Closing arguments have wrapped up in the trial of former Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann. The jury is now deliberating.  In an unusual twist, trial Judge Christopher Cooper said if a verdict arrives today, he will withhold reading the outcome until Tuesday due to prior commitments.

Despite the evidence that Michael Sussmann lied to FBI officials about the reason for him bringing the Clinton campaign manufactured false information about a Trump-Russia connection via Alfa-Bank in Trump Tower, it is highly unlikely Sussmann will be found guilty.  The reason is simply that regardless of whether he told FBI officials the material came from Hillary Clinton’s campaign; the FBI knew Sussmann was an operative of Hillary Clinton’s campaign.  It’s an issue of materiality.

Top leadership at the FBI concealed Sussmann as the Alfa-Bank source from the FBI investigators who were given the information.  Whether Sussmann lied about bringing the false evidence on behalf of the Clinton campaign was immaterial to how the evidence was handled.  Again, as CTH has said for the past two years, the background of Durham investigating the ‘outsiders’ is filled with pretending.  Even Andrew McCarthy, a defender of the institutions, outlined the FBI playing pretend as a “bad look.”

The New York Post has a solid article outlining all the pretending – “What we learned at the trial this week is that, notwithstanding Baker’s insistence that he believed Sussmann’s cover story, FBI headquarters officials fully realized they were acting on highly political information and took steps to conceal that fact.

First, a decision was made to treat Sussmann, the source, as a confidential informant. This was not done to protect Sussmann’s security. It was done to protect the FBI’s reputation. The informant pretext enabled headquarters to conceal Sussmann’s identity from the line agents in Chicago who were tasked to assess the Alfa-Bank information. 

As good investigators, the agents wanted to know the source of the information so they could assess the purveyor’s motive and thus the data’s likely reliability. They were frustrated and annoyed that headquarters would not identify the source and allow him to be interviewed. 

If they had been told Sussmann was behind the data, they would instantly have known that the information was political. As it was, they quickly concluded that the information was nonsense, that it did not come close to establishing a Trump-Kremlin communications channel, and that it probably came from someone with an anti-Trump agenda. 

Second, the headquarters effort to cover up Sussmann’s identity reached such absurd heights that the FBI itself made false statements in documenting the investigation. In the “electronic communication” by which the bureau opens cases, agents claimed that the information had come not from Sussmann, not even from a confidential source, but from … wait for it … the US Department of Justice. This was so ridiculous that, embarrassingly, none of the agents involved could explain how that happened. 

Third, the FBI’s brass was so hot to nail Trump for supposedly being a clandestine agent of Russia that the line agents’ rejection of the evidence made no difference. “People on the 7th floor to include the Director are fired up about this server,” said headquarters agent Joe Pientka in a message to one of the Chicago agents. 

The 7th floor houses the suite of top executive offices at FBI headquarters, including that of Director Comey. When the Chicago cyber investigators found no basis for criminal charges, they were told to keep the case open as a counterintelligence matter. “Priestap says it’s not an option — we must do it,” admonished Pientka, referring to the bureau’s top counterintelligence official.   (read more)

The NY Post reaches the same conclusion CTH highlighted years ago.  “In fact, if Sussmann is acquitted, that will have a lot more to do with the bureau’s machinations than Sussmann’s innocence,” they write.

The DOJ, FBI and everyone associated with the information knew they were receiving opposition research from the Clinton campaign.  However, the FBI had to pretend they didn’t know in order to use the false information to start another Trump investigation.

The media were then told by the Clinton campaign that the FBI had the Alfa-Bank material under investigation, that FBI involvement gave the illusion of credibility. The media then asked the FBI if they did have an investigation of the material and wrote their articles accordingly.

The media articles carried additional weight because the suspicions existing connected to actual material within an FBI investigation gave the suspicions more credibility.

This is the exact same reason why several months later, March 2017, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI), Vice-Chairman Mark Warner, told the SSCI security director James Wolfe to leak Carter Page FISA application to journalist Ali Watkins.  Same approach as Sussmann.

In 2016 Michael Sussmann wanted media articles verifying Donald Trump as an investigative target of the FBI to help Hillary Clinton.

In 2017 Mark Warner wanted media articles verifying Donald Trump’s campaign officials as investigative targets of the FBI to get a special counsel appointed.

In both examples the primary motive was to use the media to get an outcome.

Michael Sussmann was the delivery agent to the FBI so that the Perkins Coie law firm to lean on their media allies to spread the Trump-Russia collusion conspiracy.   Sussmann had a pre-existing relationship with FBI Counsel Jim Baker that would be useful for that purpose.  Hence, the origin of the contact that was argued in court.

It was the media angle that was more important to the Clinton campaign; the FBI angle was only to bolster the credibility of the Trump-Russia accusation, and the FBI were more than willing to use the material and try to help Hillary Clinton.

The entire media system knew along with everyone else inside and outside of government, that their efforts to create the Trump-Russia conspiracy and collusion narrative were based on fraudulent pretext manufactured by the Clinton campaign.

They all knew it.

They all acted collaboratively, and they all engaged purposefully.

The same can be said for the Mueller/Weissmann investigation that followed.  There was not a single person in Washington DC who did not know the Mueller special counsel was appointed entirely to hide all of the preceding government corruption.  However, as typical within the last decade of DC corruption, everyone keeps pretending.

From the claim of men having babies, to denying the entire apparatus of the U.S. government weaponized to target a political opponent, we are a nation pretending.