The Gowdy Interview

Trey Gowdy's interview with Maria Bartiromo this morning is causing a stir. We've discussed it a bit in the comments, but I'll deal with it again here.

I just now listened to Gowdy and I think he has been misunderstood. Many took him to be saying--as a former prosecutor himself--that in his considered legal judgment Durham has no case against anyone except Clinesmith. That's not actually what he was saying. Here's what I think he means, as I just set it out in an email to a friend:

Here's what I think he's saying--and I caution that I'm trying to make sense out of some conflicting statements:

Briefly Noted: Trey Gowdy Re Horowitz Interviewing Steele; The Census Question

Emailer Jim sent me the link to this Fox interview of Trey Gowdy. Gowdy is questioned on two issues:

1) IG Michael Horowitz's interview of Chris Steele, of "dossier" fame; and 

2) What's going on with the citizenship question for the 2020 census.

Here's that interview. IMO, Gowdy makes a lot of sense:

Ouch! Trey Gowdy Rips FBI

Yesterday on Fox News Trey Gowdy let loose on the FBI's supposed corroboration of the Steele "dossier." It's not exactly news, but it is amusing, in a dark sorta way. Here's a link to the Daily Caller account:  FBI CITED ARTICLES AND INFO FROM CLINTON ALLY TO CORROBORATE STEELE DOSSIER.

In an interview with Fox News’ Martha Maccallum, Gowdy said when he was still in Congress, he saw an FBI spreadsheet that laid out all of the specific claims in the dossier, which former British spy Christopher Steele authored. The spreadsheet also cited information the FBI believed corroborated Steele’s salacious report, he said. 

“I’ve seen the spreadsheet, Martha, I have seen each factual assertion listed in that dossier, and then I’ve seen the FBI’s justification. And when you’re citing newspaper articles as corroboration for a factual assertion that you have made, you don’t need an FBI agent to go do a Google search,” said Gowdy, who served on the House Intelligence Committee and is a Fox News contributor. 

“When the name Sidney Blumenthal is included as part of your corroboration, and when you’re the world’s leading law enforcement agency, you have a problem.”

Y'know, I think he has a point. This doesn't pass the laugh test.

Briefly Noted: Trey Gowdy On The Opening EC And Consensual Monitoring

CTH has links to a pair of Fox interviews that Trey Gowdy did during the last few days. While there was a great deal of discussion of reaction to Bill Barr's statement about FBI "spying", there were also a few additonal nuggets to be had from the interviews.

First, and very briefly, without providing details Gowdy confirmed that to his personal knowledge consensual monitoring was used by the FBI in their Russia Hoax investigation. This was a topic in our two most recent James Baker posts over the last two days. I presume that Gowdy is referring, at the least, to George Papadopoulos being recorded, but the potential for much wider use by FBI informants is there.

Second, Gowdy addressed Barr's comments re the failure of the FBI to provide the Trump campaign with a defensive briefing about their suspicions, as is normally done. Gowdy stated that, in response to his queries on that score, the FBI told him that when they attempted to provide the briefing one of the persons they had concerns about (in context, Manafort or Flynn) was in the room with Trump. When Gowdy pressed the issue, asking whether the FBI had ever attempted to follow up, Gowdy was told "we have no good answer."

Finally, Gowdy recounted that he had received two different accounts from the FBI regarding the opening of the Russia investigation. The first version was that the FBI had a general investigation going on the Russian threat and over time a few Americans came into focus. However, Gowdy was able to read the opening EC, written by Peter Strzok, and that EC was very specifically focused on the "four Americans" Comey mentioned in his Congressional testimony: Manafort, Flynn, Page, and Papadopoulos.

As I explained (again) in James Baker: Light On Informants And The "Russia" Investigation, there really is no contradiction here. The first account probably referred to a Threat Assessment or Preliminary Investigation, the second clearly to the Full Investigation that we know as Crossfire Hurricane. What is problematic in all this, as discussed in the linked post, is that there are clear indications (as Gowdy notes) that the focus on the Trump campaign began much earlier than the opening EC would have one believe. Count on it--these are issue that are being closely scrutinized by DoJ and Barr. I've always maintained that the opening EC is a bit of a Holy Grail for an investigation of the investigation. As Barr himself stated, he will want to see whether the investigation was adequately predicated (it wasn't). But the same goes for the earlier investigative activity in which Page and Papadopoulos were targeted virtually from the first day they joined the Trump campaign.

Interesting days.

Beware Conservative Tree House Conspiracy Theories; Gowdy Unbound?

I hate to have to do this, but it's necessary to criticize some of the speculation that's appearing at CTH. However, before I do that, kudos to CTH for linking to an important interview with Trey Gowdy, who appears to feel unbound now that he's no longer in the House. Gowdy speaks forthrightly on a number of important topics and regarding key players such as McCabe and Schiff. Watch it. Trey Gowdy fires off on McCabe's Russia probe 'bombshells'. Gowdy is suggesting that McCabe may be making up stories that Devin Nunes is unable to refute because Nunes isn't allowed to speak regarding proceedings of Gang of Eight meetings. I cautiously believe that Gowdy may be right--that McCabe is making 'stuff' up, just as I cautiously believe that in his book McCabe makes up the story about Trump supposedly saying (re North Korean missile capabilities): "I don't care; I believe Putin."

Gowdy also makes a key point regarding the Opening EC for Crossfire Hurricane--the document that I continually cite as key to understanding the entire Russia Hoax. Gowdy--a former prosecutor--stresses that Strzok, who wrote the EC, specifically states that the investigation is into the Trump campaign and four named individuals in the Trump campaign. That means that Crossfire Hurricane was never a counterintelligence investigation that focused on Russia election "meddling." It always targeted Trump. And that means it always relied primarily on the Steele "dossier."

OK. That said, sundance unfortunately engages in some baseless speculation, riffing off Gowdy's remarks, which ignore basic documentary/testimonial evidence. Specifically, sundance states:

So, What's A "Threat To National Security"?

Kim Strassel raised an interesting question in her column today--The Curious Case of Mr. Downer: His story about the Papadopoulos meeting calls the FBI’s into question. As the title indicates, Strassel finds the FBI's claim that their probe of the Trump campaign was based on Downer's contact with George Papadopoulos to be ... less than credible. And she closes with these observations:

For months we’ve been told the FBI acted because it was alarmed that Mr. Papadopoulos knew about those hacked Democratic emails in May, before they became public in June. But according to the tipster himself, Mr. Papadopoulos said nothing about emails. The FBI instead received a report that a far-removed campaign adviser, over drinks, said the Russians had something that might be “damaging” to Hillary. Did this vague statement justify a counterintelligence probe into a presidential campaign, featuring a spy and secret surveillance warrants?

Unlikely. Which leads us back to what did inspire the FBI to act, and when? The Papadopoulos pretext is getting thinner.

Indeed--since when does ​"something that might be 'damaging' to Hillary ... justify a counterintelligence probe into a presidential campaign, featuring a spy and secret surveillance warrants?"

As I wrote in an email this morning, I think we'll find--in fact, recent talking points floated by James Clapper and others point in this direction--that the justification for launching a counterintelligence investigation into a presidential campaign on the basis of "something damaging to Hillary" will rely on provisions of the Attorney General Guidelines. Bear with me for a moment, because this will lead back to Strassel's question.

Those AG Guidelines, which govern FBI investigations, allow the FBI to open a "predicated investigation" in the following circumstance:

"A predicated investigation relating to a federal crime or threat to the national security may be conducted as a preliminary investigation or a full investigation."

The Guidelines then expand a bit on the distinction between Preliminary and Full Investigations, but for our purposes the important distinction is simply that FISA coverage is available for Full Investigations, but not for Preliminary Investigations.

If you accept the argument that a presidential campaign that seeks "dirt" on its opponent from a hostile foreign power (Russia) is engaged in conduct that arguably constitutes activity that is a "threat to the national security," and if you further accept that the FBI's claims regarding the credibility of its Papadopoulos narrative, then you'll likely agree with Trey Gowdy's notion that the FBI was acting quite properly. Or, to be very specific, you'll likely agree that a Preliminary Investigation was warranted, since the Guidelines allow for a Preliminary Investigation to be "initiated on the basis of information or an allegation" of a "threat to the national security." "Information or an allegation" is a fairly low bar.

Virtually all commentary that I've read focuses on the initiation of an FBI Full Investigation on July 31, 2016. Commentators who have constructed timelines of events--an excellent idea, in and of itself--then argue that the use of informants or "spies" against the Trump campaign prior to July 31, 2016--for which there is considerable evidence--violated the AG Guidelines.

While it's possible that the FBI willfully violated the Guidelines it seems unlikely--bureaucracies don't often operate in such a reckless fashion. Moreover, this view ignores an important possibility, namely, that before the Full Investigation was initiated (July 31, 2016) there may have been a Preliminary Investigation. This approach--use of a Preliminary Investigation as a prior stage before going for a Full Investigation--fits better with the usual careful bureaucratic approach. It also, intriguingly, dovetails with President Obama's reported admonition to "do it by the book" (see below).