Crossfire Hurricane Flowed Seamlessly Into Team Mueller

Of course it did, you'll say--after all that's exactly what Rod Rosenstein said in his letter authorizing the formation of Team Mueller. The only quibble is that Rosenstein didn't use the codeword investigation name. What he did was describe the Crossfire Hurricane investigation. Here's how I described it all in Mueller's "Enterprise" Witchhunt:

 in Deputy Attorney General (DAG) Rod Rosenstein's letter of May 17, 2017, in which he appointed Robert Mueller as Special Counsel (SC), Rosenstein's authorization closely tracks Comey's testimony:

There are several important bits of information that we need to take special note of in this.

• First, Mueller is not starting up a new investigation--he's taking over an already existing investigation, the same one that was confirmed by Comey two months earlier. 

• Second, and very importantly, Mueller's investigation is not authorized as a general investigation into Russian "active measures" (i.e., interference, meddling) in the 2016 campaign but instead is rather narrowly focused on "coordination between people associated with the Trump campaign and the Russians."

In other words, Rosenstein did not authorize Mueller to investigate coordination between people associated with the Clinton campaign and the Russians--only the Trump campaign.

The Special Counsel is authorized to conduct the investigation confirmed by then-FBI Director James B. Comey in testimony before the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence on March 20, 2017, including any links and/or coordination between the Russian government and individuals associated with the campaign of Donald Trump; ...

What's important to remember, however, is that the personnel remained essentially the same, as well. This of course is something that sundance has stressed--the Small Group.

Now sundance is doing what he does best, constructing a timeline for the appointment of Mueller. Commenter Yancey Ward will be pleased with the results of that timeline.

Sundance draws on the questioning of Mueller by Congressman Andy Biggs and points especially to the sequence that begins at 2:26:

Obstruction--And Barr's Strategy

We all know that the Mueller Dossier is divided into two parts: The Russia Hoax proper, which is to say, the "collusion" narrative, and obstruction--which necessarily flowed from the Russia Hoax but took on a life of its own. In the past I've maintained at great length that the legal basis for the Russia Hoax--the Crossfire Hurricane enterprise counterintelligence investigation--in fact lacked the necessary predication for a Full Investigation under the Guidelines that govern all FBI investigations. The corollary to that fact is that, ipso facto, the Mueller inquisition--which explicitly continued the Crossfire Hurricane (CH) investigation--also lacked the necessary predication. Yes, an argument could be made that facts developed between the inception of CH (end of July, 2016) and the authorization of the Mueller inquisition (mid May, 2017) could have offered a belated predicate--improper as that would have been. However, as we have also seen (and will note once again), that was not what happened. There were no new facts. In fact, the entire basis of CH--largely the Steele "dossier"--had for practical predicating purposes been entirely debunked at that point.

Many who have followed this scandal have drawn from this the conclusion that the Mueller inquisition was therefore never about "collusion"--it was always only about setting an ongoing "obstruction trap" for Trump. I have also argued that this fails to do justice (!) to the true extent of the lawlessness that was being perpetrated in the effort to oust Trump--once the effort to prevent his inauguration fell through. In fact, Team Mueller was determined to use the pretext of a "collusion" investigation to discover or, if need be, manufacture, chargeable offenses, whether related to Russia or not. I think every single case brought by Team Mueller witnesses to this lawless intent. At the same time, they were determined to set the obstruction trap and keep it baited for as long as possible. Which brings us to our topic for today.

Let's step back for a moment. We began by pointing out that CH lacked a factual predicate as required for any FBI investigation.

Recently a remarkable statement came to my attention. The statement was made by James Rybicki, chief of staff to the disgraced former Director of the FBI, James Comey, as well as for Chris Wray, until January, 2018. The context is an interview that Rybicki gave to the U.S. Office of Special Counsel or “OSC,” not to be confused with the office of former Special Counsel Robert Mueller (the OSC is a permanent office that investigates Hatch Act violations. Comey was under investigation for trying to influence the 2016 Presidential election). In the course of that interview Rybicki was questioned at length about the FBI's handling of the Midyear Exam case--the Hillary email case. In the course of the questioning a comparison was made to the handling of the "Russian influence" investigation--Crossfire Hurricane. Here's what Rybicki told OSC--in heavily redacted form:

Byron York Deconstructs Nadler's Obstruction "Movie"

In a lengthy article at The Washington Examiner, Byron York explains what the Dems hope to accomplish with their Mueller hearing, and then proceeds to deconstruct it. To do this York borrows a metaphor from a Dem staffer:

Democrats know the report has failed to capture the public imagination, and they hope bringing Mueller to Capitol Hill for questioning will catch the nation's attention.

"Not everybody is reading the book, but people will watch the movie," a House Judiciary Committee official told Politico's Playbook.

York is, rightly, skeptical, because the movie will prove no more compelling than the book. As York observes: Some movies bomb.

Here are the Big Three obstruction narratives--or, wait, possible obstruction narratives--what the Dems will focus on:

UPDATED: What If The Mueller Inquisition Was Only Ever An Obstruction Ploy?

The UPDATE turns up in about the middle. I've also modified a few things for clarity and added a reference that I forgot in the passion of writing. :-)

On May 17, 2017, the "Acting Attorney General for the Russia investigation" (Mueller, V2, p.4), Rod Rosenstein, appointed Robert Mueller as Special Counsel. In the letter appointing Mueller, Rosenstein specified the matters that Mueller would be investigating, as required by regulation. According to Rosenstein, the Mueller investigation was supposed to be a continuation of the already existing FBI Crossfire Hurricane investigation:

The Special Counsel is authorized to conduct the investigation confirmed by then-FBI Director James B. Comey in testimony before the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence on March 20, 2017, including any links and/or coordination between the Russian government and individuals associated with the campaign of Donald Trump; ...

In addition, Mueller was authorized to investigate

any matters that had already arisen in the course of that investigation or that might arise directly from it, and

any other matters within the scope of CFR 600.4(a)--which included obstruction of the Special Counsel investigation.

The upshot of the Mueller inquisition has been to confirm that there never were any "links and/or coordination between the Russian government and individuals associated with the campaign of Donald Trump." None. Further, although Mueller bizarrely seems to have had no interest in such matters--even though they arose directly from the FBI's investigation--a mountain of evidence has demonstrated:

1) That Christopher Steele, the former (?) MI6 spook, was utterly biased and unreliable as a source of information; 

2) That the FBI was fully aware of Steele's bias and unreliability; and 

3) That the FBI knowlingly misrepresented Steele's reliability to the FISA court in order to obtain a warrant on Carter Page, an foreign policy adviser to the Trump campaign, which warrant would allow the FBI to conduct far reaching surveillance on the Trump himself.

In other words, the entire Crossfire Hurrican investigation that Mueller took over was quite simply a hoax that the FBI and the Deep State generally perpetrated on the American people.

The Big Picture Behind The FBI's Really Big FISA Problem

Those who have been following the Russia Hoax, having suffered through periods of information drought, are now in danger of suffering information overload. With more and more transcripts being released and more of the central players giving interviews, researchers are going back to connect previously unconnected dots (for one example).

Readers of this blog will know that I've long advocated for the absolute centrality of the famous Trump Tower meeting of June 9, 2016. That was the meeting between the Trump campaign (represented by Don Trump Jr., Jared Kushner, and Paul Manafort) and a gaggle of Russians, including the lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya. The meeting was supposed to be about "dirt on HIllary" but turned out to be Veselnitskaya advocating for a relaxation or elimination of the sanctions imposed on Russia by the Magnitsky Act.

As is now well known, Veselnitskaya was only present in the US courtesy of the Obama Administration--she had been excluded from entry but DHS decided, “in concurrence with the U.S. Attorney’s Office of Southern District of New York,” then headed by Preet Bharara, to allow her in just that one time. Also well known is the fact that Veselnitskaya had dinner with Clinton oppo research supremo Glenn Simpson of Fusion GPS both before and after the Trump Tower meeting. Further, other Clinton activists were in close communication with both Simpson and Russian participants in the meeting.

DC Whispers has a fascinating big picture view of the entire Russia Hoax, based off an original at Big League Politics. What I particularly like about his presentation is its emphasis on the centrality of the Trump Tower meeting. That centrality is borne out by the reports that have noted that this was a topic virtually always touched upon by Team Mueller's inquisitors, as well as by the fact that Congressional Dems have carped on it for the last two years.

My oft repeated view has been that the whole purpose of the meeting was to try to create at least an appearance of a corrupt quid pro quo between Trump and Russia: on Trump's side, a promise of relaxation of sanctions in return for (on the Russian side) help against Hillary. That would, IMO, almost certainly violate the federal bribery statute (and possibly other laws), which applies to those who are prospective members of the government, not just current members.

DC Whispers quotes an "FBI insider" who describes what the Trump Tower meeting was originally all about--and I find it persuasive:

How Was Trump Able To Stiff Mueller?

In other words, how was Trump able to successfully resist submitting to an interview?

Obviously an aggressive public relations campaign, led not only by Trump himself but also by lawyers Rudy Giuliani and Jay Sekulow, was a key. Trump never backed down from his insistence that he was innocent of all wrongdoing and that the whole was nothing but a witchhunt. In other words, as Devin Nunes said yesterday in response to the question, When did Mueller know he had no case:

"Likely since [the moment] he walked in the door [took charge] of the phony investigation."

A correspondent has sent me a Reuters article that addresses the question of Trump's successful resistance to an interview. Unfortunately, the article--The Mueller interview that wasn't: how Trump's legal strategy paid off--is short on legal analysis. My view, which shouldn't come as any surprise, is that the lack of probable cause for a legitimate investigation was key.

Consider: Team Mueller was only authorized to investigate an alleged conspiracy to collaborate illegally with Russian intelligence operatives--an alleged conspiracy that was supposed to have been conducted by an "enterprise" group of "four Americans" (Page, Papadopoulos, Manafort, and Flynn) as a subset of the Trump campaign. That was Crossfire Hurricane, which Team Mueller was authorized to continue. That means that, just as James Comey three times stated to Trump, Trump was never actually the subject of the substantive investigation:

A Bit More On "Obstruction"

Interest in Bill Barr's summary of the "Mueller report" has quickly shifted--quite properly--to calls for investigation. Real investigation, this time, of the real crimes. But it's still worthwhile to reflect a bit more on what the Mueller/Weissmann team tried to pull off. For that CTH offers an excellent starting point at the end of its summary blog: A Review of the Barr “Principal Conclusion” Notification, Overlaying Three Years of Background Research…

First, sundance offers a general theme:

What we find in the Barr letter about the Obstruction investigation is blood boiling. Here Team Mueller intentionally politicize their non-finding in an attempt to open the door for Nancy Pelsoi and Jerry Nadler to exploit an impeachment angle.

We all expected that, of course, but it's worth the reminder. But then sundance moves on to what's really good news:

Team Mueller intentionally tells AG Barr they cannot make a determination of obstruction, and thereby force Barr to make the decision; and make it look political. 

...

In my opinion it’s almost certain AG Barr saw this coming, which is why he forced DAG Rod Weaselstein to stick around, share in the decision and deflect the politics.

Sundance has an excellent point here, and it includes the very good news that we have an AG in Bill Barr who is shrewd and deft in dealing with underhanded legal tactics. If clownish conmen like Nadler and Schiff think Barr will be an easy mark for them, they need to rethink that--or, better, maybe their too deluded to do the necessary rethinking.

UPDATED: Bill Barr's Summary Of Team Mueller: Short And Sweet

As expected, Barr delivered a summary report to Congress. Four pages. He summarized the Team Mueller effort as it bears on Trump and the Trump campaign under two headings: "Collusion" and "Obstruction".

Collusion

There wasn't any. Not by the Trump campaign and not by anyone associated with it. This confirms, by its wording, what I said yesterday: Mueller's mandate was to continue the investigation of the four Americans who were the subject of Crossfire Hurricane. Trump was never a subject. There is no reference to Donald J. Trump in the collusion section. That's it.

Just to make this totally clear. The Crossfire Hurricane investigation was about "four Americans," none of whom were Trump. Rosenstein told Mueller: Complete the investigation. That means that to reach Trump on "collusion" Mueller needed to go throught the "four Americans": Page, Papadopoulos, Manafort, and Flynn. Four dry holes. Mueller never laid a glove on Trump.

Obstruction

This section is all about Donald J. Trump, and has nothing whatsoever to do with James Comey and his firing. Mueller thinks that there are "difficult issues" of law and fact concerning whether Trump obstructed his (Team Mueller's) investigation. Mueller doesn't "conclude that the president committed a crime," but "doesn't exonerate him." Because of the "difficult issues" Mueller decided against ... any decision at all, leaving it to Barr to decide.

In making his decision Barr says two things. The first aspect requires a bit of reading between the lines. Barr states that many of the president's actions that bothered Mueller were conducted "in public view." I take it from that that, basically, Mueller didn't like being criticized by Trump. That in his (Mueller's) view, subjects of a witchhunt are supposed to shut up, to grin and bear it. Barr--and Rosenstein--after consulting with top DoJ officials had a very different view and simply state: the evidence is insufficient to support such a charge and, specifically, that decision has nothing to do with the constitutional status of the president. However, beyond that, Barr (and Rosenstein, presumably) then go on to state that they reviewed the actions that Mueller objected to and conclude that "the report identifies no actions that, in our judgment, constitute obstructive conduct." In other words, they basically reject Mueller's theory of obstruction out of hand.

Here are two key sections re obstruction (all emphases mine):