Bull Durham v. Marc Elias?

Breitbart has a report concerning Dem top election law attorney Marc Elias. Elias is leaving his long time firm of Perkins Coie, taking with him 11 partners and some other lawyers to start a new election law firm:

Democrat Election Lawyer, Russia Hoaxer Marc Elias Leaves Perkins Coie Ahead of Durham Report

The article is very worthwhile as a refresher on Elias' involvement in the Russia Hoax. It also goes into Elias' background as one of the very top lawyers for the Dems--which means, for the Clinton organization.

For our purposes the important point is that Elias was the person who arranged for the Clinton Campaign to hire Fusion GPS to do opposition research, while funneling payments to Fusion GPS through Perkins Coie. My understanding--subject to correction--is that such an arrangement would have been in violation of election laws.

Fusion, in turn, hired Christopher Steele, the British former MI6 agent who wrote the fictional "Steele Dossier" that ultimately ended up being delivered to the FBI in Fall of 2016. This "dossier" served as the basis for the FBI's "Crossfire Hurricane" investigation. I say that, even though the attempt has been made to conceal that by claiming that Crossfire Hurricane was predicated on George Papadopoulos' conversations with Australian "diplomat" Alexander Downer.

For the last few weeks we've been treated to articles claiming that Durham's investigation is drawing to a close. Durham's investigation is said to have focused on the origins of Crossfire Hurricane and the possibility that non-government actors may have provided the FBI with false information. That appears to be a broad hint that Durham has been investigating the roles played in the Russia Hoax by key Dem operatives: Fusion GPS and its head, Glenn Simpson (also other Fusion employees such as Nellie Ohr); Marc Elias; and Michael Sussmann--a key Clinton lawyer who personally delivered the "dossier" to the FBI's top lawyer, James Baker.

Remember Alfa Bank?

Anyone might be forgiven for imagining that the Russia Hoax is over and done with. But it's not. And Techno Fog has a very interesting article to remind us of that fact. As you may recall, during the final month or two of the 2016 election campaign, outlandish accusations were leveled against Alfa Bank. The basic idea was that a Russian bank, Alfa Bank, was laundering money on behalf of Donald Trump, money that the Putin regime was paying Trump as their supposed agent. These outlandish accusations came from the Hillary campaign and its oppo research branch--in other words, Fusion GPS (remember?), Glenn Simpson, and shady Clinton campaign lawyers.

The whole story quickly collapsed under the weight of its own absurdity, after a brief flurry of excitement ginned up in the Dem media proxy outlets. Even oppo research stories require some minimal factual content, and this story lacked the bare minimum. Apparently the Clinton campaign thought the whole thing would be water over the dam, but Alfa bank had other ideas. They sued, and Techno Fog brings us up to date:

Why is a Fusion GPS attorney risking sanctions?

Fusion GPS appears desperate to settle a potentially catastrophic case.

First, some minimal background:

UPDATED: Alfa Bank Redux--Starring John Durham!

H/T to commenter EZ, who pointed me to a tweet by Fool Nelson that pointed me to a New Yorker article by Dexter Filkins--who wrote the original article touting the short lived Alfa Bank - Trump Tower server conspiracy hoax. The article--The Contested Afterlife of the Trump-Alfa Bank Story--begins with a precis of the original hoax. I say "original" because Filkins is suggesting new conspiracy theories that embrace AG Barr and John Durham acting in concert with "the Russians". 

Here's the first paragraph, to remind you of the original hoax and to get us started:

Two years ago, I wrote about a mysterious series of computer contacts between the Trump Organization and Alfa Bank, one of the most powerful financial institutions in Russia. For four months, during the summer before the 2016 Presidential election, two servers registered to the bank repeatedly looked up the address of another server, maintained by a mass-marketing firm for the Trump Organization.

 

Remember, now? There's more to it, of course, but that'll do--my interest is in what the new developments (of which, more below) tell us about what John Durham is up to.

Since late summer the conservatives have been treated to regular explosions of anti-Barr and anti-Durham sentiment. You've seen the kind of stuff I'm talking about: They're Deep State operatives working to bury the evidence and get Trump defeated. People peddling this stuff point to Trump's recent tweet storm, right after returning to the White House after his brief stay chez Walter Reed, in which Trump vented about nobody being arrested, not enough documents being declassified, and et cetera. 

I was then and remain now convinced that that was basically political theater for the base. Nevertheless, people whom I previously mistook for serious commentators have taken this cry up in all seriousness. Just last night Fred Fleitz told Lou Dobbs that Durham should have wound up his investigation "a year ago." I guess that tells you all you need to know about what it takes to be a CIA analyst. Or, hey, an FBI analyst, too. I'm agnostic when it comes to analysts--no favorites.

I'm not just trying to beat my own drum, but ... I've been maintaining ever since Barr and Durham set out down this investigative road that they were two serious guys who intended to reach the end--not just offer up a couple of easy indictments. And I've also been maintaining that Barr and Durham are working strenuously to build a "big picture" conspiracy case--a theory of the case that would take in the entire Russia Hoax, not just a few nickel-dime false statement cases divorced from the big picture story. To do that takes time and resources and, unfortunately, is not certain of success. But it's a story that the American people need to have told to them in detail--so that it can't be written off as right wing conspiracy theory.

This is where Filkins article is leading us--confirmation that that's the road that Barr and Durham are on.

Jonathan Winer, Chris Steele, Worked For Oleg Deripaska

I think we pretty much knew that Chris Steele had close ties to Russian oligarch, Oleg Deripaska. That was part of Steele's attraction for the FBI. Today Eric Felten has a pretty comprehensive round up of the ties of key figures associated with Steele's hoax "dossier" to "Putin's favorite industrialist": Top Kerry Aide, Key Conduit for Dossier, Once Worked for Russian Oligarch, as Did Steele.

The main focus of the very detailed article, however, is on Jonathan Winer. Felten works off the SSCI report, but I think we can be absolutely certain that John Durham has also been examining Winer's role in the Russia Hoax. It's a good example of the "sprawl" that Durham has had to contend with--in his position he can't afford to leave stones unturned.

Who is Winer?

Winer was for a decade an aide to Sen. John Kerry. From 1994 to 1999 he was a deputy assistant secretary at the Department of State. From government he went to the international lobby and law firm Alston & Bird. Winer moved to APCO Worldwide in 2008, about the time he met Steele, who had just left British intelligence and was setting up his own shop. Winer told the Senate that in his private sector jobs he “was still engaged in various types of Russian representation all over the map.” Pro-Putin, anti-Putin: Winer didn’t care, he told senators: “It was any work that was consistent with their needs and my values.”

"My values." Gotta luv that! What would those values have been? The almighty dollar is my guess.

Winer returned to the State Department during Obama's second term, rejoining Kerry. Here are some of the highlights of Felten's article, to whet your appetite for the whole thing. Note that both Winer and Glenn Simpson of Fusion - GPS may have perjury problems connected with their Senate testimony:

Michael Sussman Should Probably Be Concerned

Michael Sussman is getting what I'm sure is, for him, unwanted attention in the wake of the release of transcripts of House interviews of persons connected to the Russia Hoax investigation. I've mentioned Sussman before--many times. Pay particular attention to James Baker And Michael Sussman Revisited, and recall that James Baker is now said to be cooperating with John Durham's investigation. Here's a brief intro to Sussman, which should leave no doubt as to why he's important for the Russia Hoax investigation:

Michael Sussmann, formerly with the U.S. Department of Justice, is a nationally-recognized privacy, cybersecurity and national security attorney. He is engaged on some of the most sophisticated, high-stakes matters today, such as his representation of the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign in their responses to Russian hacking in the 2016 presidential election.

However, Sussman's involvement goes far, far, beyond that. It was Sussman who connected Glenn Simpson's Fusion GPS with the Clinton campaign--laundering that connection through his Perkins Coie law firm (a possible election law violation). Anyone who thinks Sussman wouldn't have vetted Simpson hires for the Russia Hoax--such as Nellie Ohr and Chris Steele--should immediately reconsider. In fact, we now know from Steele's London testimony that Steele did meet with Sussman personally.

It was also Sussman who personally went to FBIHQ to meet with his friend James Baker and peddle the fake Alfa Bank story. And the FBI did, in fact, open an investigation into that hoax, with Baker fully aware of Sussman's deep connectins to the Clinton campaign. Here's how Kim Strassel characterized that meeting (Who Is Michael Sussman?):

Chris Steele: Hillary Knew, Susan Rice And Victoria Nuland, Too

The Alfa Bank's defamation suit against Christopher Steele continues to bear fruit. John Solomon has an excellent round up of what's been learned from Steele's testimony in depositions:

Steele reveals he believes Hillary Clinton, Susan Rice knew about his anti-Trump research

Rice denies former British spy's account, which comes in a novel litigation by three Russian businessman suing over Britain's data laws.

Importantly, Steele testified that it was his clear impression--based on statements by Glenn Simpson of Fusion GPS--that he was ultimately working for the Clinton Campaign, no matter what the technicalities of the money being laundered to Fusion GPS through the DNC and the Perkins Coie law firm.

But the bombshell--something I'm sure John Durham is also aware of--is that Steele passed that knowledge about the Clinton sponsorship of the dossier on to the FBI, and Steele kept notes to that effect.

Lee Smith's Good Interview Re Info Sharing, McCabe

Author Lee Smith, The Plot Against The President, did a good interview on Fox last night regarding Eric Felton's bombshell article about the FBI doing "info/intel sharing" with Chris Steele and Fusion GPS.

Smith phrases things very well in the interview. For example, he points out the middleman "liaison" role of Chris Steele and how that sheds light on the FBI's role in the Russia Hoax vis a vis the Clinton campaign. The fact that the information flow was bi-directional means that not only was the Clinton campaign (Fusion GPS) sharing with the FBI and the FBI was using that oppo research to target Trump. But that bi-directional flow also means that the FBI was sharing with the Clinton campaign (Fusion GPS, again). Steele, in effect, becomes the FBI liaison to the Clinton campaign. And, as we saw yesterday, the FBI knew that that's what they were doing.

Smith also lets drop that Peter Strzok and Bill Priestap, High Bureau Officials as I put it yesterday, were involved in the intel sharing with Steele. Yesterday I suspected that when Horowitz referred to a "Section Chief" that would logically be Strzok. Smith, with better sources, has apparently nailed it down that the Section Chief in question was, in fact, Strzok.

Smith also appears to agree with me that the purpose of the information flow to Steele from the FBI was so that Steele could use that information to feed "source information" back to the FBI for use in the FBI application. We've seen similar information laundering operations involving media accounts, in which leaks to the media were presented by the FBI to the FISA court as independent corroborating information.

All of this goes toward proving and fleshing out the Big Picture conspiracy of the Russia Hoax--a conspiracy that involved key players at the top of the FBI, State, CIA, DoJ, the White House, and the Clinton campaign.

At the end of the interview a very important point is made regarding Andrew McCabe's excuses re the FISA applications, in which McCabe tries to push the blame off on the field agents, when in fact the whole Russia Hoax operation--as Felten documents--was very closely held at FBIHQ:

I know there was some news about the non-prosecution of McCabe, but if you think McCabe is out of the woods on this one he's got another think coming, because between Barr and Durham and the things that are going on at the Department of Justice, this show is not yet over.

Watch it--you'll be glad you did:

John Solomon On Manafort's "Black Ledger"

John Solomon has an interesting article today at his new site, Just the News. The article is based on a brief interview with Paul Manafort's former partner, Rick Gates, who was forced into a plea deal by Team Mueller in exchange for testimony against Manafort. In the interview Gates told Solomon that the famous "black ledger" that Manafort was alleged to maintain--supposedly documenting cash payments to Manafort from Russian-backed politicians in Ukraine--was a total fabrication. Not only that, but Gates told Team Mueller that all the way back in April, 2018:

Key witness told Team Mueller that Russia collusion evidence found in Ukraine was fabricated

Here's what Solomon leads off with:

One of Robert Mueller’s pivotal trial witnesses told the special prosecutor’s team in spring 2018 that a key piece of Russia collusion evidence found in Ukraine known as the “black ledger” was fabricated, according to interviews and testimony. 

The ledger document, which suddenly appeared in Kiev during the 2016 U.S. election, showed alleged cash payments from Russian-backed politicians in Ukraine to ex-Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort. 

 “The ledger was completely made up,” cooperating witness and Manafort business partner Rick Gates told prosecutors and FBI agents, according to a written summary of an April 2018 special counsel’s interview. 

... 

Gates’ account is backed by several Ukrainian officials who stated in interviews dating to 2018 that the ledger was of suspicious origins and could not be corroborated.

As Solomon points out, this puts the "black ledger" in the same category as other Russia Hoax "evidence," such as the Steele "dossier"--fabrications.

What surprises me is that, while Solomon and Gates go into considerable detail in explaining how it can be determined that the "black ledger" is a fraud, Solomon leaves out an important detail.

Horowitz Unearthed More Steele Conspiracy Tales

IG Michael Horowitz's FISA report continues to be scrutinized and mined for relevant new facts that shed light on the origins and development of the Russia Hoax. Today at the Washington Examiner Rowan Scarborough lays out new facts that demonstrate that the Russia Hoax was rooted in cynically contrived conspiracy theories emanating from the Clinton camp.

In Trump conspiracy theories beyond the Steele dossier were passed to FBI Scarborogh documents from the FISA report that Christopher Steele provided the FBI with at least three additional anti-Trump conspiracy stories, all of which were as untrue as those contained in his "dossier" memos. We can leave to another time the whole question of who actually wrote these materials and simply note that Steele spread them.

Scarborough provides a usefull account of Steele's connections to the Hillary campaign through Fusion GPS, his meetings with reporters and with FBI officials, as well as his provision of materials to political figures such as John McCain. IG Horowitz put together a timeline for Steele's activities and, in doing so, discovered that there was more to Steele's involvement in the election than merely the dossier. Here are the three new items presented in the FISA report.

What Did Obama Know--And When?

An alternative title might have been: The Russia Hoax Lives! But I decided to go with the more or less real news.

Glenn Simpson, of Fusion GPS fame, is coming out with a book in November: Crime in Progress--The Secret History of the Trump-Russia Investigation. I doubt that it's a "tell all"--you could knock me down with a feather if it were. Nevertheless, we're being teased with something rather interesting:

BREAKING: In new book "Crime in Progress," set for release next month, #Spygate archvillain Glenn Simpson reveals that he was first hired to investigate Trump in "the fall of 2015" and that memos from his now-discredited Steele dossier made their way directly "to President Obama" pic.twitter.com/inpB0swhkS

— Paul Sperry (@paulsperry_) October 14, 2019

Obviously, Obama had to have known that the Steele memos were Hillary funded oppo research. Aside from other considerations, knowing that the Steele guff came from Glenn Simpson, could Obama have imagined it was anything else but oppo research? As POTUS, he had an absolute obligation to get to the bottom of where this nonsense was coming from--was it true or not? Consider what the publisher, Penguin Random House says:

In the autumn of 2015, the founders of the US political research firm Fusion GPS, Glenn Simpson and Peter Fritsch, were hired by a Republican presidential candidate to look into the records of Donald Trump. What began as a march through a mind-boggling trove of lawsuits and sketchy overseas projects soon took a darker turn, as they became the first to uncover Trump's disturbing ties to the Kremlin and the crimes that since have plagued his presidency. 

To help them decipher this alarming evidence, they engaged the services of an old acquaintance, the former British MI6 agent and Russia expert Christopher Steele. Steele would produce the notorious dossier which disclosed that the Trump team was deeply compromised by a hostile foreign power bent on disrupting the West and influencing the US presidential election. 

In Crime in Progress, the authors - and Steele - break their silence for the first time, chronicling their high-stakes investigation and their desperate efforts to warn both the American and British governments, the FBI and the media, to little avail - and no matter the costs. Yet when the dossier finally exploded onto the world stage after a leak, a ten-person research firm above a Starbucks in Washington was thrust into the centre of the biggest news story on the planet - a story that would lead to the Mueller report and disrupt Trump's secret planned rapprochement with Putin's Russia that could have re-ordered the western alliance. After four years on his trail, the authors' inescapable conclusion is that Trump is an asset of the Russian government, whether he knows it or not.

UPDATED: Is Bill Barr Shirking His Responsibility?

That's what sundance at CTH has been claiming for months now--because Barr hasn't secured the declassification of a list of documents that sundance has compiled. Last night in HPSCI Member Devin Nunes Files Lawsuit Against Fusion-GPS Claiming Racketeering and Conspiracy sundance makes the following claim: in the context of a Hannity interview with Devin Nunes regarding his lawsuit against Fusion GPS and Campaign for Accountability--Sara Carter also weighs in (PDF of complaint in Nunes v. Fusion GPS and CfR):

The Nunes lawsuit alleges Fusion GPS participated in racketeering and conspiracy smear campaign Nunes and the House Intelligence Committee; in an attempt to impede the committee investigation of coordination between the Clinton campaign, Fusion GPS and the FBI.  [Cloud Link to lawsuit – Scribd Link to lawsuit]. 

According to the Tick-Tock club everyone must work together with Senator Lindsey Graham because the “Deep State” will attempt to obfuscate, hide information, block oversight and impede any effort to highlight damaging institutional information. 

In essence what they are saying is that U.S. Attorney General Bill Barr is incapable of releasing the information.  CTH does not agree. AG Barr is capable, he’s just not delivering; quit defending his inaction. Stop the nonsense.

If Barr is "capable" (perhaps in contrast to Jeff Sessions) of doing what's necessary and required but simply refuses to "deliver"--by sundance's standards--then one is left to suppose that Barr's course of "inaction" is deliberately chosen. In other words, he doesn't want the information to come out!

Devin Nunes Sues Fusion GPS, Campaign for Accountability

The only report I've seen on this so far is at The Daily Caller, and there's no link to a complaint, so details are a bit thin so far. The lawsuit appears to focus on the Steele "dossier" and a series of ethics complaints that were filed against Nunes when he attempted to investigate the dossier. Chuck Ross' article, Devin Nunes Files Racketeering Lawsuit Against Fusion GPS, states:

The complaint, which the California Republican filed in federal court in Virginia, alleges that Fusion GPS and Campaign for Accountability (CfA) worked on a “joint and systematic effort to intimidate, harass, threaten, influence, interfere with, impede, and ultimately to derail” Nunes’ investigation of the dossier, which he directed as chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI). 

In the lawsuit, Nunes draws a link between CfA payments to Fusion GPS and a string of ethics complaints that the watchdog group filed against him last year. 

The Daily Caller News Foundation reported Aug. 1 that CfA’s 2018 tax filings show the group paid Fusion GPS nearly $140,000 unspecified research activities. 

CfA filed three complaints against Nunes with the Office of Congressional Ethics. In a Jan. 25, 2018 complaint, CfA accused Nunes of leaking sensitive House Intelligence Committee information about Fusion GPS.

Nunes claims that the ethics complaints were "fraudulent and retaliatory." He also claims that Glenn Simpson, a founder of Fusion GPS, lied on at least two occasions with regard to the Steele "dossier":

UPDATED: The Bruce Ohr 302s

Yes, they're available--in heavily redacted form. From my perspective there's very little new or significant in the unredacted portions. What the 302s contain for the most part is a rehash of the dossier narrative--which the FBI got from Steele earlier. The contacts recorded in the 302s begin in late November, 2016--after Trump's election. Ohr recounts his contacts with both Chris Steele and Glenn Simpson of Fusion GPS, and both appear to be telling the same story: Carter Page and then Michael Cohen were Trump go-betweens to Russia, the Alfa Bank server really was a communication link from Trump to Russia, not spam, etc. I have to wonder whether the purpose of these 302s is, from the FBI perspective, some sort of CYA exercise to make believe that this is new information that fueled the continuation of the Crossfire Hurrican investigation.

The one tidbit that was new was that Ohr states that Steele was in contact with John McCain's office "before October, 2016."

UPDATE 1: OK, I missed this:

Paul Sperry‏

@paulsperry_ 

BREAKING: Glenn Simpson was talking directly to Victoria Nuland at the State Dept. during the 2016 campaign, tying Hillary Clinton closer to the conspiracy,according to just-released FBI agent Joseph Pientka's 302 summaries of interviews with Bruce Ohr uncovered by Judicial Watch 

5:49 PM - 8 Aug 2019

UPDATE 2: ht/t GP: As I stated above:

The Bruce Ohr 302s revealed that Christopher Steele was in direct contact with then-Senator John McCain’s office BEFORE the election, prior to October of 2016 — much earlier than previously known.

“Steele also told OHR that he spoke with a staff member of Senator John McCain’s office sometime prior to October 2016. Steele had this conversation at the request of [REDACTED]. Since October 2016, Steele had not spoken to anyone regarding the Trump dossier,” the 302 report said. 

The interesting question, of course, is: Was McCain in contact with anyone else during this time period re the dossier? Other Senators, Representatives, Executive Branch officials, journalists?

"A Searing Indictment Of The FBI"

Many of you have already viewed this Kim Strassel video: The Left will Silence You. The title of this post actually comes from a Strassel article that I quoted back on March 24, 2019. I have some reservations about a few of the things she says--for example, about the supposedly "anything goes" nature of CI investigations. Nevertheless, her big picture narrative of the FBI and of the Media, of Mueller's corruption, of the accurate perception of unequal justice, is so good that I highly recommend you spend a half hour listening to Strassel. I think it's a great way to spend that small amount of time while we wait for developments from AG Barr's investigation:

UPDATED: Criminal Referral? Whoa, Nellie!

It's being reported that Rep. Mark Meadows is working to "finalize" a criminal referral on Nellie Ohr--Clinton oppo researcher and wife of top DoJ official and key Russia Hoax conspirator Bruce Ohr. John Solomon has the story, but a good launching pad, that includes a link to Solomon's story plus additional background, is at Zerohedge: Nellie Ohr Criminal Referral Being 'Finalized' According To Jim Jordan. The criminal referral would be based on discrepancies between Nellie's testimony and a trove of emails that Judicial Watch has obtained.

Nellie strikes me as a hardcore, leftist extremist who hasn't outgrown the extremism of her younger days, when she defended the Stalinist government sponsored famine in Ukraine as just the price one pays for "progress":

As analyzed in 1994 by anti-communist historian Walter Laqueur, these “revisionists” included American academics who “downplayed the human cost of forcible collectivization of agriculture.” 

Did I mention Nellie Ohr’s Ph.D. thesis is titled “Collective farms and Russian peasant society, 1933-1937: the stabilization of the kolkhoz order”? 

“Kolkhoz” order means “collective farm” order, so Ohr’s subtitle refers to the “stabilization” of the collective farm order. The phrasing alone is suggestive of some silverish lining after the six million or more people were killed by Stalin’s state-created famine, mass deportations, and general war of “de-kulakization.” 

...

Speaking “revisionist” lingo, Nellie Ohr turns the millions killed by Stalin into “excesses,” which, in Ohr’s words, “sometimes represented desperate measures taken by a government that had little real control over the country.” (Poor Stalin.) She depicts purges as representing “to some degree a center-periphery conflict in which the ‘state-building’ central government tried to bring headstrong local satraps under control.”

Jordan and Meadows, in the light of the recently obtained emails, believe Nellie lied to the House. My own impression of her testimony was:

Nellie is, when compared to any of the previous witnesses, tight lipped. She volunteers virtually nothing, constantly asks for questions to be rephrased, and generally professes ignorance on most matters that she's questioned on.

Here is a link to past posts that featured Nellie to some significant degree:

https://meaninginhistory.blogspot.com/search?q=nellie+ohr


UPDATE: Confirmed:

John Solomon‏

@jsolomonReports

Breaking: Criminal referral filed against Nellie Ohr concerning congressional testimony after emails surface showing election-year contacts with DOJ

5:19 PM - 1 May 2019

And in a total non-surprise, CTH is also reporting:

Not coincidentally, Fusion-GPS owner Glenn Simpson is also being reviewed for lying to investigators about his contacts and activity in connection to the dossier.  Nellie Ohr worked for Fusion-GPS and it would appear Fusion is at the center of the effort to construct evidence to support the 2016 election operation against Donald Trump.

CTH has lots of background.

Briefly Noted: Soros, Ukraine, And The Russia Hoax; Peggy Noonan's Paean To The Establishment

Here are links to two excellent reads. The first appears at Gateway Pundit and serves as an excellent summary to the Ukrainian Connection to the Russia Hoax--which, not surprisingly is very much a Soros connection as well: Ukrainian Lawmaker Admits in Recording That Government Agency Linked to Soros Was Helping Hillary Clinton in 2016 Election. The information is dense--it's the big picture information that's only now coming out--but here's a teaser excerpt:

The Ukraine Crisis Media Center was founded in March 2014 by the Ukraine government and George Soros’ International Renaissance Foundation to give reporting on the Ukraine conflict the ‘correct’ spin. Soros has founded media lobby groups all over the world modeled on Media Matters for American, which he founded with John Podesta after the Lewinsky scandal nearly brought down Bill Clinton. 

Leshenko [sic] provided this info [so-called 'Black Ledger' pages linked to Manafort] to Clinton campaign staffer Alexandra Chalupa, as Epoch Times reports, who then passed this info on to Yahoo News reporter Michael Isikoff. Isikoff broke the story on Yahoo on Aug. 18, 2016, one of the first public mentions of purported “collusion with Russia” by the Trump team. Manafort had to step down as Trump’s campaign manager the next day. 

Chalupa also passed the Black Ledger info on to Glenn Simpson at Fusion GPS, who passed them on to staffer Nellie Ohr. Ohr passed the info on to her husband Bruce Ohr, Epoch Times reports.  On May 30, 2016, Nellie Ohr sent an email to Bruce Ohr and Justice Department staffers under the subject line “Reported Trove of Documents on Ukrainian Party of Regions’ ‘Black Cashbox.’” 

... 

Bruce Ohr then used this Soros-derived info to begin the Justice Department surveillance of the Trump campaign code-named “Crossfire Hurricane”. 

George Soros had invested billions in Ukraine before the conflict broke out 2014, and was one of the primary players in the conflict with his nemesis Vladimir Putin. “With his Open Society Foundations, Soros was not only instrumental in helping bring down the government in Kiev, he also stands to make a sizeable profit out of Ukraine, especially thanks to his close ties to the new Poroshenko government. In January of this year, he met privately several times with the Ukrainian leadership,” neopresse wrote in 2015.

Was The FBI Connected To The Trump Tower Ruse?

In the penultimate post--Papadopoulos And The Enterprise--I made a few references to suspicions I've long held regarding a possible role of the FBI in the famous Trump Tower meeting between the Russian lawyer Veselnitskaya (and companions) and Manafort, Don Jr., and Jared Kushner:

---------------

Techno Fog has a tweet that plays right into some of my obsessions. In this post I mention that evidence that this whole Russia Hoax was planned months before the first steps were taken. I've also repeatedly stated that I suspect FBI involvment somewhere in connection with the Trump Tower meeting, that was nominally run by Fusion GPS. Now read Techno Fog:

Techno Fog
‏
@Techno_Fog

Isn't it curious that Fusion GPS and former FBI informant Steele would look into Trump/Russia after the FBI/IC started that same inquiry?

What are the odds?

Are the basic assumptions all wrong- was Fusion not retained for campaign research, but to bolster the FBI investigation?

4:40 PM - 20 Apr 2019

--------------------

In private correspondence a friend suggested to me that the FBI may have used Fusion GPS to undertake this approach because there was something about it that they didn't want to be involved in. I think this avenue of speculation has great merit.

If we apply my usual approach--look to administrative guidelines to supply a context within which to understand official actions--we can make sense of this. As I've maintained for the past two years, it is a virtual certainty that before Crossfire Hurricane was opened the FBI had some sort of Preliminary Investigation opened on Page, Papadopoulos, and possibly others (Manafort may already have been the subject of a Full Investigation, but ...). However, there's no reason to believe that there was any open case on Don Jr. or Jared Kushner. That means that the FBI could not officially make this kind of undercover approach to those two, and especially not because there was the possibility that The Donald himself could be drawn in. That type of investigation could only be undertaken with an open case. That leaves open the possibility that Techno Fog suggests, that the FBI and Fusion GPS ... "colluded" on this project. That would still be borderline legal/illegal, but deniable.

Nellie Ohr's Story--Puzzlements

Reading Nellie Ohr's testimony to the House (October 19, 2018) is a bit of a frustrating experience. In the first place there's a significant amount of recurring legal wrangling over the scope of the spousal privilege that Nellie is claiming with regard to her husband, Bruce Ohr, who testified to the House on August 28, 2018. Beyond that, however, Nellie is, when compared to any of the previous witnesses, tight lipped. She volunteers virtually nothing, constantly asks for questions to be rephrased, and generally professes ignorance on most matters that she's questioned on. Nevertheless, there are possibly significant points in her testimony, so let's take a closer look.

Probably the biggest surprise in her testimony is her confirmation that Ukrainian legislator Serhiy Leshchenko was a "source" for Fusion GPS. One point of interest in this is the entire line of questioning--as of October 19, 2018, I don't think Serhiy Leshchenko was on any researchers' radar screens, but he was definitely on the House GOP's radar screen. Nellie herself states that she was quite familiar with Leshchenko as an "anti-corruption" activist in Ukraine--a George Soros connected angle that we recently explored in The Soros, Ukraine, FBI Connection and Do All Roads In The Russia Hoax Lead To Ukraine? The exchange regarding Leshchenko between Nellie and the Committee is a bit ambiguous toward the end, but there's no doubt that the questioners believe that Leshchenko was providing information about the travels of Trump family members--and area of research that Nellie was engaged in. As I say, it's somewhat unclear whether Nellie actually confirms that, although the probability is that she does--but suggests that there may have been more to Leshchenko's source information than simply Trump family travel. You decide (pp. 113-115):

Andy McCabe And Lisa Page Texted!

They emailed, too, and spoke with each other on their phones, but up till now we've only seen some of the Strzok/Page texts. It appears that that's about to change. Interesting as those texts have been, I suspect the McCabe/Page communications will have plenty to tell us--and none of it will redound to the credit of the major Russia Hoax players.

To set the stage for the Fox News article that discusses some of those communications, here are some entries from a Paul Sperry twitter thread re McCabe:

Paul Sperry‏ @paulsperry_

BREAKING: 4 days after the NYT broke the story of Hillary using private unauthorized server, McCabe privately met with her former campaign co-chair. Then, 20 days after IC IG forced FBI to open investigation of Hillary, McCabe suddenly promoted to HQ & controls the "special" case

8:18 PM - 21 Mar 2019

1. End of conversation
2. New conversation
    ❌ 🌹Pretty In Pink  🌹 ❌‏ @pepesgrandma 9h9 hours ago
   Replying to @paulsperry_
    ❌ 🌹Pretty In Pink  🌹 ❌Retweeted  ❌ 🌹Pretty In Pink  🌹 ❌
   Lottsa coincidences
    ❌ 🌹Pretty In Pink  🌹 ❌added,
   
    ❌ 🌹Pretty In Pink  🌹 ❌ @pepesgrandma
   BOTH McCabe and his wife met personally with Clinton donor (who ran a PAC), 5 days after public announcement about Hillarys email server. #mccabe #fbi #hillarysemails #hillaryclinton…
   
   
3. 1.  ❌ 🌹Pretty In Pink  🌹 ❌‏ @pepesgrandma 9h9 hours ago

      Replying to @paulsperry_

       ❌ 🌹Pretty In Pink  🌹 ❌Retweeted  ❌ 🌹Pretty In Pink  🌹 ❌

      And more coincidences

       ❌ 🌹Pretty In Pink  🌹 ❌added,

       ❌ 🌹Pretty In Pink  🌹 ❌ @pepesgrandma

      98% of Gov McAuliffe related donations 2 McCabe's wife were after Hillary investigation started #McCabe #hillary http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017/03/15/fbi-official-did-not-disclose-wifes-ties-to-clinton-ally-records-show.html …

      
      
4. New conversation
    ❌ 🌹Pretty In Pink  🌹 ❌‏ @pepesgrandma 9h9 hours ago
   Replying to @paulsperry_
    ❌ 🌹Pretty In Pink  🌹 ❌Retweeted  ❌ 🌹Pretty In Pink  🌹 ❌
   And yet another coincidence
    ❌ 🌹Pretty In Pink  🌹 ❌added,
   
    ❌ 🌹Pretty In Pink  🌹 ❌ @pepesgrandma
   Jill McCabe, wife of deputy dir of FBI Andrew McCabe, was asked to run for senate only weeks after Hillary's email server news was made public. See page 70. #mccabe #fbi @jeffsessions #hillaryclinton #hillary …
   
   

With all that in mind, would you trust McCabe to run a fair and impartial investigation of anything involving the Clintons? Recusal for McCabe from the Hillary email case would seem to a no brainer, yet McCabe fought furiously to remain involved. Apparently it was only the determination of James Baker, Comey's counsel, that succeeded in forcing McCabe to step aside. And, of course, we also know from Baker's testimony that the top level of FBI executives were fully aware that the Russia Hoax was totally driven by Clinton campaign operatives, such as Michael Sussman and Glenn Simpson's Fusion GPS. But McCabe was a key to pushing the Clinton Russia Hoax operation within the FBI.