Earlier this evening President Donald Trump spoke at the NRCC dinner in Washington DC. CTH would be remiss if we did not draw attention to @40:10:
…”We’re doing very, very well; and I think you’re going to have something very, very, special take place in a short period of time”…
Before becoming President Obama’s key Homeland Security Adviser Lisa Monaco was the head of the DOJ National Security Division. You might remember the DOJ-NSD is at the center of the “small group” collaboration between DOJ-NSD and FBI Counterintelligence unit. Remember, it was the DOJ-NSD (via Sally Yates) who would not allow OIG Oversight. (John Carlin quit; Mary McCord quit; David Laufman quit)
During the 2015/2016 presidential election Lisa Monaco was one of the key WH figures doing the unmasking of raw intelligence provided by the “small group” collaborators (with Susan Rice, Ben Rhodes). Monaco was also one of the key policy strategists, heck, she was the architect, who utilized the compartmentalization of intelligence to hide the fingerprints of collaboration. This was the issue that initially stymied HSPCI Devin Nunes.
Many people have wondered if the Obama White House, recognizing the empirical risk represented by McCabe’s insider knowledge, would distance themselves from McCabe -leaving him to swing in the wind- or whether they would circle the wagons to defend him. This interview should answer that question. Pay particular attention to the angst expressed by Monaco of Trump creating transparency within compartmentalized IC.
After watching the video, and understanding what battles are to come from within the Obama IC, you understand why THIS GROUP has assembled. It is all interconnected. It is all related. None of these alignments, moves, maneuvers and shifts are happening arbitrarily. They are all done purposefully knowing the biggest political battle in the history of U.S. politics is now visible on the horizon.
Things are proceeding swimmingly. How is it possible to outline the biggest political corruption scandal in modern U.S. history; which utilized the full weight of the institutions of government and the vast intelligence community; against the predictable tide of a mainstream U.S. media apparatus who will shout ‘conspiracy theory’; while every single entity associated with the collaborative effort will protect the group behind the scandal?
There’s the challenge. How do you introduce the scale and scope of corruption to almost half the country who have relied upon the false narrative delivered by fake news for the past two years?
Answer: You assemble a strategic communications team, timed to activate when a key series of events takes place. Joe diGenova is part of that strategic communications team. The triggering event is the OIG release. The purpose of the team is to help the news consumer digest the corruption elephant one bite at a time.
As each individual indictment is parsed and delivered, there will be tens-of-thousands of pages of evidence, multiple witness statements, and a tsunami of investigative supporting material that needs to be unpacked -per person- and understood against the backdrop of the bigger story.
Ohr FD-302 12/19/16 (interview date 11/22/16);
Ohr FD-302 12/19/16 (interview date 12/05/16);
Ohr FD-302 12/19/16 (interview date 12/12/16);
Ohr FD-302 12/27/16 (interview date 12/20/16);
Ohr FD-302 01/27/17 (interview date 01/27/17);
Ohr FD-302 01/31/17 (interview date 01/23/17);
Ohr FD-302 01/27/17 (interview date 01/25/17);
Ohr FD-302 02/08/17 (interview date 02/06/17);
Ohr FD-302 02/15/17 (interview date 02/14/17);
Ohr FD-302 05/10/17 (interview date 05/08/17);
Ohr FD-302 05/12/17 (interview date 05/12/17);
Ohr FD-302 05/16/17 (interview date 05/15/17).
Notice: DOJ Deputy Bruce Ohr was interviewed after the election four times [November 22nd, December: 5th, 12th, 20th, 2016] by the Obama FBI.
During those four 2016 interviews: President Obama, James Comey (FBI), Andrew McCabe (FBI), Loretta Lynch (DOJ), Sally Yates (DOJ), James Baker (FBI), Peter Strzok (FBI), Lisa Page (FBI), Jim Rybicki (FBI), Mary McCord (DOJ), Mike Kortan (FBI), Bill Priestap (FBI) and David Laufman (DOJ) were all still in place. The Inspector General investigation had not yet begun.
Question(s):
Why was the FBI interviewing Bruce Ohr in 2016?
Who was interviewing Bruce Ohr in 2016?
There are so many threads of information surrounding the 2016 operation to conduct political surveillance on the Trump campaign by various officials and offices within corrupt structures of government it’s easy to get lost. However, if we take all the various bits of information and place them together a less confusing picture emerges.
The {Go Deep Threads} look like this: The FISA-702(17) ‘About Queries’; the political opposition research of Fusion-GPS and Glenn Simpson; the DOJ officials and FBI officials; Bruce and Nellie Ohr; the U.S. State Department and U.N Ambassador Samantha Power; the Clinton-Steele Dossier and Christopher Steele; the FISA Title-1 surveillance warrant; and the unmasking by former Senior White House officials: Lisa Monaco and Susan Rice.
Here’s the basic overview of how all those threads come together to paint a picture.
The FBI group was participating in a plan to exonerate Hillary Clinton. That same FBI group was simultaneously conducting opposition research on candidate Donald Trump and the larger construct of his campaign team. Those FBI officials were allied by entities outside official government structures. The ‘outside group’ were “contractors”. It is likely one of the contractors was Fusion-GPS or entities in contact with Fusion-GPS. {Go Deep}
The contractors were using FBI intelligence databases to conduct opposition research “searches” on Trump campaign officials. This is where the use of FISA-702(16)(17) “To/From” and “About” queries comes in. {Go Deep} This FISA abuse was the allowed but unofficial process identified in early 2016 by NSA internal auditors.
This is where NSA Director Admiral Mike Rogers steps in on April 18th, 2016, and stops the FBI contractors from having any further access. {Go Deep}
CTH has a hunch the OIG report is going to come in multiple phases, containing multiple investigative facets, following the investigative mandate initially outlined when IG Horowitz began (also listed below for reference). The first release will likely surround McCabe and (bullet point #4) “Allegations that department and FBI employees improperly disclosed non-public information.” I’m working on some summary information therein.
Lots to chew.
Former FBI Deputy Director James Kallstrom appeared on Fox News for an interview with Maria Bartiromo earlier today. He conveys a common set of perspectives and concerns.
Michael R Bromwich (Twitter HERE) is the attorney of record for fired Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe. Mr. Bromwich responded to the firing of his client with the following statement (Pdf HERE)
March 16, 2018
STATEMENT BY FORMER IG MICHAEL R. BROMWICH
I have been involved in Department of Justice (DOJ) and Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) disciplinary matters since 1994. I have never before seen the type of rush to judgment – and rush to summary punishment – that we have witnessed in this case. The result of this deplorable rush to judgment is to terminate Mr. McCabe before his long-anticipated retirement and deny him of the full pension and retirement benefits he would have otherwise earned through his 21 years of devoted service to the FBI and this country. This is simply not the way such matters are generally handled in the DOJ or the FBI.
It is deeply disturbing.
Sometimes the most interesting and fresh insight comes from placing an atypical interviewer with a subject of strong interest. This interview by Jesse Waters of Devin Nunes is one such example. Really good interview, extracting a surprising amount of insight and perspective:
Beyond the thirst for clicks, ratings and perpetual outrage there’s an aspect to the Peter Strzok, Lisa Page and Rudolph Contreras story that deserves some attention.
♦First, the DOJ wasn’t withholding anything from congress. The DOJ told congress they (or their staff) could review any of the documents, including Strzok and Page texts, at the DOJ in their totality; as a consequence of the ongoing oversight.
However, if congress -or their staff- wanted to take possession of the documents, they would only be allowed to *remove* redacted copies.
The outrage machine shouts “cover up“, etc.
No. Not quite.
Why?
Because the IG investigative documents, in addition to being part of an internal review, are also evidence within an ongoing criminal investigation. Hence, the earlier statement by AG Jeff Sessions. The statement everyone, sucked-into and/or participating within the outrage machine, loves to ignore.
Again, before grabbing your Sean Hannity branded pitchfork, think.
With a dual track within the IG investigative findings: ¹“internal wrongdoing” and ²“potential criminal conduct”, you realize that evidence collected by the IG -that may have prosecutorial value- will be closely protected by the investigative unit, including the Sessions assigned prosecutor, and not released.
It is not hard to see the “why” when you set aside emotion and ignore the outrage machine.
For those following the increasingly curious case against General Mike Flynn, events take another unusual turn today. Congressional investigators have shared a set of unredacted text messages between FBI Agent Peter Strzok and his cohort DOJ Attorney Lisa Page which reveal a personal friendship between Agent Strzok and Flynn’s initial presiding judge Rudolph Contreras.
On November 30th, 2017, Mike Flynn signed a guilty plea; ostensibly admitting lying to investigators. The plea was accepted by Judge Rudolph Contreras; who is also a FISA court judge. Six days later, December 7th, 2017, Judge Contreras “was recused” from the case without explanation.
The case was reassigned to DC District Judge Emmet Sullivan. The Contreras recusal always seemed sketchy. The key question was: if the conflict existed on December 7th, wouldn’t that same conflict have existed on November 30th, 2017?
Today questions about the conflict seem to have been answered. Text messages between Peter Strzok and Lisa Page reveal the FBI agent and Judge Contreras were close personal friends. –SEE HERE–
Apparently DOJ lawyer Lisa Page was unaware that “Rudy” was a FISA court judge until July 25th, 2016, when she posited a question to her small group co-conspirator FBI agent Peter Strzok.