down for 60 to 90 days ahead of the contest. The order further delayed the IRS agents from taking major investigative steps.
Later in the year, on Oct. 22, 2020, Wolf said that Weiss had reviewed the search warrant for Hunter Biden's residence and agreed that it established probable cause. Shapley informed the committee that, despite that conclusion, prosecutors would not authorize a physical search warrant on Hunter Biden.
"Even though the legal requirements were met and the investigative team knew evidence would be in these locations, AUSA Wolf stated that they would not allow a physical search warrant on Hunter Biden," he said.
Shapley and his team never managed to interview Hunter, nor other Bidens
Before directly seeking to interview Hunter, Shapley and his team needed to verify his residence and sought to conduct a "walk-by" to that effect.
"We would go in general clothes, walk by the residence, see what's going on, see if there's Secret Service," the anonymous whistleblower stated, though such an operation was vetoed by the DOJ.
"Tax does not approve. This will be on hold until further notice," read the DOJ email he referenced that shut down the plan.
Ultimately, the walk-by never occurred and Shapley went to interview Hunter at his residence on the December 8th "day of action" but that Hunter declined to be interviewed.
Subsequently, the Department of Justice Tax Division held a taxpayer conference with Biden and his defense counsel. Such a proceeding affords the subject of a case the opportunity to dissuade the DOJ from pursuing charges and to outline their defense.
While the DOJ does not always include the investigators at such meetings, the second whistleblower stated that the IRS team had asked to attend it and the DOJ denied their request.
The day of action was also supposed to include interviews with other individuals, including James and Sara Biden, but they were not allowed to conduct those interviews. He did assert that they managed to serve both with a records request, however.
Prosecutors limited questions about Joe Biden
Shapley recalled that, during a Dec. 3 planning meeting for the day of action, the IRS agents discussed the game plan for pursuing interviews, including Hunter Biden associate Ron Walker.
Shapley indicated that the IRS team wanted to asked about an email reading "Ten held by H for the big guy" and hoped to identify both parties in the statement.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Wolf, however, intervened and insisted they should not ask any questions about "dad," in an apparent reference to Joe Biden. The decision prompted outrage from both the FBI and IRS teams but Wolf stood her ground.
The FBI did manage to interview Walker on the day in question and, Shapley asserted, secured some comment on the letter by not directly asking about it, technically complying with Wolf's decision. Shapley asserted that the line of questioning was "clearly valuable for the investigators to ask about Hunter Biden's dad," noting that Walker subsequently described Joe Biden's interaction with some of Hunter's business associates.
IRS agents couldn't get access to the Hunter Biden laptop
As late as Oct. 22, 2020, the IRS agents had not secured access to the now-notorious and verified personal computer of the target of their investigation.
Shapley described a meeting on that date with the FBI's computer analysis team and said that at that meeting, Wolf stated "prosecutors decided to keep it from the investigators."
"Investigators assigned to this investigation were obstructed from seeing all the available evidence," Shapley stated. "It is unknown if all the evidence in the laptop was reviewed by agents or by prosecutors."
A key Biden appointee blocked the pursuit of some of the most serious charges
In March of 2022, The DOJ Tax Division sent its prosecution memo to the United States Attorney's Office for the District of Columbia, the office that had venue relating to the 2014 and 2015 tax year elements of the case.
Shapley and the FBI case agent had requested to be a part of the presentation, but were denied. Department of Justice Tax Division Mark Daly told the case agent that the First Assistant at the office was optimistic and planned to assign an assistant U.S. Attorney to aid the case.
Within days, the team learned that the Biden-appointed D.C. U.S. Attorney, Matthew Graves, had personally reviewed the case and would not support it, effectively curtailing any and all ability of the team to pursue charges in that venue.
Shapley contended that the team did not realize the development at the time, saying "[w]e knew that President Biden-appointed U.S. Attorney Matthew Graves did not support the investigation, but DOJ and United States Attorney Weiss allowed us to believe that he had some special authority to charge."
He then pointed to testimony from Attorney General Merrick Garland, who stated on April 26th, 2022, that "[t]he Hunter Biden investigation is being run by and supervised by the United States Attorney for the District of Delaware. He is in charge of that investigation. There will not be interference of any political or improper kind."
Shapley took that to mean that "that they were still deciding whether to charge 2014 and 2015 tax violations."
DOJ rejected Weiss's request to be named special counsel
Weiss evidently lacked any unstated authority to pursue D.C. charges. Shapley stated that Graves had refused to let Weiss pursue charges in the district.
"This resulted in United States Attorney Weiss requesting special counsel authority from Main DOJ to charge in the District of Columbia," he continued, adding that Weiss's request was denied.
He went on to note that the decision killed the last chance of pursuing the 2014 and 2015 charges, as the statute of limitations on the alleged crimes would eventually expire.
"The years in question included foreign income from Burisma and a scheme to evade his income taxes through a partnership with a convicted felon. There were also potential FARA issues relating to 2014 and 2015," he went on. "The purposeful exclusion of the 2014 and 2015 years sanitized the most substantive criminal conduct and concealed material facts."
WhatsApp Messages connected Joe Biden to Hunter's business deals
The second unnamed whistleblower said that there were WhatsApp messages found where Hunter mentioned his father, President Joe Biden, in the context of business deals.
"Hunter is saying this in those WhatsApp messages, that: I'm sitting here with my dad ready to make a deal, we're waiting for the phone call," according to the whistleblower's recollection of the messages. "We couldn't believe that we saw that. That was more indication that the dad might have been involved."
Biden met CEFC, Chinese business client of Hunter’s
Shapley recalled Rob Walker, a business associate of Hunter’s, describing a meeting that Joe Biden attended with the Chinese company, CEFC.
“Walker went on to describe an instance in which the former Vice President showed up at a CEFC meeting,” Shapley said.
“Walker said: ‘We were at the Four Seasons and we were having lunch and he stopped in, just said hello to everybody. I don't even think he drank water. I think Hunter Biden said, 'I may be trying to start a company or try to do something with these guys and could you?' And I think he was like, if I'm around and he'd show up,’” he recounted.
Agents never saw the Biden FD-1023 Form
The FBI and IRS agents investigating Biden never received the "Confidential Human Source" information on a form FD-1023, which outlined an alleged bribery deal where a Burisma executive paid $5 million to Hunter and another Biden family member, according whistleblower testimony and documents released by the House Ways and Means Committee.
“In news articles, former AG William Barr is cited in saying that this Form 1023 was reviewed by the Western District of Pennsylvania and was ultimately shared with David Weiss, U.S. Attorney overseeing the subject Investigation,” according to a letter written by the IRS whistleblower’s attorney to the committee’s GOP chair, Jason Smith, and its Democratic ranking member, Richard Neal.
“As Mr. X has testified, he was the IRS-CI Case Agent over the subject investigation at the time – and Mr. X has stated to me that he has never seen this FBI Form 1023 and that he does not recall ever hearing about this information being turned over in any meetings with the prosecution team in Delaware,” the attorney also wrote.
Ben Whedon is an editor and reporter for Just the News. Follow him on Twitter.
Top 10 Hunter Biden bombshells from IRS whistleblower testimonies
"The purposeful exclusion of the 2014 and 2015 years sanitized the most substantive criminal conduct and concealed material facts," Shapley stated.
justthenews.com
"The purposeful exclusion of the 2014 and 2015 years sanitized the most substantive criminal conduct and concealed material facts," Shapley stated.
By Ben Whedon and Nicholas Ballasy
Updated: June 22, 2023 - 7:52pm
Two IRS whistleblowers who worked on the Hunter Biden tax investigation testified to the House Committee on Ways and Means in recent weeks attesting to the Department of Justice's hamstringing of U.S. Attorney David Weiss and his ability to pursue the case.
Biden reached a deal with the DOJ earlier this week to plead guilty to two tax charges and a gun violation that could potentially be dismissed. The DOJ is recommending he receive no prison time.
Gary Shapley, who led the IRS agents working on the case, initially came forward alleging that political officials had intervened to prevent the bringing of charges against the first son and that Weiss lacked sufficient authority to do so on his own. After Shapley came forward, the DOJ removed his entire team from the case.
One of his subordinate agents, who remains unidentified, has since come forward to corroborate most of Shapley's claims. The pair testified to the committee in separate interviews, revealing the extent to which the DOJ hampered the case.
File
Whistleblower 1 Transcript_Redacted.pdf
File
Whistleblower 2 Transcript_Redacted.pdf
Here are the top 10 takeaways from their testimonies:
Prosecutors resisted IRS efforts to ramp up the investigation before the election
The unnamed whistleblower recounted disagreements between the IRS whistleblowers on the case and the prosecutors about taking aggressive steps to pursue the investigation.
"So one of the first disagreements I recall between the IRS investigators and the prosecutors was the idea of going overt," he said. "When we work criminal tax investigations, there's an IRS policy in place that we need to interview the subject within 30 days of elevating the investigation."
The agent insisted that he lobbied heavily for the case to "go overt" as a means of putting Hunter on notice and to preserve relevant materials, but was overruled, allegedly due to concerns that it would compromise evidence on the FBI side of the case.
"I was overruled during multiple meetings almost to the point that I couldn't bring it up anymore to the attorneys, and they would get visually upset with me. And I was continually being told that we had to stay covert to preserve potential evidence from the FBI side of the investigation," he continued. "So we did not end up going overt and conducting interviews until after the 2020 election on December 8th, 2020, after I continually pushed the issue at various meetings."
Shapley indicated that the team had prepared documentation to support more aggressive investigative efforts in April 2020, including interviews and searches, but that career DOJ officials "dragged their feet" on the IRS pursuing them.
"By June 2020, those same career officials were already delaying overt investigative actions. This was well before the typical 60- to 90-day period when DOJ would historically stand down before an election. It was apparent that DOJ was purposely slow-walking investigative actions in this matter," he said.
DOJ repeatedly squashed search warrants
Shapley's testimony detailed materials suggesting the IRS ought to seek a search warrant for the Biden estate in Delaware and that Assistant United States Attorney Lesley Wolf had agreed there was probable cause. She did however, reportedly agree that much of the needed evidence would be in the Bidens' guest house but that they would never get approval for such a search.
He further contended that the prosecutors wanted to remove Hunter Biden's name from the search warrants and document requests, and that a DOJ tax line attorney had insisted doing so would produce "most" of the relevant data. Shapley expressed incredulity that the DOJ would regard "most" as a sufficient target for an investigative effort.
Wolf, he said, informed him in early September that the DOJ's Office of Enforcement Operations was sitting on a search warrant for "emails for Blue Star Strategies."
Acting Deputy Attorney General Richard Donoghue on September 4th, 2020, ordered that the DOJ cease all overt investigative activities due to the upcoming election. The DOJ typically stands down for 60 to 90 days ahead of the contest. The order further delayed the IRS agents from taking major investigative steps.
Later in the year, on Oct. 22, 2020, Wolf said that Weiss had reviewed the search warrant for Hunter Biden's residence and agreed that it established probable cause. Shapley informed the committee that, despite that conclusion, prosecutors would not authorize a physical search warrant on Hunter Biden.
"Even though the legal requirements were met and the investigative team knew evidence would be in these locations, AUSA Wolf stated that they would not allow a physical search warrant on Hunter Biden," he said.
Shapley and his team never managed to interview Hunter, nor other Bidens
Before directly seeking to interview Hunter, Shapley and his team needed to verify his residence and sought to conduct a "walk-by" to that effect.
"We would go in general clothes, walk by the residence, see what's going on, see if there's Secret Service," the anonymous whistleblower stated, though such an operation was vetoed by the DOJ.
"Tax does not approve. This will be on hold until further notice," read the DOJ email he referenced that shut down the plan.
Ultimately, the walk-by never occurred and Shapley went to interview Hunter at his residence on the December 8th "day of action" but that Hunter declined to be interviewed.
Subsequently, the Department of Justice Tax Division held a taxpayer conference with Biden and his defense counsel. Such a proceeding affords the subject of a case the opportunity to dissuade the DOJ from pursuing charges and to outline their defense.
While the DOJ does not always include the investigators at such meetings, the second whistleblower stated that the IRS team had asked to attend it and the DOJ denied their request.
The day of action was also supposed to include interviews with other individuals, including James and Sara Biden, but they were not allowed to conduct those interviews. He did assert that they managed to serve both with a records request, however.
Prosecutors limited questions about Joe Biden
Shapley recalled that, during a Dec. 3 planning meeting for the day of action, the IRS agents discussed the game plan for pursuing interviews, including Hunter Biden associate Ron Walker.
Shapley indicated that the IRS team wanted to asked about an email reading "Ten held by H for the big guy" and hoped to identify both parties in the statement.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Wolf, however, intervened and insisted they should not ask any questions about "dad," in an apparent reference to Joe Biden. The decision prompted outrage from both the FBI and IRS teams but Wolf stood her ground.
The FBI did manage to interview Walker on the day in question and, Shapley asserted, secured some comment on the letter by not directly asking about it, technically complying with Wolf's decision. Shapley asserted that the line of questioning was "clearly valuable for the investigators to ask about Hunter Biden's dad," noting that Walker subsequently described Joe Biden's interaction with some of Hunter's business associates.
IRS agents couldn't get access to the Hunter Biden laptop
As late as Oct. 22, 2020, the IRS agents had not secured access to the now-notorious and verified personal computer of the target of their investigation.
Shapley described a meeting on that date with the FBI's computer analysis team and said that at that meeting, Wolf stated "prosecutors decided to keep it from the investigators."
"Investigators assigned to this investigation were obstructed from seeing all the available evidence," Shapley stated. "It is unknown if all the evidence in the laptop was reviewed by agents or by prosecutors."
A key Biden appointee blocked the pursuit of some of the most serious charges
In March of 2022, The DOJ Tax Division sent its prosecution memo to the United States Attorney's Office for the District of Columbia, the office that had venue relating to the 2014 and 2015 tax year elements of the case.
Shapley and the FBI case agent had requested to be a part of the presentation, but were denied. Department of Justice Tax Division Mark Daly told the case agent that the First Assistant at the office was optimistic and planned to assign an assistant U.S. Attorney to aid the case.
Within days, the team learned that the Biden-appointed D.C. U.S. Attorney, Matthew Graves, had personally reviewed the case and would not support it, effectively curtailing any and all ability of the team to pursue charges in that venue.
Shapley contended that the team did not realize the development at the time, saying "[w]e knew that President Biden-appointed U.S. Attorney Matthew Graves did not support the investigation, but DOJ and United States Attorney Weiss allowed us to believe that he had some special authority to charge."
He then pointed to testimony from Attorney General Merrick Garland, who stated on April 26th, 2022, that "[t]he Hunter Biden investigation is being run by and supervised by the United States Attorney for the District of Delaware. He is in charge of that investigation. There will not be interference of any political or improper kind."
Shapley took that to mean that "that they were still deciding whether to charge 2014 and 2015 tax violations."
DOJ rejected Weiss's request to be named special counsel
Weiss evidently lacked any unstated authority to pursue D.C. charges. Shapley stated that Graves had refused to let Weiss pursue charges in the district.
"This resulted in United States Attorney Weiss requesting special counsel authority from Main DOJ to charge in the District of Columbia," he continued, adding that Weiss's request was denied.
He went on to note that the decision killed the last chance of pursuing the 2014 and 2015 charges, as the statute of limitations on the alleged crimes would eventually expire.
"The years in question included foreign income from Burisma and a scheme to evade his income taxes through a partnership with a convicted felon. There were also potential FARA issues relating to 2014 and 2015," he went on. "The purposeful exclusion of the 2014 and 2015 years sanitized the most substantive criminal conduct and concealed material facts."
WhatsApp Messages connected Joe Biden to Hunter's business deals
The second unnamed whistleblower said that there were WhatsApp messages found where Hunter mentioned his father, President Joe Biden, in the context of business deals.
"Hunter is saying this in those WhatsApp messages, that: I'm sitting here with my dad ready to make a deal, we're waiting for the phone call," according to the whistleblower's recollection of the messages. "We couldn't believe that we saw that. That was more indication that the dad might have been involved."
Biden met CEFC, Chinese business client of Hunter’s
Shapley recalled Rob Walker, a business associate of Hunter’s, describing a meeting that Joe Biden attended with the Chinese company, CEFC.
“Walker went on to describe an instance in which the former Vice President showed up at a CEFC meeting,” Shapley said.
“Walker said: ‘We were at the Four Seasons and we were having lunch and he stopped in, just said hello to everybody. I don't even think he drank water. I think Hunter Biden said, 'I may be trying to start a company or try to do something with these guys and could you?' And I think he was like, if I'm around and he'd show up,’” he recounted.
Agents never saw the Biden FD-1023 Form
The FBI and IRS agents investigating Biden never received the "Confidential Human Source" information on a form FD-1023, which outlined an alleged bribery deal where a Burisma executive paid $5 million to Hunter and another Biden family member, according whistleblower testimony and documents released by the House Ways and Means Committee.
“In news articles, former AG William Barr is cited in saying that this Form 1023 was reviewed by the Western District of Pennsylvania and was ultimately shared with David Weiss, U.S. Attorney overseeing the subject Investigation,” according to a letter written by the IRS whistleblower’s attorney to the committee’s GOP chair, Jason Smith, and its Democratic ranking member, Richard Neal.
“As Mr. X has testified, he was the IRS-CI Case Agent over the subject investigation at the time – and Mr. X has stated to me that he has never seen this FBI Form 1023 and that he does not recall ever hearing about this information being turned over in any meetings with the prosecution team in Delaware,” the attorney also wrote.
Ben Whedon is an editor and reporter for Just the News. Follow him on Twitter.
Deep Dive on John Durham Report
- House Of Politics & Off-Topics
- 59 Replies
I posted this article from DC Lawyer, handle Techno Fog. To some that try to debate authors credentials, I suggest you refute the facts.
Yesterday, we highlighted some of the more important conclusions Special Counsel John Durham reached in his long-awaited report. Today, we do a deeper discussion into Durham’s findings.
And we start with what was omitted: the DNC “hack.”
The Barr Appointment Order and the DNC Hack
US Attorney John Durham was appointed by Attorney General Barr as Special Counsel in October 2020. The appointment order stated Durham was authorized to investigate the intelligence and law enforcement “directed at the 2016 presidential campaigns, individuals associated with those campaign, and individuals associated with the administration of President Donald J. Trump, including but not limited to Crossfire Hurricane and the investigation of Special Counsel Robert S. Mueller, III.”
Initially, that appointment order got our attention because it mentioned the 2016 “campaigns”: Durham would be reviewing investigations “directed” at the Hillary Clinton campaign.
What investigations were those?
Nobody had a good answer at the time, and the suspicion was that it may include the purported Russian “hack” of the DNC/Clinton Campaign. The idea that Durham was looking at the DNC hack gained traction when it was reported that Durham’s team was asking this question to a Georgia Tech researcher associated with the Alfa Bank hoax perpetuated by DNC/Clinton lawyer Michael Sussmann:
Why is the DNC hack important?
It’s the starting point to all this, and it may have played a role in why the Clinton Campaign - especially Michael Sussmann, et al. - was so focused in linking Trump to Russia, even if it risked criminal charges. The theory being that the Russians didn’t hack the DNC or the Clinton campaign or the DCCC. The FBI never got the servers and they relied, in large part, on findings from DNC/Clinton Campaign contractor Crowdstrike - who just happened to be contracted by Michael Sussmann. Yet Crowdstrike, according to Aaron Mate, “had no concrete evidence that Russian hackers stole emails from the Democratic National Committee’s server.”
Why the omission?
Likely because Durham, right or wrong, followed Barr’s order as written and didn’t see it within his authority as Special Counsel to chart his own course to include the DNC hack. (The idea being that the DNC hack investigation was not “directed” at the Clinton Campaign.) To elaborate further, the report generally explains Durham’s interpretation of Barr’s order, stating it didn’t include instructions to review the DOJ/FBI’s handling of Hillary Clinton’s use of a private e-mail server or their targeting of Lt. General Michael Flynn.
What, then, to make of Durham team’s question about DARPA instructions to investigate the DNC hack? This is just an educated guess, but it may have to do with Durham’s referral to the DOD Inspector General of “irregular conduct in 2016 of two former employees of the Department of Defense.” Durham’s team may have seen something concerning and referred it to the DOD instead of opening their own investigation into the matter.
To summarize, the DNC hack attribution wasn’t a focus of the Durham investigation because Barr decided not to include it in the appointment order. That was a remarkable omission and an unfortunate mistake by Barr, who rightly viewed Crossfire Hurricane and the Trump/Russia investigation with skepticism but didn’t think to extend that skepticism to other matters involving many of the same players.
The Predicate for Crossfire Hurricane
With respect to his review of Crossfire Hurricane, Durham looked at the “information known or available to the FBI” prior to the opening of that investigation. As you may recall, Crossfire Hurricane was opened as a “full counterintelligence investigation” into the Trump campaign – one which allowed for the use of investigative tools not allowed at the preliminary investigation stage – based on casual conversations Trump campaign volunteer George Papadopoulos had with an Australian Diplomat and Australian High Commissioner Alexander Downer. Papadopoulos allegedly “suggested the Trump team had received some kind of suggestion from Russia” that it could anonymously release information damaging to Clinton and President Obama.
The FBI decision to open the full investigation into the Trump campaign came from its top officials, who were “unanimous” in their support despite FBI policies prescribing a “measured approach” to the opening of the investigation that was not followed by the Crossfire Hurricane team. It was done so without “any intelligence or other vetted, corroborated information regarding Trump or his campaign staff colluding with the Russian government.” Peter Strzok, days after drafting and approving the Electronic Communication (EC) that opened Crossfire Hurricane, basically commented to an FBI London employee that “there’s nothing to this.” British Intelligence apparently agreed, believing the Papadopoulos information was not “particularly valuable intelligence.”
As Crossfire Hurricane proceeded, the FBI decided against critically analyzing the Papadopoulos information or furthering its understanding of the Trump campaign’s contacts with Russia. That decision was apparently led by FBI leadership. According to an FBI London Assistant Legal Attaché: “FBI executive management was pushing the matter so hard that ‘there was no stopping the train.’” While FBI executives pushed the investigation, they also made sure that the agency did not conduct regular investigative steps, such as interviewing Carter Page and George Papadopoulos, or issuing national security letters, or using pen registers and trap and trace devices.
Who was the FBI executive that pushed the most?
It had to be FBI Director James Comey, who demanded a FISA be issued on Carter Page. Comey made that known despite being warned that the Steele reporting, on which the FISA warrant relied, was likely a Clinton campaign product. The impression from the Durham report is that the FBI analysts and agents assigned to the Carter Page FISA application (and the first renewal) were the product of pressure from FBI leadership.
FBI DAD Jennifer Boone, for example, ignored assessments from her agents that Page wasn’t a Russian agent and directed them “to continue the FISA renewal process.” It was the view of Boone’s team that she was “being directed by FBI executive management to continue the FISA surveillance.” Boone herself believed that Andrew McCabe was “heavily involved in all aspects of the investigation.”
All the while, even after the second Page application was submitted to the FISC, “the FBI still did not possess any intelligence showing that anyone associated with the Trump campaign was in contact with Russian intelligence officers during the campaign.” This should be no surprise given the findings of the 2019 IG report.
The Hillary Clinton Investigations
As we discussed in the opening, Durham’s scope included the FBI investigations “directed” at the Hillary Clinton campaign. It seems the purpose of that review was to assess and compare the favorable treatment received by Clinton to the targeting of Trump.
The first investigation involved an FBI tip from a CHS that a foreign government was sending a person “to contribute to Clinton’s anticipated presidential campaign, as a way to gain influence with Clinton should she win the presidency.” (Which country?!) An FBI field office sought a FISA against the foreign contributor and made that request to FBI headquarters, which ignored it for four months due to the fact that they were careful that Clinton was “involved.” According to one FBI Agent, “They were pretty ‘tippy-toeing’ around HRC because there was a chance she would be the next president.” The FISA was approved on the condition that the FBI give defensive briefings to Clinton.
The second Clinton investigation involved the same CHS, who in November 2015 reported to the FBI that another foreign government was looking to contribute to the Clinton campaign “in exchange for the protection of [that country’s] interests should Clinton become President.” That CHS would end up making a $2,700 donation to the Clinton campaign on behalf of a foreign insider, in violation of federal law which bans contributions by foreign nationals. The CHS told their handling FBI agent that “They [the campaign] were okay with it. […] yes they were fully aware from the start” of the contribution being made on behalf of the foreign interest.
Who was the FBI’s confidential human source that caught the Clinton campaign in illegal activity? Thanks to great work by the talented Fool Nelsonshowing a $2,700 contribution from Patrick Byrne, we have this admission from Byrne himself (no telling if he is being truthful, with Byrne’s history and all):
Somehow, the FBI did not obtain copies of the illegal payment and the CHS’s FBI handlers “could not explain why this apparent illegal contribution was not documented in FBI records.” Instead, the FBI handling agent “told the CHS to stay away from all events relating to Clinton’s campaign.” Later on, the CHS, who had essentially caught a member of the Clinton campaign facilitating illegal contributions, was admonished by the FBI:
The other Clinton investigation Durham reviewed – the investigation into “possible criminal activity involving the Clinton Foundation” – demonstrated, yet again, favorable treatment received by Clinton from FBI leadership. According to Durham, the Clinton Foundation case opening communication:
Despite this evidence, DOJ and FBI leadership essentially sabotaged the Clinton Foundation investigation. The DOJ was “hostile” to the Clinton Foundation presentations from the FBI Field Offices. And at a February 2016 FBI meeting to discuss the Clinton Foundation investigations, Assistant Director Andre McCabe ordered the cases to be closed. He would reconsider that demand following objections. However, any overt investigative steps needed McCabe’s approval. In May 2016, FBI Director Comey would, through an intermediary, demand the New York Field Office “cease and desist” their Clinton Foundation investigation. And in August 2016, as the presidential election approached, the US Attorneys’ offices in the Southern and Eastern Districts of New York declined to issue subpoenas to the FBI New York Field Office in support of their Clinton Foundation investigation.
They Spied on President-Elect Trump
Jumping around here for a moment: in February of last year, we reported on Durham filings in the Michael Sussmann case that indicated Rodney Joffe (a Clinton ally and FBI CHS) and his associates “exploited internet data from ‘the Executive Office of the President of the United States’ to further their own political agenda and damage President Trump.”
The Durham report provides additional context. Joffe had obtained, through what we might call a business colleague, data from the Executive Office of the President (the EOP’s network was supposedly run by DHS through a vendor) to create allegations that Trump, or someone in Trump’s orbit, was using a Russian Yotaphone to communicate with Russia. These allegations were taken by Sussmann to the CIA, which reviewed the data and passed it along to the FBI. Both agencies saw the allegations were bunk.
Here’s what the Durham report says about how Joffe obtained the data:
While the FBI was taking an essentially hands-off approach in investigating Hillary Clinton and the Clinton Campaign, it was knowingly using false information supplied by the Clinton Campaign to target Trump before and after the election. Call it the “Clinton Plan”.
In late July 2016, US intelligence agencies learned that “U.S Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton had approved a campaign plan to stir up a scandal against U.S. Presidential candidate Donald Trump by tying him to Putin.” This information went directly to CIA Director John Brennan, who would brief its contents on August 3, 2016 to President Obama, Vice President Biden, Attorney General Loretta Lynch (attending remotely) and other senior Obama Administration officials, as well as FBI Director Comey. Brennan’s handwritten notes specifically mention briefing the Obama White House on “alleged approval by Hillary Clinton on 26 July of a proposal from one of her [campaign] advisors to vilify Donald Trump by stirring up a scandal claiming interference by the Russian security services.”
Some FBI leaders and analysts and agents involved in Crossfire Hurricane – Brian Auten, Bill Priestap, and Peter Strzok – would receive this intelligence in September 2016. The information was undoubtedly material to both the FISA Court (in the upcoming FISA applications) and to assessing the intelligence coming from Christopher Steele. Yet the Crossfire Hurricane team didn’t take “any action to vet the Clinton Plan intelligence.” Again, Durham observed this stood in stark contrast to the aggressive steps taken by the FBI to investigate Trump.
Then there is the question of whether there was a criminal element to the Clinton Plan. As Durham phrased it, whether the Clinton Plan “as to intentionally provide knowingly false and/or misleading information to the FBI or other agencies.”
To get to the bottom of that question, Durham “interviewed a number of individuals connected with” the Clinton Campaign, including Hillary herself. One campaign foreign policy advisor admitted “that it was possible that she had proposed ideas” on the Trump/Russia topics “to the campaign’s leadership, who may have approved those ideas.” They also admitted that it was “possible” someone proposed linking Trump to Russia to distract from Clinton’s private email server. These discussions were followed by public statements from Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook which said “the Russian government had carried out the DNC hack to assist Trump’s electoral changes.”
Durham would ultimately find that there was “support for the notion that the Clinton campaign was engaged in an effort or plan in late July 2016 to encourage scrutiny of Trump's potential ties to Russia, and that the campaign might have wanted or expected law enforcement or other agencies to aid that effort, in part, by concluding that the Russians were responsible for the hack.” The evidence in support included Clinton Campaign lawyers Marc Elias and Michael Sussmann meeting with Fusion GPS just “three days after the purported approval of the Clinton Plan.”
Yet Durham didn’t have the evidence to charge anyone from the Clinton Campaign with intentionally providing false information to the government. While it was the Clinton Campaign who came up with the general Trump-Russia plan, they were insulated from the planning and execution – and thus consequences – of that scheme by their Perkins Coie lawyers, who used Fusion GPS and Christopher Steele (among others) to feed rumors and innuendo to the FBI.
That gets us to the other prosecution decisions.
I’ll start by observing that Durham’s team didn’t have a problem bringing to trial stand-alone false statement charges against those accused of deceiving the FBI. Sussmann was charged after giving conflicting statements to the FBI and to Congress; Danchenko was charged after lying multiple times to the FBI. Those are difficult cases for a prosecutor at trial. With that in mind, we assume that Durham would have charged FBI officials with false statements (or other crimes) if he had the evidence. (Unless the assumption is that Durham was scared to do so? But that doesn’t square with Durham’s history.)
Take, for example, the FBI’s submissions to the FISC. To prove perjury from those FISA warrants, Durham would need to prove the official made a false statement “with knowledge of its falsity, rather than as a result of confusion, mistake, or faulty memory.” There is no doubt that the submissions contained numerous falsehoods. Yet Durham concluded that the evidence they collected was not “sufficient” to meet that burden. (Part of the uphill battle Durham faced is that the system is established to insulate and protect those in power.) This doesn’t mean a crime didn’t occur; but rather, that there wasn’t a paper trail or direct testimony to support moving forward with charges.
Why wasn’t there direct testimony? In part because a number of former FBI officials involved in Crossfire Hurricane, from James Comey to Peter Strzok to Bill Priestap, declined to be interviewed relating to their Crossfire Hurricane involvement. Durham could have compelled their testimony before a grand jury, but that would have involved (1) immunity to the witnesses; (2) grand jury secrecy; and (3) answers like “I don’t recall”. Other witnesses who might have lied to the FBI invoked their Fifth Amendment privileges.
And why wasn’t there a paper trail?
A number of reasons. First, as we discussed yesterday, once issues arose in the Trump/Russia investigation, there were instructions from the top to not “write any more memoranda or analytical pieces and to provide their findings orally.” That’s related to our second point: these are FBI officials and agents who know the law and are adept at deceiving in a way to while avoiding prosecution. “Mistakes were made” or “I must have forgotten.” By the time their actions are reviewed, years have passed, memories are stale, and thus the necessary element of intent is even more difficult to prove. Third, Durham was unable to obtain some records due to attorney-client privilege - most notably Fusion GPS emails “that were purportedly prepared to assist Perkins Coie in providing legal advice to the law firm’s clients, the Clinton campaign and Fusion GPS.”
This isn’t to say that there wasn’t circumstantial evidence of FBI lies. (Just that proving the case on circumstances alone is extremely difficult for a prosecutor.) The FBI’s mistakes, which Durham thoroughly catalogued in his report, all went one direction: against Trump and his associates.
This was true for the inception and furtherance of Crossfire Hurricane, and it remained true throughout each investigative step, from the Carter Page FISA warrants to Michael Sussmann’s Alfa Bank/Yotaphone hoaxes (where FBI leadership protected Sussmann as a source – “FBI leadership, including Strzok, instructed him not to identify the source to the team”), to the protection of Steele primary subsource (and later, FBI CHS) Igor Danchenko. Time and time again, FBI personnel and FBI leadership refused to act on, or even investigate, information damaging to their collusion narrative. They protected sources who may have offered information damaging to the FBI, even to the point of trying to hide Danchenko as a future CHS during the Durham investigation.
In doing so, the FBI didn’t just abuse its authority and undertake an illegal spying campaign. It influenced elections. It permanently tarnished the reputations of good men like Carter Page. It created the Trump/Russia media frenzy that lasted for years. And it ruined the lives and otherwise bankrupted a significant number of targets and witnesses.
All because the FBI objected to the choice of the voters.
Yesterday, we highlighted some of the more important conclusions Special Counsel John Durham reached in his long-awaited report. Today, we do a deeper discussion into Durham’s findings.
And we start with what was omitted: the DNC “hack.”
The Barr Appointment Order and the DNC Hack
US Attorney John Durham was appointed by Attorney General Barr as Special Counsel in October 2020. The appointment order stated Durham was authorized to investigate the intelligence and law enforcement “directed at the 2016 presidential campaigns, individuals associated with those campaign, and individuals associated with the administration of President Donald J. Trump, including but not limited to Crossfire Hurricane and the investigation of Special Counsel Robert S. Mueller, III.”
Initially, that appointment order got our attention because it mentioned the 2016 “campaigns”: Durham would be reviewing investigations “directed” at the Hillary Clinton campaign.
What investigations were those?
Nobody had a good answer at the time, and the suspicion was that it may include the purported Russian “hack” of the DNC/Clinton Campaign. The idea that Durham was looking at the DNC hack gained traction when it was reported that Durham’s team was asking this question to a Georgia Tech researcher associated with the Alfa Bank hoax perpetuated by DNC/Clinton lawyer Michael Sussmann:
Missing from Durham’s report, however, was a review or analysis of the DNC hack.
Why is the DNC hack important?
It’s the starting point to all this, and it may have played a role in why the Clinton Campaign - especially Michael Sussmann, et al. - was so focused in linking Trump to Russia, even if it risked criminal charges. The theory being that the Russians didn’t hack the DNC or the Clinton campaign or the DCCC. The FBI never got the servers and they relied, in large part, on findings from DNC/Clinton Campaign contractor Crowdstrike - who just happened to be contracted by Michael Sussmann. Yet Crowdstrike, according to Aaron Mate, “had no concrete evidence that Russian hackers stole emails from the Democratic National Committee’s server.”
Why the omission?
Likely because Durham, right or wrong, followed Barr’s order as written and didn’t see it within his authority as Special Counsel to chart his own course to include the DNC hack. (The idea being that the DNC hack investigation was not “directed” at the Clinton Campaign.) To elaborate further, the report generally explains Durham’s interpretation of Barr’s order, stating it didn’t include instructions to review the DOJ/FBI’s handling of Hillary Clinton’s use of a private e-mail server or their targeting of Lt. General Michael Flynn.
What, then, to make of Durham team’s question about DARPA instructions to investigate the DNC hack? This is just an educated guess, but it may have to do with Durham’s referral to the DOD Inspector General of “irregular conduct in 2016 of two former employees of the Department of Defense.” Durham’s team may have seen something concerning and referred it to the DOD instead of opening their own investigation into the matter.
To summarize, the DNC hack attribution wasn’t a focus of the Durham investigation because Barr decided not to include it in the appointment order. That was a remarkable omission and an unfortunate mistake by Barr, who rightly viewed Crossfire Hurricane and the Trump/Russia investigation with skepticism but didn’t think to extend that skepticism to other matters involving many of the same players.
The Predicate for Crossfire Hurricane
With respect to his review of Crossfire Hurricane, Durham looked at the “information known or available to the FBI” prior to the opening of that investigation. As you may recall, Crossfire Hurricane was opened as a “full counterintelligence investigation” into the Trump campaign – one which allowed for the use of investigative tools not allowed at the preliminary investigation stage – based on casual conversations Trump campaign volunteer George Papadopoulos had with an Australian Diplomat and Australian High Commissioner Alexander Downer. Papadopoulos allegedly “suggested the Trump team had received some kind of suggestion from Russia” that it could anonymously release information damaging to Clinton and President Obama.
The FBI decision to open the full investigation into the Trump campaign came from its top officials, who were “unanimous” in their support despite FBI policies prescribing a “measured approach” to the opening of the investigation that was not followed by the Crossfire Hurricane team. It was done so without “any intelligence or other vetted, corroborated information regarding Trump or his campaign staff colluding with the Russian government.” Peter Strzok, days after drafting and approving the Electronic Communication (EC) that opened Crossfire Hurricane, basically commented to an FBI London employee that “there’s nothing to this.” British Intelligence apparently agreed, believing the Papadopoulos information was not “particularly valuable intelligence.”
As Crossfire Hurricane proceeded, the FBI decided against critically analyzing the Papadopoulos information or furthering its understanding of the Trump campaign’s contacts with Russia. That decision was apparently led by FBI leadership. According to an FBI London Assistant Legal Attaché: “FBI executive management was pushing the matter so hard that ‘there was no stopping the train.’” While FBI executives pushed the investigation, they also made sure that the agency did not conduct regular investigative steps, such as interviewing Carter Page and George Papadopoulos, or issuing national security letters, or using pen registers and trap and trace devices.
Who was the FBI executive that pushed the most?
It had to be FBI Director James Comey, who demanded a FISA be issued on Carter Page. Comey made that known despite being warned that the Steele reporting, on which the FISA warrant relied, was likely a Clinton campaign product. The impression from the Durham report is that the FBI analysts and agents assigned to the Carter Page FISA application (and the first renewal) were the product of pressure from FBI leadership.
FBI DAD Jennifer Boone, for example, ignored assessments from her agents that Page wasn’t a Russian agent and directed them “to continue the FISA renewal process.” It was the view of Boone’s team that she was “being directed by FBI executive management to continue the FISA surveillance.” Boone herself believed that Andrew McCabe was “heavily involved in all aspects of the investigation.”
All the while, even after the second Page application was submitted to the FISC, “the FBI still did not possess any intelligence showing that anyone associated with the Trump campaign was in contact with Russian intelligence officers during the campaign.” This should be no surprise given the findings of the 2019 IG report.
The Hillary Clinton Investigations
As we discussed in the opening, Durham’s scope included the FBI investigations “directed” at the Hillary Clinton campaign. It seems the purpose of that review was to assess and compare the favorable treatment received by Clinton to the targeting of Trump.
The first investigation involved an FBI tip from a CHS that a foreign government was sending a person “to contribute to Clinton’s anticipated presidential campaign, as a way to gain influence with Clinton should she win the presidency.” (Which country?!) An FBI field office sought a FISA against the foreign contributor and made that request to FBI headquarters, which ignored it for four months due to the fact that they were careful that Clinton was “involved.” According to one FBI Agent, “They were pretty ‘tippy-toeing’ around HRC because there was a chance she would be the next president.” The FISA was approved on the condition that the FBI give defensive briefings to Clinton.
The second Clinton investigation involved the same CHS, who in November 2015 reported to the FBI that another foreign government was looking to contribute to the Clinton campaign “in exchange for the protection of [that country’s] interests should Clinton become President.” That CHS would end up making a $2,700 donation to the Clinton campaign on behalf of a foreign insider, in violation of federal law which bans contributions by foreign nationals. The CHS told their handling FBI agent that “They [the campaign] were okay with it. […] yes they were fully aware from the start” of the contribution being made on behalf of the foreign interest.
Who was the FBI’s confidential human source that caught the Clinton campaign in illegal activity? Thanks to great work by the talented Fool Nelsonshowing a $2,700 contribution from Patrick Byrne, we have this admission from Byrne himself (no telling if he is being truthful, with Byrne’s history and all):
Somehow, the FBI did not obtain copies of the illegal payment and the CHS’s FBI handlers “could not explain why this apparent illegal contribution was not documented in FBI records.” Instead, the FBI handling agent “told the CHS to stay away from all events relating to Clinton’s campaign.” Later on, the CHS, who had essentially caught a member of the Clinton campaign facilitating illegal contributions, was admonished by the FBI:
Durham questioned how the FBI could reconcile giving defensive briefings to the Clinton campaign while denying defensive briefings to the Trump campaign. He compared the FBI and DOJ’s “measured approach” to the Clinton campaign investigation to the speed at which the FBI ran with Crossfire Hurricane. He also contrasted how the FBI made almost “no effort to investigate the possible illegal campaign contribution” to the Clinton campaign “or the Clinton campaign’s purported acceptance of a campaign contribution made by the FBI’s own long-term” source.
The other Clinton investigation Durham reviewed – the investigation into “possible criminal activity involving the Clinton Foundation” – demonstrated, yet again, favorable treatment received by Clinton from FBI leadership. According to Durham, the Clinton Foundation case opening communication:
Additionally, the FBI Little Rock and New York Field Offices investigations “included predication based on source reporting that identified foreign governments that had made, or offered to make, contributions to the Foundation in exchange for favorable or preferential treatment from Clinton.”
Despite this evidence, DOJ and FBI leadership essentially sabotaged the Clinton Foundation investigation. The DOJ was “hostile” to the Clinton Foundation presentations from the FBI Field Offices. And at a February 2016 FBI meeting to discuss the Clinton Foundation investigations, Assistant Director Andre McCabe ordered the cases to be closed. He would reconsider that demand following objections. However, any overt investigative steps needed McCabe’s approval. In May 2016, FBI Director Comey would, through an intermediary, demand the New York Field Office “cease and desist” their Clinton Foundation investigation. And in August 2016, as the presidential election approached, the US Attorneys’ offices in the Southern and Eastern Districts of New York declined to issue subpoenas to the FBI New York Field Office in support of their Clinton Foundation investigation.
They Spied on President-Elect Trump
Jumping around here for a moment: in February of last year, we reported on Durham filings in the Michael Sussmann case that indicated Rodney Joffe (a Clinton ally and FBI CHS) and his associates “exploited internet data from ‘the Executive Office of the President of the United States’ to further their own political agenda and damage President Trump.”
The Durham report provides additional context. Joffe had obtained, through what we might call a business colleague, data from the Executive Office of the President (the EOP’s network was supposedly run by DHS through a vendor) to create allegations that Trump, or someone in Trump’s orbit, was using a Russian Yotaphone to communicate with Russia. These allegations were taken by Sussmann to the CIA, which reviewed the data and passed it along to the FBI. Both agencies saw the allegations were bunk.
Here’s what the Durham report says about how Joffe obtained the data:
- A tech executive with access to Executive Office of the President (EOP) data was running queries on behalf of Joffe after Trump’s inauguration.
- After Sussmann’s meeting with the FBI, Joffe demanded a search in the Executive Office of the President data from February 1, 2017 through February 14, 2017, and for January of 2017.
- The tech executive with access to the data emailed Joffe: “I think I need to look at overall EOP volumes since Jan 20 to see if there have been significant volume changes.” That would include Trump data while he was President.
While the FBI was taking an essentially hands-off approach in investigating Hillary Clinton and the Clinton Campaign, it was knowingly using false information supplied by the Clinton Campaign to target Trump before and after the election. Call it the “Clinton Plan”.
In late July 2016, US intelligence agencies learned that “U.S Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton had approved a campaign plan to stir up a scandal against U.S. Presidential candidate Donald Trump by tying him to Putin.” This information went directly to CIA Director John Brennan, who would brief its contents on August 3, 2016 to President Obama, Vice President Biden, Attorney General Loretta Lynch (attending remotely) and other senior Obama Administration officials, as well as FBI Director Comey. Brennan’s handwritten notes specifically mention briefing the Obama White House on “alleged approval by Hillary Clinton on 26 July of a proposal from one of her [campaign] advisors to vilify Donald Trump by stirring up a scandal claiming interference by the Russian security services.”
Some FBI leaders and analysts and agents involved in Crossfire Hurricane – Brian Auten, Bill Priestap, and Peter Strzok – would receive this intelligence in September 2016. The information was undoubtedly material to both the FISA Court (in the upcoming FISA applications) and to assessing the intelligence coming from Christopher Steele. Yet the Crossfire Hurricane team didn’t take “any action to vet the Clinton Plan intelligence.” Again, Durham observed this stood in stark contrast to the aggressive steps taken by the FBI to investigate Trump.
Then there is the question of whether there was a criminal element to the Clinton Plan. As Durham phrased it, whether the Clinton Plan “as to intentionally provide knowingly false and/or misleading information to the FBI or other agencies.”
To get to the bottom of that question, Durham “interviewed a number of individuals connected with” the Clinton Campaign, including Hillary herself. One campaign foreign policy advisor admitted “that it was possible that she had proposed ideas” on the Trump/Russia topics “to the campaign’s leadership, who may have approved those ideas.” They also admitted that it was “possible” someone proposed linking Trump to Russia to distract from Clinton’s private email server. These discussions were followed by public statements from Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook which said “the Russian government had carried out the DNC hack to assist Trump’s electoral changes.”
Durham would ultimately find that there was “support for the notion that the Clinton campaign was engaged in an effort or plan in late July 2016 to encourage scrutiny of Trump's potential ties to Russia, and that the campaign might have wanted or expected law enforcement or other agencies to aid that effort, in part, by concluding that the Russians were responsible for the hack.” The evidence in support included Clinton Campaign lawyers Marc Elias and Michael Sussmann meeting with Fusion GPS just “three days after the purported approval of the Clinton Plan.”
Yet Durham didn’t have the evidence to charge anyone from the Clinton Campaign with intentionally providing false information to the government. While it was the Clinton Campaign who came up with the general Trump-Russia plan, they were insulated from the planning and execution – and thus consequences – of that scheme by their Perkins Coie lawyers, who used Fusion GPS and Christopher Steele (among others) to feed rumors and innuendo to the FBI.
That gets us to the other prosecution decisions.
I’ll start by observing that Durham’s team didn’t have a problem bringing to trial stand-alone false statement charges against those accused of deceiving the FBI. Sussmann was charged after giving conflicting statements to the FBI and to Congress; Danchenko was charged after lying multiple times to the FBI. Those are difficult cases for a prosecutor at trial. With that in mind, we assume that Durham would have charged FBI officials with false statements (or other crimes) if he had the evidence. (Unless the assumption is that Durham was scared to do so? But that doesn’t square with Durham’s history.)
Take, for example, the FBI’s submissions to the FISC. To prove perjury from those FISA warrants, Durham would need to prove the official made a false statement “with knowledge of its falsity, rather than as a result of confusion, mistake, or faulty memory.” There is no doubt that the submissions contained numerous falsehoods. Yet Durham concluded that the evidence they collected was not “sufficient” to meet that burden. (Part of the uphill battle Durham faced is that the system is established to insulate and protect those in power.) This doesn’t mean a crime didn’t occur; but rather, that there wasn’t a paper trail or direct testimony to support moving forward with charges.
Why wasn’t there direct testimony? In part because a number of former FBI officials involved in Crossfire Hurricane, from James Comey to Peter Strzok to Bill Priestap, declined to be interviewed relating to their Crossfire Hurricane involvement. Durham could have compelled their testimony before a grand jury, but that would have involved (1) immunity to the witnesses; (2) grand jury secrecy; and (3) answers like “I don’t recall”. Other witnesses who might have lied to the FBI invoked their Fifth Amendment privileges.
And why wasn’t there a paper trail?
A number of reasons. First, as we discussed yesterday, once issues arose in the Trump/Russia investigation, there were instructions from the top to not “write any more memoranda or analytical pieces and to provide their findings orally.” That’s related to our second point: these are FBI officials and agents who know the law and are adept at deceiving in a way to while avoiding prosecution. “Mistakes were made” or “I must have forgotten.” By the time their actions are reviewed, years have passed, memories are stale, and thus the necessary element of intent is even more difficult to prove. Third, Durham was unable to obtain some records due to attorney-client privilege - most notably Fusion GPS emails “that were purportedly prepared to assist Perkins Coie in providing legal advice to the law firm’s clients, the Clinton campaign and Fusion GPS.”
This isn’t to say that there wasn’t circumstantial evidence of FBI lies. (Just that proving the case on circumstances alone is extremely difficult for a prosecutor.) The FBI’s mistakes, which Durham thoroughly catalogued in his report, all went one direction: against Trump and his associates.
This was true for the inception and furtherance of Crossfire Hurricane, and it remained true throughout each investigative step, from the Carter Page FISA warrants to Michael Sussmann’s Alfa Bank/Yotaphone hoaxes (where FBI leadership protected Sussmann as a source – “FBI leadership, including Strzok, instructed him not to identify the source to the team”), to the protection of Steele primary subsource (and later, FBI CHS) Igor Danchenko. Time and time again, FBI personnel and FBI leadership refused to act on, or even investigate, information damaging to their collusion narrative. They protected sources who may have offered information damaging to the FBI, even to the point of trying to hide Danchenko as a future CHS during the Durham investigation.
In doing so, the FBI didn’t just abuse its authority and undertake an illegal spying campaign. It influenced elections. It permanently tarnished the reputations of good men like Carter Page. It created the Trump/Russia media frenzy that lasted for years. And it ruined the lives and otherwise bankrupted a significant number of targets and witnesses.
All because the FBI objected to the choice of the voters.
Ga 2020 election fraud!!! Was thegatewaypundit right all along????
- House Of Politics & Off-Topics
- 61 Replies
Georgia election workers cleared of 'unsubstantiated' 2020 fraud claims - UPI.com
Georgia Election Board investigators have dismissed a case, alleging election fraud by two Fulton County poll workers following the 2020 presidential election, as "false and unsubstantiated."
www.upi.com
No. No they were not.
To fair, this is not correctly sourced by me. I used a secondary source (in this case the United Press International... their article) where I could have found the information from primary sources, but I don't give enough of a shit to do that much work. And here's the deal with the UPI:
LEAST BIASED
These sources have minimal bias and use very few loaded words (wording that attempts to influence an audience by appeals to emotion or stereotypes). The reporting is factual and usually sourced. These are the most credible media sources. See all Least Biased sources.- Overall, we rate UPI Least Biased based on neutral wording and story selection. We also rate them High for factual reporting due to proper sourcing and a clean fact-check record.
Fun Times in the HoR
- House Of Politics & Off-Topics
- 9 Replies
To be fair guys, this is real thegatewaypundit level stuff here for sure. NOT a reliable source at all. But fun? OMG yes.
www.huffpost.com
If this is true, then IMHO there's only one way to solve it. In the ring!! The mud wrestling ring. I'd pay to see it, but odds are that Green kicks Boebert's ass. Green is a meaty beast.
Marjorie Taylor Greene Reportedly Calls Lauren Boebert A 'Little B***h' On House Floor
During the exchange, Greene accused Boebert of copying her articles of impeachment, according to sources who spoke to The Daily Beast.
If this is true, then IMHO there's only one way to solve it. In the ring!! The mud wrestling ring. I'd pay to see it, but odds are that Green kicks Boebert's ass. Green is a meaty beast.
