During his short-lived media appearances former Overstock CEO Patrick Byrne claims he had spoken to the DOJ April 5th, 2019, and again April 30th, 2019. Mr. Byrne stated he told the DOJ all of the information he was aware of during those two interviews covering approximately seven hours of questioning from officials in the Department of Justice.

During interviews Mr. Byrne highlighted the May 13th DOJ appointment of John Durham to look into the origination of the Russia investigation events. Byrne surmised this was likely, at least in part, a direct result of his two DOJ sessions April 5th and 30th, 2019.
Ms. Maria Butina, a young Russian idealist, was caught up in the 2016 vast Russian conspiracy agenda and had strong connections to high powered Russian oligarchs.
Originally the purpose of Butina coming to the U.S. in 2015, as explained by Patrick Byrne, was for her to engage with influential Americans for political contacts that could provide geopolitical value to the oligarchs.
Former Overstock CEO Patrick Byrne was seen as important to Ms. Butina due to his connections to the emerging financial structures of crypto-currency and block-chain. Mr. Byrne is a libertarian who believes in small government, and is somewhat of a disruptor in the business world. Ms. Butina wanted to introduce Byrne to her friends in Russia.
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Ms. Maria Butina, a young Russian idealist who was caught up in the 2016 election frenzy and the vast Russian conspiracies, had strong connections to high powered Russian oligarchs.
Today she was released from federal prison and immediately deported back to Russia.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Convicted Russian agent Maria Butina was released from a Florida prison on Friday after serving most of her 18-month sentence for conspiring to influence U.S. conservative activists and infiltrate a powerful gun rights group, and taken into custody by immigration officials to be deported to her native country. (read more)

Ms. Butina pleaded guilty in December 2018 to one count of conspiring to act as a foreign agent and agreed to cooperate with prosecutors.  However, the under-reported backstory to the 31-year-old Russian is actually connected to the 2016 election and FBI efforts to weaponize Ms. Butina as a FISA-enabling virus.
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Chopper pressers are the best pressers.  Earlier today President Trump stopped to answer questions from the assembled press pool as he departed the White House.  [Video and Transcript Below]

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[Transcript] – THE PRESIDENT: Hi, everybody. Hi. How are you? So, the stock market is doing very well. The economy is booming. We have a new record in sight. It could happen even today. But we have a new stock market record. I think it’ll be about 118 times that we’ve broken the record. Jobs look phenomenal.
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The background context has already been outlined –SEE HERE– so we won’t repeat.  Instead, we look at today’s defensive narrative engineering from the New York Times with a similar perspective, but a different set of reminders.
Content and distribution tells us this information is from the DOJ and FBI faction of the “Small Group“.  Not accidentally, and VERY importantly, this is the same faction under the microscope of Inspector General Michael Horowitz and his pending IG report.  Additionally, and again very importantly, the principles within the IG report have already had an opportunity to review the part of the upcoming report that highlights their conduct.

So this New York Times reporting, from conversations with the DOJ and FBI small group participants, is coming out in advance of the IG report and with their review in mind.
Here’s the article, emphasis mine:

WASHINGTON — Federal prosecutors reviewing the origins of the Russia investigation have asked witnesses pointed questions about any anti-Trump bias among former F.B.I. officials who are frequent targets of President Trump and about the earliest steps they took in the Russia inquiry, according to former officials and other people familiar with the review.

[Note “prosecutors” is plural; more than one.  “prosecutors” also implies a shift from investigative review, to a likelihood of criminal conduct.  The media presentation of John Durham has gone from a single U.S. Attorney with a mandate from his boss, to a group of people, ‘prosecutors’, working with the U.S. Attorney.]
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Within today’s reporting from the New York Times and NBC, a key aspect is how CIA analysts are worried about explaining and/or justifying the 2017 Intelligence Community Assessment (ICA).  As such it is well worth remembering information about John Durham’s originating focus from June, 2019:
Against the backdrop of the DOJ admitting FBI investigators never had access to the DNC servers to verify a Russian hack; and with new information about the FBI receiving partial and redacted analysis from Crowdstrike; the review by U.S. Attorney John Durham toward the downstream assessment/claims of the CIA takes on new meaning.
CTH has previously outlined how the December 29th, 2016, Joint Analysis Report (JAR) on Russia Cyber Activity was a quickly compiled bunch of nonsense about Russian hacking.
The JAR was followed a week later by the January 7th, 2017, Intelligence Community Assessment. The ICA took the ridiculous construct of the JAR and then overlaid a political narrative that Russia was trying to help Donald Trump.
The ICA was the brain-trust of John Brennan, James Clapper and James Comey. While the majority of content was from the CIA, some of the content within the ICA was written by FBI Agent Peter Strzok who held a unique “insurance policy” interest in how the report could be utilized in 2017.  NSA Director Mike Rogers would not sign up to the “high confidence” claims, likely because he saw through the political motives of the report.
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Following their bilateral meeting, U.S. President Trump and Italian President Mattarella held a joint press conference.  President Trump disassembled the U.S. media preferred narrative on Syria.  [Video and Transcript Below]
Pay close attention to the remarks about trade and the WTO, big stuff is about to happen as the Brexit plans of Trump/Johnson kick in soon. Canadian election Oct 21st.  Watch the international trade moves over the next 45 days.  Things will shake out quickly. Bigly.

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[Transcript] – PRESIDENT TRUMP: Thank you very much. Today, it is my honor to welcome President Sergio Mattarella of Italy to the White House. We’ve known each other for a while. We’ve dealt with each other for a while. And we’ve had some really great conversations. We’ve had a very productive discussion throughout the day with our staffs and representatives. And I look forward to hosting the President and his daughter, Laura, at a reception for Italian-Americans this evening. I look forward to that very much.
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It is becoming clear the principals connected to the 2016 weaponization of the intelligence apparatus, DOJ and FBI are increasingly concerned about U.S. Attorney John Durham and Attorney General Bill Barr looking at the origins of “Spygate” and the Trump-Russia narrative.  Lawfare and their media outlets are leading their defensive-based offensive.
Remember, Stefan Halper (U.K.), Joseph Mifsud (Italy) and Alexander Downer (Australia) all played a key part in helping CIA Director John Brennan assemble his two-page Electronic Communication (EC) that initiated the FBI to start “Crossfire Hurricane.”

All of the Obama-era officials (specifically those who weaponized government in 2016 to target their political opposition) are using the “IC anonymous whistleblower” approach in an attempt to paint any current inquiry as Trump weaponizing the investigation of their coup effort.  Any effort by President Trump to expose the 2016 misconduct is now spun to be President Trump weaponizing his office to target his political opposition.
The latest visible example of the corrupt team anxiety surfaces via a counter-narrative in a New York Times article claiming President Trump asked Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison to assist AG Bill Barr and his 2016 review.

WASHINGTON — President Trump pushed the Australian prime minister during a recent telephone call to help Attorney General William P. Barr gather information for a Justice Department inquiry that Mr. Trump hopes will discredit the Mueller investigation, according to two American officials with knowledge of the call.

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Predictable in the extreme.  Now that the Lawfare Alliance has successfully advanced the new legal authority of claims “heard from others”, they shift into phase #2. Revisit prior claims that now have additional legislative usefulness amid constructed IC leaks.
It’s the transparency trap. Here comes the next demand for HPSCI investigative material:

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Today in a court filing, surrounding a FOIA case seeking access to the fully unredacted Carter Page FISA application, the DOJ clarified the position of the DOJ as it pertains to President Trump’s May 2019 declassification authority. (pdf available here)
The DOJ highlights that President Trump did not order AG William Barr to declassify anything.  Instead, according to the official position of the DOJ, President Trump “delegated authority” to the Attorney General to determine *if* anything should be declassified:

[Source – pdf]

Whether AG Bill Barr does actually declassify anything is open to debate.  The current odds remain slightly less than 50/50; however, those odds could diminish significantly if the impeachment effort is successful.
The current priority for the Dept. of Justice does not appear to be highlighting internal corruption that targeted President Trump.  The current institutional priority appears to be protecting Rod Rosenstein.  However, we should have a better idea exactly where this will all end when we see the IG Report on potential FISA abuses against Carter Page.
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The story of a “Russian spy” being exfiltrated from Russia over U.S. intelligence concerns about excessive media reporting on the Russian Conspiracy-Collusion.  Reporting that was driven by those same intelligence leaks is, well, sketchy as heck. However, at the 30,000 ft level there is a picture providing obvious possibilities.
First, the tenuous reporting from CNN, where they attempt to paint Donald Trump into the spy narrative, is transparently political opportunism by narrative engineer Jim Sciutto and the anti-Trump brigade.  You know Sciutto’s efforts are bad when even the Washington Post and New York Times undercut the CNN script.  The exfiltration had nothing to do with President-elect Trump, or President Trump.

The part where the story becomes interesting is: (A) the timing; and (B) that DC journalists know who the “spy” is.  Indeed the claimed “spy” and his family have been living under his real name in Washington DC.  This fact doesn’t fit the outline of a retracted spy living in an era of imminent danger.
Heck, it doesn’t take more than a few minutes on the internet to discover who this “spy” might be. Obviously, if the media know all about him; well, that speaks volumes.
So what is the likely scenario here?
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