Posted originally on CTH on February 16, 2026 | Sundance
Through the years I didn’t really have much of an opinion of Steve Bannon, I approached any story of interest that surrounded him by simply looking at the factual details of the current event in question.
CTH well understood that Bannon, and subsequently his expressed opinion and objective, was simply an outcome of his position – downstream from the billionaire of the moment who paid him.
In essence, Steve Bannon always seemed to be, much like Kellyanne Conway, an advocate for whoever was financing him. From Robert/Rebekah Mercer at Breitbart forward to any endeavor thereafter, it always just appeared the same.
That said, with the release of the Epstein files, the relationship between Steve Bannon and Jeffrey Epstein is something CTH did not expect. {HERE} Bannon and Epstein were very close and talked to each other about seemingly everything.
I can never unsee what I have read. Nor will CTH ever entertain the possibility that Bannon was ever a good element within the MAGA effort. There is a solid argument to be made that the Bannon War Room was funded, or organized in the funding mechanisms, by Jeffrey Epstein. {HERE}
The files of messages between them contain some shocking stuff happening in the background while Steve Bannon was in very close proximity to candidate and President Trump. The level of disdain Bannon had for Donald Trump’s family and for Donald Trump himself is really something CTH did not expect to see. {examples: HERE and HERE}
I am left to wonder now how much of the vitriol against Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump, ie. “Javanka hatred”, actually originated from the Braintrust behind Bannon and the assembly of people in his immediate orbit. {HERE}
Initially, I saw some Twitter accounts attempt to defend Steve Bannon by saying Epstein did all the talking in their text exchanges and Bannon was less communicative. However, that only applied to the first batches of files reviewed. As a few days went along and people started citing files, reading them gives a much more fulsome picture of the relationship.
Steve Bannon may have been focused on the financial gains and perhaps networks of people in his association with Epstein; but he certainly got deep into it and expressed extreme praise for Epstein, even going so far as to call him a god. {LINK} These were two men in a very close friendship. There is no political or ideological distance between Bannon and Epstein.
The level of expressed skullduggery that has been going on for years in the background is very unsettling to accept, and I say that as a person who doesn’t customarily get shocked by duplicity.
This is not about division; this is about something more akin to betrayal.
While putting on a MAGA face for the War Room broadcasts, in the background Bannon was actually plotting and advising of ways to eliminate Donald Trump from republican politics. This is Brutus level disloyalty, even accepting the guy has no moral compass other than his bank account. I can never unsee what has been seen.
There’s also some weird stuff in the exchanges about contextual things from years past. As an example, in one set of text messages Bannon and Epstein were discussing Patrick Byrne who is now part of the Emerald Robinson/Mike Flynn network. Bannon notes in 2018 that Byrne told him he was working for the CIA, and apparently Bannon did not believe him. {SOURCE}
This is the same November, 2018, message exchange where Epstein is advising Steve Bannon on how to set up a media network to maximize privacy, structure the financing and eliminate the problems with transparency. This is the origin of what would less than a year later become Bannon’s War Room on Real Voice America.
Did Jeffrey Epstein provide the seed capital to assist the start-up of Bannon’s War Room? That question isn’t clear, but sheesh, the creepy irony of the possibility is really over-the-top.
I guess in the big scheme of things, considering all of the potential creepy stuff that is far more consequential to the Epstein file release, the relationship with Steve Bannon is not at the top of the issues of concern. However, the reality of seeing this relationship and reading how much they both hated MAGA is just so darn deflating.
Trust lost can never be reestablished.
Ugh. All of it. Just, ugh.
Now we reevaluate everyone who openly, frequently and willingly associated themselves with Steve Bannon on that “War Room” platform. Including: Julie Kelly, Mike Davis, Jack Posobiec, Lara Logan, John Solomon, Laura Loomer, Harmeet Dhillon and so many more. Did they know about this Bannon-Epstein network?
Posted originally on CTH on February 14, 2026 | Sundance
Political operatives Thomas Massie and Ro Khanna have never mentioned the name Katheryn Ruemmler despite her name appearing thousands of times in emails within the Epstein files. Yet both Massie and Khanna went out of their way to publicly claim they forced the DOJ to release the names of four men they accused of being sex traffickers and pedophiles.
Massie was very proud of his efforts to discover the names and force the DOJ to unredact them. As Massie proclaimed, continuously: if President Trump and the DOJ did not publicly unredact the names, it would be proof that President Trump and the DOJ were protecting pedophiles and sex traffickers.
Thomas Massie: "We found six men whose names have been redacted who are implicated in the way the files are presented."
After holding their joint press conference, Thomas Massie and Ro Khanna then went to the House of Representatives to proclaim (1) Salvatore Nuara, (2) Zurab Mikeladze, (3) Leonid Leonov and (4) Nicola Caputo were sexual deviants, pedophiles and much worse. They were horrible men who had abused underage girls.
…. Except, there was a problem. A BIG PROBLEM.
Salvatore Nuara, Zurab Mikeladze, Leonid Leonov and Nicola Caputo had absolutely nothing to do with Jeffrey Epstein or anything even remotely associated with Jeffrey Epstein. [SEE HERE]
The names Salvatore Nuara, Zurab Mikeladze, Leonid Leonov and Nicola Caputo were in the Epstein files because they were random pictures of men, random passport pictures, used in a photo lineup during questioning of one of Epstein’s victims.
Ro Khanna read the names of six people on the House floor and described them as "wealthy, powerful men" involved in Epstein's crimes.
Thanks to the ‘HE’S A WITCH” hunting efforts of Massie and Khanna, four random guys who never new anything about the DOJ or the FBI, or Jeffrey Epstein or anything else even remotely in that orbit, were labeled as sex criminals and horrific people.
Salvatore Nuara, Zurab Mikeladze, Leonid Leonov, and Nicola Caputo did not know they were in the Epstein files and did not know their pictures were ever used by the FBI. Their random passport photographs were used in an FBI lineup to question witnesses, that’s it. But thanks to Ro Khanna and the political efforts of Thomas Massie, they were wrongly labeled.
Khanna and Massie now claim it’s not their fault. If the DOJ had just redacted the names of the innocent men, there never would have been a problem. Except, that’s the problem… They were innocent and their names were redacted because they were innocent; but that wasn’t good enough for Massie and Khanna who used the redactions as evidence of a cover-up, and when the redactions were forcibly removed, Massie and Khanna now claim the names should have been redacted.
Inquisitor Massie: We should dunk her, if she floats, she is a witch, if she drowns, she is innocent!
Thomas Massie’s objective with his lead position on the Epstein stuff, is to defeat MAGA and return control of the Republican party to the professional Republican elites (GOPe/Bush clan).
This is the same Sea Island agenda. They are actively working to best position their preferred and controlled leader, Ron DeSantis. If the GOPe get DeSantis moved into position, they will regain control. The problem is MAGA.
The useful Republicans are exploiting the Epstein stuff to accomplish this objective. Simultaneously, they are promoting as much division as possible (Israel vs Qatar) in order to fracture the MAGA assemblies. It’s structurally easy to see it, when you understand the goal.
Ask yourself this basic, commonsense question: If you tear down President Donald Trump, who benefits?
There’s your answer to that sense; to that sensibility trying to reconcile questions; to the intuition you have.
The New York Times version appears to be the most truthful, factual and cited. It also makes the most sense.
In essence, two foreign nationals were having a phone call about Iran and discussing Jared Kushner’s role and influence in the policy of Trump toward Iran. The phone call was intercepted by a foreign intelligence agency, who then relayed their interpretation of the discussion to the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA).
NEW YORK TIMES – […] It was a discussion last year between two foreign nationals about Iran, not an unusual topic for American spies to study. But an intercept of that communication, collected by a foreign spy service and given to the United States.
[…] Mr. Kushner’s name was redacted in the original report from the National Security Agency, but people reading it, including the whistle-blower, were able to determine that the reference was to him.
[…] The foreign nationals, they said, were commenting on Mr. Kushner’s influence with the Trump administration. At a time last year when Mr. Kushner’s role in Middle East peace talks was less public than it is now, the foreign officials were recorded saying that he was the person to speak to in order to influence the talks.
[…] The intercept also included what officials described as “gossip” or speculation about Mr. Kushner that was not supported by other intelligence.
[…] The whistle-blower report was based on a telephone intercept provided to the N.S.A. from a foreign intelligence service. Intercepts are notoriously difficult to interpret.
[…] The whistle-blower, an intelligence official whose identity has not been publicly disclosed, said Ms. Gabbard’s actions improperly limited who could see the report.
[…] Some administration critics, who have reviewed the report and have considered the underlying intelligence to be significant, also agreed that Ms. Gabbard did not act improperly by restricting distribution of the report. (more)
Democrats (administration critics) agreed that DNI Gabbard did not act improperly.
If it was possible to tell the identity of the U.S. person (aka Kushner) simply by reading the intel report, and this report is simply gossip by two other people talking about a U.S. person, then yes, duh – the report should be secured and not spread.
This story becomes more of a nothingburger each time new information is leaked.
Posted originally on CTH on February 13, 2026 | Sundance
Former White House legal counsel/fixer to Barack Obama, and former personal lawyer/fixer of Susan Rice, Kathryn Ruemmler was Chief Legal Counsel for Goldman Sachs for the past six years.
Throughout those jobs and networked professional relationships, Kathryn Ruemmler was also a personal friend and advisor to Jeffrey Epstein.
Yesterday it was reported that Kathryn Ruemmler has resigned from Goldman Sachs.
NEW YORK – Goldman Sachs’s top lawyer, Kathryn Ruemmler, resigned on Thursday in the wake of the Justice Department’s release of emails and other material that revealed her extensive relationship with Jeffrey Epstein, the disgraced financier.
Ms. Ruemmler and representatives for Goldman said for years that she had a strictly professional relationship with Mr. Epstein, a convicted sex offender. But emails, text messages and photographs released late last month upended that narrative, leading to Ms. Ruemmler’s sudden resignation, which surprised many inside the firm.
Before joining Goldman in 2020, Ms. Ruemmler was a counselor, confidante and friend to Mr. Epstein, the documents showed. She advised him on how to respond to tough questions about his sex crimes, discussed her dating life, advised him on how to avoid unflattering media scrutiny and addressed him as “sweetie” and “Uncle Jeffrey.”
Mr. Epstein, in turn, provided career advice on her move to Goldman, introduced her to well-known businesspeople and showered her with gifts of spa treatments, high-end travel and Hermes luxury items. In total, Ms. Ruemmler was mentioned in more than 10,000 of the documents released by the Justice Department.
Ms. Ruemmler, in addition to being Goldman’s general counsel since 2021, was a partner and vice chair of its reputational risk committee. She earlier served as White House counsel under President Obama and was a white-collar defense lawyer at Latham & Watkins. (read more)
Newly released email exchanges add fresh details to the relationship between Kathy Ruemmler and Jeffrey Epstein. Ruemmler is a former Obama White House counsel and now one of the highest-paid lawyers in the country as the chief legal officer at Goldman Sachs. CNN's Andrew… pic.twitter.com/niXjxlDWvd
Posted originally on CTH on February 12, 2026 | Sundance
Asst Attorney General Gail Slater was the head of the Antitrust Division of the Dept of Justice. Today she announces she has “left her role.” CNN is reporting that AAG Slater was fired.
Gail Slater was in charge of the antitrust division and a hawk on the mergers and acquisitions of Big Tech and Big Corporate media. As head of the DOJ Antitrust Division, Slater’s view on competition was against the interests of the major Big Tech billionaires and corporate media conglomerates who intersect with them.
Slater was in a position to influence the Warner Brothers-Discovery’s deal to sell the Warner Bros. studio and HBO to Netflix, which Paramount (David Ellison) is trying to stop.
If you have followed the influence of Larry Ellison (Oracle, TikTok) and his son David Ellison (Paramount, CBS) in/around the Trump administration as it relates to Elon Musk (a beneficiary of Ellison), then the timing of Gail Slater’s removal doesn’t look good at all.
Gail Slater came into the administration as a part of the JD Vance network (Peter Thiel, Palantir, etc.), and it looks like that same Vance network stood aside and watched Larry Ellison leverage his position to see her removed.
Slater was a solid MAGA voice in a critical Antitrust position against the interests of Big Tech and Big Corp. However, I said on Christmas Day 2024 – we were likely to be very disappointed by the influence of Big Tech/Big Corp in the White House {SEE HERE}.
Via CNN[…] Slater said in her Thursday post on X: “It is with great sadness and abiding hope that I leave my role as AAG for Antitrust today. It was indeed the honor of a lifetime to serve in this role.”
The anti-trust division is expected to play a critical role in assessing Netflix’s Warner Brothers Discovery’s deal to sell the Warner Bros. studio and HBO to Netflix, which Paramount is trying to stop by appealing straight to shareholders with its own bid. (CNN is owned by Warner Brothers Discovery.)
In an NBC interview last week, Trump said, “I’ve decided I shouldn’t be involved. The Justice Department will handle it.” But Paramount CEO David Ellison returned to the White House last week to meet privately with Trump, two sources familiar with the matter told CNN. (read more)
There may be something else in the background that we do not understand. However, when former lobbyists and political consultants become key administration officials (Wiles, Bondi) these types of outcomes are possible.
Posted originally on CTH on February 11, 2026 | Sundance
This is one step further than simple Lawfare, this story is about lower court judges openly strategizing ways to stop the enforcement of laws they are supposed to uphold.
Last week the Fifth Circuit Cout of Appeals ruled that detaining illegal aliens during the deportation proceedings is entirely following current immigration law [SEE HERE]. Now, according to Politico, federal judges in Texas are openly strategizing ways to work around that higher court ruling and keep giving bond releases to illegal aliens under the guise of “liberty interest.”
POLITICO – […] two federal district court judges in Texas, who are bound by the New Orleans-based 5th Circuit’s ruling, said the 2-1 decision left an opening for them to continue granting immigrants’ release on other grounds, primarily constitutional arguments against detaining people who have established roots in the U.S. without due process. Those roots amount, in legal parlance, to a “liberty interest” that the Constitution says cannot be taken away without at least a hearing before a neutral judge.
“This conclusion is not changed by the Fifth Circuit’s recent decision,” Judge Kathleen Cardone, an El Paso based appointee of George W. Bush, ruled late Monday in at least five cases, concluding that the circuit’s decision “has no bearing on this Court’s determination of whether [the petitioner] is being detained in violation of his constitutional right to procedural due process.”
Judge David Briones, an El Paso-based Clinton appointee, reached a similar conclusion.
“The Court reiterates its original holding that noncitizens who have ‘established connections’ in the United States by virtue of living in the country for a substantial period acquire a liberty interest in being free from government detention without due process of law,” Briones wrote.
The decisions from the Texas-based judges are notable in part because the administration has often rushed detainees there after their arrests in other states such as Minnesota.
A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
A Justice Department official, granted anonymity to speak candidly, said the rulings were in keeping with the view that there are rogue judges who continue to make results-oriented decisions to suit their personal policy preferences.
The 5th Circuit’s ruling has yet to percolate through federal courts across Texas and Louisiana, where detained immigrants have been filing so-called “habeas” petitions in extraordinary numbers to seek freedom from what they say is illegal detention without the opportunity for bond. The losing parties in Friday’s ruling may still appeal the decision to the full bench of the 5th Circuit or the Supreme Court. (more)
Lower courts trying to circumvent higher court rulings, even before any plaintiff brings them a case or argument.
Posted originally on CTH on February 11, 2026 | Sundance
I said Monday on Twitter: “Seriously. Correct me if I’m wrong. For more than a decade we have known that billionaire Les Wexner from Victoria’s Secret was the originating money man behind Jeffrey Epstein.
This should not be some kind of revelation, as it was widely discussed by those who researched Epstein over a decade ago. Wexner’s money was the originating capital for what would later become Epstein’s influence empire.
Additionally, and again, stop me if this old news is incorrect, well over a decade ago it became openly known that the “PINK” brand of Victoria’s Secret was specifically created due to the sexuality of young girls becoming part of the marketing influence of Epstein.
Wexner created the original VS girls, and the influence of Epstein (underage sexual perversions) then led to the adding of the VS “PINK” sub-brand.
Are we supposed to understand this is all new information? Honest question. No snark. I’m just confused by this sudden newness of it. We been knew.”
Full 2001 VH1 segment, glorifying Jeffrey Epstein while showing Epstein's allegiance with Bill Clinton and Kevin Spacey.
They also point out he has his own chemistry lab in the basement and world class scientists which he pays "20 Million dollars a year to perform WHATEVER… pic.twitter.com/JVXVrdubo0
The above VH1 segment was from 2007; however, even ten years prior to that it was commonly known that Les Wexner from Victoria’s Secret was the source of most of Jeffrey Epstein’s start-up finances. The resulting social network was fraught with sexual weirdos, and the VS brand alignment just fit with the club.
Suddenly, Representative Thomas Massie, a Sea Island asset if ever there was one, is proclaiming the Epstein file information outlining the relationship with Wexner is new information, stunning in scope and worthy of extraordinary time to explore. It’s all weird.
🚨🇺🇸 REP MASSIE NAMES LES WEXNER AS CO CONSPIRATOR IN THE EPSTEIN FILES
Massie confirmed the “well known retired CEO” previously blacked out and labeled a co conspirator is none other than Victoria’s Secret founder Les Wexner. pic.twitter.com/lWId4H9TFZhttps://t.co/6YmH1NaeWL
VIA NBC – […] The newly released version of the 2019 document shows eight people are listed as co-conspirators, including four whose names are not redacted: Wexner, the former CEO of Victoria’s Secret, Lesley Groff, Epstein’s longtime secretary, the late modeling agent Jean-Luc Brunel, and Ghislaine Maxwell, the only person who was charged in connection with Epstein. She was convicted of sex trafficking charges and is serving a 20-year prison sentence.
Four other names on the document are still redacted. It’s unclear who those people are but prosecutors have said that Epstein used women he preyed on as recruiters. A separate document dated August 2019 indicated that some of the others were victims as well, and had been cooperating with investigators.
A Wexner legal representative said in a statement to NBC News Tuesday that “The Assistant U.S. Attorney told Mr. Wexner’s legal counsel in 2019 that Mr. Wexner was neither a co-conspirator nor target in any respect. Mr. Wexner cooperated fully by providing background information on Epstein and was never contacted again.”
Wexner had a long relationship with Epstein that dated back to the 1980s, and hired him to manage his personal finances. He’s said he cut ties to Epstein after he was accused of sexually abusing minors in Florida. It was after that Wexner said he “discovered that he had misappropriated vast sums of money from me and my family.”
Wexner’s name was also mentioned in a July 2019 FBI email about possible co-conspirators that was made public as part of the DOJ release. Another August 2019 FBI email said there was “limited evidence regarding his involvement.”
He is scheduled to be deposed by the House Oversight Committee next week. (more)
The first time I heard the information about Wexner and Epstein was sometime in the mid 1990’s. It was well known.
There is a lot of horrible, creepy and perverted stuff in the Epstein file releases that is factually new information. However, the relationship between Jeffrey Epstein and Les Wexner is not new. Perverse, yes -as it was even then; but not new. There were even documentaries about it, one of them I think was called “Angels and Demons“.
Posted originally on CTH on February 9, 2026 | Sundance
The General Counsel for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) has written a letter to whistleblower attorney Andrew Bakaj, outline the absurdity of the complaint. Additionally, as noted by the ODNI counsel, “The whistleblower’s rights do not extend to the attorney himself.”
This should put to reset this insufferable IC/Lawfare targeting operation intended to generate an impeachment effort against DNI Tulsi Gabbard.
Factually, Andrew Bakaj has never seen the underlying intelligence report his client generated, nor the TSSCI material intercepted by them. Everything Bakaj has been leaking to the media is a construct of fabrications, falsehoods, smears and lies.
Both the NSA whistleblower and his attorney Andrew Bakaj were counting on the classified intelligence angle to this effort creating the illusion of something that is non-existent, a fabricated narrative that could gain traction. This is the same thing Bakaj did with former CIA whistleblower Eric Ciaramella in order to generate the first Trump impeachment effort. This time, against DNI Tulsi Gabbard, they are failing.
Allison Gill is an ally of the Lawfare network and recently sat down for an interview with NSA whistleblower attorney Andrew Bakaj; the same attorney used by former CIA whistleblower Eric Ciaramella.
This interview appears to be taking place after Bakaj revised his statements to The Guardian forcing them to rewrite the central claim of the leak he provided. The Guardian rewrote their article removing the key claim within the intelligence intercept that a foreign intelligence person was in contact with a person close to President Donald Trump.
The revision now states:
[…] “The Guardian reported earlier on Saturday that the phone conversation was between a person associated with foreign intelligence and a person close to Trump, based on Bakaj’s recollection of the complaint, which he confirmed over multiple calls. However, after publication, Bakaj said he misspoke.
He clarified his understanding of the complaint in a statement: “The NSA picked up a phone call between two members of foreign intelligence involving someone close to the Trump White House,” he said. “The NSA does not monitor individuals without a reason.” {citation}
This is not a small “revision,” it is essentially a rewrite of the central component to the whistleblower complaint. As it is now clarified two foreign people were intercepted talking about a person who knows Donald Trump. This could be any two foreign people gossiping or talking about anyone who is in the orbit of Donald Trump. That explains why intelligence analysts reviewed the NSA intercept, disregarded it and said it is hearsay likely just ‘gossip” according to New York Times reporting.
However, that said, Andrew Bakaj then appears on a podcast with Allison Gill during their effort to put traction to the claims, and Bakaj repeats the false statement. See video at 7:45:
…”So, in the spring of last year there was intelligence that was gathered by an agency that captured, um, activity that was being conducted by someone close to the President.”…
This is the same lie the whistleblower’s attorney Andrew Bakaj told The Guardian; that someone close to the president was a participant in the “activity.” This is demonstrably false through all other reporting.
The complaint alleges two foreign individuals were intercepted talking to each other about a person who Bakaj defines as close to the president, on the subject of Iran.
It could simply be two Germans or Israelis talking about Iran and wondering what Devin Nunes thinks about it.
The entire predicate claim is silly. Foreign officials and foreign intelligence officials talk to each other all the time about Trump and or his people.
This complaint is a fabrication, and the fact that the NSA Whistleblower included the TSSCI material in the complaint, literally outlining who was intercepted talking, is the reason why the complaint could not be shared or circulated without careful guidance by the DNI.
The whistleblower did this on purpose. If the whistleblower wanted to share his complaint with more people, he could have just avoided including the TSSCI aspect.
This is intelligence community Lawfare in action.
Dear Chairman @SenTomCotton , please call @AndrewBakaj to appear before the Gang of Eight, preferably with his client, play this video, ask him if what he says at the prompt is true? When he says, "no" refer him to the DOJ for prosecution and dismiss the complaint. 👇
Posted originally on CTH on February 8, 2026 | Sundance
Senate Select Committee on Intelligence Vice-Chairman, Mark Warner, a man of exceptionally dubious intelligence, appears on Face the Nation for a pre-scripted interview with CBS’s Margaret Brennan. The video and transcript are below.
From his position on the SSCI, Senator Warner was one of the key players in the deployment of the Intelligence Community against President Trump’s first term in office, including his background conversations with Chris Steele and his leaking of the Carter Page FISA warrant to promote the Trump-Russia conspiracy claim and stimulate the appointment of a DOJ special counsel.
Within President Trump’s second term in office, Warner’s primary concern is having a Director of National Intelligence (DNI) who doesn’t conform to the goals and objectives of the Fourth Branch of government, the intelligence apparatus. In reality, DNI Tulsi Gabbard appears to be methodically taking apart the intelligence community weaponization system. This, when combined with Gabbard’s review of election integrity issues, has triggered the deep concern of Warner, one of the IC’s primary enablers. WATCH:
[Transcript] – MARGARET BRENNAN: Good morning and welcome to ‘Face the Nation.’ We begin this morning with the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, Virginia’s Mark Warner. Good to have you here.
SEN. MARK WARNER: Thank you, Margaret.
MARGARET BRENNAN: I want to talk about elections and security. Back on January 28, the FBI went to Fulton County, Georgia and seized ballots and 2020 voting records linked to the presidential election. The Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, then was spotted outside the elections office, and she argued that her presence there had been personally requested by the president of the United States, and she had broad statutory authority to coordinate, integrate and analyze intelligence related to election security. What would justify her involvement? Is there any foreign nexus that you have been informed of?
SEN. WARNER: We have not been informed of any foreign nexus. The job of the director of national intelligence is to be outward facing about foreigners, not about Americans, and remember, many of the reforms that were put in place actually took place after the Watergate scandal under President Nixon, where a president was directly involved in certain domestic criminal activities and appeared with the Watergate break-in. And my fear in this case is it almost seems Nixonian. If the president asked Gabbard to show up down in Georgia on a domestic political investigation- first of all, how would he know about the search warrant even being issued? That’s not his job. And then to have the irector of national intelligence down there, which is totally against her rules, unless there is a foreign nexus, and she has not indicated any foreign nexus to us to date.
MARGARET BRENNAN: There’s been no communication with the committee whatsoever on this issue?
SEN. WARNER: We have asked. We then subsequently found that this was not the first time she was involved in domestic activities. She went down and seized some voting machines in Puerto Rico earlier in the year. Again, we had no knowledge of that. And then the question of what she was doing in Georgia. There’s been three or four different stories since it broke. First, she said the president asked, then the president said he didn’t ask her. Then he said it was Pam Bondi, the attorney general. So we don’t have the slightest idea other than the fact that the whole thing stinks to high heaven, and the fact is, Donald Trump cannot get over the fact that he lost Georgia in 2020 that he lost the election in 2020. My fear is now he sees the political winds turning against him, and he’s going to try to interfere in the 2026 election, something a year ago I didn’t think would be possible.
MARGARET BRENNAN: That’s a tremendous statement. But just to clarify here, it was Reuters that first reported that Gabbard went to Puerto Rico back in the spring to seize voting machines. Was Congress informed at all? Did you learn about it in the press?
SEN. WARNER: I believe the first we ever heard about this was from the press itself.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Wow. So the- you’ve laid out that the intelligence agencies usually focus overseas, but the White House is arguing that the director was there for good reason, and that federal law, they argue, assigns a DNI statutory responsibility to lead counter intelligence matters related to election security, election voting system risk, software, voter registration databases. You’re concerned, but are your fellow Republicans on the committee concerned?
SEN. WARNER: Here’s the ironic thing, Margaret, many of the protections for our election system were put in place during the first Trump administration. We set up CISA, the cybersecurity agency, to help work with state and local elections. There was an FBI center set up for foreign malign influence, foreign influence. And then we put into law something called the Foreign Malign Influence Center at the Director of National Intelligence office. All of those entities have been basically disbanded. CISA cut by a third. The FBI center cut back. The ODNI center cut back, which we think is, frankly, counter to the law. But it all- in terms the ODNI has to be involved, of foreign involvement, there has been no evidence of that to date.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Where is Chair Cotton on this, though?
SEN. WARNER: We have jointly been making sure that we get updates on election security, and I think we see more of that to come, because this is critical. And my concern is that when we see artificial intelligence tools and others- it was almost child’s play. What happened in 2016 China, Russia, Iran others could be interfering. We’ve not seen evidence to date. Gabbard, if she’s got any evidence, should have provided it to the Congress. I think this was an effort where Donald Trump can’t get over the fact that he lost Georgia so obsessed. And it begs the question is, what was Gabbard doing there? And it frankly, begs the question is- question is, why was the president even aware of this investigation before the search warrant was issued?
MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, we would, we would love to put those questions to the director, and have asked to do so. But now that you are here, can you just button this up for me? Because we’re talking about 2020, and that’s what Fulton County. The focus was about but you also said, you think in 2026 there’s an effort to interfere. What evidence do you have of that?
SEN. WARNER: This was what I’m seeing from the president’s own comments about nationalizing elections and putting Republicans in charge, counter to the constitution. We’ve seen these activities in Georgia, where could there be some effort that suddenly gives him an excuse to try to take some of these federalization efforts we’ve seen ICE. We focused a lot of this activity on ICE in terms of they’re going rogue in Minneapolis. But there is a very real threat, without reforms at ICE, that you could have ICE patrols around polling stations, and people would say, “well, why would that matter?” If they’re all American citizens–
MARGARET BRENNAN: –Noncitizens cannot vote.
SEN. WARNER: –Because we’ve seen ice discriminate against Latinos families. We’ve seen as well mixed families where someone may be legal and others not. And candidly, you don’t need to do a lot to discourage people from voting, and we’ve more recently seen ICE starting to use technology where they can get information about Americans. Recently, there was an individual in Minnesota that got denied a global entry card to get through TSA quicker because he or she appeared at a protest rally. Do we really want ICE having that information?–
MARGARET BRENNAN: Is that what DHS said?
SEN. WARNER: Hypothetically- that was what happened in Minnesota. Hypothetically, if ICE is getting information, and you’ve got an unpaid parking ticket, would you go vote if you’ve got an unpaid parking ticket, thinking that an ICE patrol might be at a polling station, this is uncharted territory, and yet you’ve got the president’s own words, in many ways, raising concerns, because he says, well, gosh, we Republicans ought to take over elections in 15 states.
MARGARET BRENNAN: We’re going to talk about some of that and the operations at the local level with David Becker, our elections expert ahead in the show, and the immigration reform. But I want to ask you about what’s going on with Director Gabbard, because there was a whistleblower who filed a complaint against her personally and offered to come to Congress to share the information. According to the attorney for this whistleblower, this is about a complaint that two inspectors general, one of them Biden-era, concluded had a non-credible nature. You’ve viewed a redacted version of the complaint as I understand it. Do you accept their conclusions?
SEN. WARNER: Well, first of all, the previous Inspector General, who’d been a long term professional, viewed it as credible. The new–
MARGARET BRENNAN: — Which of the two complaints?
SEN. WARNER: The original- I can’t talk about the contents of the complaint. I’m old fashioned. It’s classified, and the complaint is so redacted, it’s hard to get to the bottom up, I got additional questions. My concern- what the director did, is that this information was not relayed to Congress. There is a process, and we didn’t even- we, and I mean, we the Gang of Eight, didn’t even hear about the complaint until November. We only saw it in February, and we’ve got this complete contradiction where the then lawyer for Director Gabbard said she shared the responsibility she had to share this with Congress in June, the legal responsibility. She later stated that she was not aware of her responsibility. Ignorance of the law is not an excuse if you’re the Director of National Intelligence.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, as I understand it, because when it’s deemed non-credible, it is not necessarily an urgent concern that would —
SEN. WARNER : — There was a ruling of urgency by the first inspector general. That was contradicted by the Trump Inspector General, but the process was still ongoing. The fact that this sat out there for 6,7,8 months now, and we are only seeing it now, raises huge concerns in and of itself.
MARGARET BRENNAN
Well, I know you said you will not share what the intercept and the intelligence was about, or the complaint itself, but CBS has been told by a senior intelligence official the whistleblower complaint included reference to an intelligence intercept between two foreign nationals in which they mentioned someone close to President Donald Trump. US intelligence did not verify whether the conversation itself was more than just gossip. Will you be able to speak to the whistleblower? Will you be able to see this underlying intelligence?
SEN. WARNER: My understanding is the whistleblower has been waiting for guidance, legal guidance, on how to approach the committee.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Does the whistleblower still work for the US government?
SEN. WARNER: I don’t have any idea.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Will you be able to view the intelligence, the intercept itself that she’s accused of not sharing?
SEN. WARNER: My question is- we are trying to get both the redactions and the underlying intelligence, and that’s- that is in process. I’m not going to talk to the content itself, but this whole question, remember, this whistleblower came forward in May. It’s now February of the following year, and we’re still asking questions.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Tom Cotton, the chair, says he’s- he’s comfortable with- with the process to date, but on the–
SEN. WARNER: — I’m- I’m not comfortable with the process, the timing, and I can’t make a judgment about the credibility or the veracity, because it’s been so heavily redacted.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, the director is frustrated with you personally and issued this really long blistering statement saying you’ve repeatedly lied to the American people, that the media also lies, and that that she never had the whistleblower complaint in her possession and saw it for the first time two weeks ago. I guess, the actual hard copy. So, do you care to respond to this accusation that you were lying?
SEN. WARNER: I would respond that I do not believe that Director Gabbard is competent for her position. I don’t believe that she is making America safer by not following the rules and procedures on getting whistleblower complaints to the Congress in a timely fashion. I believe she has been totally inappropriate showing up on a domestic criminal investigation in Georgia around voting machines. I think she has not been appropriate or competent in terms of, frankly, cutting back on investigations into foreign malign influence, literally dismembering the foreign line influence center that’s at the Director of National Intelligence, and we are going to agree to disagree about who’s telling the truth, and I believe her own general counsel, who’s now her deputy general counsel, testified this week that he shared with Director Gabbard, in June her legal obligations.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, the NSA has released a statement saying that they are abiding by the law. We do invite Director Gabbard on this program. Before I let you go, I have to ask you about Iran. There have been a number of think tanks who have published photos of what they believe is evidence of Iran reconstituting and rebuilding its nuclear program that the US bombed eight months ago. Are they rebuilding?
SEN. WARNER: When we struck Iranians nuclear capabilities, our military did a great job. It was not totally obliterated. So, that standard that the President himself set and Iran has been indicated in public documents, is trying to reconstitute. What I fear is that we don’t have the ability to bring the full power of pressure against Iran. A few weeks back, when the Iranian people bravely were in the streets, and there might have been a moment, we couldn’t strike, because the aircraft carrier that was usually in the Mediterranean was off the coast of Venezuela, doing the blockade there. On top of that- on top of that as well, we were unable to bring the full force of pressure of our allies in Europe against Iran, because at that very same moment, President Trump was disrupting NATO with his Greenland play. We are stronger when we use our allies, when we have our full military capabilities in region, and that military is getting stretched, as good as we are, as the President gets engaged in activities all over the world.
MARGARET BRENNAN: You support the diplomacy underway now?
SEN. WARNER: I support the diplomacy. Absolutely.
MARGARET BRENNAN: All right. Senator. Mark Warner, thank you for your time today, Face the Nation will be back in one minute. Stay with us.
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