The resistance appears to be coming together.  In a stunning and historic change of protocol the United States Supreme Court will hold teleconference hearings and will actually live-stream broadcast the oral arguments and questions. Two elements are remarkable.

First, that the Supreme Court would permit a livestream broadcast of any hearing is historic. The purposeful controls of the Court, never allowing video, cameras or live audio broadcasting for their hearings, was always justified around the court never wanting to allow politics and media to shape the serious legal issues being debated.

Secondly, and perhaps not coincidentally, during this live-stream session, the Supreme Court is going to be hearing legal arguments after they consolidated a series of casestargeting the financial and business records of President Donald Trump.  The various lawsuits against President Trump are not only going to be heard, they are going to be broadcast.   It doesn’t get much more political than that.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court said Monday it will hold arguments by teleconference in May in key cases, including President Donald Trump’s bid to shield his tax and other financial records.

The court will make live audio of the arguments available for the first time. It had previously postponed courtroom arguments for March and April because of the coronavirus.

The court will hear 10 cases in all between May 4 and May 13. In addition to fights over subpoenas for Trump’s financial records, they include two cases about whether presidential electors are required to cast their Electoral College ballots for the candidate who won their state.

[…] The court has never live-streamed courtroom arguments and only rarely has it made the audio available on the same day. Cameras also are not allowed in the courtroom.

Most federal appeals courts already have moved to allow arguments by phone, though some cases are being postponed or decided without arguments.

The Supreme Court did not indicate when it might decide the cases it will hear in May. The court usually winds up its work for the summer by the end of June, and returns to the bench on the first Monday in October. Another 10 cases that were postponed because of the virus outbreak will be argued in the fall, said Stephen Vladeck, a University of Texas law professor who will argue one of those cases, involving rapes by members of the military.

The justices last met in public on March 9, and have held private conferences by telephone since then. The court has decided seven cases in the past month, and while the justices customarily read a summary of the decision from the bench, all the opinions have been released online.

The justices all remain healthy, court spokeswoman Kathleen Arberg said.  (read more)

In December of last year the Supreme Court granted the petition for a writ of certiorari and said they would hear all cases related to attempts to gain President Trump financial records and tax filings.

The Supreme Court issued a stay upon all lower court action and consolidated the cases into one writ.  The court will hear arguments in May and release a ruling later in the summer of 2020.

President Trump went to the Supreme Court after the House Financial Services and Intelligence Committees issued subpoenas to Deutsche Bank and Capital One seeking President Trump’s tax records. In his request to the court [Read Here] Trump asked SCOTUS to block the subpoenas on the ground they go beyond the committees’ powers.

Justice Ginsburg stayed the lower court decision and ordered the House of Representatives to file a response by Wednesday, December 11, 2019.  The cases and issues were then discussed at their private SCOTUS conference.  The court decided to take up all the cases.

The underlying House case has several defects and there is a strong likelihood President Trump would win the case:

House Oversight is one of three committees that 26USC§6103(f) requires the IRS to turn over individual returns “upon request”.

They requested (PDJT taxes for 6 years 2013-2018) long before Pelosi announced her impeachment inquiry, way before the House vote on same, to which Pelosi said Sunday, (paraphrased) “We haven’t decided to impeach. We are only inquiring about it.”

The ‘upon request’ is not as absolute as it seems. The request must still be predicated on a legitimate legislative purpose. SCOTUS has held (I skip the rulings, since previously commented on here many months ago) that there are only two valid purposes, both constrained to legislative powers expressly granted by A1§8.

1. An inquiry into making, repealing, or amending an A1§8 law.
2. Oversight of executive administration of an existing law.

With respect to (1), a legitimate legislative purpose would be reviewing real estate tax law for possible changes. BUT then, the request should have come from Ways and Means (Neal) where tax laws originate. AND, it should have included requests for tax returns from other big real estate developers also. Singling out only PDJT is a fatal defect to this purpose.

With respect to (2), after Nixon/Agnew the tax code was amended to require a special IRS audit of annual POTUS and VPOTUS returns, with the results held in the National Archive. Reviewing those special audits by IRS would be a proper Oversight and Reform legislative purpose, BUT ONLY for 2017-2018 after PDJT was inaugurated. The earlier 4 years demanded are a fatal defect to this purpose.

Both these valid points were raised by President Trump and were already on their way to SCOTUS. Now the committee is trying to ‘cure’ these fatal request defects by claiming the returns are necessary for impeachment. This raises four new issues where PDJT can also win.

1. Impeachment is not a legislative purpose within A1§8.
2. Articles of Impeachment have historically been the the province of Judiciary, NOT Oversight.
3. The demand was made BEFORE the impeachment inquiry unofficially started and cannot be retrospectively cured.
4. No tax ‘high crimes of misdemeanors’ have even been alleged. Impeachment fishing expeditions are unconstitutional.

IMO this case has the potential to set a major constitutional precedent about POTUS harassment via political impeachment. The constitutional convention minutes and Federalist #65 both make it clear why ‘maladministration’ (the original third test after treason and bribery, and which WOULD allow for political impeachment) was replaced by ‘High Crimes and Misdemeanors’. The phrase was borrowed from prior British law, has a specific set of meanings, and DOES NOT allow political impeachment. (link)

The quest for President Trump’s financial records is essentially a legislative and political fishing expedition in an attempt to gain opposition research for their Democrat candidate in the 2020 election.  [Joe Biden or other]

Catherine Herridge ponders what could possibly lay behind the remain redactions on footnote #350.  We know the overall subject matter relates to U.K. intelligence, Christopher Steele’s primary sub-source, and the overall lack of interest by the FBI to undermine their objective; the investigation of the Trump campaign. [Tweet]

Not to sound overly dismissive to the question, but the remaining redactions, intentionally placed by the CURRENT DOJ, only relate to the specific sources and methods within what we know was an investigative partnership between the FBI and British intelligence.

Who or what the specific agencies are [and I’ll share one possibility below] is essentially irrelevant to the larger story.  Unfortunately, the DC administrative state writ large, is attempting to obfuscate the real story by focusing on “Russian disinformation” within the Steele report that was not identified by the FBI.

That DC narrative is a great deflection from the more uncomfortable reality that U.S. intelligence officials purposefully and willfully worked to create, promote and support a dossier they knew from the outset was garbage.  They all knew the dossier was junk because the U.S. intelligence apparatus and political operatives provided the material to include within it.

So here’s footnote #350 from the Herridge tweet, modified only by size to use as a template for possible redaction discussion:

And… considering what we know about the subject matter that is discussed in fn350; and considering what is already known from prior research and public document production; here is a rough example of what could be behind the redactions.

Again, in the big picture the redacted material is moot.  We know the FBI used U.K. sources to corroborate Christopher Steele’s work product; and we know British agencies informed FBI officials that Steele was unreliable, biased in his views toward Donald Trump as a target, and lacking due diligence as an outcome of his intent.

In reality Chris Steele only used one primary sub-source, in addition to the information he was being fed by Fusion-GPS, Glenn Simpson, Nellie Ohr, democrat allies of Hillary Clinton, U.S. media conscripts, officials of the U.S. intelligence community (FBI, CIA, DOJ-NSD) & finally The U.S. State department.  All of these operators participated in the assembly of a political opposition research document without any verification. {Go Deep}

So the part where we ask questions about U.S. agencies not verifying the material inside a dossier they helped assemble, promote and exploit is, well, a little silly.  Alas, this is the pretend questioning game the DC machine likes to play.

Meanwhile most people avoid asking why Attorney General Bill Barr classified the IG report footnotes in the first place.

The only material behind the classifications is material that exposes U.S. corruption; U.S. intentional wrong-doing; and the use of intelligence surveillance as a political weapon.

♦Footnote 334 Before

♦Footnote 334 After

{Go Deep With Source Material}

Do you see any “sources or methods” in that redaction?

Of course not….

So why was it there?

The only thing the DOJ was hiding was: the reality of a Primary Sub-source who said his contacts were not viewed by him as a network of sources.  That is correct, they were just random people he interacted with as an ordinary part of life…. and they chatted about rumors, gossip, innuendo, theories, and stuff.  [Just like it said in the IG report]

Footnote 334, outlining the PSS who gave Steele the majority of information, was embarrassing to the CURRENT institutional interests of the FBI because it showed the prior FBI officials were on a mission; undeterred by truth.

The FBI is a mess of political targeting operations.

That’s what was redacted in the December 2019 IG report, a mere four months ago.  Embarrassing stuff that makes the CURRENT institutions of the DOJ and FBI look bad.  So they hid it…. again… as they continue to hide damaging and embarrassing material.

Which brings me to the point of AG Bill Barr and his biggest challenge.

The challenge for Attorney General Bill Barr is not investigating what we don’t know, but rather navigating through what ‘We The People’ are already aware of…. And then finding a way to protect the institutions of the DOJ and FBI while getting people to stop demanding action to address the corruption within them.

We are once again stuck in this stupid place where DC pretends the previous CIA, FBI and DOJ officials were duped by “Russian disinformation”, while we roll our eyes at them because we know the truth; and we know that they know the truth; but their pretense is supported by a willfully blind media.

AG Bill Barr has to keep feeding the purveyors of investigative hope-porn as a method to keep the pitchforks at bay, while simultaneously trying to figure out how to do nothing of substance so he can preserve the institutions. Remember, the DC system operates on an entirely different legal principle when it comes to internal investigations within the bubble.

As a result we get AG Barr saying “if John Durham can find evidence of criminal conduct”; where “criminal” in DC is defined around a DC-exclusive legal theory of “intent” that doesn’t apply anywhere else in the country.  [examples: see Hillary Clinton; or see IG Horowitz saying he couldn’t find intent.]

If John Q Public violated a law, the FBI would break down our door in a no-knock raid and use the violation as leverage to get us to break.  The FBI would not sit around debating  whether John intended to violate the law; they’d deal with that aspect after the raid and the pressure on us to fork over $250,000 in a legal effort to defend ourselves.  [example: see Roger Stone]

But in the DC-tier of justice, where administrating the law is subject to the internal rules that don’t apply outside the bubble, everything must be filtered through “intent”. When intent is transparently obvious, the DC legal theory moves to the second filter where collateral damage to the institutions must be weighted. [example: see James Wolfe]

AG Bill Barr has no intention on prosecuting any former individual or entity, regardless of their political hierarchy and/or level of participation, in the matrix of the coup effort against Candidate/President Trump….  unless the DC-exclusive legal hurdles are met.

(1) There must be clear intention that cannot be excused by the coup participant behind obtuse justifications.  If the corrupt participant says they had to follow-up and investigate because the Trump-Russia ramifications were so enormous (ie. the justification trap); and there’s nobody to refute that, then it’s over.

(2) There must be no collateral damage to the institutions of government.  No executive agency or branch of government can be compromised by the truthful prosecution of an individual from within it.  If the consequences are severe enough to damage an entire institution, then it’s over.

The current DOJ redactions and lack of declassification of a host of known material (including the scope memos), is directly related to #2, the need to preserve and protect people (Rosenstein) and the institutions (DOJ/FBI/Congress).

Think about the argument:  Are we debating what lies behind redactions on current DOJ documents from the AG Bill Barr agency; and simultaneously believing that AG Bill Barr is going to deliver some form of justice from inside the institution of the DOJ?

The Bill Barr Dept. of Justice is currently engaged in an ongoing effort to cover/redact  details that are embarrassing to the institutions; but the same Bill Barr Dept. of Justice is going to prosecute those who embarrassed the institutions?…

There’s something akin to a Stockholm Syndrome in the ability of people to rationalize away two mutually exclusive facets of DOJ behavior. And no, the redactions have nothing to do with U.S. Attorney John Durham’s investigation. Look at them again if needed.

In the fulsome picture, U.S. Attorney General Bill Barr is trying to navigate.

…The challenge for Attorney General Bill Barr is not investigating what we don’t know, but rather navigating through what ‘We The People’ are already aware of… And finding a way to tamp down the inquisition…

[@4:10 of Video] INGRAHAM – What can you tell us about the state of John Durham’s investigation? People have been waiting for the, the final report, on what happened with this, what can you tell us?

BARR – “Well I think a report y’know, may be, and probably will be, a by-product of his activity; but his primary focus isn’t to prepare a report, he is looking to bring to justice people who were engaged in abuses if he can show that there were criminal violations; and that’s what the focus is on. And, uh, as you know, being a lawyer yourself, building these cases, especially the sprawling case we have between us that went on for two or three years here, uh…, it takes some time, it takes some time to build the case.  So he’s diligently pursuing it.”

“My own view is that, uh, the evidence shows that we’re not dealing with just mistakes or sloppiness, there was something far more troubling here; and we’re going to get to the bottom of it. And if people broke the law, and we can establish that with the evidence, they will be prosecuted.”

INGRAHAM – “The president is very frustrated, I think you, you obviously know that; about Andrew McCabe, uh, he believes that people like McCabe and others just were able to basically flout the laws, and so far with impunity.”

BARR – “I think the president has every right to be frustrated, because I think what happened to him was one of the greatest travesties in American history.  Without any basis uh, they, uh, they started this investigation of his campaign; and even more concerning actually, is what happened after the campaign; a whole pattern of events while he was President. uh, So I, to sabotage the presidency; and I think that, uh, or at least had the effect of sabotaging the presidency.”

INGRAHAM – “Will FISA abuses be prevented going forward given what happened here where FISA judges were not given critical pieces of information; material facts about evidence that informed the governments’ okaying of surveillance on American citizens.”

BARR – “You know I think it’s possible to put in a regime that will make it very hard, either to willfully circumvent FISA, or to do so sloppily without due regard for the rights of the American person involved. And also to make it very clear that any misconduct will be discovered and discovered fairly promptly.”

“So I do think we can put in safeguards that will enable us to go forward with this important tool.. uh.. I think it’s very sad, uh, and the people who abused FISA, have a lot to answer for. Because this was an important tool to protect the American people, they abused it, they undercut public confidence in FISA but also the FBI as an institution: and we have to rebuild that.”

There are multiple stories today about the declassification of three footnotes from within the DOJ IG report on the Carter Page FISA application.  Many voices are calling the declassification of those three footnotes “bombshells”, and “the beginning of the great reveal“; however, that’s not accurate. [Neither Is This From Congress]  Exactly the opposite is true… the release today is purposeful misdirection.

Everyone seems to be overlooking the obvious… Why were these footnotes classified four months ago when the report came out?  Who classified them?  There are no protected “sources or methods”; and the only reason for the redactions was to protect the corrupt interests of the DOJ.

With that said, I find no reason to celebrate the un-redaction of redacted information that should never have been classified in the first place.  Factually, the information revealed by the footnote declassification was already well known.   Worse still, the interpretation of the information within the footnotes is propaganda, purposeful ‘misinformation’.

Additionally, if these declassified footnotes are an example of a new DOJ shift to allow sunlight; as in: some newly discovered interest in truthfulness; then why are the Lisa Page and Peter Strzok text messages still redacted?  Why is the Susan Rice memo on inauguration day still redacted?  And, more importantly, more tellingly, why is the DOJ still hiding the ‘scope memos’ that authorized Mueller’s investigation?

Nope.  What was released today was an example of the state moving in a very specific way to protect itself.  I’ll explain after we first review what happened today: [h/t Catherine Herridge]

Senators Chuck Grassley and Ron Johnson wanted four footnotes declassified (unredacted) from the IG report on FISA: fn-302, fn-334, fn-342* and fn-350. 

Footnote 342 is still fully redacted; however the others were mostly unredacted today.

♦Footnote 302 Before

Footnote 302 After

♦Footnote 334 Before

Footnote 334 After

♦Footnote 350 Before

Footnote 350 After

As a result of the declassification, the media and congressional takeaway is this:

The “central and essential” evidence used to justify invasive surveillance of an American citizen in the FBI’s probe into Russian interference was, itself, an example of Russian interference, according to once-secret footnotes declassified at the urging of two U.S. Senators. (link)

According to these interpretations, which are fully supported by the DOJ and FBI, the former administration officials were duped, tricked, into believing Russian disinformation that was seeded into the Chris Steele dossier.

That interpretation is the official U.S. Government position.

That interpretation is also pure nonsense.  Here it is again:

[…] The footnotes reveal that, beginning early on and continuing throughout the FBI’s Russia investigation, FBI officials learned critical information streams that flowed to the dossier were likely tainted with Russian Intelligence disinformation. But the FBI aggressively advanced the probe anyway, ignoring internal oversight mechanisms and neglecting to flag the material credibility concerns for a secret court. Despite later intelligence reports that key elements of the FBI’s evidence were the result of Russian infiltration to undermine U.S. foreign relations, the FBI still pushed forward with its probe.  (more)

That is not just a wrong interpretation; it is an intentionally wrong interpretation.

That interpretation comes from interests of the U.S. government, all sides; and it is intended to help protect and insulate the institutions of U.S. government.

The truth is the CIA and FBI worked to plant disinformation in the Steele dossier.  The CIA/FBI did not get duped by Russian Disinformation. The CIA/FBI knowingly and willfully solicited Russian disinformation to be channeled to Chris Steele.

The current DOJ, current FBI, and current political class (both parties), do not want to reveal that U.S. intelligence agencies worked with Russian actors to seed disinformation into the Steele Dossier that could then be laundered and returned to the U.S. intelligence apparatus for exploitation – via political surveillance – using FISA.

♦ FACTS – In addition to working in collaboration with Fusion-GPS and Nellie Ohr (CIA), Christopher Steele was simultaneously employed by Russian billionaire Oleg Deripaska. Our current DOJ and FBI are well aware of this; so too is congress.

Oleg had hired Christopher Steele at the same time Steele was working with Nellie Ohr and Fusion GPS to write the Trump dossier. [LINK] Also WATCH:

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In September of 2016 Deputy Director of the FBI, Andrew McCabe, and two FBI agents approached Deripaska in New York – again asking for his help. This time the FBI request was for Deripaska to provide dirt on Paul Manafort and the Trump campaign.

Later the New York Times tried to spin that request, by saying the FBI was trying to “flip” Deripaska to be a source for them. [LINK]

And then there was Anastasia Vashukevich, Oleg’s female companion, who was traveling with Deripaska at the time, and coincidentally talked about overhearing conversations about Trump, Moscow, hookers and Pee tapes between Oleg and ?? [Likely Steele] Funny how those same claims were in the debunked dossier.

And lets not forget our coup-plotter pal, Senator Mark Warner, and his “would rather not have a paper trail” conversations with Oleg’s lawyer (Adam Waldman) [LINK]…

So no, the FBI didn’t “ignore likely Russian disinformation.” The entire CIA/FBI network was based around CREATING Russian disinformation [or at least the impression therein].

The reality is that Christopher Steele was working for Oleg Deripaska, and Deripaska provided material, ridiculous material like hookers, pee-tapes etc, that Steele -while working in collaboration with Bruce Ohr’s wife Nellie Ohr (CIA)- put into his silly dossier and gave to the FBI….. who then used that nonsense to gain a surveillance warrant against the Trump campaign.  That’s Oleg’s REAL STORY.

Christopher Steele, working for Deripaska and Fusion-GPS, was simply the tool to get the CIA/FBI constructed intelligence products into useful position/channels.  It was an intelligence laundry operation…. all feeding into Chris Steele and then coming out in his dossier.  There was no “ignoring” it, because the CIA/FBI was manufacturing it.

The FBI used the dossier as evidence for the FISA warrant against the campaign.  Some of the information used in the dossier was from U.S. intelligence to Chris Steele.  The FBI knew all along the Russia intelligence part was bullshit; that is the reason the FBI ignored any warnings about the validity or provenance of the dossier.

The FBI knew the dossier was junk, they were not duped.  That’s why the FBI “ignored” warnings…. They were only ignoring what they already knew.

They were ignoring all of this because the goal changed after the November 8, 2016, election.  In January 2017 the goal to get rid of Trump was now centered around creating the special counsel.

The special counsel would then use the pre-existing FISA surveillance authority to conduct intelligence operations against the administration.  The DOJ/FBI needed to hand Mueller the tools to investigate Trump; that’s why they kept renewing the FISA warrant despite the collapse in provenance.  This was all by design.

No-one participating was unaware of the background of their participation.  No-one was duped; no-one was a victim of Russian disinformation.  Everyone knew the operational goals and objectives to target Trump.  Everything was done purposefully and with specific intent, including Deputy AG Rod Rosenstein…

…And that’s why we cannot see the expanded scope memos.

The current DOJ and FBI are protecting themselves and their institutions.

House minority Leader Kevin McCarthy appears for an interview with Lou Dobbs to discuss the recent revelations around the exculpatory Papadopoulos transcript and the inference from AG Bill Barr that no legal consequences are likely for the coup attempt.

It has been so long since the original 2018 congressional request that many people have forgotten what was included in the “Bucket Five” declassification request.

Bucket Five – Intelligence documents that were presented to the Gang of Eight in 2016 that pertain to the FISA application used against U.S. person Carter Page; including all exculpatory intelligence documents that may not have been presented to the FISA Court.

Bucket Five includes transcripts of the FBI wiretap operations using confidential human sources that were run against members of the Trump campaign; including George Papadopoulos and Carter Page.

One of those transcripts, from the operation against Papadopoulos was declassified on April 1st, and released last night and today.

Before getting into the transcript, it is also important to see the bigger context and the bigger landscape as it is visible.  Recent moves by the Trump administration highlight much more context and color… some may be interpreted as positive signs, and some are worth a note of caution.

Richard “Ric” Grenell was moved into the position as Acting Director of National Intelligence.  Together with a new staff within the ODNI Grenell is now in position to assist in any declassification effort.  Thus we also see the apoplexy by HPSCI Chairman Adam Schiff, as Grenell is positioned to bring a lot of sunlight on the overall FISA-gate and Spygate operations.   The corrupt intelligence community operators are not happy with Grenell holding such power.  Keep this in mind.

Additionally, former congressman Mark Meadows is now President Trump’s chief-of-staff.  That becomes a key point when you remember that Meadows participated in many of the investigative aspects within the FISA and Spygate scandals.  Additionally, Meadows was, perhaps still is, the primary source for journalist John Solomon.

♦Now a note of caution…. The declassification of documents in/around the core issues of Spygate may indicate a more political approach to sunlight, and not any criminal investigation, at least in part, of the overall IC schemes.  Whatever U.S. Attorney John Durham is looking into (seems targeted to John Brennan) does not appear to be related to a criminal finding of wrongdoing by the FBI actors.   However, don’t be alarmed by that nuance because it has long been visible that the FBI position would boil down to a claim they were hoodwinked by an unknown political agenda within the CIA.

Former FBI Director James Comey has leaned into the “we were duped” approach; but the “we” in that deflection doesn’t necessarily apply to the reality of Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe’s participation.   Comey may have been willfully blind, and incompetent toward his responsibilities, thereby holding plausible deniability as his exit strategy; thus Comey kept all those notes and memos to cover his ass. However, McCabe was not a mere bystander, subject to the manipulation of bad actors within the schemes. McCabe was an active participant, that’s the essential difference between the two.

OK, now on to the transcript as released…

In May 2016 George Papadopoulos was contacted by two members of the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA),Terrence Dudley and Greg Baker, working out of the U.S. embassy in London. Two American spies working in London put Papadopoulos in contact with their ally/counterpart in the Australian Embassy, Erika Thompson. [ie. ‘unofficial channels’] After meeting with Downer’s aide, Erika Thompson on May 6th, she sets up a meeting between George Papadopoulos and her boss for May 10th.

On May 10th, 2016, Ms Erika Thompson and Mr. Alexander Downer then meet with George Papadopoulos.  After the meeting, Ambassador Downer reports back to the Australian government on his conversation with Papadopoulos. [document release]. It is from this May 10th, 2016, meeting where communication from Downer, July 26th, 2016, is referenced as the origin of Crossfire Hurricane July 31st.

On August 2, 2016, Special Agent Peter Strzok and another agent at the Federal Bureau of Investigation met with Alexander Downer in London to discuss his conversation with Papadopoulos further. Strzok then received reading materials, which he texted about to Lisa Page.

A month later, September 2016, the FBI used a longtime informant, Stefan Halper, to make contact with George Papadopoulos, pay him $3k and fly him to London for consulting work and a policy paper on Mediterranean energy issues.  As part of the spy operation the FBI sent a female intelligence operative (a spy) under the alias Azra Turk to pose as Halper’s assistant and engage Papdopoulos.

A month later, October 21, 2016, the FBI used Papadopoulos as a supplemental basis for a FISA warrant against Carter Page.

(Page FISA Application)

A few weeks after the FBI received the FISA warrant against Carter Page, they ran another operation against George Papadopoulos using a friend as an asset; a wired asset.

The FBI labeled Papadopoulos as “crossfire typhoon”, and ran a confidential human source (CHS #3) recently identified as Jeffrey Wiseman.

Former Chairman of the House Oversight Committee, Trey Gowdy, told Maria Bartiromo in May 2019 that he had seen the transcripts of the FBI’s Jeffrey Wiseman operation and those transcripts exonerate Papadopoulos.  WATCH:

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[Transcript Video 01:10] Bartiromo: I’m really glad you brought that up; the FBI agents’ discussion with George Papadopoulos. Because when the FBI sends in informants to someone they’re looking at, typically those conversations are recorded right? Those people are wired?

Gowdy: Yeah, I mean if the bureau is going to send an informant in, the informant is going to be wired; and if the bureau is monitoring telephone calls there’s going to be a transcript of that.

And some of us have been fortunate enough to know whether or not those transcripts exist; but they haven’t been made public and I think one in-particular is going – it has the potential to actually persuade people.  Very little in this Russia probe I’m afraid is going to persuade people who hate Trump, or who love Trump, but there is some information in these transcripts that I think has the potential to be a game-changer if it’s ever made public.

Bartiromo: You say that’s exculpatory evidence and when people see that they’re going to say: wait, why wasn’t this presented to the court earlier?

Gowdy: Yeah, you know, Johnny Ratcliffe is rightfully exercised over the obligations that the government has to tell the whole truth to the court when you are seeking permission to spy, or do surveillance, on an American.  And part of that includes the responsibility of providing exculpatory information, or information that tends to show the person did not do something wrong.  If you have exculpatory information, and you don’t share it with the court, that ain’t good.  I’ve seen it, Johnny’s seen it, I’d love for your viewers to see it.

Today the transcript of the Wiseman operation was released.  This is the transcript where Papadopoulos’s friend Jeffrey Wiseman is wired by the FBI for a meeting in Chicago.

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Papadopoulos told Wiseman that he knew “for a fact” that nobody on the Trump campaign was involved in hacking the DNC.

The IG report said the FBI tapped Wiseman, referred to as “Source 3” in the report, due to a previous “connection” with Papadopoulos. The report said Wiseman indicated years earlier during an interview for a separate investigation he would be willing to work with the FBI.

After lunch, Wiseman and Papadopoulos traveled to a casino, where they played blackjack. According to the transcript, in addition to discussing Russia and the Trump campaign, Papadopoulos said he had worked for Israeli businesses, “to lobby for them in Washington.”  This conversation appears to be taking place in late October or early November 2016, prior to the election.

Despite all of the surveillance operations against Papadopoulos, the target was not interviewed by the FBI until January 2017. None of the exculpatory information was included in the January FISA renewal or the two subsequent renewals.

It’s likely the FBI will justify not including the exculpatory evidence based on the fact that Carter Page and not Papadopoulos was the primary target of the FISA application.

With the release of the Papdopoulos transcript, this interview from May 2019 also takes on new context.

Everything anyone needed to know about the motives and intents of fired Intelligence Community Inspector General (ICIG) Michael Atkinson is evidenced by his releasing a political statement tonight protesting his termination.

Atkinson doesn’t write a “letter”, his diatribe is not addressed to anyone, it is just a political “statement” designed to be exploited by the same people, for the same intents, as his prior ICIG work product.  This transparently political effort is ridiculous.

Just as pathetic and political as Atkinson’s statement, is the statement expressed by current DOJ IG Michael Horowitz on behalf of Atkinson:

….“Inspector General Atkinson is known throughout the Inspector General community for his integrity, professionalism, and commitment to the rule of law and independent oversight.”…

What makes this Horowitz statement so ridiculous, political and hypocritical, is that only four days earlier IG Horowitz was so alarmed at the gross incompetence of Atkinson that he submitted an interim memorandum noting extreme deficiencies in the FISA work product of Michael Atkinson as legal counsel for the DOJ-NSD.

The DOJ and FBI have an internal FISA self-check mechanism. The DOJ National Security Division (DOJ-NSD) chief counsel Michael Atkinson, and the chief counsel for every FBI field office are required to conduct an “Accuracy Review” of selected FISA applications. One per field office (25 to 30 field offices),which are also sent to DOJ-NSD (main justice) for general counsel Atkinson inspection.

Horowitz detailed 39 examples of Michael Atkinsons’ willful violations of law and policy within 42 “accuracy review” files at the DOJ-NSD. The error rate within the DOJ-NSD files that Atkinson was responsible for was over 93%.

IG Michael Horowitz was so alarmed by the gross incompetence he sent an urgent interim memorandum to the DOJ and FBI notifying the Attorney General and FBI Director of the systemic violations discovered.  Two days later the FISA court responded to the IG memorandum by demanding the DOJ/FBI reveal the names of the application targets.

So it is more than a little disingenuous and self-serving for Michael Horowitz to be clutching his pearls about Michael Atkinson getting fired as ICIG, when only a few days earlier Horowitz was raising alarm bells about Atkinson’s gross incompetence in his former position as general counsel for the DOJ National Security Division.

Perhaps Horowitz didn’t think anyone would notice?

Perhaps Horowitz was so assured of MSM providing cover, that he didn’t think anyone would connect the dots from his recent memo on the DOJ-NSD incompetence, to the man who held the job, Michael Atkinson?

Regardless of Horowitz’s anticipatory outlook, the recent IG report outlining Atkinson’s gross incompetence in the FISA scandal, vis-a-vis the 42 DOJ-NSD Accuracy Reviews, is the atomic shield against the political narrative Horowitz, Atkinson and their political allies might attempt to deploy.

Funny that.

RESOURCES:

♦ IG Michael Horowitz report on Atkinson’s gross incompetence HERE.

♦ FISA Court response based on Horowitz’s report of Atkinson’s incompetence HERE.

♦ Details of ICIG Firing & Background Connection to all the above – Available HERE.

National Security Council resistance member Alexander Vindman starts a rumor about the Trump-Zelenskyy phone call, which he shares with CIA operative Eric Ciaramella (a John Brennan resistance associate)….

Ciaramella then makes contact with resistance ally Mary McCord in her role within the House Intel Committee headed by Adam Schiff….

Ms. McCord then helps Ciaramella create a fraudulent whistle-blower complaint via her former DOJ-NSD colleague, now ICIG, Michael Atkinson….

…And that’s how the impeachment operation was started. (read more)

Acting DNI Richard Grenell announces the replacement for ICIG Michael Atkinson.

Thomas Monheim is a retired Colonel from the US Air Force Reserves and is currently the General Counsel of the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency. Previously, Col Monheim served as Associate Counsel to the President and Deputy General Counsel at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.

…The recent IG report that outlines Atkinson’s gross incompetence in the FISA scandal, vis-a-vis the 42 DOJ-NSD Accuracy Reviews, is the atomic shield against the political narrative….

President Trump has sent a letter to congress giving them 30-days advance notice and informing them of the removal of Intelligence Community Inspector General Michael Atkinson:

The necessary, albeit politically controversial, move comes about two months after President Trump assigned Ric Grenell to lead the Office of the Director of National Intelligence; Grenell is ultimately the acting boss of the overall intelligence community. It is likely DNI Grenell provided some key insight into the sketchy background activity in/around Atkinson’s office, and the overall intelligence apparatus writ large.

Additionally, former congressman Mark Meadows is now President Trump’s Chief-of-Staff; and Meadows has been a critic of those within the intelligence apparatus who attempted a soft-coup twice: Once by special counsel (Russia investigation) Robert Mueller; and once by impeachment (Ukraine investigation) using CIA operative Eric Ciaramella and NSC operative Alexander Vindman.

Also, in the recent FISA review by the OIG the DOJ inspector general specifically identified issues with the “accuracy reviews” conducted by DOJ-NSD chief legal counsel.  Who was that former DOJ-NSD chief legal counsel?  That would be current ICIG Michael Atkinson…

Currently, former CIA Director John Brennan is under investigation for his role in the FBI spy operations against the Trump campaign and administration.  Brennan is being investigated by U.S. Attorney John Durham, an assignment from AG Bill Barr.

Few people have asked why it would take a U.S. attorney to conduct a review of the CIA considering ICIG Atkinson should have been doing that oversight already.  The answer within that non-discussed dynamic points to the reason why Ric Grenell as ODNI was needed.

Intelligence Committee member John Ratcliffe has been nominated for the permanent ODNI role, but his nomination has not been taken up by corrupt Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI) Chairman Richard Burr.   Ironically, Senator Burr is now under investigation for insider trading related to his divestiture of Wall Street investments prior to the financial collapse due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Additionally, since our original research into ICIG Atkinson revealed he was part of a corrupt deep state effort to cover his own involvement during the FBI operation against candidate Trump, there have been some rather interesting additional discoveries.

The key to understanding the corrupt endeavor behind the fraudulent “whistle-blower” complaint, doesn’t actually originate with ICIG Atkinson. The key person is the former head of the DOJ National Security Division, Mary McCord.

Prior to becoming IC Inspector General, Michael Atkinson was the Acting Deputy Assistant Attorney General and Senior Counsel to the Assistant Attorney General of the National Security Division, Mary McCord.

It is very safe to say Mary McCord and Michael Atkinson have a working relationship from their time together in 2016 and 2017 at the DOJ-NSD. Atkinson was Mary McCord’s senior legal counsel; essentially her lawyer.

McCord was the senior intelligence officer who accompanied Sally Yates to the White House in 2017 to confront then White House Counsel Don McGahn about the issues with National Security Advisor Michael Flynn and the drummed up controversy over the Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak phone call.

Additionally, Mary McCord, Sally Yates and Michael Atkinson worked together to promote the narrative around the incoming Trump administration “Logan Act” violations. This silly claim (undermining Obama policy during the transition) was the heavily promoted, albeit manufactured, reason why Yates and McCord were presumably concerned about Flynn’s contact with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak. It was nonsense.

However, McCord didn’t just disappear in 2017 when she retired from the DOJ-NSD. She resurfaced as part of the Lawfare group assembly after the mid-term election in 2018.

THIS IS THE KEY.

Mary McCord joined the House effort to impeach President Trump; as noted in this article from Politico:

“I think people do see that this is a critical time in our history,” said Mary McCord, a former DOJ official who helped oversee the FBI’s probe into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election and now is listed as a top outside counsel for the House in key legal fights tied to impeachment. “We see the breakdown of the whole rule of law. We see the breakdown in adherence to the Constitution and also constitutional values.”

“That’s why you’re seeing lawyers come out and being very willing to put in extraordinary amounts of time and effort to litigate these cases,” she added. (link)

Former DOJ-NSD Head Mary McCord was working for the House Committee (Adam Schiff) who created the impeachment scheme.

Now it becomes critical to overlay that detail with how the “whistle-blower” complaint was organized. Mary McCord’s former NSD attorney, Michael Atkinson, is now the intelligence community inspector general who brings forth the complaint.

The “whistle-blower” had prior contact with the staff of the committee. This is admitted. So essentially the “whistle-blower” almost certainly had contact with Mary McCord; and then ICIG Michael Atkinson modified the whistle-blower rules to facilitate the outcome.

There is the origination. That’s where the fraud starts.

The coordination between Mary McCord, the Whistle-blower and Michael Atkinson is why HPSCI Chairman Adam Schiff will not release the transcript from Atkinson’s testimony.

It now looks like the Lawfare network constructed the ‘whistle-blower’ complaint aka a Schiff Dossier, and handed it to allied CIA operative Eric Ciaramella to file as a formal IC complaint. This process is almost identical to the Fusion-GPS/Lawfare network handing the Steele Dossier to the FBI to use as the evidence for the 2016/2017 Russia conspiracy.

Atkinson’s conflict-of-self-interest, and/or possible blackmail upon him by deep state actors who most certainly know his compromise, likely influenced his approach to this whistleblower complaint.

That dynamic would explain why the Dept. of Justice Office of Legal Counsel so strongly rebuked Atkinson’s interpretation of his responsibility with the complaint.

In the Justice Department’s OLC opinion, they point out that Atkinson’s internal justification for accepting the whistleblower complaint was poor legal judgement. [See Here] I would say Atkinson’s decision is directly related to his own risk exposure:

.

Michael Atkinson was moved from DOJ-NSD to become the Intelligence Community Inspector General (ICIG) in 2018. What we end up with is a brutally obvious, convoluted, network of corrupt officials; each carrying an independent reason to cover their institutional asses… each individual interest forms a collective fraudulent scheme inside the machinery of government.

Michael Atkinson and Mary McCord worked together in 2016/2017 on the stop-Trump surveillance operation (FISA application via DOJ-NSD). Then, following the 2018 mid-term election, in 2019 Mary McCord and Michael Atkinson team up again on another stop-Trump operation, each in a different position, and -working with others- coordinate the House impeachment plan via the ‘whistle-blower’ complaint.

HPSCI ranking member Devin Nunes was/is focusing more closely on the false statements of ICIG Michael Atkinson as they relate to his involvement.  Overlaying that focus is the contact between the CIA ‘whistle-blower’ (Eric Ciaramella) and the House Intelligence Committee via Mary McCord.

There became a very obvious dynamic that the impeachment construct was manufactured out of nothing.

National Security Council resistance member Alexander Vindman starts a rumor about the Trump-Zelenskyy phone call, which he shares with CIA operative Eric Ciaramella (a John Brennan resistance associate). Ciaramella then makes contact with resistance ally Mary McCord in her role within the House Intel Committee headed by Adam Schiff. Ms. McCord then helps Ciaramella create a fraudulent whistle-blower complaint via her former colleague, now ICIG, Michael Atkinson….

…And that’s how the impeachment operation was started.

Even more recently the inspector general for the DOJ and FBI, Michael Horowitz, reviewed elements of the DOJ-NSD (National Security Division) that directly relate to Michael Atkinson.

The DOJ National Security Division (DOJ-NSD) chief counsel [formerly Michael Atkinson], and the chief counsel for every FBI field office are required to conduct an “Accuracy Review” of selected FISA applications. One per field office (25 to 30 field offices),which are also sent to DOJ-NSD (main justice) for general counsel inspection.

Keep in mind, these “accuracy reviews” are known in advance, so the FBI has all the time in the world to select the best FISA file for review. Additionally, I surmise the OIG wanted to inspect the “accuracy review” FISA’s because they would show the best light on the overall system itself. The OIG was looking for the best, most compliant, product to report on.

However, when the OIG inspected 42 of these Accuracy Reviews, the IG identified that only three of them had accurately assembled documents (Woods File) supporting the application. The error rate within the files self-checked was over 93%.

So the best FBI files are selected to undergo the FBI and DOJ-NSD accuracy review. The accuracy review takes place by FBI legal counsel and DOJ-NSD legal counsel. However, the IG found that only three FBI applications in the accuracy reviews were compliant.

The error rate in the files undertaken by the internal accuracy review was over 93% (3 compliant out of 42 reviewed). These were the FISA files with the greatest possibility of being accurate.  It was specifically Michael Atkinson who held responsibility for conducting former “accuracy reviews” the IG finds were grossly non compliant.

That, current IG memorandum, evaluating the prior performance of Atkinson as legal counsel for the DOJ-NSD, now provides evidence to support President Trump saying he no longer has confidence in ICIG Michael Atkinson.  However, in the immediacy of the anti-Trump narratives, almost all media will not see that connection.

Prepare for the egg-on-face when that FISA connection is made…. though it might take a while before that narrative destroying reality bomb is deployed.

All the right people; that is to say all of the political operatives who participated in both of the soft-coup attempts; will now go bananas as President Trump removes ICIG Atkinson for his involvement in the plot.

Senator Chuck Schumer:

SSCI Vice Chairman, Senator Mark Warner:

The severity of pearl-clutching and teeth gnashing; together with the scale of their apoplexy in reaction to this development; is directly proportionate to their level of participation in the overthrow of President Trump.

The IG report that outlines Atkinson’s gross incompetence in the FISA scandal, vis-a-vis the 42 DOJ-NSD Accuracy Reviews, is the atomic shield against the political narrative.

The collective guilt-driven apoplexy from the deepest part of the administrative state is the one constant in an ever-changing universe….