Tag Archives: FBI

The Swamp Runs Deep

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The following is a Press Release put out by Judicial Watch on January 18, 2022. Note that none of this has been reported in the mainstream media:

(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch announced today the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) told Judicial Watch in a response to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request that it has communications from Pfizer in an investigative file targeting Project Veritas. (In October 2021, Project Veritas, a nonprofit investigative journalism organization, published two viral stories [here and here] about the Pfizer covid vaccine.)

On December 21, 2021, Judicial Watch filed a FOIA request for:

All records of communications, whether by email (on .gov or non.gov email accounts), text message, or instant chat, between officials in the FBI, including but not limited to officials in the offices of the FBI New York Field Office on the one hand, and employees and representatives of Pfizer Inc. on the other hand, regarding Project Veritas founder James O’Keefe and/or Project Veritas.

Email communications with Pfizer Inc. employees or representatives include but are not limited to those with the email domain “@pfizer.com”.

On January 6, the FBI denied the request for all “communications regarding Project Veritas between FBI officials and employees/representatives of Pfizer” the following reason:

The material you requested is located in an investigative file which is exempt from disclosure pursuant to 5 U.S.C. § 552(b)(7)(A). 5 U.S.C. § 552(b)(7)(A) exempts from disclosure:

records or information compiled for law enforcement purposes, but only to the extent that the production of such law enforcement records or information … could reasonably be expected to interfere with enforcement proceedings….

The records responsive to your request are law enforcement records; there is a pending or prospective law enforcement proceeding relevant to these responsive records, and release of the information could reasonably be expected to interfere with enforcement proceedings.

On January 10, the FBI denied the request for “email communications with Pfizer Inc. employees or representatives including email domains ‘@pfizer.com’ (On or after September 1, 2021),” stating: “Please be advised the FBI will neither confirm nor deny the existence of such records …”

On November 9, 2021, the CEO of Pfizer, Albert Bourla, participated in an online discussion in which Bourla states that he was working with the FBI regarding “dark organizations” that were “targeting” Pfizer.

“It is disturbing to see that Pfizer evidently has the Biden FBI at its beck and call to target journalists at Project Veritas,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. “This development is especially concerning coming on the heels of the FBI’s outrageous Ashley Biden diary raid on the home of Project Veritas founder James O’Keefe.”

###

The April 2022 issue of “The Judicial Watch Verdict” reports:

On January 10, the FBI denied the request for “email communications with Pfizer Inc. employees or representatives including email domains @pfizer.com (on or after September 1, 2021),” stating: “Please be advised the FBI will neither confirm nor deny the existence of such records…”

So much for transparency.

 

Changing The Rules After The Fact

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On Monday, PJ Media reported the following:

On Jan. 6, 2021, a protestor, 40-year-old Brady Knowlton, says that an officer at the Capitol told “You can go in, as long as you don’t break anything.” At 2:35 p.m., Knowlton did, entering through the Upper West Terrace doors. He looked around inside the building, walked through the Rotunda, lobby, and Senate chamber gallery, obeyed the officer’s injunction not to break anything, and left the building at 2:53 p.m. For that, Knowlton now faces twenty years in prison in Old Joe Biden’s vengeful banana republic.

…According to the charges filed against him in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, Knowlton “did unlawfully and knowingly enter and remain in a restricted building and grounds.” He also “did knowingly, and with intent to impede and disrupt the orderly conduct of Government business and official functions, engage in disorderly and disruptive conduct in and within such proximity to, a restricted building and grounds, that is, any posted, cordoned-off, and otherwise restricted area within the United States Capitol and its grounds, where the Vice President and Vice President-elect were temporarily visiting.” He “willfully and knowingly engaged in disorderly and disruptive conduct within the United States Capitol Grounds. He “willfully and knowingly entered and remained in the gallery of either House of Congress, without authorization to do so.”

If Knowlton’s contention that a police officer said he could go in is true, it vitiates all these charges, and Knowlton’s claim is certainly corroborated by photographic and video evidence of cops at the Capitol opening gates, holding the doors open for protestors, and reports that police even posed for selfies with protestors. Also, when the FBI raided Knowlton’s home, they found no evidence whatsoever “concerning the breach and unlawful entry” of the Capitol, or “of any conspiracy, planning, or preparation,” or “maps or diagrams” of the Capitol, or of any “materials, devices, or tools” that Knowlton might have planned to use to get inside.

The article notes the obvious contrast with the way people with other political views have been treated:

Compare the treatment of Knowlton and the other Jan. 6 scapegoats to the treatment of Quintez Brown, the Black Lives Matter activist who recently shot at Louisville mayoral candidate Craig Greenberg. Journalist Miranda Devine noted that Brown was “portrayed sympathetically by the media and immediately bailed out of jail by his Black Lives Matter comrades, who crowdfunded the $100,000 cost.” Devine added that Brown was “a celebrated gun control advocate, anointed as a rising star by the Obama Foundation, he was an honored guest on Joy Reid’s MSNBC show. He was granted a biweekly opinion column in the Louisville Courier-Journal to spew boilerplate leftist, race-based, anti-cop sentiment.” Brown had, Devine says, “BLM privilege.” Indeed.

This sort of uneven treatment divides America. It is time that we went back to the concept of “equal justice under the law” which was part of the foundation of our government. If the foundation is destroyed, the building falls down.

Does Breaking The Law Actually Have Consequences?

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On Friday, The Western Journal posted an article confirming something almost all of us already knew.

The article reports:

Former acting Director of National Intelligence Richard Grenell said the FBI absolutely broke the law with its surveillance of Donald Trump both when he was a candidate and after he became president.

In an interview with Just the News’ John Solomon published on Wednesday, Grenell agreed that leadership at the bureau and the Department of Justice must have known ahead of time that evidence that Trump somehow “colluded” with Russia to affect the outcome of the 2016 election was false.

“Political appointees and the leaders of the FBI and DOJ purposefully manipulated the truth,” he told Solomon.

Grenell also said he has spoken with FBI operatives who knew the investigation into Trump was faulty.

“The people in the middle management, I’ve talked to them. I’ve talked to FBI agents. They knew that this was a phony exercise,” he said.

The people who chose to break the law to further a political agenda need to be in jail. They lied to the courts to get permission to spy on the Trump campaign and later on the President. If this is the kind of activity the FBI and the DOJ choose to engage in, they we either need to eliminate these departments totally or fire everyone in them and start from scratch.

Please read the entire article for details on who has been indicted so far and what the consequences have been for those people.

Is A Refusal To Answer An Answer?

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There are many Americans who believe that a lot of what we saw on January 6th was a false flag operation. The fact that no one can explain why President Trump’s request for the National Guard was denied adds to that suspicion. The fact that Roy Epps mysteriously disappeared from the FBI’s Most Wanted List after being seen on video telling people to go into the Capitol also adds to that suspicion. A Congressional Hearing on Tuesday added further fuel to the suspicion that January 6th was a set-up.

The U.K. Daily Mail posted an article on Tuesday about the Congressional Hearing. The article reports:

An FBI agent refused to give answers on Tuesday as to who Ray Epps is and whether any agents or informants participated in any capacity in the January 6 Capitol riot.

Senator Ted Cruz demanded to know the level of involvement, if any, the agency had in the deadly attack last year and wanted to know more about an ex-Marine accused of being an FBI plant sent to help incite the events last year.

‘How many FBI agents or confidential informants actively participated in the events of January 6th?’ Cruz asked the FBI’s Executive Assistant Director of the National Security Branch Jill Sanborn during a hearing on domestic violence threats on Tuesday.

‘Sir, I’m sure you can appreciate that I can’t go into the specifics of sources and methods –’ Sanborn began, but was cut off but Cruz re-asking the same question.

‘I can’t answer that,’ said Sanborn, who joined the hearing virtually.

‘Did any FBI agents or confidential informants commit crimes of violence on January 6?’ Cruz pushed.

‘I can’t answer that.’

‘Did any FBI agents or FBI informants actively encourage and incite crimes of violence on January 6?’ the Texas Republican senator asked.

Sanborn repeated the same answer for a third time.

Cruz then said that President Biden needs to answer questions about the FBI’s supposed role in January 6.

‘Unfortunately, under Joe Biden we have seen an incredibly partisan Department of Justice,’ Cruz said. ‘And both the Department of Justice and the FBI have an arrogance that they are not accountable to anyone, that they can stonewall.’

So much for the transparency of the Biden administration.

I Hope Your Thanksgiving Guests Didn’t Take This Advice Seriously

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Yesterday Trending Politics posted an article with the following title, “‘The Atlantic’ Gives Advice To “Deprogram” Pro-Trump Relatives On Thanksgiving; Suggests Reporting Them To FBI.” Nothing like feeling the love if you are a conservative in a family gathering of liberals.

The article reports:

Towards the end of the article, she even throws out the idea of reporting their relatives to the FBI. Some may think it’s a joke, but it’s something that is actually happening across the United States.

“This is your chance to deprogram them. Facebook knows its algorithm radicalizes users. This is your chance to tell your aunt that maybe the news she gets from it isn’t all that reliable. And that maybe the MAGA news network is not giving her unbiased news,” she writes.

Jong-Fast rejected the idea that Thanksgiving should be a time of peace and harmony. Instead, she thinks her readers should turn the day into an opportunity to tell their “creepy uncle” to get the vaccine.

What if your creepy uncle has already had the virus and has the antibodies?

The article concludes:

She concludes with a dogwhistle suggestion to report their family members to the authorities for their political beliefs.

“Maybe it won’t work. Maybe you’ll leave Thanksgiving dinner as divided as you were when you sat down at the table five hours and 4,000 calories ago. Or maybe you’ll plant the seed, sow just a little doubt about whatever Tucker Carlson is saying now. Maybe you’ll even change a heart or a mind. Maybe you’ll bring the temperature down just a tiny bit. Or maybe you’ll need to report a relative to the FBI,” she added.

Can’t you just feel the love of the holiday season?

After The Narrative Has Been Firmly Established, The Truth Is Revealed

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On Saturday Red State posted an article about part of the FBI investigation into the riots in Washington on January 6th.

The article reports:

The last of the Capitol rioters had barely vacated the premises when Nancy Pelosi’s allies began slandering their Republican colleagues, claiming that Republican members of Congress had taken an active role in permitting the demonstrators… indeed, if they were BLM demonstrators, we would be calling them “peaceful”… to enter the Capitol. Baseless allegations were made that some Republican members of Congress allowed rioters to enter the Capitol by having them issued visitor’s passes.

…The whole story reached a crescendo two weeks ago when it was revealed that the FBI had subpoenaed the telephone records of members of Congress.

…This didn’t have the panache of John Brennan having members of Congress subjected to electronic surveillance because they opposed the Iran nuclear deal, but it is close. You can bet that the cell records of members of Congress who are giving the FBI difficulties were thoroughly mined to determine who inside the FBI was leaking information.

Now the inquiry is complete. This is the complete coverage from the New York Times. It is hidden inside a bullsh** story (read Media Continues to Try to Tie President Trump to the Capitol Riot Because They Are Terrified of His Popularity) purporting to link a “person associated with the White House” with a member of the Proud Boys.

The article concludes:

This is just another of the completely false narratives peddled by the Democrats, the media, the National Review, the Bulwark, the Dispatch, and a bunch of pedo-enabling losers that have self-destructed. The sad fact is that the truth probably does not matter. Pelosi’s goal was to tar all the GOP with direct responsibility for the Capitol riot and use those false allegations in the 2022 campaign. The narratives are out there. A viciously partisan press is still circulating them, even the provably false ones. We will see these allegations again in the next election… and the next.

Please follow the link to read the entire article–there are some interesting details included. This is simply another example of the media trying to push forward a narrative that will smear those people who support President Trump and his fight for the average American. The successes of the Trump administration are a genuine threat to the political-media establishment. All Americans need to carefully analyze any news report they hear before drawing a conclusion as to what events actually occurred.

An Interesting Timeline on Hunter Biden’s Laptop

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Yesterday Just the News posted an article detailing the history of Hunter Biden’s laptop and how it became public knowledge. It’s a rather lengthy article, so I suggest you follow the link to read the entire article. There were a few things that stood out to me as I read the article.

The article reports:

The family of the Delaware shop owner who says he came into possession of a laptop purportedly belonging to Hunter Biden first tried to turn over the computer to the FBI in summer 2019 but was rebuffed, only to have agents return months later during President Trump’s impeachment proceedings, his lawyer said Thursday night.

The article notes the timeline:

  • A man claiming to be Hunter Biden dropped off three laptops on April 12, 2019 to Mac Isaac’s shop to be repaired, and returned two days later with an external hard drive. The man believed to be Hunter Biden eventually abandoned one of the laptops and the external hard drive without paying for them.
  • Mac Isaac’s father, a retired Air Force colonel, first tried to provide a copy of the laptop to an FBI office in Albuquerque, N.M., in summer 2019, but the bureau turned him away.
  • FBI agents from Albuquerque, N.M., contacted the father in October 2019, as impeachment proceedings were ongoing in Washington, to discuss the laptop and then to interview the younger Mac Isaac in Delaware. A few weeks later, FBI agents in Delaware seized the original laptop from Mac Isaac.
  • On Oct. 13 of this year, Hunter Biden’s attorney contacted Mac Isaac to discuss the hard drive and followed up with an email but no further action.

The article details some of the difficulties with getting law enforcement to pay attention to the laptop:

“Out of an abundance of caution, John Paul made a copy of the drive in case he was ever thrown under the bus as a result of what he knew. As John Paul watched the impeachment trial, he wondered why there was no reference to the information he had provided to the FBI. As a result, starting in February of 2020 and until July of 2020, John Paul reached out to several members of Congress to notify them of what he had in his possession. His requests fell on deaf ears.

Out of frustration, in the beginning of September, John Paul reached out to someone he thought would be able to provide the information directly to the President. That person was Rudy Giuliani. A day after John Paul reached out to Giuliani’s office, Robert Costello, Rudy Giuliani’s lawyer, contacted John Paul to discuss the information and John Paul’s concerns.

On September 24, 2020, John Paul then submitted information about the drive to Senator Ron Johnson through the whistleblower link on Senator Johnson’s website. After that submission and while Giuliani’s office was still trying to verify the information, Senator Johnson released the Senate report on the Biden business dealings.”

The article concludes:

“… The problem is not that John Paul turned over the information to those he believed he could trust, it is that politics today seems to revel in sensation and ignores the collateral damage left in its wake. Not only are our elected officials seemingly happy to obfuscate the facts in order to attack their opponents, they are also perfectly willing to throw everyday Americans under the bus for their own political gain.”

…”Instead of reporting on the matter, news outlets are making the decision themselves as to the veracity of the claims about Hunter Biden’s laptop. If you are an avid follower of CNN or Politico, you have already been led to believe that John Paul is a part of an overall Russian disinformation campaign.

“Twitter and Facebook have taken it upon themselves to relegate this story to a level equal to that of conspiracy theories. The actions by these social media platforms further hurt John Paul’s reputation by advancing the notion that he is a part of a Russian disinformation campaign.”

If you depend on the mainstream media for your news, a lot of this information is new to you. That is not good for the health of our representative republic.

More Evidence For The Mainstream Media To Ignore

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Gregg Jarrett posted an article today about more evidence that is coming to light about the activities of the Biden family during the time Joe Biden was Vice-President.

The article reports:

Joe Biden’s claim that he has never discussed business directly with his son Hunter “is false” says Tony Bobulinski. “I have firsthand knowledge about this because I directly dealt with the Biden family, including Joe Biden” added Bobulinski who has been outed as a colleague of the Bidens in text messages obtained by The Daily Caller News Foundation.

On May 1, 2017, Hunter Biden texted Bobulinski, “No matter what it will need to be a US company at some level in order for us to make bids on federal and state-funded projects. Also, We don’t want to have to register as foreign agents under the FCPA which is much more expansive than people who should know choose not to know.” The very next day after the text was sent, May 2, 2017, Hunter arranged for a meeting in Los Angeles with Bobulinski, James Biden and Joe Biden.

Hunter Biden’s text went on to say, “James has very particular opinions about this so I would ask him about the foreign entity. Regardless, we should have a DE come called CEFC America…” At a press conference on Thursday, Bobulinski recognized the occurrence of the meeting and said it lasted an hour. In that hour, the entire meeting, “the Biden’s family business plans with the Chinese” was discussed. Bobulinski said of father Joe Biden that he was “plainly familiar” with the plans discussed at the meeting “at a high level.”

Biden’s reference to FCPA is believed to be the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. CEFC China Energy is “a Chinese conglomerate whose chairman had links to the communist regime in Beijing” according to the DCNF. Additionally, the DCNF acknowledges “Biden did not explain in the messages why he thought the venture with CEFC would violate FARA or FCPA without the buffer of a U.S. shell company.”

At least he was smart enough to use the loopholes in the law to avoid officially breaking the law.

The article concludes:

Bobulinski has provided emails, text messages and business records to the Senate Homeland Security Committee and even met with the FBI on Thursday. Information provided showed “Bobulinski, Hunter Biden, James Biden and two other partners, James Gilliar and Rob Walker, went on to form companies called SinoHawk and Oneida Holdings to partner with CEFC.” Furthermore, the information shows Oneida Holdings was formed only a mere three weeks after the big meeting, on May 22, 2017.

Where is the FBI that so meticulously combed through every scrap of information they could find on President Trump and his associates?

Corroborating Evidence

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The Federalist reported yesterday that Secret Service records confirm the travel dates and trips taken by Hunter Biden that were reported in the emails posted by The New York Post last week. That is not good news for the Democrats attempting to claim the emails are fake and are based on attempts by foreign governments to interfere with our election. Actually, the release of the emails was done by people who want to make sure American voters understand the history of one of the candidates for president.

The article reports:

In one email reported by the Post, sent from Hunter Biden to his business partner Devon Archer dated Apr. 13, 2014, Hunter refers to a trip to Houston slated for “tmrw.” Secret Service records released by Johnson and Grassley corroborate details of the trip with a travel entry from Hunter Biden for Apr. 13, 2014 to Apr. 14, 2014 to Houston.

In another email published by the Post, senior Burisma adviser Vadim Pozharski allegedly wrote on May 12, 2014 of a trip to Como Lake. Secret Service records reported a travel entry for Hunter Biden to Lake Como, Italy just more than a  month earlier dated Apr. 3 to Apr. 6.

“Other reports indicate that, in May 2014, Mr. Biden and Mr. Archer may have been in Doha, Qatar,” the senators wrote. “USSS records contain a travel entry for Hunter Biden to Doha, Qatar on May 11, 2014 – May 14, 2014.”

So far the attempts by people supporting Joe Biden for President to debunk the emails have failed. The biggest question in my mind is, “If the FBI took possession of the computer in December, why did we have to wait almost a year for anything on the computer to become public?” The FBI really does not look very unbiased right now.

The article notes:

The Biden campaign has not disputed the authenticity of the Post’s reported emails.

At Some Point This Story Will Have To Be Reported On Honestly By The Mainstream Media

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Today Just the News posted an article about a different area of concern regarding Hunter Biden’s laptop computer.

The article reports:

Rudy Giuliani, one of President Trump’s private attorneys, has reported to Delaware police concerns that materials on a laptop purportedly tied to Hunter Biden contained evidence of possible child endangerment.

Giuliani, a former U.S. attorney and New York City mayor, confirmed Tuesday night he went Monday to a local police department in Wilmington to report his concerns of children endangerment and sexual exploitation. Giuliani told Just the News that former New York Police Department commissioner Bernard Kerik joined him when he delivered photographs and text messages to the New Castle County Police Department.

“I told them other details about what appears to be an inappropriate sexual relationship,” he said in an interview. “They told me it would be investigated.”

I suspect we are about to find out how deep the corruption in our government is.

The article continues:

Giuliani said the materials he gleaned from the controversial laptop — which a Delaware computer shop owner alleges was left with him by Hunter Biden — gave him concern for the welfare of a minor girl. Giuliani declined to identify the alleged minor victim or who was in the photos.

“There are many texts which I gave to them that point out that family was concerned about the safety of the child,” Giuliani said. “I will tell you the evidence I gave them states it was reported to Joe Biden. What did he do about it?”

Kerik confirmed Wednesday he joined Giuliani in reporting the materials to police, suggesting the laptop content “raises serious questions as to Joe Biden‘s national security vulnerability.”

The article reminds us:

“The conduct falls under the mandatory reporting requirements for child endangerment,” Giuliani said. “If I was the U.S. attorney or the mayor or Bernie was still the commissioner, it would have been a crime for us not to report what we had.” 

The Delaware Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act mandates reporting by “any person, agency, organization, or entity who knows or in good faith suspects child abuse or neglect.”

It is interesting that the laptop is said to have been in the FBI’s possession since December 2019. Why did they choose to ignore what was on it?

Stay tuned.

 

Can The People With A Vested Interest In This Story Remaining Untold Keep It Quiet Until After The Election?

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The Epoch Times is reporting the following today:

Senate Homeland Security Chairman Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) is requesting a statement from FBI Director Christopher Wray about the veracity of details that were found on a laptop that purportedly belonged to Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden’s son Hunter Biden after the New York Post published explosive new claims about the family’s business ties abroad.

Johnson, in a letter to Wray over the weekend, said a whistleblower contacted his committee on Sept. 24 about the laptop that was left at his business, saying he turned it over to the FBI. Johnson said that staff immediately asked if the agency can either confirm or deny details to validate the claim, but he said that the FBI wouldn’t confirm or deny the information that was found on the device.

“I have a responsibility to validate and verify the contents of any information produced to my committee,” Johnson said in his letter. “The committee must know if it receives information that could be fraudulent or not accurate.”

He mentioned that the information could be related to a foreign election interference campaign, saying that if that is the case, a defensive briefing is necessary. Johnson added that if the whistleblower provided false information, it could be a crime.

…“For these reasons, the committee must know whether the FBI has assessed the validity of materials the whistleblower has provided, and what, if any, actions the FBI has taken since obtaining this information,” Johnson said in the letter.

He also included a series of questions that the FBI should answer about the laptop, including whether the agency has material from the device, how they acquired it if they did indeed obtain the laptop, if the records on the hard drive have been altered or are genuine, whether the records were authored by Hunter Biden, or if the laptop was hacked in some way.

Unfortunately, Hunter Biden’s behavior is generally consistent with what was found on the laptop. He was discharged from the Navy for drug use, and he fathered a child with a stripper. However, we need to remember that the details of what is on the laptop matter. If Hunter was involved in selling access to his father, is his father also implicated? I don’t know. If the accusations about the money flowing to Hunter Biden from China and going to Joe Biden are true, it is an entirely different story. It will be interesting to see exactly what the FBI says about the information.

Gradually The Truth Emerges

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The treatment of retired General Flynn by the FBI has alarmed many Americans. It has become increasingly apparent to people who don’t rely on the mainstream media for their news that the treatment of the General was an attempt to cripple the Trump administration. Information on what was actually going on has remained secret because career people in the FBI have a vested interest in hiding the truth. On September 25th, The Epoch Times posted two articles highlighting information that is coming from people involved in the investigation (here and here).

The first article reports:

FBI agent William Barnett told government investigators last week that he heard other FBI agents at the special counsel’s office (SCO) “comically talk about wiping cellular telephones,” according to a summary of the interview released as part of the court proceedings in the case involving former national security adviser Michael Flynn.

“Barnett had a cellular telephone issued by the SCO which he did not ‘wipe.’ Barnett did hear other agents ‘comically’ talk about wiping cellular telephones, but was not aware of anyone ‘wiping’ their issued cellular telephones,” the summary (pdf) states.

The article also notes:

Two well-known members of the Mueller team, FBI attorney Lisa Page and Deputy Assistant Director Peter Strzok, mentioned sending and clearing iMessages from their SCO iPhones on more than one occasion.

“Clear imsg …” Strzok wrote to Page on June 5, 2017, and again on June 8.

The records officer, who isn’t identified in the documents, noted that Strzok’s phone contained “no substantive texts, notes or reminders.” Page’s phone went missing under questionable circumstances after she left the Mueller team. When it was recovered more than a year later, the device was already wiped.

The second article reports:

An FBI agent assigned to the investigation of retired Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn wanted to be taken off the case, he recently told FBI investigators, saying the prosecution of Flynn was being used as a means to “get Trump.”

FBI agent William Barnett was assigned to the Flynn case shortly after it was opened in August 2016, as part of the FBI’s probe into alleged collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia, which was dubbed “Crossfire Hurricane.” But the case was “opaque,” lacking much detail of specific evidence of any crimes, Barnett told FBI and DOJ investigators on Sept. 17 (pdf).

The case theory was “supposition on supposition,” he said.

The second article concludes:

The lawyers were convinced Trump aide K.T. McFarland was the “key to everything” who had conveyed Trump’s orders for Flynn to talk to Kislyak. The “ground just kept being retreaded,” but it was just “astro projection,” he said. No evidence was found.

On multiple occasions, when Mueller lawyers interviewed people from Trump’s circle, it was Barnett who stepped in with clarifying and follow-up questions, such as, “Do you know that for a fact or are you just speculating?”

One time, the lawyers tried to kick Barnett off a McFarland interview. He had to threaten he’d report them to the inspector general before they allowed him in. When he started to ask clarifying questions, he said, they paused the interview and warned him, “If you keep asking these questions, we will be here all day.”

He called the lawyers in question the “obstruction team.”

In one interview, Flynn said something that suggested Trump knew about the calls to Kislyak. Barnett had the impression Flynn was just trying to say what the lawyers wanted to hear. He had to step in with a follow-up question and Flynn clarified that Trump wasn’t aware of the calls.

Flynn said in court papers his lawyers told him after the first special counsel interview that the investigators weren’t happy with his answers. For the subsequent session, his lawyers coached him to use words he wouldn’t have used himself, he said. He eventually fired the lawyers and accused them of ineffective counsel due to a conflict of interest.

The dismissal of his case is scheduled for a hearing on Sept. 29 before District Judge Emmet Sullivan after Flynn’s bid to have a higher court force the judge to accept the dismissal without further proceedings failed in August.

The FBI is out of control and will remain so until some of the people involved in this scandal are held accountable. So far only Kevin Clinesmith has been charged with anything. This is a disgrace.

The Reasons Portland Has Suddenly Gone Quiet

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Portland has suddenly gone quiet. According to BizPacReview, Thursday evening marked “the first time in 93 days” that downtown Portland didn’t succumb to rioting. Somehow I doubt that was because the rioters were home watching President Trump speak.

Andy Ngo, who has been covering the riots for the past three months, tweeted early Friday morning, he speculated that the silence may be a result of reports that the FBI’s Portland branch has begun actively investigating the Black Lives Matter and Antifa extremists responsible for the rioting.

The article reports:

“Portland, Oregon’s FBI chief said Wednesday he is shifting the agency’s resources to focus more heavily on the nightly [extremist riots] in Oregon’s largest city that often end in vandalism, clashes with local police and dozens of arrests,” the Associated Press reported Wednesday.

“Special Agent in Charge Renn Cannon said he is pulling agents from fraud and organized crime teams to focus on ‘acts of violence and federal crimes’ committed during nearly three months of unrest.”

“We do investigate major threats of violence and federal crimes. And sometimes a major threat of violence is a cumulative threat that happens over a period of time. It starts to have a really negative impact on the community,” Cannon said to the AP.

“Here in Portland, we’re … making the assessment that we should be trying to do a little more than we have, because the cumulative effects and the nature of the problem indicate that the community needs help.”

The article includes a tweet from the FBI Portland showing pictures of rioters and asking for information.

There is, however, another aspect of this. The article includes the following tweet:

I realize the tweet is blurry. What it essentially says is that approval for Black Lives Matter is rapidly dropping (probably because of the riots). Keep in mind that the Democrat Party has managed to link themselves with Black Lives Matter by claiming the riots are simply valid protests. At one point a member of the mainstream media described a protest as a mostly peaceful but fiery protest as the fires burned behind him. I think most Americans want to feel safe in their homes, and the violence they are seeing undermines that feeling. The Democrats reluctance to condemn those perpetuating the violence is undermining the support for the Democrat party.

Things That Cause Division In Our Country

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The New York Post posted an article yesterday about the role the media played during the Russia scandal.

The article reports:

Despite what The New York Times and Washington Post were loudly reporting in early 2017, the FBI had failed to find any evidence of Trump-Russia “collusion” — and indeed had found that the central source of those claims was a joke.

This is a key takeaway from the Justice Department’s latest release of documents from the FBI’s investigation.

One shocker is the summary of the long FBI interview that January with the “Primary Subsource” for the infamous Steele dossier — indeed, about the only source.

The FBI had learned that Hillary Clinton’s campaign had paid for British ex-spy Christopher Steele to produce dirt on Donald Trump, and the resulting dossier was pretty much the entire basis for any investigation (barring gossip about a drunken conversation with an on-paper-only Trump adviser).

And now Steele’s “factual” source admitted, essentially, to simply repackaging rumors — some of them from Internet “research.”

Yet the nation’s two most prestigious papers were reporting that the FBI was finding a treasure trove of scandal.

Such as a Feb. 14, 2017, Times piece declaring, “Phone records and intercepted calls show that members of Donald J. Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign and other Trump associates had repeated contacts with senior Russian intelligence officials in the year before the election.”

Ha! A memo from Trump-hating (now ex-) FBI man Peter Strzok shows that story was garbage: “We have not seen evidence of any individuals affiliated with the Trump team in contact with” intelligence officials. The story also said top FBI officials trusted Steele, when they’d learned he was full of it.

Think about the impact this dishonest reporting has had on the American political discourse. Half the country believes that President Trump has some sort of arrangement with the Russians. That half of the country considers themselves well-informed because they read The New York Times or The Washington Post. The other half of the country has been reading the media that has been reporting on the classified documents that have been de-classified and understands that the accusations of Russian collusion are not true. We have entered a topsy-turvy world when the people we should trust to keep us informed are lying to us and the honest investigative reporting is left to the alternative media. I am reminded of the scene in “Men in Black” where the agents pick up the tabloids to find out what is actually going on. Unfortunately, dishonest reporting is a threat to our republic. The job of the media in a republic is to inform the voters so that they can make informed choices when they vote. Our mainstream media has forgotten (or abdicated) their responsibility.

This Could Get Very Interesting

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The New York Post is reporting today that longtime Jeffrey Epstein associate Ghislaine Maxwell was arrested Thursday on a six-count indictment charging her with grooming young girls for sex.

The article reports:

The British socialite, 58, was arrested by the FBI in New Hampshire around 8:30 a.m., sources told The Post.

The just-unsealed indictment charges stem from Maxwell’s role “in the sexual exploitation and abuse of multiple minor girls by Jeffrey Epstein” as early as 1994, court papers say.

“The victims were as young as 14 years old when they were groomed and abused by Maxwell and Epstein, both of whom knew that certain victims were in fact under the age of 18,” the indictment says.

She is specifically accused of grooming three underage victims for sex with Epstein in places including his Upper East Side townhouse, Florida, New Mexico and London.

Maxwell is charged with six counts — conspiracy to entice minors to travel to engage in illegal sex acts, enticement of a minor to travel to engage in illegal sex acts, conspiracy to transport minors with intent to engage in criminal sexual activity, transportation of a minor with intent to engage in criminal sexual activity and two counts of perjury.

There are a few things to note here. Maxwell was arrested by the FBI–not any local jurisdiction. The charges will be announced by the US Attorney’s Office in Manhattan today. Her testimony, if she chooses to reveal what she knows, could be very damaging to many people in powerful positions. Hopefully she will be better protected than Jeffrey Epstein was.

A Final Note On The NASCAR “Noose”

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Yesterday The Daily Wire posted an article about a more recent statement by Bubba Wallace about the ‘noose’ found in his pit area at the Talladega Speedway. Evidently this was a misunderstanding, but it was a misunderstanding with some interesting roots. The ‘noose,’ actually a loop handle on the garage door opening had been there since 2019.

The Conservative Treehouse posted an article today noting:

Today, NASCAR released a picture of the garage pull-down rope and knot that both they and Bubba Wallace described as a “noose hanging over the car“.

Except it clearly was not hanging over the car, and it clearly wasn’t a “noose” or it wouldn’t function to help pull the door down. Driver Bubba Wallace now calls it “a non-functioning noose.”  Or, in simple terms, a garage pull-down rope with a loop-knot tied in the end.

However, what NASCAR does not yet realize is the picture they have provided actually makes the situation worse; because the picture shows something else, something worse:

This is the picture:

The picture was taken Sunday, in Bubba Wallace’s garage stall #4, when the race was cancelled due to inclement weather (rain and lightning).  However, pay close attention to the partially visible uniform on the man standing at the left of the picture.

That person is a member of the Woods Brothers Race Team and this is a VERY important facet.  The picture was taken Sunday, prior to the “noose” (hereafter called a knot) being cut down.  According to a statement by the Woods Brothers team, they informed NASCAR officials the garage-pull in question was in place in 2019:

“One of our employees notified us yesterday … he recalled seeing a tied handle in the garage, from last fall.  We immediately notified NASCAR and have assisted the investigation”. (link)

So that would explain why one of the Woods Brothers team was present on Sunday June 21st when the photograph was taken.

But here’s the problem…. If that picture was taken by NASCAR that means NASCAR was aware the knot in question was in place in 2019; and therefore knew Bubba Wallace was not the target…. and they would know this on Sunday; before they went out and made a big racial publicity stunt over it.

At any rate, The Daily Wire reports the following:

NASCAR driver Bubba Wallace struck a much different tone over the alleged “noose” incident in a statement issued Wednesday than he did the night before during an interview with far-left CNN host Don Lemon.

Instead of expressing anger over the FBI findings that the “noose” his team found hanging from his garage stall on Sunday was in fact not part of a hate crime, but a mere garage pulley, as he did on Tuesday night, the driver expressed gratitude that he was not the victim of a hate crime and praised NASCAR and fellow drivers over their show of “unity” and support.

The Daily Wire also reports NASCAR’s statement:

NASCAR issued a statement Tuesday regarding the FBI findings, which clearly stated that “the garage pull rope fashioned like a noose had been positioned there since as early as last fall”:

The FBI has completed its investigation at Talladega Superspeedway and determined that Bubba Wallace was not the target of a hate crime. The FBI report concludes, and photographic evidence confirms, that the garage door pull rope fashioned like a noose had been positioned there since as early as last fall. This was obviously well before the 43 team’s arrival and garage assignment. We appreciate the FBl’s quick and thorough investigation and are thankful to learn that this was not an intentional, racist act against Bubba. We remain steadfast in our commitment to providing a welcoming and inclusive environment for all who love racing.

It would be interesting to know what all of this fuss was actually about and why cooler heads did not prevail in the beginning.

When You Only See What You Want To See

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There was a dust-up recently in NASCAR about a noose found in the pit area of NASCAR’s only black driver. The media was all over it. The FBI was called in (as they should have been). Well, things are not always what they appear to be. It seems that the noose was actually a loop used to open the garage door. The noose had been there since before the driver was assigned to that garage. Yesterday The New York Post posted an article with a few observations on the overreaction to the situation.

The article notes:

For those who have somehow missed it, over the weekend NASCAR dramatically and declaratively announced that Wallace had been the target of a “noose” found in his garage at the Talladega speedway in Alabama. This was just before a high-profile race on that track that took place on Monday.

When I first heard of the story, I assumed there must be a photo of the noose in question, and was very curious to see how someone could be both so incredibly awful, and well as insanely stupid, as to do something so horrifically racist to a black driver. It quickly became obvious, however, that there was no public photo, and my spidey senses began to tell me that something about this story was just not correct.

…However, the lack of a photo was so inexplicable that it appeared obvious to me that this could have been a misunderstanding (under the presumption that if the noose/scene was really unambiguous, we absolutely would have seen a photo immediately). In these times of extreme racial tension, and after NASCAR had just announced it was completely banning the Confederate flag from its events, it seemed to me that someone may have seen a simple rope with an open knot at the end of it, panicked, and then once the “noose” narrative got started, there was no way to contain it, especially in this current media atmosphere. (For context, there have been two noose stories here in California over just the past week that have turned out not to be hate crimes.)

The article concludes:

Will there be any accountability for this enormous and easily avoided act of media malpractice? Will there be any apology to NASCAR fans and the people of Alabama who were presumed to be racist enough to commit, or at least enable, such a heinous act? Will there be any lessons learned by the news media?

Sadly, but predictably, the answers to these important questions will likely all be negative. No one in the major media gets fired for being wrong in interpreting a news event anymore, at least not if they are incorrect in the woke direction, and the ratings for the story are good.

What happened here will surely happen again, especially in the sports world. Largely because those in the elite media, particularly white males, are so incredibly terrified of being canceled for not being woke enough that they would much rather go along with the media herd and be proven wrong, than leave the protection of the media mob, and risk being run over, even if (especially?) they are right.

I’m glad to hear that there was no noose. I am also sorry to see that the media jumped on the story so quickly.

Behind The Shiny Objects

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As the looting and rioting continues, there are some important things going on in our government that the media might have overlooked. The Conservative Treehouse posted an article yesterday with the following headline, “AG Bill Barr: “For the First Time in American History, Police and National Security Investigations Were Used to Spy on a Political Campaign”…”

The article includes the following video, posted on YouTube:

For those of you who still do not understand the significance of what the FBI and the Department of Justice did, do you want to live in a country where you can be accused of and tried for treason because you don’t support a particular ideology or political party? That is what was done to President Trump. If it can be done to him, it can be done to anyone of us who differs from the preferred group of ideas. This needs to be nipped in the bud quickly with the guilty parties severely punished.

Slowly Things Are Unraveling

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Just the News has been one of the leading sources for information on the Flynn case and for tracking misreporting of the Mueller investigation. Today the site posted an article listing some of the things that need to be investigated in the Mueller investigation.

The article notes:

Despite a February 2018 order from the judge in the Flynn case Emmett G. Sullivan to prosecutors to turn over all material exculpatory evidence to the defense — including information impeaching the credibility of witnesses against him — prosecutor Brandon van Grack never turned over any of the recently released information showing:

    • FBI agents investigating Flynn’s contacts with Russian Ambassador Sergei Kislyak  had recommended closing the case after turning up “no derogatory information.”
    • Agents were blocked from closing the case by fired, anti-Trump agent Peter Strzok, who in text messages attributed his move to intervention from the bureau’s “7th floor” leaders.
    • A senior FBI official confessed qualms — in notes recorded after a 2017 senior strategy meeting on the Flynn investigation — about whether the bureau’s purpose was to discover the truth or, instead, entrap Flynn in a lie that would lead to his dismissal or prosecution.

The recent revelations raising questions of prosecutorial misconduct in the Flynn case fit an emerging, more general pattern of questionable tactics employed by the Mueller probe, including withholding relevant exculpatory evidence and misrepresenting the government’s interactions with investigative targets.

The article lists nine problems with the Mueller probe:

  1. Misrepresentation of Papadopoulos cooperation
  2. Silence about Trump Tower meeting exculpatory evidence
  3. Court filings with deceptively edited email
  4. Scope memo used debunked Steele Dossier to set investigative parameters
  5. Mueller final testimony ignores Steele Dossier
  6. Deceptive editing of Dowd voicemail
  7. The secret side deal
  8. Improper acquisition of transition email
  9. Misleading Trump’s lawyers about his status

General Flynn is not the person who should be facing a prison term. Please follow the link above to read the entire article. It is chilling that this abuse of our legal system has been allowed to continue as long as it has.

Gradually The Truth Emerges

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Yesterday John Solomon posted an article at Just The News about some new information regarding the Mueller investigation.

The article reports:

In Robert Mueller’s final report on the Russia investigation, a little-known translator named Anatoli Samochornov played a bit role, a witness sparsely quoted about the infamous Trump Tower meeting he attended in summer 2016 between Donald Trump Jr. and a mysterious Russian lawyer.

The most scintillating information Mueller’s team ascribed to Samochornov in the report was a tidbit suggesting a hint of impropriety: The translator admitted he was offered $90,000 by the Russians to pay his legal bills, if he supported the story of Moscow attorney Natalia Veselnitskya. He declined.

But recently released FBI memos show that Samochornov, a translator trusted by the State Department and other federal agencies, provided agents far more information than was quoted by Mueller, nearly all of it exculpatory to the president’s campaign and his eldest son.

Despite learning the translator’s information on July 12, 2017, just a few days after the media reported on the Trump Tower meeting, the FBI would eventually suggest Donald Trump Jr. was lying and that the event could be seminal to Russian election collusion.

Samochornov’s eyewitness account entirely debunks the media’s narrative, the FBI memos show.

The article continues:

The translator’s detailed account — omitted from the Mueller report — validated most aspects of Trump Jr.’s original story. And the FBI knew it from the start of the controversy.

The belated release of the FBI interview report under a Freedom of Information Act request is likely to raise serious questions among congressional oversight committees about why the information was suppressed in the Mueller report, why the FBI kept it quiet for two years while Trump Jr. was being politically pilloried, and why the news media has failed to correct its own record of misleading reporting.

“The omission from the Mueller report leaves a distorted picture that has been allowed to persist for more than two years,” a Senate staffer involved in the Russia investigation told me on condition of anonymity because he wasn’t approved to talk to the news media. “We are looking into the circumstances of the editing of that report and why DOJ allowed such investigations and false public narratives to carry on in the face of significant evidence of innocence.”

People need to go to jail over this–leaving out exculpatory information in order to feed a false narrative to the American people is inexcusable. These are the actions of a police state. If we do not hold people accountable, we can expect more of this behavior in the future.

As The Truth Comes Out Many Previous Statements Are Now Becoming ‘Inoperative’

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The Gateway Pundit posted an article today about Crowdstrike. Crowdstrike was the firm that claimed to have examined the Democrat National Committee computers and claimed that the computers had been hacked by Russians and the information relayed to Wikileaks. There have always been a few problems with this story. First of all, a number of computer experts have stated that the speed at which the information was copied from the computers indicates an inside job with a data stick rather than a hack. Secondly, the FBI was never actually allowed to examine the computers. Thirdly, Crowdstrike has links to both Democrat politics and Ukraine. The article reminds us that in the infamous telephone call between President Trump and Ukrainian President Zelinsky, President Trump specifically asked President Zelinsky to look into Crowdstrike.

Here are a few highlights from the article:

Pelley (Scott Pelley), from 60 Minutes, used former anti-Trump Ambassador Bill Taylor, from the sham impeachment fiasco, as his expert witness on the Ukraine. Taylor claims he knew of no connection between Crowdstrike and the Ukraine. Pelley then shared the following in his report [emphasis added]:

Robert Johnston dealt directly with the FBI as an investigator of the DNC hack for CrowdStrike, a leading cyber security company hired by the Democrats. He told us the FBI didn’t physically examine the DNC servers because CrowdStrike gave the bureau copies of the data from the servers.

“If there is a server or a computer system of any kind that’s involved in the incident you can take an exact bit for bit digital copy of what’s on that system. Now that digital copy is just as good as having the real thing,” Johnston said.

“As far as you know, the FBI got what it needed and what it wanted?” Pelley asked Johnston.

“Exactly and evidence of that is you don’t hear the FBI complaining,” Johnston said.

The article continues:

We reported that Crowdstike is related to the Ukraine and this is through Ukrainian billionaire and longtime contributor to the Clinton Foundation Victor Pinchuk. We also know Crowdstrike is connected to James Clapper and the Atlantic Group:

Pinchuk serves on the International Advisory Board of a Washington-based think tank called the Atlantic Council. This group is “connected to Ukrainian interests through its “Ukraine in Europe Initiative,” which is designed to galvanize international support for an independent Ukraine within secure borders whose people will determine their own future.” Also serving on the International Advisory Board of the Atlantic Council is James Clapper, who served as Obama’s Director of National Intelligence. Funnily enough, Bongino discovered that the Chief Technology Officer of “the only company that investigated the hacking of the DNC’s servers and quickly determined it was the Russians, is a nonresident senior fellow in cybersecurity” at the Atlantic Council. His name is Dmitri Alperovitch (owner of CrowdStrike).”

We also know that in July 2015 Google invested $100 million into Crowdstrike

There are some problems with the story that the media has told so far:

There are many holes with the ‘Russia hacked the DNC emails’ claim, much of what has already been posted here at TGP.

Several individuals previously shared they have sources who claim that the DNC servers were never examined by Crowdstrike

Please follow the link to The Gateway Pundit to read the rest of the story. It may be that some people who have told a false story for the past three years are about to be confronted by evidence of the truth that contradicts what they are saying.

This Story Needs To Stay In The News Until The Truth Is Found

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The U.K. Daily Mail posted an article today about the death of Philip Haney. The police department that handled the case is expressing doubts that the death was a suicide.

The article reports:

Authorities have backtracked on initial reports that a Department of Homeland Security whistleblower committed suicide after his body was found with a gunshot wound by a California highway.

Philip Haney, who spoke out against his own agency during the Obama administration, was found dead in Plymouth, about 40 miles east of Sacramento, last Friday. 

His body was found in a park and ride area near Highway 16 and Highway 124.

The Amador County Sheriff’s Office initially said the 66-year-old was found with what appeared to be a ‘self-inflicted gunshot wound’.

They also said a firearm had been found next to Haney and his vehicle. 

The sheriff’s office have since described those initial reports as ‘misinformation’ and said they have asked the FBI for assistance in investigating Haney’s death. 

Let’s hope they get the honest FBI and not the deep state FBI.

The article reports information that might hold some clues to the cause of death:

Haney gained national attention in 2016 when he criticized the agency – which at the time was under the Obama administration – for its handling of radical Jihadists and Islamic extremists.

He testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee that the DHS ordered him in 2009 to delete hundreds of files that showed links between people and Islamic terror groups.

The whistleblower testified that several terror attacks in the U.S. could have been thwarted if some of those files had not been deleted. 

In an opinion piece for the Hill prior to his testimony, Haney wrote: ‘It is very plausible that one or more of the subsequent terror attacks on the homeland could have been prevented if more subject matter experts in the Department of Homeland Security had been allowed to do our jobs back in late 2009.

‘It is demoralizing – and infuriating – that today, those elusive dots are even harder to find, and harder to connect, than they were during the winter of 2009.’

At the time of Haney’s testimony, Republicans questioned former Obama-era DHS Secretary Jet Johnson about the allegations.

Senator Ted Cruz asked: ‘Was Mr Haney’s testimony that the Department of Homeland Security order over 800 documents… altered or deleted accurate?’

Johnson replied he had ‘no idea’ and denied knowing who Haney was.

‘I don’t know who Mr Haney is. I wouldn’t know him if he walked into the room,’ he said. 

Hopefully Mr. Haney left the information for his next book with a reliable person.

I don’t believe that Philip Haney committed suicide. I hope the investigation will be kept open until authorities know exactly what did happen.

The American Government Needs To Realize That China Is Not Our Friend

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On Tuesday, Stars and Stripes reported the following:

Two more Chinese nationals have been arrested for illegally taking photographs at a Florida Navy base, court records show.

The arrests over the weekend of Yuhao Wang and Jielun Zhang bring to four the number of Chinese people charged recently with snapping pictures at the Naval Air Station in Key West, Florida.

An FBI affidavit says Wang and Zhang drove up to an air station annex entrance and were told by a security officer they could not enter the property without military identification. The FBI says the pair drove onto the base anyway and were apprehended by authorities about 30 minutes later after taking photos of structures on the base.

…The arrests follow two similar cases involving Chinese nationals taking photos at the Key West base. On Dec. 26, Lyuyou Liao was charged with illegally taking pictures at another annex of the Naval Air Station.

Liao, 27, is being held without bail. His lawyer argued at a recent hearing that Liao was on vacation taking pictures and that evidence of any crime is thin.

A fourth Chinese man, Zhao Qianli, pleaded guilty last year to illegally taking photographs at the same Florida Keys installation. Qianli, 20, was sentenced to a year in federal prison.

China has a history of freely helping itself to the military technology of America. Trade deals make during the Clinton administration advanced the missile program of China between ten and fifteen years. China also has little respect for intellectual property rights. Hopefully any trade agreement signed with China will take its past behavior into consideration.

Some Perspective From A Former FBI Agent

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Sometimes the people who have done a job are the most qualified to analyze how a job was done. Frank Watt, a former FBI Agent, posted an article at The American Thinker today about the surveillance of Carter Page. The title of the article is, “Two Possibilities in Trump Wiretapping, and Neither Is Good.”

Mr. Watt reminds us that because the surveillance of an American citizen violates that citizen’s Fourth Amendment rights, there has to be proven justification for that surveillance. We know that was not the case with Carter Page, in fact, some things were left out of the application for surveillance that would have immediately called into question the need for surveillance.

The article notes:

Based on what we are told by the I.G., there are only two possible conclusions that can be reached regarding the official conduct of those responsible for infringing on Carter Pages Constitutional freedoms: 

The first is that the hand selected team of investigators, attorneys, and Senior Executive Service officials with decades of law enforcement, administrative, and judicial experience were abject failures at a task that they were hired to perform. Speaking from personal experience, in FBI, DEA, and state and local wire tap investigations, the slightest omissions, misstatements, and clerical errors are routinely identified and corrected by the street agents and line prosecutors who do these investigations for a living. To believe that a “varsity level” team, with unlimited time, support, and resources, somehow inadvertently overlooked seventeen major omissions, misstatements, and/or outright falsehoods, is simply not believable. 

The second possibility is that nearly everyone who significantly participated in obtaining FISA coverage on Page knowingly and deliberately operated outside the law to one degree or another. The reasons behind the decision to do so are irrelevant. The particulars regarding the seventeen I.G. findings are startling, taken individually. It’s difficult to see how any of the individual omissions or misstatements could have happened accidentally. Viewed collectively, the apparent intentionality is nearly impossible to reconcile as anything but corruption. 

In light of the I.G findings, the presiding FISA court judge seems to have come down on the side of intentional abuse. In a recent court order, Judge Rosemary Collyer gave the FBI until January 10 to explain to the court why the FBI should be allowed to continue to utilize FISA. The statement that the FBI “withheld material information” and that “FBI personnel misled NSD” suggests that the judge isn’t buying the “series of unfortunate events” excuse peddled by prominent figures in defense of the indefensible. 

The article concludes:

Whichever explanation seems more likely, the end result should be infuriating to every American. Either your nations premiere law enforcement agency was breathtakingly incompetent when the stakes were the highest, or select officials in that organization made deliberate decisions to break the law, undermine the Constitution, and illegally spy on a fellow American. Either possibility has deeply damaged the reputation of the FBI and DOJ in addition to the reputations of thousands of honest FBI Agents and DOJ attorneys. Despite the legitimate concerns of civil libertarians, the FISA process has indisputably proved an invaluable resource in safeguarding the country from terrorism. If the heinous abuses documented in the I.G.s report result in a weakening or loss of FISA, we will all be the worse for it. If those responsible are not held to account, this will happen again. There is no happy face to put on this episode. 

It is time for those guilty of corruption to be tried and held accountable for their actions.

Even Rolling Stone Has Figured It Out!

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Yesterday Rolling Stone posted an article about the Inspector General’s Report. Please follow the link to read the entire article–it is well written and informative. I will try to highlight some of it, but you really do need to read the whole thing.

The article notes:

The Guardian headline reads: “DOJ Internal watchdog report clears FBI of illegal surveillance of Trump adviser.”

If the report released Monday by Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz constitutes a “clearing” of the FBI, never clear me of anything. Holy God, what a clown show the Trump-Russia investigation was.

Like the much-ballyhooed report by Special Counsel Robert Mueller, the Horowitz report is a Rorschach test, in which partisans will find what they want to find.

Much of the press is concentrating on Horowitz’s conclusion that there was no evidence of “political bias or improper motivation” in the FBI’s probe of Donald Trump’s Russia contacts, an investigation Horowitz says the bureau had “authorized purpose” to conduct.

Horowitz uses phrases like “serious performance failures,” describing his 416-page catalogue of errors and manipulations as incompetence rather than corruption. This throws water on the notion that the Trump investigation was a vast frame-up.

However, Horowitz describes at great length an FBI whose “serious” procedural problems and omissions of “significant information” in pursuit of surveillance authority all fell in the direction of expanding the unprecedented investigation of a presidential candidate (later, a president).

The article comments on the role the news media played in this drama:

Not only did obtaining a FISA warrant allow authorities a window into other Trump figures with whom Page communicated, they led to a slew of leaked “bombshell” news stories that advanced many public misconceptions, including that a court had ruled there was “probable cause” that a Trump figure was an “agent of a foreign power.”

There are too many to list in one column, but the Horowitz report show years of breathless headlines were wrong. Some key points:

The so-called “Steele dossier” was, actually, crucial to the FBI’s decision to seek secret surveillance of Page.

Press figures have derided the idea that Steele was crucial to the FISA application, with some insisting it was only a “small part” of the application. Horowitz is clear: 

We determined that the Crossfire Hurricane team’s receipt of Steele’s election reporting on September 19, 2016 played a central and essential role in the FBI’s and Department’s decision to seek the FISA order.  

The report describes how, prior to receiving Steele’s reports, the FBI General Counsel (OGC) and/or the National Security Division’s Office of Intelligence (OI) wouldn’t budge on seeking FISA authority. But after getting the reports, the OGC unit chief said, “receipt of the Steele reporting changed her mind on whether they could establish probable cause.”

The article notes:

Steele in his “reports” embellished his sources’ quotes, played up nonexistent angles, invented attributions, and ignored inconsistencies. The FBI then transplanted this bad reporting in the form of a warrant application and an addendum to the Intelligence Assessment that included the Steele material, ignoring a new layer of inconsistencies and red flags its analysts uncovered in the review process.

Then, following a series of leaks, the news media essentially reported on the FBI’s wrong reporting of Steele’s wrong reporting.

The impact was greater than just securing a warrant to monitor Page. More significant were the years of headlines that grew out of this process, beginning with the leaking of the meeting with Trump about Steele’s blackmail allegations, the insertion of Steele’s conclusions in the Intelligence Assessment about Russian interference, and the leak of news about the approval of the Page FISA warrant.

As a result, a “well-developed conspiracy” theory based on a report that Comey described as “salacious and unverified material that a responsible journalist wouldn’t report without corroborating,” became the driving news story in a superpower nation for two years. Even the New York Times, which published a lot of these stories, is in the wake of the Horowitz report noting Steele’s role in “unleashing a flood of speculation in the news media about the new president’s relationship with Russia.”

The article has a fantastic conclusion:

No matter what people think the political meaning of the Horowitz report might be, reporters who read it will know: Anybody who touched this nonsense in print should be embarrassed.

Rolling Stone doesn’t always get it right, but this time they nailed it!