Today he testified in classified setting before the House intelligence committee.  Tomorrow is the public version.

Special Counsel John Durham is scheduled to be questioned tomorrow by members of the House Judiciary Committee in a public setting.  The hearing is scheduled for 9:00am ET, Rayburn Office Building [ DETAILS HERE ] – “The hearing will focus on the report of Special Counsel John Durham that examined the origins and justifications of the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI) Crossfire Hurricane investigation against then-presidential candidate Donald Trump.”

Questions have been passed along, and hopefully this summary is timed to avoid giving Mary McCord and her Lawfare team prep-time to construct their defensive talking points.

[Durham Report Here] Questions like:

(1) Mr. Durham, having spent four years investigating, researching, reviewing, interviewing and pouring through files related to the overall Trump-Russia collusion story, your report -like the report of Robert Mueller that preceded it- found no substantive predicate existed to ever open an investigation of candidate Donald Trump for any efforts with Russians or foreign actors to interfere in the 2016 election.  As a result of your time and diligence, you are likely the #1 subject matter expert in the entire series of events.

♦ Question: In your opinion, was President Obama aware there was no reason in 2016 to investigate Donald Trump, who then became President-elect Trump?

(2) You note in your report that you never re-reviewed any of the material evidence that formed the baseline for the Robert Mueller special counsel investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election.

♦ Question: Why not?

♦ Question: Who made the decision not to review the 2-year Mueller probe activity as part of your investigative review?  Why was that decision made?

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Some insider threats are more equal than others; so goes the position of the nation’s biggest leaker of classified documents in modern history, and it’s not Jack Teixeira.

This story shows the importance of what was hidden by the combined efforts of the national security apparatus in 2018.

Readers here are familiar, but most Americans are not, with how Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Mark Warner leaked a top-secret classified Title-1 FISA application in March of 2017.

Then the Vice-Chair of the SSCI, Senator Warner instructed Senate Security Director James Wolfe to leak the 82-page FISA application assembled against Carter Page.  On the afternoon of March 17, 2017, Wolfe took 82 pictures of the “Read and Return” document that was delivered to the SSCI basement SCIF by FBI Supervisory Special Agent Brian Dugan from the Washington Field Office.

Later that evening, Wolfe sent the images to journalist Ali Watkins using an encrypted messaging app.  Ms. Watkins then shared the FISA content with her peers and used the information to leverage a top-tier job at the New York Times.  The media were off to the races talking about FBI surveillance of the Trump campaign and using the leaked FISA as evidence of the ongoing investigation, later known as Crossfire Hurricane.   Three days later, March 20, 2017, after coordinating the intent of the narrative creation with Mark Warner, FBI Director James Comey publicly admitted the Trump-Russia investigation for the first time.

After James Wolfe was arrested for the FISA application leak, his defense lawyers threatened to expose the role of the Senate Intelligence Committee in the leak and subpoena the members as witnesses.  The Mueller/Weissmann team, then in charge of all DOJ operations that touched on Trump-Russia, took apart the evidence of Wolfe’s conduct, and DC Attorney Jessie Liu dropped most of the charges against Wolfe.  Mueller then ran cover for Mark Warner, and eventually – out of an abundance of caution to maintain the need for the coverup operation – the Mueller/Weissmann team then made the FISA application public. The rest is history.

Keep in mind, I could be civilly sued if anything written above as an asserted truth was false.  I’m not, because the truth is the defense.  All of this happened.

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Several people have emailed asking for opinion on the Yahoo News article [READ HERE] outlining Ali Watkins as a victim of the horrible investigative apparatus that targets journalists who are involved in leaking and denying leaking, “Top Secret, Classified Information” from their narrative engineering positions.  {{Insert Eyeroll Here}}

Having read the lengthy article a few times, there are some interesting aspects and also a lot of nonsense in the grand scheme of things.  The motive for the article appears to be a defense against government investigating journalists, and a sub-sector of one of the intelligence agencies (Customs and Border Patrol) having a semi-rogue actor named Jeffrey Rambo. Ali Watkins was contacted by Rambo in 2017 based on his discovery of her connection to Senate Intelligence Committee Security Director James Wolfe.

You have to read the article [HERE] to see where the author, Jana Winter, is coming from.   Overall, the article is a little weird and defensive, and frames a position that secretive U.S. government agencies should not be conducting surveillance on U.S. journalists.   Much of the article is not too interesting to anyone who is not a journalist. However, there are a few parts worth noting. One paragraph specifically, which I’ll get to.

First… The author Mrs. Jana Winter and Ali Watkins are lying about a very key point.  Watkins claims James Wolfe never leaked any classified information to her, and Jana Winter makes that point repeatedly.  This is a lie, they are liars – [sue me].    James Wolfe did leak classified information to Ali Watkins, who was writing for Buzzfeed at the time, which Watkins then shared with her friends and peers in the media.   One specific classified leak was the Carter Page FISA application, which Wolfe leaked to Watkins in March of 2017.

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There is an issue being overlooked, well, not so much ‘overlooked’ per se’, but rather intentionally being ignored by everyone in the discussion.

Maybe not an 800lb gorilla in the room, but at least to a troop of screaming spider monkeys swinging from the drapes and chandeliers.

As everyone is well aware, back in 2016 the entire U.S. media apparatus was given copies of the Clinton-funded Christoper Steele dossier, as Fusion GPS worked every source in their contact list to push the fabricated claims into the headlines.  Eventually the stenographers in/around DC, led by CNN and Buzzfeed, acquiesced.

As a result of the Durham indictment, we now know a fellow named Igor Danchenko was working closely with Democrat Party public relations executive Charles Dolan to funnel the fabricated source material to Chris Steele.

Chris Steele, under contract with Fusion-GPS to assemble opposition research that would be used by allies in the media and FBI, then took the Danchenko/Dolan fabricated claims and put it into his dossier.

DOJ official Bruce Ohr, the husband of another Fusion-GPS employee Nellie Ohr, was used as the laundry conduit to put the dossier into the hands of the FBI.  Simultaneously Glenn Simpson took the dossier and shopped it to his media pals.  That’s how the entire story was created; and yes, we already knew most of this and Durham is simply filling in the details.   However, there is something missing from all reporting.

We know the dossier was used as the resource material for the October 21, 2016, FISA application -a Title 1 search warrant-  to conduct political surveillance against the Trump campaign by accusing Carter Page of being an agent of the Russian government.  The Steele dossier was essentially a substitute for the ‘woods file’ that justifies an intrusive search warrant against a U.S. citizen.  The dossier was the evidence used by the FBI and DOJ to justify the warrant application.

What’s missing from this context is not just the fabricated dossier in the hands of the media; but rather, in March 2017 the actual FISA application was in the hands of the media.   Not only did most mainstream U.S. media like Buzzfeed, Politico, The New York Times and the Washington Post have the dossier in their hands, effective March 17, 2017, they also had the full and unredacted FISA application as it was leaked by the Senate Intelligence Committee Security Director James Wolfe.

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Senator Marco Rubio appears on Fox News with Maria Bartiromo to discuss a variety of issues and subjects from the 2020 election to the current policies toward China and social media surveillance.

However, at the mid-point of the interview Bartiromo asks the SSCI Chairman about the committee refusal to provide Senators Grassley and Johnson with documents and transcripts from testimony previously given to the SSCI in their Russia investigation.

While explaining the reason for the refusal to share transcripts, Senator Rubio shares that all prior testimony to the committee was provided with the expressed agreement that none of the witness testimony would be shared with anyone else. A remarkably self-serving construct with the deliberate outcome of allowing strategic leaks and narrative assembly without sunlight on the actual questioning.

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An additionally revealing aspect from this Rubio segment is the statement that Chairman Burr and Vice-Chair Warner have constructed committee rules that both parties must be in agreement with any process within the committee – before any action is taken. This is a key facet when we consider that Senator Warner made covert contact with Chris Steele’s lawyer Adam Waldman in 2017.

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Of all the *tells* that have surfaced in the past four years, this is the biggest.  This is the one that reveals just how corrupt and duplicitous the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence really is.   Do not pass over this information without pausing and evaluating just how explosive this refusal is amid the largest, most corrupt scheme in political history.

The republican led Senate Intelligence Committee (SSCI) is refusing to provide documents to republican senators from their Russia investigation.  Citing archaic justification within senate parliamentary rules current Chairman Marco Rubio (R) and Vice-Chairman Mark Warner are refusing to allow Senator Johnson and Senator Grassley to review the evidence the SSCI assembled to create their report on Russian election interference.

The reason and motives for the denial are simple, yet the majority of Americans have no idea…. The SSCI was the legislative entity, both republicans and democrats, who participated in the unlawful effort to remove President Trump from office.  The risk of exposure is exactly why Mitch McConnell put Senator Marco Rubio on the committee as chairman to replace Richard Burr.  The Senate was participating in the soft-coup.

WASHINGTON DC –  The Republican and Democratic leaders on the Senate Intelligence Committee rejected a broad request from two Republican Senate leaders seeking access to the panel’s records to assist in their investigation into the Trump-Russia investigators.

Acting Chairman Marco Rubio of Florida and Vice Chairman Mark Warner of Virginia rejected a late August letter from Senate Homeland Security Chairman Ron Johnson of Wisconsin and Senate Finance Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley of Iowa, who said that they “respect the authority” of the Senate Intelligence Committee to protect its interests, adding that “ultimately, we have the right as United States Senators” to access the records.

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Stories of a top aide to USAO John Durham, Nora Dannehy (good Irish family), leaving the investigative unit have hit the media narrative cycle.   However, here’s a slightly different perspective about her departure you won’t see anywhere else.

CONNECTICUT – Federal prosecutor Nora Dannehy, a top aide to U.S. Attorney John H. Durham in his Russia investigation, has quietly resigned from the U.S. Justice Department probe – at least partly out of concern that the investigative team is being pressed for political reasons to produce a report before its work is done, colleagues said. (read more)

That highlighted narrative segment is horse-pucky.

Unbeknownst to Ms. Dannehy, we met, we crossed paths in DC.  It was an serendipitous outcome of putting my physical presence in a position to interact.  From our encounter Ms. Dannehy seemed to be a functionary of the investigative process; located in DC as an outcome of her task assignment.

Dannehy, very familiar with the DC national security networks; and carrying a top-secret clearance level; had a role to play where she reached into compartmented silos, retrieved information, conducted interviews and then sent the raw data along with summaries back up the investigative pipeline. Ergo, she seemed to be an investigative “functionary.”

Although she was/is obviously a badge carrying member of the Orange-Man-Bad committee (most of them cannot hide that inherent disposition), she seemed competent and detached emotionally from the work.  That said, obviously this ‘Durham’ investigation touches on several ‘third-rails’ that could negatively impact the financial prospects of any DC insider if their assigned role undermined the position of the administrative state that functions to pay the network.   Did that play a role?  If I were a betting man….

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Red State has a good article expanding consideration of the Sara Carter exclusive this week surrounding a recent DOJ and FBI admission to the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence about the special counsel, Andrew Weissmann, “recreating” the original Woods File to support the June 29, 2017, Carter Page FISA application.

[Red State Here -AND- Sara Carter Here]

In essence the questions are: why would the special counsel need to re-create a file?  And if so what would be the purpose behind “losing” their original?

However, CTH would add an overlaying question: What investigative event would precipitate the DOJ approaching the FBI to inquire about investigative “files” secured and handled by the special counsel?…..  Such that the SSCI would need to be brought into the information pipeline recently.

Perhaps !

The 2018 timeline here is very specific.  Both the Wood’s File (for Horowitz review) and the investigative file of SSA Brian Dugan (for Jessie Liu review) would have to be handled within a very similar special counsel time-frame.   Questioning one could certainly lead to more sunlight upon the other. Perhaps time will tell.

Former Acting DNI Richard Grenell appears on Sunday Morning with Maria Bartiromo to expand on the challenges facing current DNI John Ratcliffe.

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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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