Refusing To Continue A Practice That Was Abused

Townhall posted an article this morning stating that the House Freedom Caucus will refuse to reauthorize the FISA (Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act) court unless serious reforms are made. The FISA court was the vehicle used by the Obama administration to spy on the Trump campaign and the early days of the Trump administration. The authorization to spy was gained by misleading the court, specifically by omitting the fact that Carter Page was a CIA asset–not a Russian asset and omitting the fact that Joseph Mifsud was an American asset–not a Russian spy.

The article reports:

Members of the House Freedom Caucus released a statement Wednesday morning vowing to vote against any reauthorization of the FISA court unless serious and substantial changes are made to the spying program. 

“Members of the Freedom Caucus have long called for reforms to FISA (Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act). Recent revelations that FISA was severely and repeatedly used to spy on a presidential campaign are beyond the pale—if the government can misuse this system to spy on a presidential campaign, they can surely do it to any other American citizen,” members of the caucus said. “As Congress considers reauthorizing FISA, anything short of significant and substantive reforms would betray the trust of the American people. The House Freedom Caucus will oppose any bill that does not meet a Constitutional standard for the protections of American citizens’ rights. We will also oppose any ‘clean’, short-term reauthorization of the current, harmful version of FISA.”

Members of the Freedom Caucus include House Oversight Committee Ranking member Jim Jordan, Paul Gosar, Louie Gohmert, Matt Gaetz, Chip Roy and other long time critics of FISA. 

The FISA court was misused by the Obama administration, and unless it is seriously reformed, could easily be used for political purposes again. There needs to be a limitation so that the court could only use surveillance on foreign citizens–not Americans. Unfortunately, FISA misuse was one of many traps set in place by the Obama administration to hinder the progress of the Trump administration.

The article continues:

“Enhanced penalties for abusing the system and additional layers of certification from the Department of Justice and the FBI are insufficient to gain our support, particularly when, to date, no one has been charged with a crime for previous abuses,” the statement continues. “A proposal for additional scrutiny when elected officials and candidates are the target of investigations similarly misses the point: politicians don’t need more protection from government spying than their fellow citizens. More fundamental changes to standards of evidence and process that mirror as closely as possible our Article III courts are needed to gain our support.”

Yesterday the House reached a compromise on how to move a bill, sponsored by House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler, forward for reauthorization of the program. It does not reform the system that was used as a political weapon against President Trump in 2016 and well into his presidency.

Until people are held accountable for past abuses of FISA, it should not be reauthorized.

We Now Have The Proof

On May 8, I posted an article about Joseph Mifsud. The article pointed out that some members of Congress were aware that Joseph Mifsud was an American asset. The Mueller Report describes him as a Russian spy. Well, that was the beginning clue that something might be wrong. Now we have the evidence.

The Gateway Pundit posted an article today about an interview by Maria Bartiromo on Sunday Morning Futures. Ms. Bartiromo interviewed John Solomon of The Hill.

The article reports:

The two discussed John Solomon’s latest interview with CIA operative Joseph Mifsud’s attorneys.

According to Mr. Mifsud’s attorneys their client was working for the CIA and was NOT a Russian operative as reported by the Mueller witch hunt team of liars.

Maria Bartiromo: We know that there were informants thrown at certain Trump campaign people, like George Papadopoulos. George Papadopoulos was on this show and he told me directly on this show that Mifsud was the guy they wanted him to meet in Italy… That is the individual who told him that Russia has emails on Hillary Clinton. Why is that important, John?

John Solomon: Well, I interviewed Mr. Mifsud’s lawyer the other day, Stefan Rowe, and he told me and also provided me some deposition evidence to both Congress and myself that his client was being directed and long worked with Western intelligence. And he was being directed specifically, he was asked to connect George Papadopoulos to Russia, meaning it was an operation, some form of intelligence operation. That was the lawyer’s own words for this. If that’s the case that means the flash point the started the whole investigation was in fact manufactured from the beginning.

The use of Joseph Mifsud in this manner is an example of blatant misuse of intelligence operations for political purposes. All of those involved need to be charged with violating the civil rights of various people in the Trump campaign. They need to be punished so that this will not happen again.

Five Obvious Problems

On August 1, Real Clear Investigations posted an article listing five major problems with the Mueller Report. Please follow the link to read the entire article, but I will post the five problems here:

  1. Who Is Joseph Mifsud, and Was He the Actual Predicate for the Russia Investigation?
  2. What Was the Role of the Steele Dossier?
  3. Why Did the Mueller Team Invent the Polling Data Theory About Konstantin Kilimnik, and Omit His U.S. Ties?
  4. Why Did the Mueller Team Falsely Suggest That Trump Tower Moscow Was a Viable Project – and What Was the Role of FBI Informant Felix Sater?
  5. Was Specious Info Leaked to Justify the Absence of Trump-Kremlin Links?

Please read the entire article. I think it is interesting that we haven’t heard very much about Joseph Mifsud or Felix Sater.

The article concludes:

Less than two weeks after the dossier’s publication, someone from U.S. intelligence leaked classified details of an intercepted phone call between Michael Flynn and then-Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak. The leak fueled baseless speculation that Flynn and Kislyak had discussed sanctions relief in exchange for Russia’s help in the 2016 election, and ultimately led to Flynn’s resignation. Weeks later, the New York Times reported that the U.S. investigators had obtained “phone records and intercepted calls” showing that members of Trump’s campaign and other associates “had repeated contacts with senior Russian intelligence officials in the year before the election.” Four months later, Comey testified that the story was “not true.” The Times has never retracted it.

Nunes also tried to question Mueller about U.S. government leaks, asking if he agreed that the leak of a phone call involving Flynn, the then-national security adviser, was a “major scandal.” Mueller responded: “I can’t adopt that hypothesis.”

Mueller could very well have a plausible explanation for his inability to account for the investigation’s core flaws. Or, as his awkward testimony suggested, perhaps he was not the hard-nosed investigator that the media portrayed him to be, but instead a figurehead who did not make the key decisions in the office of the Special Counsel.

What is clear is that neither his report nor testimony provide the answer. After determining that there never was a Trump-Russia conspiracy, Mueller showed no interest in investigating why so many high-placed officials said they believed there had been. His report told us what didn’t happen during the 2016 election, but shed little light on what did happen, and why.

It is becoming more an more obvious that there were those in the government working against the interests of an elected President. Those people need to be held accountable. If they are not, we can expect it to become routine for those in power to use government agencies for political purposes.

A Few Random Notes On The Mueller Hearing

Robert Mueller does not look as if he has full knowledge of the Mueller Report or that he is fully up to the task of answering questions about it.

One of the more interesting exchanges during the hearing is reported today at The Gateway Pundit. Representative Jim Jordan is questioning Robert Mueller about some information in the Mueller Report.

The article reports:

Jordan asked Mueller who allegedly told Papadopoulos about the Russians having Hillary Clinton’s emails.

Mueller reverted back to his talking points and said that he cannot answer questions about internal deliberations.

Jordan hit back and told Mueller that the answer is in his own report!

“Yes you can because you wrote about it — you gave us the answer! Page 192 of the report you told us who told him — Joseph Mifsud — Joseph Mifsud is the guy who told Papadopoulos!”

Jim Jordan also blasted Mueller for not charging Mifsud with making false statements even though he lied to investigators three times.

Mueller would not answer Jordan why he didn’t charge Mifsud with lying (hint: it’s because he’s a Western Intelligence spy).

…In reality, Mifsud is a Western Intelligence spy.

In May Rep. Devin Nunes revealed that Joseph Mifsud visited the State Department in Washington DC in 2017 — likely AFTER Trump was inaugurated. This was a MAJOR OMISSION by Robert Mueller, Andrew Weissmann and their band of angry Democrats.

On Tuesday John Solomon in his report reveals that Joseph Mifsud was indeed a Western Intelligence spy. Robert Mueller likely knew this, lied in his report, and labeled Mifsud a Russian operative.

So let’s sort this out for a minute. General Flynn was set up through unmasking and being told that he didn’t need a lawyer for a ‘friendly’ FBI visit at the White House. The initial report by the FBI agents who interviewed him said that he didn’t lie to them. General Flynn was later charged with lying and after being financially destroyed by lawyers fees, etc, agreed to a plea deal. That case is ongoing. The Mueller Report states that Joseph Mifsud made false statements (lied), and no action was taken. Whatever happened to equal justice under the law?

Telling Only Half The Story To Paint The Picture You Want

Yesterday Townhall posted an article about the Mueller Report and the Russian collusion charges. Last week I posted an article about the misrepresentation of Konstantin Kilimnik, portrayed in the Mueller Report as a “Russian asset” when in fact he was a source for American intelligence. In May I posted an article about Joseph Mifsud, also portrayed as a “Russian asset” when in fact he was training American intelligence agents in Italy. It seems that the Mueller Report spent a lot of time grasping at straws. There is also the matter of editing a phone message to make it appear as something it was not. The Mueller Report is not the objective document it is supposed to be.

The Townhall article deals with the charges that Carter Page was colluding with Russia.

The article reports:

The Department of Justice inspector general is said to be readying a scorching report on the alleged FISA abuses. It’s expected to be released this summer. At the heart of the Trump-Russia collusion nonsense is Spygate and the FISA warrant secured to monitor Page based off this dossier. First, there’s the allegation that FBI, or the CIA, tried to infiltrate the Trump campaign based on this Russian collusion hysteria. The second part is the FBI citing this dossier as credible evidence to secure a spy warrant on Page. It was renewed three times through 2017. Political opposition research was cited to secure a spy warrant on the rival campaign from the sitting presidential administration of the opposing party during an election year. Yeah, one could argue that’s weaponizing the DOJ to go after your enemies. How much did Obama know? Also, welcome to this circus, State Department. 

The officials in the Obama administration knew that this was biased trash days prior to securing the FISA warrant is bad enough. Another odd angle is that this very intelligence community knew Carter Page because he worked with the CIA, the State Department, and the FBI…before he became a Russian traitor or something (via RCP):

“I was asked various questions, not only by State, FBI, etc, but also the CIA,” he said. “I had a long-standing relationship with the CIA going back decades essentially, and I was always very transparent, open.”

“I had a longstanding relationship with the CIA, going back decades, essentially,” Page said. “I was always very transparent, open.”

The Mueller Report was an opportunity to provide a factual account of bad behavior during the 2016 election. Unfortunately the report turned a blind eye to actual foreign intervention and went on a witch hunt instead. It is my hope that the people involved in the misuse of government agencies and the witch hunt will be brought to justice.

Twisted

No one ever claimed that the team put together by Robert Mueller to investigate President Trump was politically unbiased, but I at least expected them to report the facts as they uncovered them. Evidently my expectations were too high. On May 8, I posted an article about Joseph Mifsud, claimed by the Mueller Report to be a Russian asset. It turns out that he was training American intelligence officers. His contract with George Papadopoulos had nothing to do with Russia. On June 1st, I posted an article about the editing of a phone message from President Trump’s attorney John Dowd to Michael Flynn. The message was edited in a way that left an impression totally different than what was actually happening. Well, okay, maybe that was just an oversight. That’s two strikes. Now we have another incident where something totally misleading (and false) was stated in the Mueller Report.

John Solomon at The Hill posted an article yesterday with the following headline, “Key figure that Mueller report linked to Russia was a State Department intel source.” The person in questions in Ukrainian businessman Konstantin Kilimnik.

The article reports:

In a key finding of the Mueller report, Ukrainian businessman Konstantin Kilimnik, who worked for Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort, is tied to Russian intelligence.

But hundreds of pages of government documents — which special counsel Robert Mueller possessed since 2018 — describe Kilimnik as a “sensitive” intelligence source for the U.S. State Department who informed on Ukrainian and Russian matters.

Why Mueller’s team omitted that part of the Kilimnik narrative from its report and related court filings is not known. But the revelation of it comes as the accuracy of Mueller’s Russia conclusions face increased scrutiny.

It gets worse:

Three sources with direct knowledge of the inner workings of Mueller’s office confirmed to me that the special prosecutor’s team had all of the FBI interviews with State officials, as well as Kilimnik’s intelligence reports to the U.S. Embassy, well before they portrayed him as a Russian sympathizer tied to Moscow intelligence or charged Kilimnik with participating with Manafort in a scheme to obstruct the Russia investigation.

Kasanof’s and Purcell’s interviews are corroborated by scores of State Department emails I reviewed that contain regular intelligence from Kilimnik on happenings inside the Yanukovych administration, the Crimea conflict and Ukrainian and Russian politics. For example, the memos show Kilimnik provided real-time intelligence on everything from whose star in the administration was rising or falling to efforts at stuffing ballot boxes in Ukrainian elections.

Those emails raise further doubt about the Mueller report’s portrayal of Kilimnik as a Russian agent. They show Kilimnik was allowed to visit the United States twice in 2016 to meet with State officials, a clear sign he wasn’t flagged in visa databases as a foreign intelligence threat.

The emails also show how misleading, by omission, the Mueller report’s public portrayal of Kilimnik turns out to be.

For instance, the report makes a big deal about Kilimnik’s meeting with Manafort in August 2016 at the Trump Tower in New York.

By that time, Manafort had served as Trump’s campaign chairman for several months but was about to resign because of a growing controversy about the millions of dollars Manafort accepted as a foreign lobbyist for Yanukovych’s party.

Specifically, the Mueller report flagged Kilimnik’s delivery of a peace plan to the Trump campaign for settling the two-year-old Crimea conflict between Russia and Ukraine.

“Kilimnik requested the meeting to deliver in person a peace plan for Ukraine that Manafort acknowledged to the Special Counsel’s Office was a ‘backdoor’ way for Russia to control part of eastern Ukraine,” the Mueller report stated.

But State emails showed Kilimnik first delivered a version of his peace plan in May 2016 to the Obama administration during a visit to Washington. Kasanof, his former handler at the U.S. Embassy in Ukraine, had been promoted to a top policy position at State, and the two met for dinner on May 5, 2016.

I am grateful for investigative reporters. It is time to acknowledge that the Mueller Report, despite the fact that it found no evidence of collusion on the part of the Trump campaign, is tainted. It is time to put this entire farce to rest and lift the cloud the Democrats have placed over the Trump administration. It is time to allow the President to solve the problems at our southern border, deal with Iran, negotiate trade deals, and generally be President.

Spy Vs. Spy

For those of you too young to recognize this image, it is from Mad Magazine in the 1960’s when the magazine featured a cartoon called “Spy Vs. Spy.” This cartoon is very relevant right now because of recent information surrounding the Mueller Report.

One of the chief figures in the Mueller Report is Joseph Mifsud — the mysterious professor from Malta who helped ignite the Russia probe in 2016. Information has now come out that Mifsud was an FBI trainer and an American asset. If people in Congress knew that, why didn’t Robert Mueller and why isn’t it in the Mueller Report?

On Sunday, May 5, The Washington Examiner reported the following:

Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., said Maltese academic Joseph Mifsud — the man who told former Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos the Russians had thousands of Hillary Clinton’s emails — likely has links to “U.S., British, and Italian intelligence services” and the State Department where Clinton served as the country’s top diplomat.

Mifsud, a London-based professor and former Maltese diplomat, has long been suspected of deep ties to Russian intelligence. He is an elusive figure who has stayed out of the spotlight and is the subject of a letter Nunes, the House Intelligence Committee ranking member, sent to U.S. intelligence agencies and the State Department on Friday seeking relevant documents.

Nunes told Fox News on Sunday there were many questions that arose from special counsel Robert Mueller’s report on Russian interference in the 2016 election, which his letter said “omits any mention of a wide range of contacts Mifsud had with Western political institutions and individuals,” that still need to be answered.

The Gateway Pundit reported on May 5:

Rep. Nunes accused the Mueller Special Counsel of angry Democrats of lying to the American public in their report.  Nunes alleged that deep state operatives were selectively leaking and planting information in the mainstream media and then using this same disinformation in their report.

Nunes also accused the Mueller team of lying about Joseph Misfud.  Dirty cop Mueller alleged in the report that Joseph Misfud was a Russian operative.  This was a lie.  Misfud worked with Western operatives.  He is suspected of being an FBI trainer and asset.  And…. According to Nunes Mifsud visited the State Department in Washington DC in 2017 — likely AFTER Trump was inaugurated.  This is a MAJOR OMISSION by Robert Mueller, Andrew Weissmann and their band of angry Democrats.

So why is this important? Misfud’s meeting with George Papadopoulos is supposedly what triggered the surveillance of the Trump campaign. If Misfud is an FBI trainer and asset, why was he labeled a Russian asset? This smells like the people in the State Department working to influence the outcome of an election and cripple an elected President. Deep state, anyone? Obviously a very naive George Popadopoulos was set up. As recently reported, the set-up included the stereotypical blonde bombshell. The Russians were not spying on the Trump campaign–the Obama administration was.

One last thought–we have a pretty good idea of the money involved in transferring a large amount of America’s uranium resources to Russia. Don’t you think Russia would rather have Hillary Clinton as President so that the information they have on that deal could be used to keep her under control?