SWC Takes On The $64K Question

And, like the rest of us, admits it's a total head scratcher:

Mark Philip

@SwimInRawSewage

Replying to @shipwreckedcrew

Who the f*ck was advising Trump on DOJ appointments before Barr showed up?

shipwreckedcrew

@shipwreckedcrew

I have always wondered who "championed" RR as DAG.  Makes very little sense to me.  He was Maryland US Attorney, and had no DOJ time that I can find.  Very unusual, especially with a DOJ outsider like Sessions as AG.

There is no rational explanation other than he was a "stealth" resistance guy, likely put in place by some Bush DOJ NeverTrumpers who wanted him to just keep everyone else away from the Trump-Russia investigation.

Admittedly, Rosenstein was, at the time of his DAG appointment, the nation's longest serving US Attorney. He's also a smart lawyer--on paper. But paper smarts don't tell you about character and judgment. So imagine a guy with that background offering, as one of his first significant decisions as Deputy AG, to wear a wire against the POTUS on behalf of a total nutter like Andy McCabe.

The only way to figure that is that he thought he was doing the bidding of some very powerful DC actors. Someone told him, Rod, your job is to appoint Mueller and step out of the way.

When all is said and done, this question will be one of the really big ones in the entire Russia Hoax, because without RR in place it really goes nowhere. And if he's actually looking deeply at the merits of it all--as was his duty--it goes nowhere in a very big hurry and in a very big way.

Fortunately, Mitch McConnell got his act together, Bill Barr stepped in and told RR--Rod, time to go back to Maryland.

When Strzok Knew There Was No 'There' There

When the Team Mueller witchhunt was formally ramped up by Rod Rosenstein, in mid-May, 2017, disgraced former FBI official Peter Strzok famously anguished over whether to join the witchhunt, texting to another disgraced former FBI official, Lisa Page: We both know there's probably no 'there' there. Meaning, of course: No collusion.

We now know for sure, thanks to the stage managed revelation (by DoJ through Senator Graham) of Strzok's notes critiquing the NYT coverage, that Strzok--and presumably everyone else in his FBI orbit--had come to that conclusion no later than mid-February, 2017. Well before Team Mueller was set up.

Who else thinks Rod Rosenstein has a LOT to answer for? The reason he has a lot to answer for is in plain sight for anyone who reads Strzok's notes. Rosenstein claimed that the witchhunt was simply a continuation of Crossfire Hurricane, the investigation of "four Americans" associated with the Trump campaign that the FBI ginned up in summer of 2016. But Strzok makes it clear that not only was Trump himself clear of such claims, but so, too, were all Trump associates. Even Politico gets that--or has been forced to admit that--finally. With the Carter Page FISA still running--and yet to be renewed two more times!--Strzok wrote re claims being pushed by the NYT:

“We have not seen evidence of any officials associated with the Trump team in contact with IOs [intelligence officers]. We are unaware of ANY Trump advisors engaging in conversations with Russian intelligence officials.”

In other words, the stuff being peddled as investigative gold by the NYT was, in fact, the purest propagandistic horsesh*t.

Here's how Politico soft peddles Strzok's quite categorical statements:

The documents suggest that even as press reports began to describe connections between Americans in Trump’s orbit and figures in Russia’s shadowy intelligence services, the FBI had gathered little, if any, evidence that such ties existed.

"Suggest." As if one needs to somehow parse Strzok's words to ascertain just what he might be trying to say. Instead, Politico tries to staunch the mortal wound that Strzok's notes are to the Russia Hoax by blaming ... The Orange Man:

Trump supercharged the investigation, however, in May 2017 when he abruptly fired FBI Director James Comey and invited senior Russian officials to the Oval Office. Comey went on to provide internal notes, through an intermediary, to The New York Times that described his growing concerns about Trump’s posture toward the Russia probe. Days later, the Justice Department appointed Mueller to take over the Russia investigation, which continued for two more years.

Problem: Rosenstein appointed Mueller to "take over [a] Russian investigation" which Strzok himself had admitted months previously in categorical terms had no predication. How does firing the FBI Director--based on a justificatory memo that Rosenstein himself wrote--justify continuing an investigation that had no predication? Does the President of the United States inviting with "senior Russian officials" to the Oval Office justify opening an investigation? Rosenstein nowhere suggests that as a basis for any investigation, but for the sake of argument, exactly how would one articulate that as predication for an investigation? It doesn't pass the laugh test.

This, now, is what the NeverTrumps are reduced to.

Annex A

There's been a fair amount of comment regarding the soon to be famous "Annex A" to the Intelligence Community Assessment (ICA). The ICA, of course, was the brainchild of the Intel Triumvirate of Brennan, Clapper, and Comey. Released in the first week of January, 2017, it sought to delegitimize the incoming Trump administration before Trump was even inaugurated by claiming that the Intel Community had "high confidence" that Russia had tried to help Trump get elected.

The whole thing was nonsense, of course, and now we're told that there is documentary evidence that IC analysts pushed back against the official conclusions of the ICA. The official conclusion was that the Russians wanted Trump elected, but the analysts apparently put in writing that the evidence that claimed to support that conclusion was actually very weak. Instead, the analysts pointed out, the evidence that the Russians wanted Hillary to win was quite strong. That pushback was suppressed by the IC, but has been dug out by the Barr/Durham investigation. We have never missed an opportunity to stress that the ICA is at the very heart of the Big Picture conspiracy case that Durham is building.

Yesterday, as one of his first official acts as DNI, John Ratcliffe forwarded to Senators Grassley and Johnson a newly declassified version of Annex A. It's quite brief--not even a page and a half. All it is is a summary of the fabrications that Chris Steele ginned up for the Clinton campaign as contractor for the Clinton oppo research shop at Fusion GPS. Steele then also purveyed these falsehoods to the FBI, the Fake News Media, and various politicians and their operatives. As the Horowitz Report was at pains to point out, the FBI was fully aware--from the get go, in July, 2016--of the political provenance of the Steele "dossier," as it came to be known. The fact that this material was, in all essentials, fiction was also known by the FBI when Peter Strzok helped put together the summary of the "dossier" that was appended to the ICA--Annex A.

None of this should be news to regular readers. Bill Barr and John Durham are smart guys, and they've been focused on the ICA all along. The reason is simple. If the ICA was a knowingly fraudulent production that put forth conclusions favored by the IC Triumvirate, but disputed by the analysts themselves, then we have a conspiracy. It's a conspiracy to defraud the US Government of the honest services of the Intel Community, because if the ICA had been the product of honest services it would have incorporated the views of the analysts who were fraudulently claimed to have reached the official conclusions. By colluding to falsify the true views of the analysts, the IC Triumvirate of Brennan, Clapper, and Comey conspired to defraud the US Government of their honest services. The aim of their conspiracy, of course, was to undermine the legitimacy of Trump's election.

UPDATED: Rosenstein's Day In The Senate

The Rosenstein testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee is over. Overall, I found the questioning to be rather unimpressive. Unlike many commenters on blogs and Twitter, I found the hammering away at FISA related issues to be, in the main, fairly pointless. 

The important takeaway can be summarized fairly quickly. While numerous commenters on Twitter (including John Cardillo and Jonathan Turley) picked up on two major and closely related points, John Solomon does so in readable style. Both of what I consider to be the most important points were brought up by Senator Graham. The first major admission had to do with the lack of any basis for the claim of "Russian Collusion" that was the basis for his authorization of the Team Mueller witchhunt:

Former Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein conceded on Wednesday that by August of 2017 there was no evidence that the Trump campaign had colluded with Russians to sabotage the 2016 election, even though the investigation into that allegation would persist for another year and a half.  

The jaw-dropping admission came during a contentious hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee, which is actively investigating the F.B.I.'s Crossfire Hurricane investigation that sought to uncover whether Trump campaign officials had colluded with Russian agents to sabotage the 2016 election. 

Addressing Rosenstein during the hearing, committee member Sen. Lindsey Graham asked him: "The whole concept, that the campaign was colluding with the Russians, there was no 'there' there in August of 2017, do you agree or not?" 

"I agree with the general statement," Rosenstein replied. 

The second major admission by Rosenstein is related to the first and concerned Michael Flynn:

Good Read: Gregg Jarrett On Rod Rosenstein

Like Joe diGenova, FoxNews legal analyst Gregg Jarrett is no fan of Rod Rosenstein. He shares his views today:

In Russia collusion hoax, Rod Rosenstein must be held accountable for his flagrant misconduct

Jarrett directs plenty of invective Rosenstein's way, beginning with this:

Former Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein is a master of prevarication and deflection. He holds an M.S. in BS and a Ph.D. in vacuous excuses. He’s a professor emeritus of duplicity and deception. As a prodigious suck-up, he’s the Eddie Haskell of lawyers.

We can expect Rosenstein’s skill set to be on full display Wednesday when he finally and belatedly appears before the Senate Judiciary Committee as its first witness in an investigation into the origins and evolution of the fallacious Trump-Russia collusion probe.

However he also gets into substantive matters:

Is Walid Phares The 'Fifth Man'

H/T emailer Jim.

At the beginning of this month DoJ released a copy of Rod Rosenstein's "scope memo" for Team Mueller, the one dated August 2, 2017 (Rod Rosenstein's Second "Scope Memo" For Team Mueller). The released copy was largely unredacted--in fact, as regards the well known "four Americans" (Flynn, Page, Manafort, Papadopoulos) who were the original subjects of Crossfire Hurricane, the scope memo was totally unredacted. But there was a fifth subject, and that person was totally redacted. Speculation as to the identity of this 'Fifth Man' centered on familiar persons such as Michael Flynn, Jr.

This evening the NYT is reporting:

F.B.I. Once Investigated Trump Campaign Adviser’s Ties to Egypt

Investigators scrutinized ties between Walid Phares and the Egyptian government. He was never charged with a crime.

Wow! "Ties" to Egypt--that sounds pretty serious, and yet he was never charged with a crime. Isn't there some statute in the criminal code that criminalizes "ties"? Am I missing something? Was Walid Phares that mysterious 'Fifth Man'?

While the NYT doesn't offer an absolutely categorical answer to that last question, they certainly hint very strongly that that is the case.

The F.B.I. and the special counsel’s office investigated whether a former Trump campaign adviser secretly worked for the Egyptian government to influence the incoming administration in the months before President Trump took office, according to several people familiar with the inquiry. 

The former adviser, Walid Phares, was one of five Trump campaign aides investigated over their ties to foreign countries. Robert S. Mueller III took over the investigations after he was appointed special counsel in May 2017. 

The decision to investigate Mr. Phares was based on highly classified information, the people said. Investigators examined the matter for months but ultimately brought no charges. 

Though Mr. Mueller’s primary mandate was to examine Russia’s covert operation to sabotage the election and whether any Trump associates conspired, several Trump campaign advisers and transition team members elicited concerns at the F.B.I. because of their overseas contacts and the possibility that a variety of foreign governments might have been trying to secretly use the advisers to advance their agendas. 

If you're wondering whether, once Phares signed on to the Trump campaign, the FBI started scrambling to find out: Who is this guy? Who is Walid Phares? The answer to that question is, Probably not.

News: Bash, Rosenstein, Sullivan

Catching up on the news right now--we can do it quickly.

AG Barr has appointed John Franklin Bash III--currently US Attorney for the Western District of Texas (i.e., San Antonio) to probe more deeply into "certain aspects" of the Deep State unmaskings of Donald Trump and members of his campaign and administration--which is to say, the "certain aspects" will concern unmaskings that took place both "before and after the 2016 election." That's according to FoxNews. DoJ spokeswoman Kerri Kupec noted that while unmasking isn't illegal, what Barr is having Bash examine could play into the bigger picture investigation that John Durham is conducting:

"Unmasking inherently isn't wrong, but certainly, the frequency, the motivation and the reasoning behind unmasking can be problematic, and when you're looking at unmasking as part of a broader investigation -- like John Durham's investigation -- looking specifically at who was unmasking whom, can add a lot to our understanding about motivation and big picture events."

"Big picture?" Can you say "conspiracy"? I sure can. As I noted last night in a comment, Bash will certainly be examining whether any unmaskings can be associated with illegal leaks targeting the Trump administration, which have been rampant right up to the present. However, even unmaskings that cannot be associated with specific criminal acts may be associated with the "big picture" conspiracy. If those unmaskings can be seen to be in furtherance of the conspiracy, they become criminal acts in and of themselves. Obviously Barr thinks that Durham has come up with something that's worth pursuing regarding the unmaskings. He wouldn't be pulling a US Attorney from a major metro area if he didn't think so.

Interestingly, Bash has the distinction of having been one of the very few non-girl law clerks for Brett Kavanaugh.

Moving on.

When the DC Circuit took up the Flynn camp's petition for a mandamus directed at Sullivan, the three judge panel, in addition to ordering Sullivan to respond, "invited" the government to also file a response. DoJ has confirmed, as expected, that they will file a brief that will reiterate the position they stated previously: that the Flynn prosecution should be dismissed with prejudice.

No surprise here. It would have been passing strange if DoJ had ignored the DC Circuit's invitation.

Finally, we learned yesterday that Rod Rosenstein, former Deputy AG and Acting AG and ringmaster for all things Russia Hoax related--especially Team Mueller--will voluntarily testify before the Senate next week. If some really obvious questions are asked--and pressed--Rosenstein's testimony might prove to be of interest. Presumably Senator Graham has consulted with AG Barr about the parameters for Rosenstein's testimony--which may be circumscribed by some prior agreement with Barr and Durham.

The Russia Hoax world seems to be divided into two camps: those who think Rosenstein was either a dupe or a Trump mole in DoJ, and those who regard him as an evil weasel. I'm pretty firmly in the latter camp. In that regard, Debra Heine has dredged up some of Rosenstein's emails dating back to 2017, and it's all highly incriminating as regards Rosenstein's total complicity in the plot against the president. We've seen these before, but it's an excellent reminder--Key Questions Former DAG Rod Rosenstein Should Be Asked at Senate Oversight Hearing Next Week:

Rod Rosenstein Was Barney Fife To Team Mueller?

That's what former federal prosecutor shipwreckedcrew is saying today:

shipwreckedcrew
@shipwreckedcrew

Yes -- I think RR is not a "player" in the action.  I think he was "Barney Fife", and the players just needed to keep him on the sidelines and out of their way. So they told him what they thought he needed to know in order to keep him from feeling like he needed to engage more.

12:35 PM · May 27, 2020

So, lemme see if I understand this. The Deputy Attorney General of the United States of America--confirmed as such with the advice and consent of the United States Senate--can approve a Special Counsel investigation without any actual basis or predication, and it's OK as long as he didn't feel engaged? He's not held to any higher standard to determine the basis of the investigation than anyone moron picked at random? He's not in any way responsible for the ensuing grotesque false prosecutions and violations of civil rights? In other words, he walks? Really?

I think I'm with John Dowd on this one. In fact I know I'm with John Dowd.

Kevin Brock Dissects Strzok's CH Opening EC

Predication. It's impossible to stress the importance of this concept too much when evaluating the attempted lawfare coup against President Trump that we know as the Russia Hoax. Kevin Brock, a former assistant director of intelligence for the FBI, has a fine article at The Hill today in which he walks through the Strzok Opening EC for Crossfire Hurricane. We covered this in The Crossfire Hurricane Opening EC--Predication And The Way Forward. Brock provides additional perspective that I believe most will find informative. In fact, his article, New FBI document confirms the Trump campaign was investigated without justification, works well as a followup to Gregg Jarrett's interview article with John Dowd. Whereas Dowd focuses on the responsibility of key prosecutors--Rod Rosenstein and Robert Mueller--Brock looks at the document that those prosecutors would ultimately have had to rely upon. If they had been men of integrity, not intent on framing and removing the president. Stylisticly, I find the opening paragraph very strong:

UPDATED: John Dowd: Mueller And Rosenstein Should Not Walk

Brian Cates won't like this, but President Trump's attorney during the Mueller Witchhunt, John Dowd, is saying that Rod Rosenstein needs to be held to account. This is included in a Gregg Jarrett at Fox: Trump attorney accuses Mueller of 'monstrous lie and scheme to defraud'. 

The fact that Dowd believes he was lied to and deliberately misled by Mueller isn't news. What's of interest in the article is Dowd's take on how the entire DoJ/FBI campaign against Trump relied on the Steele Dossier--a document they knew to be discredited. It is for this act of corruption that Dowd says Rod Rosenstein must be held to account:

They used it as a pretext to spy on the Trump campaign and investigate the president. This led to the illegitimate appointment of the special counsel, Bob Mueller, who launched an investigation in search of a crime that never occurred. As Dowd correctly stated in his letter, the special counsel appointment was “void” because it was the product of corruption. 

On Tuesday, Dowd called Mueller’s investigation and report a sham. “They knew there was nothing there.” Dowd said that Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein also knew it and is “just as guilty.” 

Dowd said he hopes that U.S. Attorney John Durham, who is currently investigating the Russia hoax, would hold all of them to account for their rampant corruption and dishonesty. “Their three-year investigation was all phony,” he observed.       

Trump’s attorney concluded our conversation with these words: 

“They knew there was nothing to investigate. People subverted the system of justice. One corrupt act after another. It’s staggering. The lies were monstrous. It was all pretense and fraud. Mueller should not walk. Rod Rosenstein should not walk.”

Once again: Predication.

UPDATE: Rosenstein to testify as part of Graham's Russia investigation probe

Rosenstein, in a statement, confirmed that he would testify. 

"I am grateful to Chairman Graham for the opportunity to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee about information that has come to light concerning the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act process and the FBI’s counterintelligence decision-making, as a result of completed inquiries by Department of Justice Inspector General Michael Horowitz and ongoing reviews by U.S. Attorneys John Durham and Jeff Jensen," he said. 

How Deep Will Durham Go?

If Adam Housley is to be credited, the Durham investigation will go beyond the Russia Hoax and may get into issues that ultimately relate to the fake impeachment. Here's my reasoning.

Today Housley tweeted:

The corruption runs deep and through both parties and it ain’t gonna look good when it’s all said and done. 

It ain’t about Republican and Democrat anymore…it really isn’t. People were given the opportunity to do the right thing and some chose wrong. It’s about right versus wrong. 

Names to watch…McMaster. Rosenstein….McCain. This crosses party lines and you all need to be prepared. This isn’t about being pro Trump, or anti Trump. You ALL need to understand that….and you need to be willing to call it out irrespective of party. 

Major issues within the FBI. An agency that I love as you guys know. But major issues. Sides being taken and even amongst former agents, a lot of frustration. Especially outside of headquarters. 

Wray should have cut out the cancer and didn’t.

The key here, I think, is McMaster. With Rosenstein and McCain we're basically talking about the Russia Hoax, pure and simple. True, Rosenstein's involvement in the Mueller Witchhunt leads to impeachment, but not directly. I think we can distinguish Rosenstein from McMaster in that regard.

While it's true that with McMaster we could be dealing with leaks, nevertheless the fact that McMaster took Eric Ciaramella as his personal aide is highly suggestive. It's a far more direct link to fake impeachment than anything else we can come up with.

If Durham is seriously looking at McMaster--as I very much hope--then Barr's characterization of the Durham investigation as "sprawling" takes on a whole new meaning.

What Will Barr Do About Rosenstein?

It's no secret that Rod Rosenstein is one of the chief villains in the unraveling of truth, justice, and the American Way that we call The Russia Hoax. But for Rod Rosenstein's despicable conduct, his betrayal of the nation, virtually none of this would have gotten past square one.

I was pleased to read Michael Goodwin's article today--Piecing together the ‘phony’ case against Michael Flynn--and to see that he devoted the last part of a fine article to the important issue of Barr's unfinished business with Rosenstein. I assume that Rosenstein is cooperating, having turned on those he enabled in the first place. Goodwin nicely summarizes the effects of Rosenstein's perfidy:

Barr also must resolve the conduct of former Deputy Assistant Attorney General Rod Rosenstein. When former AG Jeff Sessions recused himself, Rosenstein took over the Russia probe and appointed Mueller as special counsel. 

A highly questionable move then, it now looks far more sinister, given the misconduct by Mueller’s team on the Flynn case and other issues. 

Moreover, Rosenstein himself was involved in the FISA court abuse, having signed an extension of the Page warrant without admitting that the FBI failed to verify the Steele dossier or that Clinton’s campaign commissioned it. 

Any of these was sufficient reason to pull the plug on Mueller by early 2018. Yet Rosenstein allowed the probe to continue into 2019. 

The impact was enormous. It is possible, for example, that Dems would not have taken the House if voters knew by the fall of 2018 that the collusion charge was false. 

In that case, Nancy Pelosi would not have become Speaker and Schiff would not have had the power to conceal the 2017 testimonies. 

Flynn would not have lost two more years of his life and there would have been no phony Ukraine impeachment last year. In short, America would have been a very different place politically. 

So as the hunt for pieces of the puzzle continues, add Rosenstein to the list of those who have some serious explaining to do.

Techno Fog Argues That President Trump Is The Redacted Subject Of Mueller Witchhunt Memo

Last night DoJ released disgraced former DAG Rod Rosenstein's second "scope of the witchhunt" memo, which outlines whom Team Mueller could investigate and under what pretext. There were no real surprises in the revelations, except perhaps that Rosenstein actually cited the Logan Act with regard to Michael Flynn. The one exception to the "no surprises" statement is that there was a fifth subject whose identity was redacted and the allegations against whom were also redacted.

Naturally everyone wants to know who that fifth (redacted) subject is. There is no lack of plausible candidates, except that--with regard to most of them--it's difficult to understand why everything should be redacted: Roger Stone? Michael Cohen? Rick Gates? Etc.?

For that reason a number of internet commenters have been suggesting that the fifth (redacted) subject is, in fact, President Trump, and the pretext for that investigation would be "obstruction" for having fired disgraced former FBI Director James Comey. Last night I included a tweet by Undercover Huber to that effect in Rod Rosenstein's Second "Scope Memo" For Team Mueller.

This morning Techno Fog presented a fairly concise argument that seeks to make that case--that President Trump was explicitly targeted by Rosenstein and Team Mueller:

Does the redacted section of the 8/2/17 Mueller scope memo relate to President Trump?

Recall McCabe's admission that he opened an FBI investigation into Trump "as an agent of Russia" in May 2017...

ht @JohnWHuber and @TheLastRefuge2 and @almostjingo pic.twitter.com/xl0rSHteyX

— Techno Fog (@Techno_Fog) May 7, 2020

To make things a bit easier, here are the relevant attachments to Techno Fog's tweet:

UPDATED: Rod Rosenstein's Second "Scope Memo" For Team Mueller

(h/t commenter EZ)

The Department of Justice has responded to Senator Lindsey Graham's request for

an unredacted copy of  the August 2, 2017 memorandum from then Acting Attorney General Rod Rosenstein to Special Counsel Robert S. Mueller, III regarding “The Scope of Investigation and Definition of Authority” (“Scope Memo”). 

You may recall that Rod Rosenstein's initial authorization letter for a Special Counsel, dated May 17, 2017, outlined the scope of Team Mueller's authorized investigation in the broadest terms. Basically that letter stated, in a guarded fashion, that Mueller was to continue the Crossfire Hurricane investigation as described by disgraced former FBI Director James Comey in testimony before the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence on March 20, 2017. Comey had described an investigation of "four Americans."

The substantially unredacted copy of the second Rosenstein "scope memo" largely confirms that. It states that Team Mueller is authorized to investigate the four Americans--Carter Page, Paul Manafort, George Papadopoulos, and Michael Flynn. A fifth subject's name  remains redacted, along with the allegations against that fifth subject.

With regard to the first three subjects--Page, Manafort, and Papadopoulos--the primary and precipitating allegation is the same. Each is alleged to have:

Avenues Of Inquiry Into Team Mueller?

Today at CTH sundance does an overall nice job of evaluating an important document: a letter from Assistant Attorney General John C. Demers to Rosemary Collyer, Chief Judge of the FISC (the "FISA Court"). Demers, you might like to know, succeeded John P. Carlin as head of the National Security Division, as of February 22, 2018. Here's his Wikipedia bio:

Prior to his post in the United States Department of Justice, Demers served as the vice president and assistant general counsel at Boeing. Demers clerked for Diarmuid O'Scannlain of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and Antonin Scalia of the Supreme Court of the United States. He worked in private practice before serving in the Office of Legal Counsel. Demers was on the leadership team of the United States Department of Justice National Security Division, first as senior counsel to the Assistant Attorney General and then as Deputy Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Law & Policy. Demers is an adjunct professor of national security law at Georgetown University Law Center.

Demers' letter was dated July 12, 2018--in other words, at the height of the Mueller Witchhunt, with high hopes in the air that the Dems would retake the House in November and use the Mueller Dossier to impeach President Trump. What this letter is all about is the fact that, as a result of the efforts--largely--of Devin Nunes, serious and persistent questions had been raised publicly about the fraudulent nature of the Carter Page FISA order (and its three renewals). By the time Demers wrote his letter to the FISC it was well known that the application for the FISA had been largely based on materials developed by opposition research contractors working for the Hillary Clinton campaign, and that those materials were as suspect as that characterization makes them sound. Another major source behind the FISA application, it was well known by then, had been undercover FBI assets and foreign operatives who were used to target persons in the Trump campaign--"with no basis", as AG Bill Barr recently put it.

Joe diGenova Sketches The Conspiracy Case

Today I have another transcript of a Mornings on the Mall interview with Joe diGenova (hosted by Mary Walter and Vince Coglianese).

There's a lot of interest in the interview, much of it going over the ground I covered earlier in Bill Barr: "Without Any Basis", but with diGenova's own characteristically strong take on it. So, from my point of view, it's worth looking at his words in print to absorb the full import, to get an idea where the Durham investigation is headed. DiGenova is on the same page that we've been on at this blog: We can expect a major conspiracy prosecution, and I want readers to understand ahead of time what that involves, what facts are important for shaping that type of prosecution. This interview will help.

The first thing you may notice as the interview gets started--and I really appreciated this--is that while the hosts start out all eager to discuss the now famous Footnote 350 in the Horowitz FISA report, diGenova is far more eager to move on and talk about the Barr interview with Laura Ingraham--and rightly so, in my view. However, as we'll see, diGenova has a very different take on what's behind that footnote--emphasizing, as I and a few others like sundance have, that it leads to the foreign government angle, and especially to  the importance of the UK's involvement. So, here we go:

A Closer Look At The FBI's Carter Page Investigation (Part 2)

Let's continue with our "Closer Look" at the FBI's investigation of Carter Page, as explained in the Horowitz FISA report.  Part I of our "Closer Look" dealt with the origins of the investigation in the FBI's New York Field Office's (NYFO) dealings with Carter Page--which stretch back to 2009--and stopped at the point that the Crossfire Hurricane investigation was opened (July 31, 2016) and a separate sub-investigation was opened on Page. Here we will look at Horowitz's account of FBI investigative activity with regard to Page prior to the FBI's supposed first knowledge of the Steele "dossier" on September 19, 2016.

Once again I've pasted in several pages from the OIG report--the full section, with footnotes. The page numbering is included as before: (paper doc page number/pdf file page number). My comments are in "quote" format.


(77/110)

IV. Investigative Steps in Crossfire Hurricane Prior to Receipt of Christopher Steele Reporting on September 19

Jeff Sessions Places Second, Forces Runoff

President Trump had something to say about the Republican primary for US Senator:

This is what happens to someone who loyally gets appointed Attorney General of the United States & then doesn’t have the wisdom or courage to stare down & end the phony Russia Witch Hunt. Recuses himself on FIRST DAY in office, and the Mueller Scam begins! 

https://t.co/2jGnRgOS6h— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 4, 2020

My supposition has always been that Sessions did a corrupt deal with Chuck Schumer according to which, in exchange for a narrow confirmation as AG, Sessions would recuse from all things Russia Hoax. Rod Rosenstein was enthusiastically confirmed as DAG, 94–6. Just for the record, here are the Nay voters, those who voted against Rosenstein:

Blumenthal (D-CT)
Booker (D-NJ)
Cortez Masto (D-NV)
Gillibrand (D-NY)
Harris (D-CA)
Warren (D-MA)

Overall, the Dems had faith In RR.

I've heard "conservatives" express sympathy for Sessions, because of Trump's harsh public criticisms. For the record, I have no such sympathy and regard Session's actions--failing to inform Trump of his clearly premeditated recusal--as a selfish betrayal of Trump and of the national interest of the American people.

Judicial Watch: RR's Comms With Team Obama

Judicial Watch has obtained emails to and from Rod Rosenstein in mid-May, 2017. You know, right around the time Rod appointed a Special Counsel to conduct a witchhunt against President Trump. Turns out that Rod was in close contact with Obama's peeps. You can read about what Judicial watch learned here, but this is my favorite part:

On May 16, 2017, U.S. Attorney John Huber wrote to Rosenstein: “Rod, We’re proud of you.” Later that year, Huber was chosen by then-Attorney General Sessions to head up the Clinton Foundation investigation.

(On May 17, 2017, Robert Mueller was appointed by Rosenstein as special counsel.)

UPDATED: What's Taking Durham So Long?

As I've indicated, I think the two recent posts on the Steele - Papadopoulos connection

An Update Re Steele - Papadopoulos

A Steele - Papadopoulos Connection?

take us to the heart of John Durham's investigation. Just as AG Bill Barr has been telling us all along, Durham wants to get to the origins of the Russia Hoax. The thing is, getting to the origins doesn't just take us back, it also points us forward to later events that flowed from the original Russia Hoax--like, forward to the Mueller Witchhunt. The reason for that is the realization that the FBI knew--NO LATER THAN JANUARY, 2017--that the Steele "dossier" that was key to the Russia Hoax was, not to put too fine a point on it, bullsh*t that was paid for by Hillary. If the FBI knew that--and they did, as we know from the Strzok/Page texts--then that has to mean that Rod Rosenstein and Team Mueller knew it, too. And if they knew that, exactly what was going on when Rosenstein appointed Mueller?

Senators Grassley and Johnson have done the American public the favor of pointing to some footnotes in the Horowitz Dossier--the so-called FISA abuse report. Those footnotes are almost certainly what led Bill Barr and John Durham to take very public exception to Horowitz's take on the predication for the FBI's Russia Hoax investigations.

We have also learned that there is a Steele - Papadopoulos connection that runs through Steele associate Sergei Millian. That helps explain the use of the bogus narratives about Papadopoulos' supposed chatter about the Hillary "dirt". Since the FBI has claimed that Crossfire Hurricane was predicated on the Papadopoulos narrative rather than the Steele "dossier," the discovery of the connection for this to Steele puts the FBI players on ever shakier ground. Their last line of defense may be starting to crumble.

We're just learning some of this, but there's no secret what Durham is after. He's been gathering documentary evidence, much of it already gathered by Horowitz re the FISA applications, and is now looking for human evidence--i.e., witnesses who can testify that specific persons in the US government (FBI, DoJ, DoS, CIA, DNI) knew exactly what they were doing. It's that combination of documentation plus credible witness testimony that will make or break the conspiracy case. The combination of the two, if possible, will make for a powerful case. Will Rod Rosenstein be one of those key witnesses?

Durham isn't about to rush through this. There's too much at stake. He's moving full speed ahead, but there will be no shortcuts.

UPDATE: Not entirely clear--"separate [from]" or "separate [part of]" John Durham probe?

Catherine Herridge
@CBS_Herridge

#SCOOP Source familiar with process tells @CBSNews staff assigned by AG Barr, outside Main Justice, to review Ukraine matter.  CBS News told this review is separate John Durham probe into origins FBI 2016 Russia case and being handled by US Attorney Pittsburgh...

12:21 PM · Feb 11, 2020