Two Questions Re Danchenko's FBI/DoJ Interview

As we've recently learned, Christopher Steele claims that he got the "information" in his reports (which were compiled into a "dossier" that was behind so much of the Russia Hoax) from a "Primary Subsource", Igor Danchenko. Danchenko was interviewed by a team of FBI and DoJ investigators, analysts, and lawyers in January, 2017. The interview took place in Washington, DC, over at least three days, and in the interview Danchenko basically debunked any notion that there was a solid basis in fact for anything Steele claimed in his "dossier". In fact, Danchenko specifically disclaimed all knowledge of certain "information" that Steele passed on to his employers, the Clinton campaign, and the FBI. In spite of what Danchenko told the interviewers, the FBI and DoJ proceeded to allow the Carter Page FISA (based virtually 100% on the Steele "dossier") to remain up and running then obtained two additional renewals of the same FISA on the basis of the Steele "dossier" that Danchenko had debunked!

Two pseudonymous lawyers and Twitter commenters have raised questions about that interview.

First, noting that Danchenko had a lawyer present, Undercover Huber asks:

Who was paying for the Primary Sub Source’s attorney to sit in for *a full week* of high level FBI/DOJ interviews? 

That time likely cost tens of thousands of dollars 

It wasn’t the PSS, and it wasn’t Orbis, who didn’t know he was talking to the feds. So who was it?

It's an interesting question for which I certainly have no answer. However, Undercover Huber is obviously suggesting that interested parties may have provided Danchenko with a lawyer. Knowing Danchenko's connection to Deep State operatives like former NSC staffer Fiona Hill, and knowing the connection of various DoJ lawyers to the Clinton campaign, the question of who Danchenko's lawyer was and who paid the lawyer is of more than passing interest. The people paying had to have had strong motives to fork out that kind of money, and those motives will be of great interest to the Barr/Durham investigators. Again, this goes to the nature of what AG Barr has described as John Durham's "sprawling" investigation. Since this all occurred after Trump was inaugurated, the presumption must be that it could possibly tie into the fake impeachment at some point.

Second, Shipwreckedcrew responds to former FBI agent and NSC staffer Jim Casey and asks:

I want to know who the DOJ NSD lawyer was who was in the room during the interview.
Quote Tweet

Jim Casey
@Jim_Casey_
Replying to @MZHemingway
A number of people are going to have to explain how two FISA renewals were allowed to move forward, once the FBI knew this information from the PSS. The Page FSIA and renewals were almost 100% based on the dossier. Somebody swore to the FISC it was true and accurate.

Casey, the former FBI agent, naturally focuses on the role of the FBI--and his observation is very much on the money. The PSS's information not only should have prevented the next two renewals of the Carter Page FISA but should have caused the FISA that was then running to be shut down immediately.

Shipwreckedcrew, a former AUSA, equally naturally focuses on the role of DoJ-NSD in the interview. His question is as apt as were Casey's observations. Basically, he's asking: How is it possible that a high DoJ National Security lawyer could have listened to what the PSS said and not gone back to DoJ and informed the relevant lawyers in Office of Intelligence (OI). Of course, as it happens, the relevant lawyer was Stu Evans, who had already expressed strong reservations about the Carter Page FISA and thus made himself a pain in the ass to people like Peter Strzok, Lisa Page, and Andy McCabe.

Here I can answer Shipwreckedcrew's question. The DoJ-NSD lawyer was David Laufman, who was forced to resign (a fact Laufman vigorously denies). Since then he has come totally out of the closet as a hard Left Dem activist.

The Horowitz OIG FISA report has 7 pages of discussion of the PSS interview (241-247), and I have to say that most of what the FBI and DoJ officials had to tell Horowitz's investigators fails to pass the laugh test. Like most commentators, I refuse to believe that the results of the interview were not made known to the key plotters against Trump. Here's what Laufman had to say to OIG--read it and ask yourself, If that's true, what was he doing at the interview? But, all the more reason to have run the results past Stu Evans at OI--except, of course, Laufman was fully aware of the implications of what PSS had said over those three days:

The NSD's Counterintelligence and Export Control Section (CES) representatives who attended the Primary Sub-source's January 2017 interview--Section Chief David Laufman and his Deputy Section Chief--told us that they did not recall discussing the interview with OI officials afterward. They told us that they did not have knowledge of the information in the Carter Page FISA applications at the time, and that they were not sufficiently familiar with the Steele reports to have understood that there were inconsistencies between the Primary Sub-source and Steele. We did not find any information to the contrary. They told us that they attended the interview because CES had helped negotiate the terms of the interview with the Primary Sub-source's attorney, and, as noted previously, their role during the interview was primarily to address any issues or concerns raised by the attorney during the interview.

The OI Attorney told the OIG that if had he known about the inconsistencies between the Primary Sub-source and Steele on the facts asserted in the FISA applications, he would have wanted an opportunity to ask questions and gather more information. In particular, after we asked the OI Attorney to read the written summary of the Primary Sub-source's interview regarding the telephone call with Person 1, the OI Attorney was surprised, agreed it was not consistent with the information in the FISA applications concerning Report 95, and said "it doesn't seem like the same story." Evans told us that OI would have sought to determine how the new information impacted the FISA applications, including obtaining the FBI's own assessment of how to reconcile the apparent inconsistencies. Evans said that at a minimum, OI would have advised the court of the inconsistencies and the FBI's assessment of those inconsistences. He further stated that, depending on the information from the FBI, 0I may have decided to delay or abandon the filing of the next renewal application altogether. 

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to guess that nobody wanted Evans to find out about what the PSS had to say.

Well, Evans is said to have cooperated extensively with Durham, and it's likely that Strzok, too, has cooperated--along with others whose names haven't figured as prominently. OIG doesn't have GJ power, but Durham does. I'm sure Durham will be questioning those involved closely--including regarding their earlier testimony to OIG.