From the Office of Director of National Intelligence, John Ratcliffe appears on Fox News with Maria Bartiromo to discuss latest events amid the intelligence apparatus.  Ratcliffe outlines his approach to foreign election interference as a national security threat.

Additionally DNI Ratcliffe discusses pending declassification of documents once it can be determined that such a release would not impede the investigation by John Durham.

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The DOJ announced today they are requesting data from several states that mandated COVID-19 patients be sent into nursing homes.  “Data will help inform whether the Department of Justice will initiate investigations under the Civil Rights of Institutionalized Persons Act (CRIPA) regarding New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Michigan’s response to COVID-19 in public nursing homes.”

[DOJ Press Release] – Today the Justice Department requested COVID-19 data from the governors of states that issued orders which may have resulted in the deaths of thousands of elderly nursing home residents. New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Michigan required nursing homes to admit COVID-19 patients to their vulnerable populations, often without adequate testing.

For example, on March 25, 2020, New York ordered: “No resident shall be denied re-admission or admission to [a nursing home] solely based on a confirmed or suspected diagnosis of COVID-19. [Nursing homes] are prohibited from requiring a hospitalized resident who is determined medically stable to be tested for COVID-19 prior to admission or readmission.”

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Carter Page appears on Fox News for an interview with Maria Bartiromo to discuss a book he is publishing about the DOJ and FBI targeting him for surveillance and identifying him as “an agent of a foreign government” in 2016 and 2017.

Interestingly, Page notes [@02:56] he had five interviews with the FBI in March of 2017, and he connects those interviews to the possibility of leaks to the Washington Post.  However, it would be interesting to find out the exact dates of those interviews because the FISA application identifying him, leaked by James Wolfe, was delivered to the SSCI on March 17, 2017, as a “read and return” document.  It was after March 17th when the Washington Post wrote the article mentioned by Carter Page.

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There is strong circumstantial evidence when the FISA application was delivered to the SSCI on March 17, 2017, that only James Wolfe and SSCI Vice-Chairman Mark Warner reviewed it.  First, it was “read and return”, back to the equity provider, FBI SSA Brian Dugan.  Second, if any other member of the SSCI had reviewed the application it’s doubtful they would have been requesting to review it in December ’17 and early ’18.  Common sense would indicate only Warner and Wolfe saw the application, and Warner never informed the committee of his review; hence their later requests.

Additionally, another unusual aspect to the FISA application delivery surrounds the 2018 letters written by Chairman Nunes (HPSCI) and Chairman Bob Goodlatte (House Judiciary) to presiding Judge Rosemary Collyer, where both chairman were being blocked by the special counsel from obtaining the FISA application and both were seeking to gain it from the FISA Court.

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The transcript of the oral arguments from the August 11th DC Circuit Appeals court has been released. [pdf available here].  The DC Circuit held a full panel hearing to decide the outcome of the unopposed DOJ & defense motion to drop the case against Michael Flynn.

You will remember Judge Sullivan injected himself into the case by approving an amicus to argue against dismissal; this led to a request by the Flynn defense for a writ of mandamus overriding Judge Sullivan.  Initially a three judge panel agreed with the writ giving Sullivan 30 days to dispose of the case; however, Sullivan appealed to the full panel (en banc).  The first appellate court ruling was stayed, and the full panel heard oral arguments earlier this month.  That transcript is below.

The panel of appellate judges included Judge Srinivasan, Judge Henderson, Judge Rogers, Judge Tatel, Judge Garland, Judge Griffith, Judge Millett, Judge Pillard, Judge Wilkins and Judge Rao.  However, with Judge Griffith retiring at the end of this month, it is likely the ruling will be announced very soon; could be this week.

Regardless of what decision is reached, the announcement should be anticipated prior to Judge Griffith being replaced by recently confirmed Trump nominee Judge Justin Walker.  That means we could see a decision announced this Friday, or by next Friday at the latest.

The judges could remove Judge Sullivan and reassign the case. In that event it’s likely the next judge would simply accept the motion to dismiss.  However, the DC circuit could also deliver a ruling that allows Sullivan to retain the final disposition with strong guidance on any subsequent activity.

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Fox News host Maria Bartiromo has a conversation with Senate Judiciary Chairman Lindsay Graham about new documents he plans to share with the John Durham team asking questions about why Hillary Clinton was provided defensive briefings while Donald Trump was not.

Interestingly, and not caught by Graham or media yet…. The documents Graham released [See Here] showed the FBI approver for the Clinton defensive briefings was David Archey. [Use CTH search function] As it turns out David Archey was hand selected by the Weissmann/Mueller special counsel to head the FBI responsibilities of the special counsel probe after they could no longer use Peter Strzok.

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WASHINGTON – Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina) today released newly declassified FBI documents and communications demonstrating the Bureau’s double standard when it came to the Clinton and Trump campaigns.

According to these declassified documents and communications, in 2015 FBI leadership sought to give the Clinton campaign a defensive briefing before an FBI field office could pursue a FISA warrant related to a threat posed to the Clinton campaign by a foreign government. But in 2016 when there was a similar counterintelligence threat to the Trump campaign, FBI leadership failed to give a defensive briefing to the Trump campaign, opting instead to open the Crossfire Hurricane investigation and relentlessly pursue FISA warrants targeting the Trump campaign.  (more from Senate Judiciary)

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Lee Smith is one of the most decent and genuine people I have ever had the good pleasure to meet.  In this interview Smith discusses his latest book “The Permanent Coup”.

The Trump-Russia collusion hoax, the Mueller investigation, the impeachment inquiry, the “weaponization of the coronavirus,” and now the riots raging in major U.S. cities are all intrinsically linked, says investigative journalist Lee Smith.

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On Tuesday August 18th, I had the opportunity to talk to, be interviewed by, and brief the person described as the “main guy”, the “central investigator”, “the guy who coordinates all investigative aspects” behind the John Durham investigation.

His name is William Aldenberg, and before getting to the substance of the conversation some background context is needed.

On June 7, 2018, an indictment against Senate Intelligence Committee Security Director James Wolfe was unsealed.

Approximately six weeks later, July 21, 2018, the DOJ mysteriously declassified and publicly released the Carter Page FISA application.  That’s when I noticed the first two documents were related.  The FISA application was the “top secret classified document” described in the Wolfe indictment.

Immediately I recognized it wasn’t just any copy of the FISA application that was released by the DOJ; but rather a very specific copy of the FISA application.  What the DOJ released was the exact copy used in the leak investigation of James Wolfe.  The ramifications of this specific copy being publicly released were immediately noted, although almost everyone seemed to gloss over the issue in favor of discussing the content.

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Former CIA Director John Brennan delivers the following message through his former chief of staff and spokesperson Nick Shapiro.  The statement following an interview today by investigators looking into the background of the fake Trump-Russia conspiracy which John Brennan was promoting heavily in 2016 and 2017.

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1. Remember, the Special Counsel was appointed in May 2017, and from then until April 2019 any matter which had anything to do with Spygate or Trump/Russia, was managed exclusively by the Special Counsel team. [Rosenstein testified to this June 2, 2020]

2. The Carter Page FISA warrant of June 29, 2017, was renewed during the tenure of the Special Counsel. They alone ran the FISA process for the third renewal.

3. Kevin Clinesmith’s boss at the FBI during the period for FISA assembly was a supervisory special agent and Trisha Beth Anderson was the lawyer responsible to sign-off on the final assembly. [LINK]

4. The Clinesmith criminal indictment (actually an “information”) informs that, while the Special Counsel was running the DOJ, and Andy McCabe was running the FBI, Clinesmith made this request to another government agency “OGA”:

We need some clarification on [Carter Page]. There is an indication that he may be a “[digraph] source.”

[LINK]

5. Why is this “digraph” redacted from the Clinesmith information?

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As noted in the DOJ press release: “Former FBI attorney Kevin Clinesmith, 38, pleaded guilty today in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia to a false statement offense stemming from his altering of an email in connection with the submission of a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (“FISA”) application.”

Despite the falsification of court documents within a FISA document; and despite the likelihood of an intentional conspiracy to commit fraud upon the court in order to obtain a Title-1 surveillance warrant against the Trump campaign – via Carter Page; the DOJ entered into a plea agreement on a single count of lying to federal officers.

The agreement holds a maximum penalty of zero to six months in federal prison and a $250k fine.  This is the same plea agreement the DOJ (DC U.S. Attorney) previously gave to the Senate Intelligence Committee Security Director James Wolfe, who leaked the SAME, earlier, top-secret classified FISA application to the media on March 17, 2017.

Judge James Boasberg noted early in the phone hearing that he is “currently the presiding judge for the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court,” but that “this case, however, is a criminal case, it is not a FISC case, and it is a case that was randomly assigned.”  As anticipated Boasberg said the FISA court could be seen as a “victim” in the case, but also said he would preside over the case fairly without recusing himself.  He stated if either the defense or prosecution wanted him to recuse, then he would.  Neither party requested.

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