Former Director of National Intelligence <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/james-clapper" target="_blank" rel="noopener">James Clapper</a> had a short reply when he was asked by Fox News if he regrets signing the intelligence officials’ letter in 2020 that labeled the Hunter Biden laptop story as Russian disinformation.
Clapper, along with 50 other former senior intelligence officials, signed the letter in October 2020 — just weeks before the presidential election between Donald Trump and Joe Biden — saying <a href="https://nypost.com/2020/10/14/email-reveals-how-hunter-biden-introduced-ukrainian-biz-man-to-dad/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">the New York Post story</a> that exposed emails from Hunter Biden’s “laptop from hell” had “all the classic earmarks of a Russian information operation.”
Since that letter, Hunter Biden’s laptop has been confirmed as authentic by multiple media outlets and the Department of Justice. The laptop was also confirmed as real during Hunter’s <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hunter-biden-gun-trial-confirms-laptop-was-real-all-along">ongoing gun trial</a> earlier this week when the prosecution shared images from the laptop and Hunter’s iCloud account that showed him nude and holding crack pipes.
When Clapper was asked if he regretted adding his name to the intelligence officials’ letter, he simply replied, “No,” Fox News <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/politics/former-obama-official-one-word-answer-asked-retract-attack-hunter-biden-laptop">reported</a>. He also refused to publicly remove his name from the letter.
Hunter’s laptop contained evidence that the first son introduced the commander-in-chief to a Ukrainian businessman less than a year before then-Vice President Joe Biden pressured Ukrainian government officials to fire a prosecutor investigating the businessman’s company. Hunter had been hired to the board of a Ukrainian energy firm a year before Joe Biden’s meeting with the Ukrainian businessman.
Clapper, and dozens of other former intelligence officials, wrote of the Hunter Biden laptop story, “If we are right, this is Russia trying to influence how Americans vote in this election, and we believe strongly that Americans need to be aware of this.”
The letter was covered in a report by <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2020/10/19/hunter-biden-story-russian-disinfo-430276">POLITICO</a> that was published on October 19, 2020, and Biden referred to the letter in a debate with Trump three days later when Hunter’s laptop and foreign business dealings were brought up. Biden went on to win the 2020 election just two weeks later, but it would be another three years before the “Russian disinformation” claims put forth by the former intelligence officials were debunked by the DOJ.
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Hunter Biden’s foreign business dealings — along with his father’s alleged involvement in them when he was vice president — have been the center of a months-long impeachment inquiry led by House Republicans.
Earlier this week, House Republicans <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hunter-and-james-biden-referred-by-congress-for-criminal-prosecution-over-provably-false-statements">referred</a> Hunter Biden and the president’s brother, James Biden, for criminal prosecution for allegedly lying while testifying as part of the corruption-focused impeachment inquiry into the president.
Ashe Schow contributed to this report.

James Clapper

James Clapper Asked If He Regrets Signing Infamous Letter Labeling Hunter Biden Laptop Story Russian Disinfo

Director of National Intelligence

General

Hunter Biden

Joe Biden

National Intelligence

New York Post

U.S.

Former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper accused POLITICO of &#8220;deliberately&#8221; misrepresenting a letter he and 50 other intelligence veterans signed regarding the Hunter Biden laptop story.
Clapper, who served as the nation&#8217;s spy chief during the Obama administration, said the letter did not assert that reporting on the laptop was part of a Russian disinformation operation, a notion that POLITICO peddled with its headline when first reporting the existence of the letter.
“There was message distortion,” Clapper <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/02/13/hunter-biden-laptop-claims-russian-disinfo/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">told The Washington Post&#8217;s Fact Checker</a>. “All we were doing was raising a yellow flag that this could be Russian disinformation. Politico deliberately distorted what we said. It was clear in paragraph five.”
The <a class="c-link c-link--focus-visible" href="https://www.politico.com/f/?id=00000175-4393-d7aa-af77-579f9b330000" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-stringify-link="https://www.politico.com/f/?id=00000175-4393-d7aa-af77-579f9b330000" data-sk="tooltip_parent" data-remove-tab-index="true">letter from the 51 former intelligence officials</a> came out in the days leading up to the 2020 presidential election, warning that reporting about the laptop&#8217;s alleged contents &#8220;has all the classic earmarks of a Russian information operation.&#8221;
Although the signees stressed they did not know if emails being reported at the time were genuine, and they insisted they had no evidence of Russian involvement, POLITICO, which first reported the letter, went further than what the letter said by <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2020/10/19/hunter-biden-story-russian-disinfo-430276" target="_blank" rel="noopener">publishing a headline</a> that said the former intelligence officials were claiming the story was &#8220;Russian disinfo.&#8221;
Then-candidate Joe Biden, Hunter&#8217;s father, used the letter to <a href="https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/house-gop-demand-records-from-ex-intel-officials-about-hunter-biden-laptop-letter" target="_blank" rel="noopener">cast doubt on the laptop story</a> during one of his debates with then-President Donald Trump. &#8220;There are 50 former national intelligence folks who said that what he’s accusing me of is a Russian plan,&#8221; Biden <a href="https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/joe-biden-says-hunter-biden-laptop-story-is-russian-plan-despite-lack-of-evidence" target="_blank" rel="noopener">said during the debate</a>.
In an October 2020 interview with CNN, Clapper made comments that hewed more closely to POLITICO&#8217;s headline than the letter itself. &#8220;To me, this is just classic textbook Soviet Russian tradecraft at work,&#8221; he said.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
“To me, this is just classic textbook Soviet Russian tradecraft at work,” former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper says as authorities are investigating if recently published emails are tied to a Russian disinformation effort targeting Biden. <a href="https://t.co/shyMNnJ7Yr">https://t.co/shyMNnJ7Yr</a> <a href="https://t.co/GFSeIWXeY4">pic.twitter.com/GFSeIWXeY4</a>
&mdash; CNN (@CNN) <a href="https://twitter.com/CNN/status/1317307227963678721?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 17, 2020</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Clapper&#8217;s level of candidness became a subject of intense scrutiny roughly a decade ago during his service as director of national intelligence. Clapper <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zRhjgynfhag" target="_blank" rel="noopener">testified to Congress</a> that the National Security Agency did not &#8220;wittingly&#8221; collect data on millions of Americans. <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jun/06/nsa-phone-records-verizon-court-order" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Amid revelations</a> that the NSA was conducting bulk collection of U.S. caller data, Clapper conceded his statement was <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2013/07/02/198118060/cl" target="_blank" rel="noopener">&#8220;clearly erroneous</a>.&#8221; He further claimed <a href="https://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/intel-chief-clapper-gave-least-untruthful-answer-u-164742798.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">to NBC News</a> that he had been responding to a senator&#8217;s question &#8220;in what I thought was the most truthful, or least untruthful, manner.&#8221;
The Washington Post indicated that it reached out to Clapper after House Republicans, led by Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH), sent Clapper and 11 other signers <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/jim-jordan-puts-a-dozen-intel-veterans-on-notice-over-hunter-biden-laptop-letter" target="_blank" rel="noopener">requests for documents and testimony</a> regarding the Hunter Biden laptop letter — a development first reported by The Daily Wire.
“No one who has spent time in Washington should be surprised that journalists and politicians willfully or unintentionally misconstrue oral or written statements,” former State Department official Thomas Fingar, another signer of the letter who was contacted by House Republicans, told The Washington Post. “The statement we signed was carefully written to minimize the likelihood that what was said would be misconstrued, and to provide a clear written record that could be used to identify and disprove distortions.”
The new report offered other tidbits of information, including that Clapper claimed he was unaware of how Biden described the letter during the presidential debate. The Washington Post also reported that its Fact Checker learned that former CIA Deputy Director Michael Morell, who had been a top candidate for CIA director in the Biden administration, organized the letter.
The laptop, which allegedly was abandoned at a Delaware computer repair shop before the FBI obtained it, contains details about Hunter Biden&#8217;s personal life and financial affairs. In the spring of 2022, the repairman who obtained the laptop, John Paul Mac Isaac, sued POLITICO and others for defamation, <a href="https://nypost.com/2022/05/03/repairman-who-revealed-hunter-biden-laptop-sues-schiff-cnn-politico-beast/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">accusing them of falsely asserting</a> that he spread Russian disinformation. The Daily Beast, one of the new outlets named in the lawsuit, later <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/media/daily-beast-apologizes-john-paul-mac-isaac-hunter-biden-laptop?intcmp=tw_fnc" target="_blank" rel="noopener">issued an apology</a> for reporting that the laptop was &#8220;stolen.&#8221;
POLITICO defended its reporting about the letter.
“The article fairly and accurately reported on — and summarized — the intelligence officials’ letter,&#8221; the statement said. &#8220;More specifically, the headline is a fair summary of their allegations, the subhead offers additional context, and the first paragraph of the article hyperlinks to the letter itself, allowing readers to draw their own conclusion.&#8221;
Since the laptop story emerged more than two years ago, many of its contents have been <a class="c-link c-link--focus-visible" href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/03/30/hunter-biden-laptop-data-examined/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-stringify-link="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/03/30/hunter-biden-laptop-data-examined/" data-sk="tooltip_parent" data-remove-tab-index="true">analyzed and shown to be authentic</a>. Hunter Biden&#8217;s lawyers recently began to send letters to state and federal officials <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hunter-biden-demands-criminal-investigation-into-several-figures-after-admitting-infamous-laptop-is-his" target="_blank" rel="noopener">demanding investigations into individuals</a> involved in sharing the contents of the laptop, which made their way to the media. His attorney, Abbe Lowell, later insisted the letters <a href="https://www.newsnationnow.com/politics/hunter-bidens-lawyer-says-letters-dont-mean-laptop-is-his/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">do not &#8220;confirm&#8221;</a> the laptop was his client&#8217;s device.
Douglas Wise, a former Defense Intelligence Agency deputy director, <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/intel-veteran-knew-hunter-biden-laptop-had-to-be-real-before-signing-letter" target="_blank" rel="noopener">divulged last month</a> that he and the other signees surmised the contents of the laptop were genuine at the time the letter came out. &#8220;All of us figured that a significant portion of that content had to be real to make any Russian disinformation credible,&#8221; he <a href="https://www.theaustralian.com.au/subscribe/news/1/?sourceCode=TAWEB_WRE170_a_TWT&amp;dest=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.theaustralian.com.au%2Fworld%2Fhunter-biden-laptop-files-had-to-be-real-intelligence-chief%2Fnews-story%2F2173db346096e625f538064772424775&amp;memtype=anonymous&amp;mode=premium&amp;v21=dynamic-groupb-control-noscore&amp;V21spcbehaviour=append" target="_blank" rel="noopener">told The Australian</a>.
Hunter Biden is under investigation by federal prosecutors, including over his foreign business dealings and tax affairs, though the existence of that years-long inquiry was not <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/hunter-biden-under-federal-investigation/2020/12/09/3b7361be-3a64-11eb-9276-ae0ca72729be_story.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">revealed to the public</a> until after the 2020 election. Hunter Biden has said he expects to be <a href="https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/big-footing-house-investigation-into-hunter-biden-could-hit-firewall" target="_blank" rel="noopener">cleared of wrongdoing</a>.

Former Spy Chief Accuses POLITICO Of Distorting Letter On Hunter Biden Laptop

Obama Spy Chief Accuses POLITICO Of Peddling Fake News About Hunter Biden Laptop Letter

2020 Election

Fake News

laptop computer

Media

Media Bias

Politics

Fox News anchor Bill Hemmer pressed Congresswoman Elissa Slotkin (D-MI) on what former President Barack Obama&#8217;s administration did wrong when Russia invaded Crimea in 2014 — and asked what she thought President Joe Biden should do differently to make sure history did not repeat itself.
Slotkin joined Hemmer and co-anchor Dana Perino on &#8220;America&#8217;s Newsroom&#8221; to discuss Russia&#8217;s <a href="https://dailywire.com/news/biden-ready-to-respond-to-russian-invasion-of-ukraine-with-unity-clarity-and-conviction-press-conference/">ongoing invasion of Ukraine</a> and what she believed the next steps should be.
Perino began with a clip of former Director of National Intelligence (DNI) James Clapper, who told CNN anchor Jake Tapper that he wished the Obama administration had been &#8220;more aggressive&#8221; in 2014. Clapper noted that the main difference between 2014 and 2022 is that Putin &#8220;clearly is a lot more emboldened than he was eight years ago&#8221; — but he also said that the United States had much better intelligence.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
“I wish we as an administration had been more aggressive in 2014,” Clapper says of Putin seizing Crimea. <a href="https://t.co/YS9eqeIq8M">https://t.co/YS9eqeIq8M</a>
&mdash; Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) <a href="https://twitter.com/jaketapper/status/1496311160542482441?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 23, 2022</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
&#8220;Do you agree with that? If so, what would you do differently now if you were in the Biden administration or a chance to advise them?&#8221; Perino turned the question to Slotkin.
&#8220;I do think that in 2014 we were just pretty shocked at what Putin was doing,&#8221; Slotkin began, saying that the calculus at the time seemed to be centered on a reluctance to see two nuclear powers &#8220;come to potential blows.&#8221;
&#8220;In the intervening years, we watched the Ukraine military get much better, we watched our intelligence get much better, as former DNI Clapper just said,&#8221; Slotkin continued. &#8220;I think what the administration tried to do was just declassify amazing amounts of intelligence to sort of shame Putin out of invasion. It doesn’t look like it worked. They attempted it. Doesn’t look like it worked.&#8221;
Slotkin concluded by saying that the <a href="https://dailywire.com/news/biden-expected-to-announce-sanctions-on-russias-nordstream-2-gas-pipeline/">sanctions</a> had to get &#8220;stronger and a lot more personal,&#8221; arguing that they needed to target the oligarchs who supported Putin directly by sanctioning their wives, their mistresses, and their ability to send their children to foreign universities.
&#8220;You can target these folks who are holding Putin up in a much more severe way,&#8221; she said.
&#8220;You make a great point,&#8221; Hemmer agreed. &#8220;Why wait?&#8221;
WATCH:
<div style="width: 720px;" class="wp-video">
<video class="wp-video-shortcode" id="video-346419-1" width="720" height="406" preload="metadata" controls="controls"><source type="video/mp4" src="https://www.dailywire.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/Grabien-1458511.mp4?_=1" /><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/Grabien-1458511.mp4">https://www.dailywire.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/Grabien-1458511.mp4</a></video></div>
&#8220;At this point, I think we’re seeing what Putin is doing in real-time. We’ve been watching it. He has made this crazy speech that complements what he is doing along the border. So I think we’re seeing his plan play out and just go for it and throw the book at him,&#8221; Slotkin replied.
Hemmer pushed back, saying that if it was clear the response had been too slow in 2014, maybe the Biden administration should be speeding up the timeline. &#8220;Are we responding too slowly now in 2022?&#8221;
&#8220;The question is, is the American public willing to put American sons and daughters into an armed conflict with Russia,&#8221; Slotkin said, noting that a showdown between two nuclear powers was something that many had wanted to avoid and arguing that the Biden administration has been clear that it was unwilling to commit to that. &#8220;He sort of showed our hand and said we were never going to have American sons and daughters go to fight Russia.&#8221;
&#8220;I apologize for the interruption. I don’t want to cross lines on the arguments,&#8221; Hemmer pressed again. &#8220;No one is arguing to put American men and women forces in Ukraine, that&#8217;s not the argument. You say go after the oligarchs. And my question was, why don’t you do it now? Because if we were behind eight years ago, it would seem based on your argument, that we’re behind again eight years later.&#8221;
Slotkin agreed that it was time for action, concluding, &#8220;At this point throw the book at it.&#8221;
The Daily Wire’s first original film, Shut In, has made its cinematic debut, being met with rave reviews. The Daily Wire is building an alternative to the leftist entertainment industry, one gripping movie at a time. Join us in this mission and stream Shut In today by <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/subscribe-shutin?utm_campaign=shutin&amp;utm_medium=editorial&amp;utm_source=facebook&amp;utm_content=subscribe_shutin&amp;utm_talent=dailywire" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.dailywire.com/subscribe-shutin?utm_campaign%3Dshutin%26utm_medium%3Deditorial%26utm_source%3Dfacebook%26utm_content%3Dsubscribe_shutin%26utm_talent%3Ddailywire&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1644699149485000&amp;usg=AOvVaw0hSL9sbxEl3fLS6INjonzw">becoming a Daily Wire member</a>.

House Homeland Security Hearing Held To Examine Worldwide Threats

‘Why Wait?’: Fox’s Bill Hemmer Presses Democrat Rep. On What Went Wrong The Last Time Russia Invaded — And Why Biden Doesn’t Act Faster

Barack Obama

Bill Hemmer

Dana Perino

Fox News

Russia

The Senate Judiciary Committee announced late on Monday that it would be voting to authorize issuing subpoenas to top Obama-era officials over their investigation into the 2016 Trump campaign and other related matters.
Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-SC) made the announcement in a press release saying that the subpoena authorization &#8220;covers a number of documents, communications and testimony from witnesses, including James Comey, Andrew McCabe, James Clapper, John Brennan, Sally Yates, and others.&#8221;
Assuming the vote passes, Graham&#8217;s subpoena would give the Committee <a href="https://www.judiciary.senate.gov/press/rep/releases/chairman-graham-announces-committee-to-consider-subpoena-authorization-related-to-oversight-of-fisa-process-crossfire-hurricane-investigation">access</a> to:
<ul>
<li>Documents and communications referenced in, and testimony at a hearing or deposition of any individual named or identified by pseudonym in, the report titled “Review of Four FISA Applications and Other Aspects of the FBI’s Crossfire Hurricane Investigation” issued by the U.S. Department of Justice Inspector General</li>
<li>Documents and communications related to, and the testimony at a hearing or deposition of any current or former executive branch official or employee involved in, the Crossfire Hurricane investigation (including investigations opened under the Crossfire Hurricane umbrella) or the receipt or analysis of reports prepared by Christopher Steele (commonly referred to as the “Steele dossier”)</li>
</ul>
The 53 Obama-era officials that are listed as part of Graham&#8217;s subpoena included, &#8220;Trisha Anderson, Brian Auten, James Baker, William Barr, Dana Boente, Jennifer Boone, John Brennan, James Clapper, Kevin Clinesmith, James Comey, Patrick Conlon, Michael Dempsey, Stuart Evans, Tashina Gauhar, Carl Ghattas, Curtis Heide, Kathleen Kavalec, David Laufman, Stephen Laycock, Jacob Lew, Loretta Lynch, Andrew McCabe, Mary McCord, Denis McDonough, Arthur McGlynn, Jonathan Moffa, Sally Moyer, Mike Neufield, Sean Newell, Victoria Nuland, Bruce Ohr, Nellie Ohr, Stephanie L. O’Sullivan, Lisa Page, Joseph Pientka, John Podesta, Samantha Power, E.W. “Bill” Priestap, Sarah Raskin, Steve Ricchetti, Susan Rice, Rod Rosenstein, Gabriel Sanz-Rexach, Nathan Sheets, Elizabeth Sherwood-Randall, Glenn Simpson, Steve Somma, Peter Strzok, Michael Sussman, Adam Szubin, Jonathan Winer, Christopher Wray, and Sally Yates.&#8221;
The move comes after Attorney General William Barr said earlier in the day that the actions by the Obama-era officials was &#8220;unprecedented&#8221; in American history and that a &#8220;grave injustice&#8221; was done.
“And what happened to the president and I’ve said this many times, what happened to the president in the 2016 election and throughout the first two years of his administration was abhorrent,” Barr said. “It was a grave injustice and it was unprecedented in American history. The law enforcement and intelligence apparatus of this country were involved in advancing a false and utterly baseless Russian collusion narrative against the president.”
“The proper investigative and prosecutive standards of the department of justice were abused, in my view, in order to reach a particular result,” Barr continued. “We saw two different standards of justice emerge, one that applied to President Trump and his associates and the other that applied to everybody else. We can’t allow this ever to happen again. The Durham investigation is trying to get to the bottom of what happened, and it will determine whether there were any federal laws broken. And if there were, those who broke the laws will be held to account.”
Barr previously said in an interview with CBS News investigative reporter Catherine Herridge that the investigation into the Trump campaign was not a legitimate investigation.
The Daily Wire, headed by bestselling author and popular podcast host Ben Shapiro, is a leading provider of conservative news, cutting through the mainstream media’s rhetoric to provide readers the most important, relevant, and engaging stories of the day. Get inside access to The Daily Wire by becoming a <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/subscribe">member</a>.

Senate Republicans Walk to and From Their Caucus Launch in Washington, US

Senate Judiciary To Vote On Subpoenaing 53 Obama-Era Officials Over Crossfire Hurricane Scandal

Andrew McCabe

Donald Trump

James Comey

John Brennan

Lindsey Graham

Bryan Dean Wright

INTERVIEW (Part II): Former CIA Officer On What The ‘Deep State’ Looks Like If A Democrat Wins In 2020, And What Can Be Done To Recover

Deep State

Socialism

The release of Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz&#8217;s report on alleged misconduct by the FBI in its investigation of the Trump campaign in 2016 shredded any hint of legitimacy of the infamous Democrat-funded anti-Trump dossier compiled by Christopher Steele. The extensive IG report&#8217;s utter dismantling of any claims to the legitimacy of the dossier has given previous mainstream media coverage of the &#8220;dirty&#8221; document some rather devastating context.
The Steele Dossier, Horowitz&#8217; investigation found, played a &#8220;central and essential role&#8221; in the FBI’s decision to surveil the Trump campaign. &#8220;We determined that the Crossfire Hurricane team’s receipt of Steele’s election reporting on September 19, 2016 played a central and essential role in the FBI’s and Department’s decision to seek the FISA order&#8221; targeting Trump campaign adviser Carter Page, reads the report.
Though it played a pivotal role in the decision to move forward with the surveillance of the Trump campaign, the dossier — created by oppo research firm Fusion GPS and funded by the Democratic National Committee and the Hillary Clinton campaign — was viewed by the CIA as based on &#8220;internet rumor&#8221; and was largely discredited by intelligence officials by the time it was used to help begin the surveillance of the Trump campaign, Horowitz explains.
The Rolling Stone&#8217;s Matt Taibbi summed up the report&#8217;s findings about the Steele Dossier in a piece titled, &#8220;<a href="https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/political-commentary/horowitz-report-steele-dossier-collusion-news-media-924944/">‘Corroboration Zero’: An Inspector General’s Report Reveals the Steele Dossier Was Always a Joke</a>&#8221; (formatting adjusted):
<blockquote>The Steele report reads like a pile of rumors surrounded by public information <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/03/16/politics/steele-information-dossier/index.html" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">pulled off the Internet</a>, and the Horowitz report does nothing to dispel this notion. At the time the FBI submitted its first FISA application, Horowitz writes, it had “corroborated limited information in Steele’s election reporting, and most of that was publicly available information.” Horowitz says of Steele’s reports: “The CIA viewed it as ‘internet rumor.’”
Worse (and this part of the story should be tattooed on the heads of Russia truthers), the FBI’s interviews of Steele’s sources revealed Steele embellished the most explosive parts of his report. The “pee tape” story, which inspired countless grave headlines (see this chin-scratching <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/11/world/europe/donald-trump-russia.html" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">New York Times history of Russian “sexual blackmail</a>”) and plunged the Trump presidency into crisis before it began, was, this source said, based a “conversation that [he/she] had over beers,” with the sexual allegations made… in “jest”!
Steele in his report said the story had been “confirmed” by senior, Western hotel staff, but the actual source said it was all “rumor and speculation,” never confirmed. In fact, charged by Steele to find corroboration, the source could not: corroboration was “zero,” writes Horowitz.</blockquote>
Taibbi goes on to list a few more glaring red flags with the dossier, but you get the point.
In light of the report&#8217;s findings, <a href="https://news.grabien.com/story-media-americans-course-trump-dossier-true-supercut">Grabien</a> went back and looked at how the mainstream media reported on the claims of the &#8220;dirty dossier,&#8221; and what the outlet found was gravely damaging to the credibility of those supposedly tasked with giving Americans the facts.
Initially, mainstream outlets repeatedly assured their viewers that substantive details in the dossier had been &#8220;corroborated,&#8221; a claim that Horowitz made clear is false. When more and more claims in the Democrat-funded dossier were discredited, the media shifted to asserting that it hasn&#8217;t been &#8220;conclusively disproven.&#8221;
A few sample quotes from Grabien&#8217;s devastating supercut, which is packed with clips of various anchors, host and analysts from CNN and MSNBC, as well as a few Democratic lawmakers:
<ul>
<li>&#8220;Parts of the now-infamous dossier on Donald Trump have proven to be true,&#8221; CNN tells its viewers.</li>
<li>&#8220;I know the history of the dossier, but it hasn&#8217;t been discredited,&#8221; CNN&#8217;s Alisyn Camerota insists. &#8220;In fact, it&#8217;s been the opposite. It&#8217;s been corroborated.&#8221;</li>
<li>&#8220;It hasn&#8217;t been discredited!&#8221; Camerota declares again. &#8220;Your intel community has corroborated all of the details in there!&#8221;</li>
<li>&#8220;Some of the substantive content of the dossier we were able to corroborate in our intelligence community assessment, which, from other sources, in which we have very high confidence in,&#8221; insists CNN analyst and former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper.</li>
<li>&#8220;We know that with the FISA application, the relevant parts of Christopher Steele&#8217;s dossier were corroborated,&#8221; claims far-left Democratic Rep. Ted Lieu, asserting falsely in another clip: &#8220;We also know that as time goes on, more and more parts the Steele dossier get corroborated.&#8221;</li>
<li>&#8220;If the application included information from the dossier, it would only be after the FBI had in fact corroborated information through its own investigation,&#8221; another CNN anchor assures the American people.</li>
<li>&#8220;So when the president refers to it as &#8216;fake dossier,&#8217; that is false?&#8221; a CNN host asks Clapper, who responds: &#8220;I don&#8217;t think that is an accurate characterization of the entirety of the dossier.&#8221;</li>
</ul>
Video below via Grabien:
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
SUPERCUT — Media to Americans: Of course the Trump dossier is true! <a href="https://t.co/R2uOijnMeJ">pic.twitter.com/R2uOijnMeJ</a>
&mdash; Tom Elliott (@tomselliott) <a href="https://twitter.com/tomselliott/status/1205542093831233536?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 13, 2019</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Related: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/fact-check-republicans-famous-memo-on-fisa-abuse-blasted-by-democrats-ended-up-getting-it-mostly-right">WaPo Admits: Republicans’ Famous Memo On FISA Abuse Blasted By Dems Ended Up Getting It Mostly Right</a>

Alisyn Camerota

WATCH: Supercut Of Media Declaring Discredited Steele Dossier Is Legitimate

According to <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/justice-department/ag-barr-expands-controversial-review-origin-russia-investigation-n1068971?cid=sm_npd_nn_tw_ma">NBC News</a>, a review ordered by Attorney General William Barr and conducted by Connecticut U.S. Attorney John Durham has been expanded &#8220;significantly&#8221; and now includes two high-profile, vocal critics of President Trump that held key positions in the Obama administration: former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and former CIA Director John Brennan. The review, new developments suggest, could also be morphing into an official criminal investigation.
Citing multiple current and former federal officials, including Brennan himself, NBC reported Saturday that Durham &#8220;has expressed his intent to interview a number of current and former intelligence officials involved in examining Russia&#8217;s effort to interfere in the 2016 presidential election.&#8221; Among the former officials are Clapper, who now works as a national security analyst for CNN, and Brennan, whose security clearance Trump famously <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-revokes-security-clearance-of-former-cia-director-john-brennan/2018/08/15/043b6fc4-a0bb-11e8-8e87-c869fe70a721_story.html">revoked</a> in 2018.
Reports that Barr greenlighted the expansion of Durham&#8217;s investigation into the origins of the Russia investigation began to circulate a few weeks ago, but the specific claim that Clapper and Brennan were of interest appears to be a new detail from NBC&#8217;s sources. Also new is NBC&#8217;s description of the response of CIA analysts reportedly targeted in the review.
&#8220;Durham has also requested to talk to CIA analysts involved in the intelligence assessment of Russia&#8217;s activities, prompting some of them to hire lawyers, according to three former CIA officials familiar with the matter,&#8221; NBC reports, noting that sources say there is &#8220;tension between the CIA and the Justice Department over what classified documents Durham can examine.&#8221;
<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/19/us/politics/durham-review-fbi-witnesses.html">The New York Times</a> also revealed some new details about the ongoing review Saturday. Citing unnamed former officials and others familiar with the matter, the Times reports that the federal prosecutors &#8220;have asked witnesses pointed questions about any anti-Trump bias among former F.B.I. officials who are frequent targets of President Trump and about the earliest steps they took in the Russia inquiry.&#8221;
Thus far, according to the Times&#8217; sources, Durham&#8217;s team has interviewed about two dozen current and former FBI officials, while two senior FBI officials are assisting in the process. &#8220;The number of interviews shows that Mr. Durham’s review is further along than previously known,&#8221; the Times notes.
As for the expansion of the probe, NBC reports that Barr has given Durham the go-ahead to expand both his staff and the timeframe he can examine, which now includes &#8220;conduct past Donald Trump&#8217;s inauguration in January 2017.&#8221; NBC also notes suggestively that DOJ officials would offer no comment when asked if the review has &#8220;morphed&#8221; into a criminal investigation.
The initial investigation into Russian interference, headed up by then-FBI Director James Comey, eventually led to the special investigation into collusion and obstruction headed up by Robert Mueller. But after two years and over $30 million spent on the effort, Mueller&#8217;s exhaustive report concluded that &#8220;the investigation did not establish that members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities.&#8221;
As for alleged obstruction of justice by Trump, the special counsel came to no conclusion at all, stating &#8220;while this report does not conclude that the President committed a crime, it also does not exonerate him&#8221; &#8212; a non-conclusion met with much criticism from both sides.
The DOJ&#8217;s review of the roles of various FBI and CIA officials in the origins of the Russia probe in a sense flips the focus of the initial investigation, looking not at Trump and his associates but at those who allegedly helped promote what Mueller determined to be the evidence-less &#8220;collusion&#8221; narrative.

Donald Trump Bill Barr

Report: DOJ Review Of Origins Of Russia Probe Expanded, CIA Officials ‘Hiring Lawyers’

William Barr

The following is satirical.
Flash! In a dramatic mass breakout, several former government officials have escaped from justice. Tunneling free in the pre-dawn darkness, the dangerous crew raced into the woods, where they split up, hoping to avoid the sweeping spotlights, armed search parties and howling bloodhounds. As the law followed in hot pursuit, several clashes broke out between officers and the bad men.
Perjurer and Leaker James Comey sprayed the night with machine gun fire as he climbed atop an old gas storage facility, trying to escape the federales.
&#8220;You&#8217;ll never take me alive, you lousy G-Men,&#8221; Comey shouted. &#8220;I know how dirty the FBI is and I&#8217;ll never turn myself into them as long as I can go out with a bang.&#8221; Then, with an insane scream of &#8220;Top of the World, Ma!&#8221; Comey fired into the storage tanks and disappeared in a gigantic ball of fire.
Another renowned perjurer, James Clapper, slogged desperately through a muddy stream trying to throw the bloodhounds off his terrible scent. The snarling fugitive traded gunfire with officers before losing them, but later turned up, wounded and bleeding on the steps of a nearby cathedral, where he cried out for forgiveness before tumbling down the stairs to the sidewalk, where he lay still.
&#8220;Who was he?&#8221; asked a passerby of a nearby policeman.
&#8220;He used to be a big shot,&#8221; the copper replied.
Escaped Communist John Brennan managed to evade the law using the skills he learned in the CIA. Brennan made his way to the Sixth Avenue studios of CNN, where he&#8217;d once strutted around like he owned the world. Now he found the place apparently deserted, and was left to pound pitiably on the locked doors shouting, &#8220;Open up, ya dirty rats. Don&#8217;t you remember me? I was your pal!&#8221; There was no answer, though several anchormen were seen peering through the darkened windows, pretending they weren&#8217;t at home.
Still at large, are Andrew McCabe, Hillary Clinton and the mysterious gangleader known only as the Big O.
Updates as they come in.

Flash! Government Criminals Escape from Justice! [Satire]

Hillary Clinton

Will the government officials and members of Congress who perpetuated the Russian collusion narrative, hyping every non-story as evidence of treason, face consequences for their involvement?
The short answer is &#8220;no.&#8221;
The long answer is also &#8220;no,&#8221; even though there should be.
These people, who spent years telling the American people that the president of the United States colluded with a foreign government to steal the 2016 election from Hillary Clinton, will not face any consequences. Instead, they have been, and will continue to be, richly rewarded for their roles.
James Comey
The ex-FBI director was one of the principle players in the Russia conspiracy, having been provided the discredited &#8220;Trump dossier&#8221; paid for by the Hillary Clinton campaign and compiled by an ex-British spy with help from the Russians. Comey was the one who briefed President Donald Trump on the uncorroborated, salacious dossier, giving media outlets the &#8220;hook&#8221; they needed to report on the document, which they had already been shown.
Trump fired Comey, so he then leaked FBI records to the media to make sure a special counsel investigation would ensue against Trump. He may have been fired, but he has managed to maintain a high-profile ever since.
He published a book in 2018 and naturally made the media rounds to make his claims about Trump and Russia with no pushback from alleged journalists. He was also given the opportunity to teach a course about ethical leadership at his alma mater, the College of William &amp; Mary.
Comey may, however, be brought before Congress for more questioning, as hinted to by Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC).
John Brennan
The former CIA director also spent the past two years claiming to have special insight into the investigation against Trump. Just three weeks ago he predicted there would be more indictments from Mueller&#8217;s investigation. When there weren&#8217;t, Brennan went to MSNBC to defend his actions during the scandal.
&#8220;I don&#8217;t know if I received bad information, but I think I suspected there was more than there actually was,&#8221; he said.
Brennan was rewarded for his constant attacks on Trump with a contributor position at NBC and MSNBC as a senior national security and intelligence analyst. Even though he spent years pushing Russian conspiracy theories, there&#8217;s no indication that he won&#8217;t be retained by the network.
James Clapper
The former Director of National Intelligence was apparently the one who decided to set Trump up by suggesting he be briefed on the uncorroborated dossier, according to memos from Comey. He also appears to have been the one who leaked the briefing to CNN, who reported the story as a bombshell.
Clapper was rewarded with a CNN contributorship.
Andrew McCabe
McCabe became acting FBI director when Comey was fired and led the agency when the Russia investigation began because it might not have been started if Trump&#8217;s chosen successor was in charge. The investigation, we now know, was opened in part as retaliation against Trump for firing Comey.
McCabe was fired after an Inspector General report found he had repeatedly lied under oath about leaking to the media.
As soon as he was fired, a GoFundMe account was set up to pay his legal bills, which raised over half a million dollars from just over 13,000 donors. McCabe, like Comey, was also rewarded with a book deal, which brought with it breathless coverage and interviews with all the networks.
Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA)
Schiff may be one of the worst offenders over the past few years, having gone on dozens of news programs to proclaim he has seen the &#8220;ample&#8221; and &#8220;more than circumstantial&#8221; <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/45072/republicans-escalate-calls-adam-schiffs-ashe-schow">evidence that Trump colluded with Russia</a>. Further, Schiff has vowed to continue investigating Trump even after the Mueller investigation concluded.
Schiff has been rewarded with a hero status among Democrats, who now feel he may be their best hope to take down Trump. He is also still routinely interviewed by the media.
Other Players
We can&#8217;t forget some of the others involved in the media scandal. Fired FBI agent Peter Strzok, who famously texted his mistress about an &#8220;insurance policy&#8221; if Trump won the election, also raised half-a-million dollars on GoFundMe. His mistress, Lisa Page, resigned from the FBI and seems to be the only person in this scandal not receiving public support. Bruce Ohr, who acted as an intermediary between the people paid by Clinton to create the dossier, Fusion GPS, and the FBI, is still with the Department of Justice.

Will There Be Consequences For Comey, Brennan, Clapper, McCabe, Or Schiff Over Russiagate?

Adam Schiff

On Tuesday, former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper said on CNN that he didn&#8217;t lie during his congressional testimony in 2013, but that he misunderstood the question that was asked.
The Intercept&#8217;s Glen Greenwald has reported earlier in the week that the National Security Agency program revealed by Edward Snowden was finally shut down.
&#8220;The very first NSA program we revealed from Snowden documents &#8211; the mass domestic spying program of Americans&#8217; phone records, which James Clapper lied about &amp; Obama insisted was vital to national security &#8211; has been shut down,&#8221; Greenwald tweeted.
<div class="embed tweet">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
The very first NSA program we revealed from Snowden documents &#8211; the mass domestic spying program of Americans&#8217; phone records, which James Clapper lied about &amp; Obama insisted was vital to national security &#8211; has been shut down <a href="https://t.co/H91zvOcVMk">https://t.co/H91zvOcVMk</a>
&#8212; Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) <a href="https://twitter.com/ggreenwald/status/1102741757035462662?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 5, 2019</a></blockquote>
</div>
The lie Greenwald was referring to was something Clapper said during his testimony in 2013. Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) asked Clapper if the NSA collects &#8220;any type of data at all on millions or hundreds of millions of Americans.&#8221;
Clapper responded: &#8220;no sir. Not wittingly.&#8221;
This was clearly untrue, as Snowden&#8217;s leaked documents showed the agency had <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/andygreenberg/2013/06/05/nsas-verizon-spying-order-specifically-targeted-americans-not-foreigners/">collected millions of cell phone records from Verizon customers</a>, and had specifically requested the records of Americans and not the records of foreigners, according to Forbes. Clapper later apologized for his &#8220;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/andygreenberg/2013/07/02/national-intelligence-director-clapper-apologizes-for-clearly-erroneous-congressional-testimony-on-nsa-surveillance/#74e32b126d62">clearly erroneous</a>&#8221; testimony. Now that the program has been scrapped, CNN&#8217;s John Berman asked Clapper for a reaction to Greenwald&#8217;s claim that he lied.
Clapper defended himself by claiming he misunderstood the question back in 2013, <a href="https://www.mediaite.com/tv/james-clapper-i-didnt-lie-to-congress-about-nsa-surveillance-i-simply-didnt-understand-the-question/">according to a clip uploaded to Mediaite</a>.
&#8220;Well, the original thought behind this, and this program was put in place as a direct result of 9/11, the point was to be able to track quickly a foreign communicant talking to somebody in this country who may have been plotting a terrorist plot and was put in place during the Bush Administration for that reason,&#8221; Clapper told Berman. &#8220;I always regarded it as kind of a safeguard or insurance policy so that if the need came up you would have this to refer to.&#8221;
Clapper continued:
<blockquote>
As far as the comment, the allegation about my lying, I didn&#8217;t lie, I made a big mistake and I just simply didn&#8217;t understand what I was being asked about. I thought of another surveillance program, Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act when I was being asked about Section 215 of the Patriot Act at the time, I just didn&#8217;t understand that.
</blockquote>
Wyden, the senator who asked Clapper the question back in 2013, took to Twitter to shut down Clapper&#8217;s claims.
&#8220;James Clapper needs to stop making excuses for lying to the American people about mass surveillance. To be clear: I sent him the question in advance. I asked him to correct the record afterward. He chose to let the lie stand,&#8221; Wyden tweeted.
&#8220;When intelligence leaders mislead the public about surveillance, they fuel the cynicism and mistrust of government that lets wannabe authoritarians gain power,&#8221; he added in another tweet.
<div class="embed tweet">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
When intelligence leaders mislead the public about surveillance, they fuel the cynicism and mistrust of government that lets wannabe authoritarians gain power.
&#8212; Ron Wyden (@RonWyden) <a href="https://twitter.com/RonWyden/status/1103355480498470913?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 6, 2019</a></blockquote>
</div>
Clapper also tried to defend the program from reports that it never helped capture a terrorist.
&#8220;Well, that&#8217;s true, and I think probably at the time contemporaneously back in 2013 or so when all this broke that we may have oversold it a bit because, you know, we were hard-pressed to point out to a specific case in point,&#8221; Clapper said. &#8220;What this was was just trying to capitalize on the lesson learned from 9/11. I will say that &#8212; and I&#8217;ve said this publicly many times before, that what this did prove was the need for the intelligence community to have been more transparent.&#8221;

James Clapper Claimed He Didn’t Lie, But Misunderstood A Question. Democrat Senator Destroys Him.

Glenn Greenwald

National Security Agency (NSA)

Oregon

Amid reports that the Justice Department is preparing to receive Special Counsel Robert Mueller&#8217;s report on his nearly two-year-long investigation into alleged &#8220;collusion&#8221; between the Trump campaign and Russia as early as next week, CNN is preparing its viewers to be deeply disappointed.
Asked by &#8220;New Day&#8221; host Alisyn Camerota Wednesday if he believed the Mueller investigation would find &#8220;enough&#8221; to take down Trump, former National Intelligence Director and rabid anti-Trump CNN analyst James Clapper attempted to temper the audience&#8217;s expectations.
&#8220;That&#8217;s the big question,&#8221; Clapper said, in comments noted by <a href="https://thehill.com/policy/national-security/430720-former-director-of-national-intelligence-mueller-report-may-be-anti">The Hill</a> (video below). &#8220;I think the hope is that the Mueller investigation will clear the air on this issue once and for all. I&#8217;m really not sure it will, and the investigation, when completed, could turn out to be quite anti-climactic and not draw a conclusion about that.&#8221;
Having expressed clear reservations about the Mueller investigation finding much, Clapper said the next question is what the House committees might do on their own.
Before his &#8220;anti-climactic&#8221; comments, Clapper was asked by Camerota what he thinks about fired former Acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe declaring on Friday that it&#8217;s &#8220;possible&#8221; that Trump is a &#8220;Russian asset,&#8221; whether &#8220;witting or unwitting.&#8221;
Clapper responded by noting McCabe&#8217;s &#8220;important&#8221; caveat that Trump might be an &#8220;unwitting&#8221; asset, which he noted would &#8220;soften&#8221; the over-the-top charge &#8220;somewhat.&#8221;
&#8220;I do think that it is sort of an institutional obligation or responsibility of the FBI to at least consider that a possibility,&#8221; he said. &#8220;Given the track record and the behavior through the campaign and into the early part of the administration, culiminating in the firing of Jim Comey.&#8221;
Clapper failed to mention the aggressive actions taken by the administration against Russia since early on in Trump&#8217;s presidency.
Asked directly if he sees &#8220;evidence of some kind that Trump is an unwitting asset of Russia,&#8221; Clapper responded with some apparent hesitancy. &#8220;Well, the strange thing I think that bothered a lot of people, both in and out of the intelligence community, is this strange, uh, personal deference to Putin by the president,&#8221; he said.
Clapper then suggested that Putin treating Trump &#8220;as an &#8216;asset'&#8221; makes Trump guilty of being an asset. &#8220;I&#8217;ve speculated in the past that the way Putin behaves is to treat President Trump as an &#8216;asset&#8217;,&#8221; said Clapper, noting that he &#8220;put that in air quotes.&#8221;
Pressed on how exactly that was the case, Clapper said, &#8220;Becuase &#8230; you consider Putin&#8217;s background, as a trained, experienced KGB agent, and how he would approach somebody that he is trying to coopt or influence or gain leverage over, and in this case, appeal to ego. And so in that sense, in that context, is what I think of when I mean an &#8216;unwitting asset.'&#8221;
But, of course, what Clapper described is simply one international leader &#8220;playing&#8221; another international leader &#8212; not creating an &#8220;asset.&#8221;
Asked what a &#8220;witting asset&#8221; would look like, Clapper admitted he &#8220;rather doubt[s]&#8221; that that&#8217;s the case with Trump. A witting asset is a &#8220;recruited asset,&#8221; he went on to reluctanctly explain, &#8220;who is responding to direction of a &#8216;case officer.'&#8221;
&#8220;I really don&#8217;t think that&#8217;s the situation here,&#8221; he reiterated.
Video below via &#8220;New Day&#8221;:
<div class="embed tweet">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
Former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper hopes that &#8220;the Mueller investigation will clear the air,&#8221; but also cautions the results might be &#8220;anti-climatic, and not draw a conclusion&#8221; <a href="https://t.co/fCl8eRvh3D">https://t.co/fCl8eRvh3D</a> <a href="https://t.co/DYYuEOqKt2">pic.twitter.com/DYYuEOqKt2</a>
&#8212; New Day (@NewDay) <a href="https://twitter.com/NewDay/status/1098203152271245318?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 20, 2019</a></blockquote>
</div>
Related: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/43511/limbaugh-media-trying-convince-us-we-havent-heard-james-barrett">Limbaugh: Media Trying To Convince Us We Haven&#8217;t Heard What We&#8217;ve Heard For Last Two Years</a>

WATCH: CNN Prepares Viewers For Bad News About Mueller’s Russia Report

Trump Administration

Vladimir Putin

A chain of emails between FBI officials regarding FISA applications obtained largely on the basis of the infamous Democrat-funded anti-Trump dossier may contain &#8220;the most damning evidence to date of potential abuses of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA),&#8221; The Hill&#8217;s <a href="https://thehill.com/hilltv/rising/419901-fbi-email-chain-may-provide-most-damning-evidence-of-fisa-abuses-yet">John Solomon</a> reports.
The evidence reportedly contained in the email chain relates to the dossier, compiled by former MI6 British intelligence operative Christopher Steele and funded by the Hillary Clinton campaign and the DNC, which contains salacious and &#8212; over two years later &#8212; still unverified claims about Trump&#8217;s supposed connections to Russia. As more details about the process have come to light, it has become more clear that the partisan and highly suspect dossier was the key source of information FBI officials used to obtain the initial warrant to spy on Trump associate Carter Page.
House Intelligence Committee Chair Devin Nunes (R-CA) requested right before Thanksgiving that President Trump declassify the emails, which have been withheld from most members of Congress for over two years. According to Solomon&#8217;s sources, this could spell trouble for some high-profile former FBI officials.
&#8220;The email exchanges included then-FBI Director James Comey, key FBI investigators in the Russia probe and lawyers in the DOJ&#8217;s national security division, and they occurred in early to mid-October, before the FBI successfully secured a FISA warrant to spy on Trump campaign adviser Carter Page,&#8221; Solomon writes. &#8220;The email exchanges show the FBI was aware &#8212; before it secured the now-infamous warrant &#8212; that there were intelligence community concerns about the <a href="https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/trey-gowdy-well-never-know-if-the-fbi-had-enough-to-spy-on-carter-page-without-the-trump-dossier" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">reliability of the main evidence</a> used to support it: the Christopher Steele dossier.&#8221;
Steele, who has been highly <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/03/12/christopher-steele-the-man-behind-the-trump-dossier">critical of Trump</a>, worked for the FBI as a confidential human source until November 1, 2016, when he was fired &#8220;on the grounds that he had unauthorized contacts with the news media,&#8221; Solomon notes. His firing came two weeks after information he provided was used to secure the warrant.
The emails reportedly show that officials were aware that Steele had contacted news media before the FISA warrant was secured &#8212; that contact resulting in a <a href="http://www.foxnews.com/politics/fbi-told-fisa-court-steele-wasnt-source-of-report-used-to-justify-surveilling-trump-team-docs-show">Yahoo News report</a> that was used by FBI officials as supposedly &#8220;independent&#8221; corroboration of some of Steele&#8217;s claims to help secure the warrant.
If the FBI indeed knew before obtaining the warrant that Steele had contacted media, that would constitute &#8220;circular intelligence reporting,&#8221; a &#8220;forbidden tactic in which two pieces of evidence are portrayed as independent corroboration when, in fact, they originated from the same source,&#8221; Solomon explains.
We already know that FBI officials failed to reveal to Congress until months after the fact that Steele had been paid by the firm Fusion GPS, which had been hired to do oppo research for Clinton and the DNC, notes Solomon. &#8220;If the FBI knew of his media contacts and the concerns about the reliability of his dossier before seeking the warrant, it would constitute a serious breach of FISA regulations and the trust that the FISA court places in the FBI.&#8221;
One of Solomon&#8217;s sources commented that if the email chain is released as requested by Nunes, &#8220;the American public will have clear and convincing evidence to see the FISA warrant that escalated the Russia probe just before Election Day was flawed and the judges [were] misled.&#8221;
The evidence that has already come to light is damning enough: FBI officials that have since demonstrated a clear political bias used an unverified document produced as opposition research as rationale to secure multiple FISA warrants related to a presidential candidate representing the opposing party of the administration.
&#8220;If ever there were grounds to investigate the investigators, these facts provide the justification,&#8221; writes Solomon.
<a href="https://thehill.com/hilltv/rising/419901-fbi-email-chain-may-provide-most-damning-evidence-of-fisa-abuses-yet">Read Solomon&#8217;s full report here</a>.

Report: FBI Email Chain May Spell Big Trouble For Anti-Trump FBI Officials For FISA Abuse

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