During a round of questioning with Senator Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) AG William Barr was asked about scale and scope of the current IG investigation [04:22 prompted].  In response to the question AG Barr replies:

“I don’t want to be too specific; I talked to Mike Horowitz a few weeks ago about it, and its focused on the FISA, the basis for the FISA, and the handling of the FISA application. But by necessity it looks back a little bit earlier than that.  The people I have helping me with my review will be working very closely with Mr. Horowitz.”

(more…)

Former Deputy National Security Advisor to President Obama, Ben Rhodes, says any investigation of prior administration “will find nothing” that shows former President Obama or White House staff had any “involvement” in the origins of the surveillance of Trump campaign and Russia collusion investigation.

Prior to March 9th, 2016, the Obama-era political surveillance and spy operations consisted of using the FBI and NSA database to track/monitor their opposition. However, once the NSA compliance officer began initiating an internal review of who was accessing the system, the CIA and FBI moved to create ex post facto justification for their endeavors. [Full Backstory] Everything after March 9, 2016, became a cover-story.
Looking at White House engagement in the last half of 2016, The War Economy has done some excellent research on this period to contrast the reference of Ben Rhodes:

[Via TWE] […] On July 31, 2016, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, ran by Director James Comey, opened an investigation into the Trump campaign titled “Crossfire Hurricane”, named after the Rolling Stones documentary of the same name. It focused on the actions of four members of the Trump campaign:

(more…)

Those who participated in the 2015/2016 surveillance and spy operations, which evolved into the 2017 (through today) soft-coup effort, are relying on a defense that Russia ‘hacked’ the 2016 election. This false narrative is how the corrupt administrative state will defend themselves.
Pay close attention to this interview and note how Senator Graham supports that narrative saying: “the Russians hacked into John Podesta’s e-mails, the campaign manager for the Democratic candidate for President. The Russians hacked into Hillary Clinton’s e-mails, the candidate for the Democratic Party.”
This ‘Russia-hacking narrative’ is the DC ‘chaff and countermeasures‘; when combined with their ‘by-the-book‘ justifications, it becomes their unified defense. Once you accept their baseline, it becomes much more difficult to expose their unlawful conduct.

[Transcript] MARGARET BRENNAN: We just heard about this tragic shooting. It was an AR-15-style semi-automatic weapon. Hate crimes seem to be on the rise–
SENATOR LINDSEY GRAHAM: Right.
MARGARET BRENNAN: –in this country. What do we need to do to combat this, prevent it?
(more…)

Senate Judiciary Chairman Lindsey Graham gave some brief remarks to local Dallas media discussing his summer agenda for the Judiciary Committee.  Graham notes he does not intend to question Robert Mueller -deferring to AG Barr- which is not surprising considering how lightly Mueller may have been involved in the investigation.
Graham also notes the separation between the legislative branch and judicial branch as a firewall for inquiry into the FISA court.  However, Graham explains his intent to discuss possible FISA abuse (manipulation from the executive branch) with Chief Justice John Roberts. It appears Graham is also waiting for the DOJ inspector general report.

(more…)

The 2016 anti-Trump effort and 2017 soft-coup was not just an assembly created by Obama officials; there was/are a significant number of mutually aligned republican politicians willfully blind to the effort.
As a consequence, we see the administrative state holding a vested interest in retaining the originating Russia premise.
With President Trump openly stating “coup” and “overthrow“, those who participated in the coup and overthrow need to protect their involvement by substantiating the background lie they used to carry out the cover-up operation.  We note the media outlets used by the intelligence community never change. Cue the predictable:

New York Times – The F.B.I. director warned anew on Friday about Russia’s continued meddling in American elections, calling it a “significant counterintelligence threat.”
[…]  “We recognize that our adversaries are going to keep adapting and upping their game,” Christopher A. Wray, the F.B.I. director, said Friday in a speech in Washington, citing the presence of Russian intelligence officers in the United States and the Kremlin’s record of malign influence operations.

(more…)

Can’t make this stuff up folks…. as if on cue.
Vice President Mike Pence responds to Senator Grassley and Senator Johnson’s speculation that FBI agents wanted to use Pence’s chief of staff to infiltrate President-elect Trump’s transition team in 2016:

“I was deeply offended to learn that two disgraced FBI agents considered infiltrating our transition team by sending a counter intelligence agent to one of my very first intelligence briefings only 9 days after the election,” Pence said in a statement to Axios. “This is an outrage and only underscores why we need to get to the bottom of how this investigation started in the first place.”
“The American people have a right to what happened and if these two agents broke the law and ignored long-standing DOJ policies, they must be held accountable.” (more)

Next up: Deep State (IC) deploys Washington Post and New York Times remind everyone how intense the 2016 Russian election interference was…. In 3, 2, 1..

Yesterday Senators Johnson and Grassley opened the door for the DOJ and FBI to justify the post-election investigation of President Donald Trump, based on a premise of a possible FBI counterintelligence operation ran against the office of the Vice-President, Mike Pence. And lickety-split the outrage voices jumped right to work. Predictable.

Discussions, conversations and displays of evidence outlining the efforts of the intelligence community, to defend against the potential of a compromised President, are exactly what the previous administration officials want to see.  This is the conversation President Obama, Susan Rice, Ben Rhodes and Denis McDonough would be happy to discuss.
Think of the worst or most shocking possibility you can imagine for what might have taken place.  Wiretaps on the White House? Enlisted assistance from staffers? Bugs placed in the cufflinks of Donald Trump?  So what?  From their position all of these efforts were undertaken because they were dealing with the possibility of a U.S. President who might be under the control of a foreign government.  This is the conversation they would enjoy.
From their ‘by-the-book‘ perspective the officials who ran the counterintelligence operation against President Trump have no fear of discussions about what they did in their post-election defense of the constitution (that’s how they will sell it). No fear.
(more…)

CTH suspected this was sketchy when notorious Swamp Defender Chris Wallace was used as the point person to push it. FUBAR suspicions confirmed when looking at the construct.
Senators Chuck Grassley and Ron Johnson send a letter to AG William Barr questioning post election text messages by Lisa Page and Peter Strzok that outline questions about the FBI counterintelligence operation against the Trump transition team. First the letter:
[scribd id=407638522 key=key-P6WGecNAMQ7aMu9ud4L6 mode=scroll]
.
If you’ve followed the DC pattern, you can pick up the purpose of sending a letter that walks directly, and purposefully, into the President Obama and Susan Rice justification trap, CTH warned about a few months ago.
Asking questions about the motives of Lisa Page, Peter Strzok and the FBI counterintelligence unit in the post election period is ridiculous; all it does is open the door for justification. The FBI has admitted on-the-record the operation picked up by Special Counsel Robert Mueller was an extension of an ongoing FBI investigation.
(more…)

Everything after March 9th, 2016, is a function of two intelligence units, the CIA and FBI, operating together to coverup prior political surveillance and spy operations.
Prior to March 9th, 2016, the surveillance and spy operation was using the NSA database to track and monitor their political opposition.  However, once the NSA compliance officer began initiating an internal review of who was accessing the system, the CIA and FBI moved to create ex post facto justification for their endeavors. [Full Backstory]
The evidence for this is found in the documents attached to both operations; and bolsters the original statements by Congressman Devin Nunes as highlighted below.

♦The CIA track took place between March and July 2016, and consisted of using foreign intelligence allies in Italy, the U.K and Australia to create a background illusion of Russian involvement with the Trump campaign.  This operation was based on earlier -more innocuous- contacts from various countries, weaponized and redeployed in what everyone calls “spygate”.  This track successfully culminated in Operation Crossfire Hurricane.
♦The FBI track was domestic-centric, albeit sub-contracted to Fusion GPS and later a former British intelligence officer, and took place between April and October 2016; also to create the illusion of Russian involvement.  This operation is best known around the Steele Dossier and FISA warrant against U.S. person Carter Page.  The FBI track continued with the Mueller investigation into 2017, 2018 and 2019.
(more…)

A great panel segment delivered by Mike Huckabee tonight as Rudy Giuliani, Robert Ray and particularly Joe diGenova discuss the origin of the 2016 Russia conspiracy narrative, the FISA court and specifically the abuses of the NSA database. [Background]
Mr. diGenova outlines the nature of how the FISA-702(16)(17) database searches were weaponized for political spy operations.  Quite good:
[The panel segment starts at 10:09 prompted, just hit play]
https://youtu.be/4_yMcVq6-ak?t=10m9s
(more…)