At Forbes Thomas Del Beccaro weaves together the threads of Hillary Clinton’s email server, the Trump campaign’s activities the prompted the Mueller investigation, and some of the major players in both at the FBI and DoJ involved with both into a timeline that looks pretty damning on the face of it. I presume there is a counter-argument. What is it?
What do I think about it? I think that Hillary Clinton, her advisors, and, possibly, President Obama were engaged in a conspiracy to evade the Records Act and multiple violations of the Records Act. I think that Trump’s close associates and, possibly, Trump himself have been involved in some pretty smarmy business dealings in Russia and, possibly, some ham-handed attempts at oppo research using Russian sources. I think that the FBI abused the FISA process.
There’s a lot I don’t know. For example, I don’t know if Donald Trump, his close associates, or the Trump campaign did anything illegal. That’s what the Mueller investigation is about.
I’m unhappy about all of it but I’m not as outraged by these shenanigans as I might be because I have a dour view of government in general, probably because I’m familiar with how it works. In government as in any large organization there are a lot of people just trying to do their jobs, there are a lot of people trying to avoid doing anything at all, and there are some people trying to benefit personally from it by doing whatever they can get away with.
He has significant omissions, is wrong about a few things and states as fact things that are disputed. Sure, if you accept as fact everything he says, and forget the omissions, he has a good case. Don’t have time to fisk the whole thing, but just a few. One, he “forgets” (LOL, as if he forgot) that Page was being followed by the FBI as early as 2013. Next, he claims that Clinton’s email server was illegal. That is not clear as a number of legal experts think that it was. Next, intent does matter. I probably accidentally sent classified information in letters to the wife when I was deployed. Pretty sure the aren’t going to prosecute me. There simply isn’t any history of prosecution (that I can find) of anyone for accidentally sending a few classified emails. The drone related ones were the same as done by another SoS (Powell?) as it was difficult getting these in a timely fashion. Finally he states as Fact that Strzok was trying to stop Trump from taking office with no evidence. In fact, the same McCarthy he cites said that Strzok was the one who thought Flynn was innocent.
Again, this is another guy who claims, in essence to know what was in the FISA application. If he does, he should share. If he does not, which I suspect is the case, he should stop making up stuff.
Steve
Given what we know right now, that’s probably a balanced assessment. (It’s fine if people want to wait on Mueller, but there hasn’t been jack squat come out on collusion compared to other identified malfeasance. Call me very skeptical.)
I would quarrel with one point. It seems to me “FISA abuse” is awfully understated. HRC was one of two major candidates for the presidency. Her long time henchmen and her hired Russia dirt digger Steele created a fraudulent dossier, fraudulently represented by sympathetic FBI and DoJers to the FISA court for the purpose of derailing, and then later hamstringing, the other candidate turned eventual winner. Thats it. That’s all it was, so far. Campaign dirty tricks. But, however, use of the law enforcement apparatus to accomplish this is a staggering abuse of power. That’s not supposed to happen here, no matter how cynical ones view of government. It’s more than “FISA abuse.” And it’s the second time. Lois Lerner and Kiskinnen are still walking around.
steve:
Your emphasis is on classified material. I didn’t mention classified material once. My emphasis is on violations of the Records Act, something for which there is an open and shut case. That has been my focus since the private email server became public knowledge.
That Hillary Clinton and Huma Abedin were aware of the Records Act is a matter of public record: their sworn statements of their awareness of it are on file. They, the guy who set the server up, other staffers, and possibly President Obama himself were all engaged in a conspiracy (when you cooperate in an effort to break the law you’re a conspirator whether you know about it or not). That’s not just a technical violation. That’s a felony.
I agree that there are lots of problems but focusing on the political motivations of those pointing them out doesn’t change the facts.
Guarneri:
I focus on what is supported clearly by the facts and IMO that the FBI abused the FISA process is now obvious. I avoid assessing motives and counting political coups.
“That’s all it was, so far. Campaign dirty tricks. But, however, use of the law enforcement apparatus to accomplish this is a staggering abuse of power. That’s not supposed to happen here, no matter how cynical ones view of government. It’s more than “FISA abuse.†And it’s the second time. Lois Lerner and Kiskinnen are still walking around.”
So this still doesn’t make sense. They do all o that to torpedo Trump’s campaign, then hid it away until after the election? They use it to get a warrant on Carter page, a low level advisor? Not buying it. Lois Lerner? You guys could have just offered her immunity. We all know that wasn’t happening since you needed to keep her around as an issue.
Steve
I agree with your final paragraph except that I grew up in a country that ostensibly had checks and balances against the abuses of the people in the third category and there were (I think) a greater number of people in the first category who were interested in maintaining the integrity of the system through use of those checks and balances. It sure feels as though that is slipping away.
I think the forthcoming IG report will be telling.
So this still doesn’t make sense. They do all o that to torpedo Trump’s campaign, then hid it away until after the election? They use it to get a warrant on Carter page, a low level advisor? Not buying it.
I think the working theory goes more like this:
The Clinton campaign (through two layers of plausible deniability, the law firm and the research firm) sought to establish ties between Trump and Russia, and/or expose dirty business practices involving Russia.
They weren’t very successful and when they shopped the dossier around to journalists during the summer they couldn’t get most to bite on it.
Through the process they were using either illegal or unethical means of surveillance and when it appeared that Clinton might not win they needed “the insurance policy” to prevent exposure of those practices if Trump won.
The Carter Page FISA surveillance warrant was the insurance policy, under this theory, because it was how they planned to retroactively give cover to the previous (possibly unlawful) surveillance.
I’m not saying I completely buy this and I don’t think there’s yet enough evidence to prove or disprove it. But it is different than the scenario you describe and your reason for skepticism isn’t operable under this theory. And at minimum you are incorrect to say that they “hid it away.” I definitely remember when all of this first became public journalists were all saying that “someone” had tried to get them to publish stories about the dossier, and I think it was Glenn Simpson’s testimony that established that they had set up meetings between Steele and the NYT, WaPo, etc during the summer and again in the fall. Just because there were no takers doesn’t mean they were hiding it.
Dave
That’s fine. Re: motives. But the unredacted Grassley – Graham memo has now been issued. What a mess. Gross malfeasance on the part of the FBI. With obvious intent to deceive the FISC. It wasn’t incompetence, it was a motivated effort. Comey has a problem.
Also, as I had said in a previous comment, HRCs henchmen were also on the case in manufacturing the dossier.