The threads of the Russia collusion hoax are unraveling at an ever faster pace, it seems, and those who were at the center of it can see the gathering storm clouds. Department of Justice officials and the DOJ’s inspector general, Michael Horowitz, are now conducting parallel investigations into the origins of the hoax and the conduct of the conspirators. Many fears are being confirmed and many more questions remain to be answered.
That the 2016 campaign team of President Donald Trump was spied on – a suspicion for which Trump himself was previously lambasted – is no longer in doubt. Even Trump-hating former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper recently admitted to CNN that the operation targeting the Trump campaign “meets the dictionary definition of spying.”
The Latest Incriminating Document
There is also little doubt that the FBI was well aware of Christopher Steele’s political associations before the Bureau sought the original FISA warrant to surveil Carter Page, a Trump campaign associate. In a mostly redacted summary of a meeting between Steele and Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Kathleen Kavalec – written by Kavalec herself – the former British spy revealed that his client, an unidentified “institution” that is almost certainly the Democratic National Committee, was determined to publicize his opposition research on Trump prior to the 2016 election.
This meeting took place on October 11, 2016, ten days before the FBI obtained the Page FISA warrant. Kavalec’s notes on the meeting were made public following a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) legal action brought by Citizens United. All but five lines of text from this summary have been redacted:
“Background: Orbis undertook the investigation into the Russia/Trump connection at the behest of an institution he declined to identify that had been hacked. The institution approached them based on the recommendation of Glenn Simpson and Peter Fritch (specialists in economic crime, formerly of the WSJ) and is keen to see this information come to light prior to November 8. Orbis undertook the investigation in June of 2016.”
Orbis Security is Steele’s firm. A server belonging to the Democratic National Committee had recently been hacked and it has already been established that the DNC, along with Hillary Clinton’s campaign, had paid Glenn Simpson’s firm, Fusion GPS, to gather opposition research on Clinton’s presidential election opponent.
It seems that neither this summary nor any other of Kavalec’s notes had been provided to congressional committees investigating the Russia collusion/FISA affairs, according to a report by The Hill’s John Solomon. As recently as April 26, 2019, the FBI classified this document as “SECRET,” to be declassified on the last day of the year 2041. It appears that both the FBI and the State Department are going to some lengths to keep Kavalec’s documents under wraps.
Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA), who headed up the House Intelligence Committee prior to the 2016 midterm elections, told Solomon: “They tried to hide a lot of documents from us during our investigation, and it usually turns out there’s a reason for it.” The Kavalec document has been handed over to the DOJ’s inspector general, who may not have previously been aware of its existence.
FBI’s FISA Deception All But Confirmed
What does all this really mean? It means that the State Department was aware that Steele was gathering opposition research on Trump for the DNC and Clinton campaign before the FBI used the so-called Steele dossier to obtain its FISA warrant. Assuming the Bureau was doing a thorough job of investigating Trump-Russia collusion, it must also have known about Steele’s political connection.
Meanwhile, another Trump campaign advisor, George Papadopoulos, has been recounting how he was approached in 2016 and probed for information on the Trump campaign by individuals connected to the FBI. Azra Turk, posing as an assistant to Stefan Halper, attempted to develop an association with Papadopoulos following a pre-arranged meeting with him in London. The latter says he suspected Turk was working for the CIA. A report in The New York Times describes Turk (an alias) as a “government investigator” who was working, at the time, for the FBI. Halper was also an FBI informant with CIA connections.
Conspirators Racing the Clock
While Clapper and former CIA head John Brennan have wisely chosen to be less hysterical and reckless with their accusations against the president since the release of the Mueller report, others do not seem to have learned the lesson. Hillary Clinton – sensing, perhaps, that the noose may be tightening around her own neck – continues to throw around outrageous statements about how the 2016 election was stolen from her.
Hillary Clinton
Congressional Democrats are becoming increasingly desperate to paint the entire Trump administration as some lawless band of despots who are destroying the country. They are racing against the clock to destroy Attorney General William Barr before he uncovers more details of the real 2016 political conspiracy.
The months left until the 2020 general election will be crucial to the very survival of the Republic precisely because a Democrat in the White House – or even a Democrat-controlled Congress – will bury every trace of the Russia collusion scandal and of how sedition against a sitting U.S. president was attempted on such a sweeping scale. If these conspirators can escape justice this time, there is no telling what may befall a future president. The nation deserves to know the entire story before the next election and justice must be served before the guilty have the opportunity to forever cover their tracks.
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