Pages

Showing posts sorted by relevance for query marc elias. Sort by date Show all posts
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query marc elias. Sort by date Show all posts

Monday, January 28, 2019

Marc Elias: A Reminder

A search of this blog reveals, remarkably, that there appear to be no references to Marc Elias, so this post will remedy that. And right up front I want to offer (FWIW) a hat tip to Mark Penn, the former "pollster and adviser" to Bill Clinton, whose (typically) excellent article on the Roger Stone indictment and arrest brought Elias specifically to my attention (Mueller’s selective prosecution of Stone, Venezuelan-style).

Who is Marc Elias, and why is he important for understanding the Russia Hoax? Wikipedia explains it lucidly:

Marc Erik Elias (born February 1, 1969)[1] is an American attorney. He is a partner at the law firm Perkins Coie LLP and head of its Political Law practice. He is the general counsel for Kamala Harris's 2020 presidential campaign. He worked in the same role for Hillary Clinton's 2016 presidential campaign and for John Kerry's 2004 presidential campaign. 
... 
He served as lead counsel for Senator Al Franken in the 2008 Minnesota Senate election recount and contest, the longest recount and contest in American history.[6] Elias has testified before committees in both houses of Congress and before the Federal Election Commission on campaign finance.[7] Elias has worked on voting rights and redistricting lawsuits in Virginia, Ohio, Nevada, Minnesota, New York, Wisconsin, Texas, Florida and North Carolina.[8] 
... 
In April 2015 Hillary Clinton engaged Elias as attorney of record for her 2016 presidential campaign.[5] According to The Washington Post, in April 2016, Elias hired Fusion GPS on behalf of the Democratic National Committee and the Clinton campaign to complete the research that resulted in the Donald Trump–Russia dossier.[11] ...

Are you getting the picture? You've heard of Super Lawyers? Well, in the legal field of Democrat politics, or simply politics generally, Marc Elias is an 800 lb. gorilla.

Sunday, August 22, 2021

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.

Saturday, March 13, 2021

UPDATED: Too Good To Pass On

I'm sure everyone's aware that the US MIlitary launched a coordinated strike on Tucker Carlson yesterday--in retaliation for that video of his that I included yesterday. That's what our storied military has come to. This morning Don Surber comments:


ITEM 2: The Daily Caller won the headline of the day with "U.S. military launches coordinated strikes against American TV host."


The story cited a headline at the Official Taxpayer-Paid DOD web site, "Press Secretary Smites Fox Host That Dissed Diversity in U.S. Military."

...

Unless Tucker Carlson (the host in question) made a factual error, the Pentagon press secretary should shut his trap. 

But our military is politicized and part of this anti-American cabal of Washington politicians, the media, the deep state, and corporate America that are hellbent on destroying everything that made America great.

...

The spokesman in question, retired Admiral John Kirby, is a former CNN commentator, which raises questions of ethics.

The new Marine Hymn: "From the Halls of Tucker Carlson, to the shores of New Jersey. We will fight the P.C. battles, for the L, G, B, and T."


Nevertheless, it is serious that this is the state of our polity.

UPDATE: Oh, here's a name from the Russia Hoax past, also via Don Surber: Marc Elias. Call this one, Federal Judge launches coordinated strike on top DNC lawyer:


ITEM 10: Bloomberg reported, "One of the Democrat Party’s top election lawyers was hit with sanctions by a federal court for violating ethics rules in a suit against Texas over straight-ticket voting, a rare rebuke for a seasoned attorney following months of tumultuous litigation over the November election.

"Marc Elias and other lawyers with Perkins Coie LLP were ordered Friday by the U.S. Court of Appeals in New Orleans to pay legal fees and double costs to Texas. The order was issued in a suit Elias filed in August on behalf of the Democrats’ Senate and congressional campaign committees."


"Rare" rebuke? I'd call it pretty much unprecedented. Follow the link at Elias' name if you need a refresher course re Elias. He was an integral part of every aspect of the Hillary coverups and all related hoaxes--the Russian "hacks", Fusion GPS, Chris Steele, FBI. You name the swampy dealings and he was there. So, it's nice to see this on his record.


Friday, October 16, 2020

How Big Could The Alfa Bank Hoax Turn Out To Be?

The last time we referenced the Alfa Bank hoax--Alfa Bank Redux--Starring John Durham!--I pointed out that the importance of the fact that Durham is pursuing the Alfa Bank Hoax angle with grand jury subpoenas lies in where that inquiry leads: Straight to the Clinton and, now, the Biden campaigns and organizations:


The Alfa Bank hoax "dossier" memo was written up by Christopher Steele at the express direction of Clinton lawyer Michael Sussmann and Fusion GPS founder Glenn Simpson. Sussmann then took the story directly to the FBI--to a friend of his, James Baker, who happened to be FBI General Counsel, i.e., Comey's top lawyer. Knowing Sussmann as he did, Baker also knew that this hoax story was coming straight from the Clinton campaign. Add that background to the involvement of Daniel Jones and Jake Sullivan in the Alfa Bank hoax (see above), along with the fact that James Baker has long been believed to be cooperating with Durham and we come to this: Durham's conspiracy net is attempting to catch some of the biggest fish in the Dem hierarchy, central figures in both the Clinton and now the Biden campaigns. 


The theory that draws these non-government actors into Durham's big picture conspiracy case is they provided false information--false statements, so think 1001--to the government, the FBI. The fact that the FBI would have known the information was false in beside the point. It was a form of information laundering--Hey, we received allegations, we investigated them: Wink, wink! 

Monday, June 10, 2019

What's Important In The DoJ Letter To Nadler

Stephen Boyd, Assistant AG, has written a letter to Jerrold Nadler in response to Nadler's request for information regarding the "review" that DoJ is conducting into "certain activities" with regard to the 2016 presidential election--"and related matters." You can read the letter here.

Boyd states that

"it is well established that, in 2016, the U.S. government and others undertook certain intelligence-gathering and investigative steps directed at persons associated with the Trump Campaign ... there remain open questions relating to the origins of this counter-intelligence investigation and the U.S. and foreign intelligence activities that took place prior to and during that investigation.”

Boyd goes on to note activities that have been undertaken thus far, mostly to coordinate with other agencies:

1. Preserve relevant records, 
2. Ensure the availability of witnesses, 
3. Identify and assemble relevant materials. 

For my money, however, the key is in the first paragraph. Boyd makes no bones about how broad the scope of the "review" is. The review includes not only the actions of the US intelligence services, it will also seek to illuminate the role of foreign intelligence services as well as non-governmental organizations and individuals:

Tuesday, March 2, 2021

Briefly Noted: Arizona Election Law Case In SCOTUS

I'm not about to try to summarize Shipwreckedcrew's full article about the AZ election law case that will be argued at the SCOTUS today--Brnovich v. DNC. Very briefly, because election law is very technical and this case depends on constitutional interpretation of state and federal law, at issue are AZ election laws that are race neutral on their face but which the DNC claims have a disproportionate impact on minorities. The case goes all the way back to 2016 and came up through the District Court, a three judge panel of the 9th Circuit, and then an en banc rehearing in the 9th Circuit. SWC engages in some speculation, as you can see from the title:


Is Brnovich v. DNC -- Set for Argument Today -- the Reason the Supreme Court Refused to Take up Election Cases?


SWC doesn't exactly spell this out, but here's my read on what he's at least hinting at. SWC is arguing--and this part is explicit--that CJ Roberts has a long term strategy for getting the federal courts out of the election law business and returning these matters to where they belong: state legislatures. SWC goes back through a bit of the history of the Roberts court on election law. The bottom line appears to be that, as long as the laws in question are not discriminatory on their face it's time for the federal courts to more or less butt out.

Friday, May 10, 2019

UPDATED: Briefly Noted: Giuliani Traveling To Ukraine

Not much to add--Giuliani's been talking about Ukraine for several weeks, and the evidence appears overwhelming that Ukraine was a key nexus for the Russia Hoax. Fox News reports:

... Rudy Giuliani said in an interview Thursday that he plans to travel to Ukraine to push the country's leadership on several probes that may prove "very, very helpful" ... 
Ukrainian President-elect Volodymyr Zelensky, who takes office in June, will assume stewardship of two major ongoing investigations. One concerns evidence that the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and Hillary Clinton campaign may have worked with Ukrainians to illegally help Clinton by revealing damaging information about then-Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort. 
The other investigation pertains to allegations that former Vice President Joe Biden pressured Ukraine to fire its top prosecutor in order to take the heat off the prosecutor's probe into a company that employed his son as a board member.
“I am going to tell him what I know about the people that are surrounding him, and how important it is to do a full, complete and fair investigation," Giuliani told the New York Times, referring to Zelensky. 
"We’re not meddling in an election; we’re meddling in an investigation, which we have a right to do,” Giuliani continued, when pressed on whether his visit would be appropriate. "And this isn’t foreign policy — I’m asking them to do an investigation that they’re doing already and that other people are telling them to stop. And I’m going to give them reasons why they shouldn’t stop it because that information will be very, very helpful to my client, and may turn out to be helpful to my government.”

Last week Ukraine's embassy in Washington confirmed that "a DNC insider" or, possibly, "a DNC contractor," attempted to persuade Ukraine to approach a member of the US Congress to open hearings on Paul Manafort or to ask (then) Ukraine President Poroshenko to raise Manafort's name while visiting Washington. "A DNC insider" suggests perhaps a lawyer for Perkins, Coie--someone like Marc Elias or Michael Sussman, both of whom we've seen before. On the other hand, "a DNC contractor" would clearly seem to point toward Fusion GPS and Glenn Simpson.

UPDATE: Whoops! It's off!

Tuesday, April 13, 2021

In Bull Durham News

You've probably seen some of the stories that are floating around about Bull Durham. He's issuing subpoena's to Brookings--OMG! He's suspicious about the FBI's turning a blind eye to Chris Steele's use of Igor Danchenko as a primary source--Holy Cow!

If this excites you, I recommend Shipwreckedcrew's article:


Russian Hoax Prosecutor John Durham Issues Subpoena to Democrat Party Think Tank "Brookings Institute"


For my money, I'm still not impressed. SWC notes--way at the end of his article:


The continued use of information from Danchenko has always been a huge “red-flag” problem in my review of the FBI’s conduct.  There was simply too much information known to the FBI by December 2016 and January 2017 to press forward with the investigation while continuing to rely on earlier judgments that there was some substance to the Russia Hoax allegations.


Guess what? That information was also known to IG Michael Horowitz very early on in his investigation. Did Horowitz really just sit on that information until his report came out in December, 2019--no heads up to Bull Durham or Bluto Barr? I find that hard to believe. Anyway, what stood in the way of the incredibly competent and legendarily aggressive Dynamic Duo finding out that really basic information on their own? Nothing that I can think of. For example, couldn't they have asked Kevin Clinesmith about sources for the Dossier? Or any of several other FBI employees? And yet ...

Durham didn't issue a subpoena to Danchenko's employer, the Brookings Institute, until ... December 2020? A year after Horowitz's report came out? Puh-leeze! Look--if that had been my case I would have served Brookings with a subpoena for all documentation regarding Danchenko the day after I found out he was Steele's source--maybe even the same day. From where I'm sitting, none of this passes the sniff test. Were they investigating or were they not? What's so hard about issuing subpoenas for documents? Delays due to Covid? What BS. And now SWC thinks that Durham will try to flip Danchenko? Sounds to me that, now, in 2021, Durham is just getting started. So what was all the BS Barr was putting out about the supposed investigation?

ADDENDUM: Yeah, I can see this:



Also this:



It's just so hard for me to believe at this point that Durham is really trying to get the big story out. We all know what it was about, and it's taken Durham over a year to get just very, very basic records? C'mon, man!


Saturday, March 13, 2021

Things Fall Apart?

We saw how the Second Faux Impeachment quickly fell apart, but even so the Dem's laughable insurrection narrative continues to grind on--undergirded by a massively corrupt FBI and DoJ. However, even as the the FBI continues to conduct grotesquely overwrought "operations" supported by armored vehicles, against women and children, to arrest persons whose only apparent offense is to have been in the Imperial City on the Potomac on January 6, or to have spoken to fellow citizens, even liberal judges have been pushing back against these abuses.

One particularly egregious example of over the top federal behavior was documented yesterday at TGP:


Joshua James is a war hero, a veteran, a Godly man, a provider, and a business owner. Joshua James DID NOT commit any violent crime. He attended the January 6th speech by President Trump at the Ellipse along with a million other Americans.  He volunteered to work security with other members of the Oath Keepers.

The FBI is holding him until trial because he was seen speaking with two other members of the Oath Keepers that day.


James was lured away from his home and then arrested--follow the link for details. Then, the FBI showed up to search his home, where only his wife and 3 year old were present when this rolled up:

Monday, April 27, 2020

Steele Testified That He Was In Direct Contact With Clinton Lawyers

There's been a bit of a buzz about the tired old Alfa Bank story lately, and tonight The Daily Caller has a lengthy article on the origins of that hoax. Or sub-hoax, if you will.

Dossier Author Christopher Steele Had Previously Undisclosed Meetings With Lawyers For DNC, Clinton Campaign

The Russian Alfa Bank has sued Christopher Steele for defamation, over the September 16, 2016 memo that Steele wrote, which claimed that there was some sort of secret communications channel between the Trump campaign and the Russian government, routed through Alfa Bank's server. In testimony last month--March 17 and 18--Steele traced the story directly to Clinton lawyer Michael Sussmann as well as to the Clinton campaign's opposition research shop, Fusion GPS. Sussmann, of course, is the top Dem election lawyer, lawyer for the DNC, and has been for years. Steele also met personally with Marc Elias, the Clinton campaign's top lawyer, just a week after writing the hoax memo.

In his testimony, Steele explicitly states that the Alfa story was provided to him by Sussmann and that Glenn Simpson, Steele's employer at Fusion GPS, "directed" Steele to write the story up as a report. In other words, Simpson told Steele to frame Sussmann's phony story as an "intelligence" report. The Clinton lawyers and Steele then peddled the story to the FBI, the State Department, and various media outlets. Steele's testimony provides a glimpse of just how directly the Clinton campaign was involved in the production of the dossier--including its content:

Wednesday, January 30, 2019

UPDATED: Nellie Ohr Partial Transcript Leak

Another week, another partial leak of the transcript of testimony by a Russia Hoax insider before the House Intel Committee. This time it concerns Nellie Ohr, researcher for Glenn Simpson's Fusion GPS and wife of then top DoJ career official Bruce Ohr. Fusion GPS, of course, was the oppo research firm for the Clinton campaign, hired through Hillary's and the DNC's Perkins Coie partner, Marc Elias. The partial leak comes to us this time courtesy of the Daily Caller.

At first glance this leak is similar to that of James Baker's testimony: there doesn't appear to be any bombshells, per se, but it does provide confirmation of the role played by the subject.

The obvious takeaway from Nellie's testimony--to the extent that it was leaked--is that she researched travel of Trump's family as well as any links between Trump and Russian "oligarchs":

Wednesday, July 1, 2020

Remember Bruce Ohr?

Bruce Ohr was, in 2016, the highest non-political appointee official in the DoJ. He also worked as an informant for the FBI without telling his superiors--hey, that's his story--and was a handler for Chris Steele. His wife Nellie was a ham radio enthusiast and, in her spare time, did Russia related oppo research against Trump and Trump family members for Glenn Simpson's Fusion GPS--all funded by the Clinton campaign, as laundered by Clinton lawyer and all around consigliere, Marc Elias.

Well, Bruce Ohr is still around and, after receiving several serious demotions, is still at DoJ. He also is still an important witness to all things Russia Hoax, and in that capacity he testified yesterday before the Senate Judiciary Committee--behind closed doors. There were no leaks and no announcements of what was said, but we know there would be many fascinating topics the GOP senators would want to discuss with Ohr. Ohr would, of course, have much to say about political bias at the FBI and DoJ, relations among those entities and Fusion GPS--stuff we've all heard about. Another topic of interest--and one for which Ohr was very specifically targeted by Michael Horowitz' OIG report--has to do with the fact that Ohr, while claiming not to have briefed his superiors on what he was doing on DoJ time, admitted to keeping subordinates like Andrew Weissmann and Zainab Ahmed (both later of Team Mueller fame) fully informed on the Russia Hoax in the second half of 2016. Horowitz pointedly stated in his report that, beyond Ohr's many other improper actions, Ohr had absolutely no reason for sharing any such information about a highly sensitive FBI investigation with persons who had no official need to know--not even remotely.

This appears to be another instance in which Durham has completed work on all aspects of his investigation that involve Ohr and for that reason Durham (and Barr) are now willing to make Ohr available as a witness to the Senate--under strict conditions, such as, no public testimony. Sidney Powell may have been alluding to this mode of operation on Durham's part in her interview with Jan Jekielek. Powell noted that only after every single Brady motion she made had been turned down by Sullivan did DoJ on its own begin to turn over portions of the material she had requested. Powell pointed out that she believed that some of the material lacked the usual government markings and stated that she believed that it had come to her via Durham's shop.

While I have no experience with such high stakes public corruption investigations of high DoJ or FBI officials as we see in the Durham investigation, my belief is that the reason that Ohr (and other officials who were key witnesses) has been kept on board has to do with the investigators maintaining tight control over him. That control would be lost if Ohr (or the others) left government employment. In other words, I'm suggesting that a deal was made with Ohr--full cooperation and continued employment as long as the investigation has a need for his cooperation. The fact that, unlike most other key figures in the Russia Hoax, Ohr remains employed at DoJ, is an indicator to me of how important his information and cooperation is to the Durham investigation.

Thursday, January 9, 2020

Why Did The FBI Stop Documenting Its Contacts With Chris Steele?

This past Monday I adverted to a circumstance that Margot Cleveland dug up from perusing the Horowitz Dossier--which is slowly being revealed as a gold mine of information (albeit partial) on the Russia Hoax: Cleveland: OIG Report Fingers Team Mueller. The nugget that caught my attention was the previously unknown fact that that Team Mueller continued to contact Chris Steele--supposed author of the eponymous dossier--until nearly the end of 2017. They did this, using Bruce Ohr as a cut-out, but they didn't document those meetings. Here's what I wrote about that:

Wednesday, May 26, 2021

UPDATED: Briefly Noted: Is The CJ Roberts Plan Working?

UPDATE: I'm putting this update at the beginning because it tends to support what follows. Briefly, this.

The Soros SecState of AZ was declining to get involved in the AZ election law case discussed below--it's now before the SCOTUS and it deals with stuff like ballot harvesting. This is potentially a huge case with implications for the freedom of ALL states to police elections as they see fit. While CA would doubtless seek to continue its anti-election integrity ways, most states would not. So, since the failure of the SecState to defend AZ law could throw a monkey wrench into the appeal, the AZ Attorney General has formally jumped in to preserve AZ's interests in fair elections. This via TGP--this reads like a press release and appears as a quote, but I couldn't find a link:


On Tuesday, Attorney General Mark Brnovich filed a Motion to Intervene with the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals on behalf of the State of Arizona in the Democratic National Committee lawsuit challenging Arizona’s ban on ballot harvesting and statutes regulating out-of-precinct voting. Attorney General Brnovich is moving to intervene on this matter on behalf of the State because defendant Secretary of State Hobbs has announced that she does not support an appeal.

As noted in today’s filing, Attorney General Brnovich moves to intervene in this matter, assuring the State’s interest in retaining its “broad authority to structure and regulate elections,” is fully preserved and that there is no possible procedural hindrance to Supreme Court review of the matter. The Attorney General is empowered by Arizona law to seek intervention in federal court on behalf of the State.

********************

Back at the beginning of March I wrote a post that examined an idea that Shipwreckedcrew had put forward. The basic idea was that, in declining to involve the SCOTUS in legal disputes over the 2020 presidential election Roberts was pursuing an actual strategy--not just abdicating the SCOTUS' responsibility to uphold the Constitution.

Let me elaborate on that idea just a bit, to give Roberts the benefit of the doubt. There's no question that the SCOTUS could have stepped in--the Texas case in which numerous additional states joined would have been, IMO, perfect. From that standpoint the reasons given by the SCOTUS for sidestepping the case were unconvincing and harmed the prestige of the court by calling its judicial integrity into question. After all, what constitutional isse could be more fundamental and more important than one that called into question our entire electoral process? I discussed this aspect in the earlier post: Arizona Election Law Case In SCOTUS.

On the other hand, while the SCOTUS--in contrast to the executive and legislative branches--is supposed to be above politics, it simply is no longer possible for the Court to disregard political considerations--if that ever was possible. That is all the more true in that politics in America have become utterly toxic from a constitutional standpoint. The country is sharply divided, with the current regime narrowly controlling both the White House and Congress impugning fundamental concepts of the American order. What is the SCOTUS to do--plunge forward, or ...

Encourage the state legislatures to act by exercising their constitutional authority to regulate elections? That would return elections to regulation by the political branches of state governments, where the US Constitution placed the authority in the first place. The idea is that the putative Roberts strategy would support state legislatures taking charge of their own affairs--rather than the SCOTUS arrogating that authority to itself. In future, then, the SCOTUS would largely butt out of election law cases--the effect being to neuter much of the electoral lawfare we currently see in the federal courts. Voters at the state level would be able to express their views on their own states' election laws and their own courts at the ballot box. That HOPEFULLY is the significance of the SCOTUS--having previously declined to get involved in more sweeping election cases--now taking on a much more pointed case involving the swing state of Arizona.

I'll go into these issues a bit down below, by pasting in part of the earlier post which discusses the Arizona case that is now before the SCOTUS. For now, I want to simply question whether what we see happening in Arizona with regard to the AZ senate's audit of Maricopa County may reflect the effect of Roberts' strategy. 

Here's what interests me. We saw early on in the audit process that Dem election lawyers descended upon AZ and urged the Zhou regime's DoJ to get involved. That hasn't happened, so far. Why not? Is it possible that the Dem lawyers have come to the realization--perhaps as a result of the SCOTUS taking on the AZ case--that any legal challenge by DoJ of a state exercising its authority under the US Constitution would likely get fast tracked to the SCOTUS, and could result in a sweeping ruling that the Dems could bitterly regret? The AZ senate is pressing forward with its audit, despite continuing obstruction--the senate shows absolutely no signs of backing down, which may be encouraging audit and/or reform efforts in other states as well. Again, the question arises: Is Roberts' strategy having an effect? We can only hope so. The road forward would be messy and prolonged, but politics almost always is. We have in our constitutional order a political regime. Such a Roberts strategy--if that's what we're seeing--would recognize that fundamental constitutional fact by returning to the states the authority that the SCOTUS unwisely usurped. We shall see.

Now, here's a portion of the previous post: