Posted originally on CTH on February 16, 2026 | Sundance
An interesting thing happened last weekend, President Trump went golfing with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. {SOURCE} Simultaneously, President Trump released the following statement from his Truth Social account.
(Via Truth Social) – “The Board of Peace has unlimited potential. Last October, I released a Plan for the permanent end to the Conflict in Gaza, and our Vision was unanimously adopted by the United Nations Security Council. Shortly thereafter, we facilitated Humanitarian Aid at record speed and secured the release of every living and deceased Hostage.
Just last month, two dozen distinguished Founding Members joined me in Davos, Switzerland, to celebrate its official formation, and present a bold Vision for the Civilians in Gaza, and then, ultimately, far beyond Gaza — WORLD PEACE!
On February 19th, 2026, I will again be joined by Board of Peace Members at the Donald J. Trump Institute of Peace in Washington, D.C., where we will announce that Member States have pledged more than $5 BILLION DOLLARS toward the Gaza Humanitarian and Reconstruction efforts and have committed thousands of personnel to the International Stabilization Force and Local Police to maintain Security and Peace for Gazans.
Very importantly, Hamas must uphold its commitment to Full and Immediate Demilitarization. The Board of Peace will prove to be the most consequential International Body in History, and it is my honor to serve as its Chairman.” PRESIDENT DONALD J. TRUMP
I said a few weeks ago that I would not be surprised to see President Trump announce the appointment of Ron DeSantis to be the Chief Executive Officer of the Board of Peace. DeSantis’ executive experience in combination with his relationship with Israel functionally makes him a good fit. Just a guess.
DeSantis is a political animal without much of a career path that does not lean heavily on his governorship. Ron and Casey DeSantis are the republican equivalent of Bill and Hillary.
DeSantis will need a job after his term expires this year. The traditional path would be to take a job as the CEO within a major company, make money then launch for the 2028 campaign later in 2027.
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 13, 2026 | Sundance
Holding an impromptu press conference, Vice-President JD Vance gives an impromptu press conference flying back to the USA. Vance was asked about the latest revelations in the Epstein files and for his opinion about the political consequences the files represent. WATCH:
Posted originally on CTH on February 13, 2026 | Sundance
Highlighting how the various anti-Trump factions of the Republican apparatus are using the Epstein drama to support their specific needs, Representative Nancy Mace announces yesterday she will use Epstein drama to, “go full blown scorched earth for the victims of Jeffrey Epstein and his friends. With no regard to our personal, or professional detriment.”
The background and political timeline hold the key to understanding the mooonbat crazy of it all.
Thursday morning South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster endorsed Lt. Gov. Pamela Evette to succeed him when he leaves office at the end of the year. {LINK} This triggered the generally unstable Nancy Mace into an explosive fit of rage, because it’s likely President Trump will also follow McMaster’s endorsement. {LINK}
By the end of the day Thursday, Nancy Mace had her strategy in place. The LAUNCH:
See how it works? Don’t get what you want in MAGA-era politics; simply throw out the Epstein name and become a virtue signaling member of the righteous tribe, vowing to take down the corrupt Trump system that allows Epsteinism to exist.
Approximately 80% of every narrative surrounding the Jeffrey Epstein saga is manufactured nonsense. The politicians like Thomas Massey and Nancy Mace are working diligently inside that 80% to manufacture false stories based on innuendo, rumor, gossip and strawman arguments that collapse when scrutinized. In short, it’s a grift!
Posted originally on CTH on February 10, 2026 | Sundance
Apparently, Steve Bannon and Jeffrey Epstein had a considerable relationship together. Bannon is cited frequently in the 3 million+ Epstein files that were released by the DOJ.
Unfortunately, part of the document production includes text messages between Steve Bannon and an unknown individual. Within a segment of the text messages Bannon calls Jared Kusher “the idiot son-in-law,” and frames himself as more important that President Donald Trump who Bannon sees as “transitory.”
STEVE BANNON (SB) – “To do that shows that [Trump] is center of gravity of this movement and not me — will never do — they are transitory figures — the dc game is to succumb to that — it’s why I never did before joining campaign — I could have been the trump whisperer years ago — avoided on purpose”
This rather elevated sense of self-importance likely explains why Bannon was the source for Michael Wolf via leaks, and why President Trump seems to have kept distance from Mr. Bannon. However, people who walk the deep weeds of U.S. politics will also remember when Steve Bannon was the editor of Breitbart and together with financial owner Robert Mercer in 2015/2016 was backing Ted Cruz in the run-up to the 2016 election.
Both Steve Bannon and Kellyanne Conway were original political consultants and financial beneficiaries connected to the failed Ted Cruz presidential effort, before they abandoned the Cruz Crew and jumped aboard the MAGA movement.
The Cruz Crew has essentially morphed into the Ron DeSantis coalition and this superiority attitude expressed by Bannon is one of the key characteristics of the group we affectionately call the “alligator emojis.”
Perhaps the best two words to describe the brilliant political strategies of Steve Bannon are ‘Roy – Moore’.
I digress.
Trust your instincts folks, and always remember…. It’s ALWAYS about the money!
It should not come as a surprise to see the Senator who lost her 2010 primary, then refused to leave congress and ran as a write in candidate; then supported changing the state voting system to a ranked choice structure; who then lost again in 2022 but ultimately won because Democrats all listed her as their second choice in the new structure; come out against anything that would lead to stronger voting requirements.
Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski has now pledged to vote against the SAVE Act. The SAVE Act would bar states from registering a person to vote unless they provide documents or evidence proving U.S. citizenship. It would also require all Americans to present ID when they go to vote. The SAVE Act is supported by President Trump and strongly opposed by GOPe members of the UniParty.
WASHINGTON — Sen. Lisa Murkowski became the first Republican senator to speak out against the SAVE Act, a sweeping election bill backed by President Donald Trump that would require proof of citizenship to vote nationwide.
In doing so, the Alaskan reminded her colleagues on Tuesday that they roundly claimed to oppose new federal election laws as recently as Joe Biden’s presidency.
“When Democrats attempted to advance sweeping election reform legislation in 2021, Republicans were unanimous in opposition because it would have federalized elections, something we have long opposed,” Murkowski said in a statement. “Now, I’m seeing proposals such as the SAVE Act and MEGA that would effectively do just that. Once again, I do not support these efforts.” (read more)
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.
Posted originally on CTH on February 5, 2026 | Sundance
Senate Select Committee on Intelligence Chairman, Tom Cotton, outlines via his X account that he has reviewed the intelligence community whistleblower complaint being used in a ridiculous effort to impeach DNI Tulsi Gabbard and finds it “not credible.”
The entire construct of this CIA-NIC ‘whistleblower’ operation is transparent. We have outlined the basic parameters of the entire fiasco {GO DEEP}. The intelligence community/Lawfare operation is a replay of the 2019 intelligence community/Lawfare operation used to frame Donald Trump during the 2019 impeachment effort.
Even setting aside the insufferable politics of it all, our national enemies must be laughing at us and how easy it is to identify the background of the super-secret, classified and “highly sensitive” national security information regarding Venezuela that underpins the baseline for the CIA-NIC effort.
If a simple website can put it together, then certainly our enemies know our own intelligence community is leveraging the rules and regulations around CIA assets to frame domestic political lawfare operations.
It is stunningly embarrassing on a national level.
Dear Senator Tom Cotton, you are Chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. You are a member of the Gang of Eight. You have all the clearances.
Please take a few hours and go to the House Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI) scif; sit down with the October 2019 deposition from ICIG Michael Atkinson and read it.
Access should not be a problem with HPSCI Chairman, Representative Rick Crawford, also being a fellow Arkansan.
Read how then ICIG Atkinson gained authority to change the CIA whistleblower rules to facilitate the false claim by CIA National Intelligence Council, Russia desk analyst Eric Ciaramella.
Look at how Ciaramella coordinated with then HPSCI Chairman Adam Schiff, while former AAG of the NSD, Mary McCord, was working as staff on the background structure of the Trump impeachment operation.
Remind yourself of the context. In 2019, ICIG Atkinson was Mary’s former office counsel in the NSD (2016). They worked together on the Trump surveillance in 2016 (Page FISA) and then again in 2019 on the pathway to create an anonymous CIA whistleblower complaint.
What you will notice from that 2019 deposition is the similarity to the whistleblower complaint pathway and IC operation you just reviewed today.
Ciaramella was one of the key authors of the 2017 ICA from his office desk inside the CIA (per Brennan’s instructions to the NIC). Ciaramella was also the anonymous CIA whistleblower in the Trump impeachment 2019. See the issue?
Then ask yourself, if we the ordinary American people can see this stuff and put it together… then what exactly does that say about the SSCI role in oversight?
Posted originally on CTH on February 1, 2026 | Sundance
In January of 2017 California Senator Dianne Feinstein abdicated her position as Vice-Chair of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI). Upon the initiation of a new congress, and two weeks before the inauguration of President Donald Trump, Virginia Senator Mark Warner took the SSCI Vice-Chair seat…. and that’s how things get started.
Amid a concerted effort to resist the incoming administration the Russia Collusion Conspiracy was launched. Politicians, the U.S. intelligence apparatus and DC beltway media united in common purpose to push a Trump-Russia narrative.
Within the early days of that effort, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence initiated an investigation into Russian interference with the election. Chairman Richard Burr and Vice-Chair Warner were toasted throughout DC as an example of bipartisan oversight against what House minority leader Nancy Pelosi called a “fraudulent president.”
Sometime in late February/early March 2017 Senator Warner requested a copy of the top secret FISA application used against Carter Page, falsely accusing him of being “an agent of a foreign power.” Simultaneous to this the FBI was trying to track down the details of dozens of classified intelligence leaks to the media from within the DC system. FBI Special Agent, Washington DC Field Office, Brian Dugan appears to have been tasked with tracking and identifying intelligence leakers. Dugan saw an opportunity.
On March 17, 2017, in order to fulfill the request of SSCI Vice-Chairman Mark Warner, Agent Dugan goes to the FISA Court and picks up a copy of the FISA application. At the time there were only two components: The original application (Oct ’16), and the first renewal (Jan ’17). The next renewal did not come until April and then again in June.
NOTE: The FBI did not go to the DOJ-NSD to pick up a copy. Why?
You’ll see.
The FBI went to FISA Court for their copy. The FISA Clerk stamped the copy with the Date March 17, 2017, and Dugan returned to the Washington Field Office of the FBI.
We know this was the process, because Dugan later writes the copy was “an FBI equity”, meaning the origination of the leaked document came from the FBI. Not the DOJ-NSD or the FISA Court directly (the two other possible sources).
When SSA Dugan returned to the FBI office he changed the dates (by one day) on the application and first renewal, presumably as a leak tracer, and prepared them for release.
Throughout this process DOJ Main Justice appears purposefully unaware. The Washington Field Office FBI were limiting information in order to track classified leaks.
This exclusion process narrows the possibility.
Later in the afternoon of March 17, 2017, the WFO delivered the FISA application to SSCI Security Director James Wolfe. [Wolfe indictment page 6 – Line 17, 18]
Shortly after 4:00pm Mark Warner arrives at the SSCI Sensitive Comparmented Information Facility, or SCIF. We discover this exact timeframe from text messages belonging to Chris Steele’s U.S. Attorney, Adam Waldman. More on that in a minute.
Before, during or after Senator Warner’s review of the FISA application, SSCI Security Director James Wolfe leaked the FISA application content to his allied media cohort, a journalist at Buzzfeed, Ali Watkins.
Additional material later released puts the most likely sequence for Wolfe’s leak coming after Warner’s review.
The leak was accomplished by a series of picture texts. The original FISA application is 83 pages in total with one intentionally blank page [Ali Watkins is “Reporter #2”]:
James Wolfe took a photograph of each of the pages and then sent those 82 image texts to Ms. Ali Watkins. At this moment, March 17, 2017, Ms. Watkins now holds a copy of the unredacted original FISA application. However, the copy also carries the leak tracer.
After reporting of Carter Page (Male 1) appears in Buzzfeed written by Watkins; and after both the New York Times and Washington Post publish articles about the FISA application using the leak trace information; the FBI now knows the leak came from the SSCI.
Over the next several months physical surveillance on Wolfe is conducted. The FBI must have been able to gather very credible evidence that Wolfe was the leaker to Watkins because eventually a DC judge granted the FBI a search warrant for Ms. Watkins records.
It is very difficult to get a warrant on a journalist. There are tight legal protocols for doing so. The evidence gathered must have been very overwhelming. The court granted the search warrant. Ms. Watkins is unaware. Additionally, and importantly, it appears Main Justice now occupied by the Mueller investigation, is also unaware. [Doc Link]
The search warrant runs from Feb 1, 2017 to July 31, 2017. This specific leak of the FISA application is March 17, 2017.
Somewhere in/around this mid-late summer timeframe the Washington Field Office FBI also retrieved text messages from Lawyer and registered Lobbyist Adam Waldman.
We know the text messages are from Waldman’s side of the conversation from the attached screenshots later released. We also know the date of the capture was similar to Ms. Ali Watkins. Feb 15, 2017 to May 15, 2017. Again the Wolfe leak was March 17th.
The telephone communication of both SSCI Vice-Chairman Senator Warner and Journalist Ali Watkins were captured. This indicates both were suspects in the investigation. Thus, it seems likely the Wolfe pictures were sent *after* Mark Warner reviewed them, not before.
It would be very tenuous for the FBI to capture texts messages from the sitting Vice-Chair of the SSCI. This is not something the Washington Field Office of the FBI would do lightly. That aspect also explains why the texts were captured from the Waldman side of the conversation. Much easier to get the texts of a lobbyist than a sitting SSCI member.
In October 2017 the FBI first approached Wolfe with an fyi on the leak investigation to see how he would respond. [Indictment Here] By mid December 2017 Wolfe is confronted. He lied repeatedly, until shown the evidence, then he admitted, and admitted he lied.
James Wolfe was quietly removed from the SSCI immediately after, and was in a state of suspension until his indictment was unsealed June 8th. However, it’s the story between December 2017 and June 8th where things are very interesting.
As you can see from above, Mueller and the 17 resistance members that took over Main Justice had no idea any of this FBI investigation was happening, UNTIL the FBI investigative files were transferred to seat a grand jury to hear the evidence.
It appears FBI SSA Brian Dugan finished his investigation immediately after Wolfe left the SSCI; or soon thereafter. Somewhere around the end of January, to first week of February, all reports and FBI evidence would be submitted.
That transfer included: the March 17, 2017, FISA application with leak tracers; the Ali Watkins phone records; the Adam Waldman/Mark Warner phone records; and all the subsequent interview notes with James Wolfe and other parties (FD-302’s etc).
Keep in mind, every investigation that touched on Trump-Russia became proprietary to the Robert Mueller Special Counsel. This FBI investigation centered around the FISA application which was at the center of the special counsel probe.
This means the Mueller special counsel took ownership and control over the FBI evidence in the totality of the Wolfe investigation.
The evidence did not go to a grand jury.
On February 9, 2018, the evidentiary text messages capturing Mark Warner’s involvement with James Wolfe were sent back to the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence:
In essence, Senator Mark Warner was given a head’s up. Or put another way, time to clean up any sticky issues and narrate a justification.
Four days later, February 13, 2018, the DOJ notified Ali Watkins, and the New York Times, that all of her communications were intercepted as part of the investigation. By now Wolfe was two months removed from his position; undoubtedly Watkins knew.
In essence to the New York Times, who had been using the FISA application as part of its false reporting, were also given a legal head’s up.
The Wolfe Grand Jury was not seated until May 3, 2018; and the indictment unsealed on June 8, 2018. [link] All the work that SSA Brian Dugan put into catching an intelligence leaker was ignored. Wolfe was only indicted for lying to the FBI because it appears the grand jury never saw the evidence of his leaking the FISA application.
Why not? Because an admission of the FISA leak would have been toxic to special counsel Robert Mueller in 2018. It would have also been toxic to the SSCI and specifically Senator Mark Warner. The leak would have outlined how the Senate was involved in the targeting of Trump.
In 2018 Robert Mueller and Andrew Weissmann were in control of Main Justice for everything surrounding the Trump-Russia information. It appears the evidence file against James Wolfe went into Main Justice with clear and overwhelming evidence of Wolfe leaking the FISA, only to have it return to DC US attorney Jessie Liu for presentation to a grand jury with the evidence of that core element removed. Ergo, Wolfe was only charged with lying to the FBI.
However, it appears FBI Special Agent Brian Dugan didn’t relent. In a sentencing attachment on December 14th 2018, well after the plea agreement was concluded, Dugan swears under oath that James Wolfe leaked the FISA application:
“In this case, because the known disclosure of classified information – the FISA application– involved an FBI equity, the FBI devoted substantial agent and intelligence analyst resources”…
The evidence is irrefutable that Wolfe leaked the FISA application on March 17, 2017.
Once that point is established…. then the reason why the special counsel released the FISA application under the premise of a FOIA application, July 21, 2018, starts to have much more significance.
However, let’s just stop there.
The Top Secret FISA application was leaked March 17, 2017, by James Wolfe.
Why wasn’t he prosecuted for it?
Additionally, despite the evidence above, no media outlet has ever admitted James Wolfe leaked the FISA application.
Posted originally on CTH on January 25, 2026 | Sundance
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent appears on ABC News with narrative engineer Jonathan Karl to discuss the outcomes of the Davos assembly, the Canadian trade conflict and the U.S-NATO deal over Greenland. Video and Transcript Below:
[Transcript] – KARL: I’m joined now exclusively by Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who is just back from Davos and joins us here in the studio.
Thank you for being here, Mr. Secretary. Let me start with the threat that the president made just yesterday to Canada. He said, if Canada makes a deal with China, it will immediately be hit with a one hundred percent tariffs against all Canadian goods. Why is Donald Trump threatening Canada again with another trade war?
SCOTT BESSENT, (R) UNITED STATES TREASURY SECRETARY: Well, Jonathan, good to be with you. And look, Prime Minister Carney went to — went to China, came back, dropped some industry specific tariffs on Chinese goods, and we have a highly integrated market with Canada, sometimes in autos, which he dropped the E.V. tariff, I believe, from a hundred percent to six percent.
The goods can cross across the border during the manufacturing process six times. And we can’t let Canada become an opening that the Chinese pour their cheap goods into the U.S. We have a USMCA agreement, but based on — based on that, which is going to be renegotiated this summer, and I’m not sure what Prime Minister Carney is doing here, other than trying to virtue-signal to his globalist friends at Davos.
I don’t think he’s doing the best job for the Canadian people.
KARL: But there’s confusion from President Trump on this. I mean, we heard from him just — I think it was nine days ago, eight or nine days ago. He had this to say about Canada negotiating with China.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REPORTER: How do you see the deals — Canada and China just signed trade deals between the two partners?
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Well, that’s OK. That’s what he should be doing. I mean, it’s a good thing for him to sign a trade deal. If you can get a deal with China, he should do that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KARL: OK. So, he gives a green light to a deal with China just after they do it. And then nine days later, he’s saying that’s it, hundred percent tariffs.
BESSENT: Well, no, there’s possibility of hundred percent tariffs if they do a free trade deal. So, what —
KARL: So, it’s not now? It’s — this is if they go further than what’s already happening?
BESSENT: Well, it’s — if they go further, if we see that the Canadians are allowing the Chinese to dump goods. And Jonathan, just to be clear that the Canadians, a few months ago, joined the U.S. in putting high steel tariffs on China because the Chinese are dumping. The Europeans also have done the same thing. And it looks like that Prime Minister Carney may have done some kind of about-face.
KARL: You’ve got tariffs that have been in place since April. And the idea is to bring back manufacturing jobs, but in fact, every month, according to the data from the Fed, every month since April, we’ve actually had a decline in manufacturing jobs in the country.
BESSENT: Well, that — those are the manufacturing jobs. What we’re seeing is a burst in construction jobs because we’re seeing record number of factories construction. I was just in my home state of South Carolina a couple of months ago. There’s a rare earth magnets factory, 800 construction jobs. It could morph into 3,000 factory jobs.
I was just at the Boeing plant in Charleston. Thanks to President Trump’s constant push during the trade deals to sell more aircraft, Boeing is expanding their capacity there by fifty percent. So those will be construction jobs that morph into factory jobs. So, I could not be more upbeat about the prospects for manufacturing, for the economy in 2026.
KARL: And how do you explain what happened with Greenland? I mean, the president goes into Davos, not ruling out military force, talking about imposing tariffs on the Europeans who oppose us retaking Greenland. And now, suddenly, he’s OK with essentially, it seems like the same agreement that’s been in place since the ’50s.
BESSENT: Well, I think you haven’t seen the full agreement. Secretary General, Mark Rutte was a very good interlocutor between the Europeans and between President Trump. But look, a lot — a lot of things have changed up in Greenland. Jonathan, do you know what the Istanbul Bridge is?
KARL: Tell me.
BESSENT: A Chinese freight ship that, for the first time in October, came across the Arctic into the U.K. They are shortening their travel time. So, the Arctic is changing. Very important strategically for the U.S. to help control that.
KARL: OK. But again, it seems like we’re going to basically have the — I mean, Greenland’s not going to become part of the United States. We’re going to have the same access that we’ve had.
(CROSSTALK)
BESSENT: I promise you, the deal is not what we had before.
KARL: OK.
BESSENT: It is much more fulsome for the United States. And again, Jon, just to be clear, for 150 years, American presidents have had their eye on Greenland. We administered Greenland during World War II after the Danish were invaded by the Nazis.
KARL: Let me — let me ask you. Let me show you a photo that was posted by the French Defense Ministry yesterday showing coffins of French soldiers who died fighting alongside Americans in Afghanistan. And we also heard from the Italian prime minister, a good supporter of Donald Trump, Prime Minister Meloni, reacted to what the president had to say about European troops serving in Afghanistan, saying that she was astonished, and noted that 53 Italian service members were killed, more than 700 were wounded.
Does the president regret what he said about our NATO allies and their service in Afghanistan?
BESSENT: Jon, I was traveling. I haven’t seen any of that, but I can tell you that the president values NATO, and since his first term, he has worked hard to make sure that our NATO allies are pulling their fair share.
Just to be clear, since 1980, since 1980, the U.S. has spent $22 trillion more on defense than NATO. And now by President Trump getting our NATO allies, including Canada, who was very deficient in the funding, NATO is going to be stronger than ever.
KARL: But this is about sacrifice. Let’s play President Trump’s words so you understand exactly what they were talking about, what I’m talking about.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We’ve never needed them. We have never really asked anything of them. You know, they’ll say they sent some troops to Afghanistan or this or that, and they did. They stayed a little back little off the front lines.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KARL: I mean, do you understand why our European allies, the ones you’re negotiating with, are insulted by that?
BESSENT: Again, I think President Trump is laser-focused on the strongest NATO possible, that he has worked to negotiate a settlement on Russia-Ukraine. The U.S. has made much bigger sacrifices than the European has — Europeans have. We have put 25 percent tariffs on India for buying Russian oil. Guess what happened last week? The Europeans signed a trade deal with India.
They — and just to be clear again, the Russian oil goes into India. The refined products come out, and the Europeans buy the refined products. They are financing the war against themselves. So, President Trump’s leadership, we will eventually end this Ukraine-Russia war.
KARL: And before you go, I know this is not your lane, but I got to ask you about what’s happened in Minneapolis. As a member of the — of the Trump cabinet, are you concerned to see another American citizen ends up dead, shot by federal law enforcement?
BESSENT: Jonathan, it’s a tragedy when anyone dies, but I can tell you the situation on the ground there is being stirred up by Governor Walz. I was out there two weeks ago. Governor Walz declined to provide a security detail for me to go into the Minnesota capital with the state police. So, he is fomenting the — he is fomenting chaos because there is substantial waste, fraud and abuse.
My job as Treasury secretary is to investigate that, and I think that, you know, this chaos that’s going on out there, and again, I am sorry that this gentleman is dead, but he did bring a nine-millimeter semi-automatic weapon with two cartridges to what was supposed to be a peaceful protest. I think that there are a lot of paid agitators who are ginning things up, and the governor has not done a good job of tamping this down.
KARL: Yes. I mean, as you know, he was an ICU nurse, worked for the Veterans Administration, and there’s no evidence that he brandished the gun whatsoever. In fact, it appears that —
BESSENT: He brought a gun.
(CROSSTALK)
KARL: He’d been disarmed before he was —
(CROSSTALK)
BESSENT: He brought a gun. Have you ever gone to a protest, Jonathan?
KARL: I mean, we do have a Second Amendment in this country that —
BESSENT: Jonathan, have you ever gone to a protest?
KARL: I mean —
BESSENT: Have you gone to a protest?
KARL: I mean, I’ve — no, actually, as a reporter covering it.
BESSENT: OK. I’ve been to a protest.
KARL: Yes.
BESSENT: Guess what? I didn’t bring a gun. I brought a billboard.
KARL: OK. Secretary Bessent, thank you for joining us.
Coming up, we’ll have the latest on the massive winter storm sweeping the country. We’re back in a moment.
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