Aaron Maté, The FBI, and Russia.

After devoting what now seems almost like an entire previous lifetime to the Russia Hoax, my interest is seriously flagging. Not that I don’t still regard this episode in our national life as supremely important—I still do—but because, like so many other things, it’s all in Trump’s hands. In a few days Trump will be POTUS and will be in a position to reveal all of the Deep State and Ruling Class machinations to subvert our constitutional order. Even more, by doing so he will be revealing to the American people the true nature of our Deep State and Ruling Class. Well, at least the portions of the Russia Hoax that were reduced to writing in one form or another. If Trump doesn’t do that I’ve done what I feel I can reasonably do while still retaining some vestige of a real life.

Nevertheless, and in spite all the geopolitical turmoil, I do want to address Aaron Maté’s recent contributions regarding the Russia Hoax. And first of all I offer a caveat: While I may appear to be criticizing Maté’s account at points, I do still regard it as valuable. Rather than go through his lengthy article, however, I’ll work off a transcript of his summary account yesterday on Judge Nap’s show:

Aaron Maté: The FBI and Russia.

Rather than break up the flow of his remarks, what I’ll do is present the transcript—just the relevant parts for our purposes—but with numbers in brackets to flag the comments that I’ll append. I hope that will help to make this more readable. So.

Crossfire hurricane ... was opened up in July 2016 by the FBI, targeting Trump's campaign and going after people like George Papadopoulos and Michael Flynn and Paul Manafort, accusing them of somehow conspiring with Russia in the 2016 election. Now that case is widely known and has been discredited. John Durham did a lengthy investigation. He found the predication for that investigation to be basically baseless. If you read the opening FBI document that launched that case they talk about Papadopoulos having suggested some kind of suggestion that Russia could help Trump, without making any reference to the stolen emails that Russia allegedly stole--which I don't think they actually did but that's a different story. The vaguest tip possible. I think that vague predication then was actually just a cover for the fact the FBI was, in real life, relying on the Steele dossier but didn't want to admit it. [1] The Steele dossier being the collection of conspiracy theories paid for by the Hillary Clinton campaign in their effort to frame Trump as a Russian asset, but we know by now that that case has been discredited.

No one takes that seriously anymore. But, amazingly, after that case was already ongoing, after Trump took office, Andrew McCabe, in May 2017, decided, 'You know what? It's not enough--we have one investigation going targeting Trump and his circle for conspiring with Russia, let's open up a second investigation, a counterintelligence investigation of the president himself, personally, for being an agent of Russia and also possibly obstructing the ongoing probe into his campaign's ties to Russia.' And so Andrew McCabe, in May 2017, personally ordered this investigation and it was launched against Trump while he was sitting in the White House for being an agent of Russia, and we've never gotten an official explanation for why this investigation was launched. [2] We got the official explanation for why the original Trump Russia Crossfire Hurricane investigation was opened. That was that Papadopoulos tip, that was incredibly vague. We don't know what the predication was for this may 2017 probe. And the takeaway from my document that I just got from the FBI is, they're still hiding it--the part of the document that says the factual basis for that probe is completely redacted. We're talking about more than seven years later and we still don't know officially from the the FBI why they felt they had grounds to investigate the sitting president as a Russian agent.

...

It was launched as a full investigation and you know better than I that, if the FBI launches a full investigation, I assume that that comes with sweeping surveillance powers [3] and what we know from the closing document to this probe--because, of course, this probe turned up absolutely nothing, because it was based on a scam that Trump is a Russian agent--the FBI in its closing communication said that they used "a variety of investigative techniques to pursue it." We don't know what that variety of investigative techniques entailed but it's not hard to imagine that that involves surveillance of a sitting president on the completely baseless grounds that he was a Russian agent. Andrew McCabe in public statements has said the basis for this probe was that Trump had fired Jim Comey which led him to believe that Trump was covering something up--because why else would Trump fire Jim Comey?--when in real life there were a million reasons to fire Jim Comey.

[1] Maté is on to something important here, in stating that the Papadopoulos episode was really a cover story to conceal the fact that the FBI was really relying on the Steele “dossier”. Now, the first thing to understand about this—and we’ll get back to this point later—is that the real purpose of Crossfire Hurricane was to go beyond Hillary’s smear campaign by getting a FISA (electronic surveillance) order that could mine the Trump campaign for possibly harmful information that could be leaked. Without a FISA the Crossfire Hurricane investigation would have been utterly pointless. The next thing to understand is that the FBI could never have obtained a FISA order with the kind of BS predication offered by the bogus Papadopoulos narrative. It’s one thing to open an investigation based on a transparently baseless narrative—to that point, nobody outside the FBI/DoJ will see the opening communication. But when it comes to getting a FISA, the FBI/DoJ will have to present an affidavit to the FISA Court (FISC), and the probable cause required for that affidavit would need to go far beyond anything that could be derived from the Papadopoulos nonsense. It was the Steele material—also false—that provided that probable cause for 4 FISA orders.

Maté explains the subterfuge by stating that the use of Papadopoulos was to conceal the very real link to the Hillary campaign—if Steele were identifiable from the opening communication his role as a political operative for the campaign would blow the entire Russia Hoax out of the water. They needed to maintain a distance between the opening—no matter how threadbare—and the FISA application. Remember, the FISA doesn’t happen without an open investigation. Get the investigation opened, and anything goes—and it will be far more difficult for outsiders to learn that there was ever a FISA, much less learn what the probable cause was.

However, beyond that, there’s the role of Carter Page in the Steele material. First of all, it’s necessary to recall that Page was for years a CIA asset, then was handed over to the FBI in New York for use as an asset in what was hoped would be a blockbuster prosecution of Russian intelligence personnel in New York. The prosecution did come off, although few remember it now. However, the FBI became enraged with Page because of his actions that they—probably wrongly—believed could jeopardize their case. The FBI was so enraged with Page that they opened an investigation of him (in March 2015, as I recall) in the hopes of screwing Page over, on general principle—that happened within about a month of Page turning up as a so-called “adviser” to Trump, in April, 2015. As far as I can tell there was no basis for the investigation of Page, but, well, that seems to have somehow become SOP in the Bureau.

Fast forward just a few months to July, 2015, when Crossfire Hurricane was opened. The opening on the Papadopoulos taradiddles would have been pointless without probable cause for a FISA, which the Papadopoulos material couldn’t provide. So, call it serendipity or whatever you want, but at the same time, July, 2015, Steele began writing “reports” that featured Page. Page traveling to Russia (true). Page having “secret” meetings with Putin insiders (if they were “secret” how did Steele know?). Page as the legman for Paul Manafort who fronted for Trump in a “well developed conspiracy” between the Trump campaign and Putin—in the context of oil and real estate deals in Russia (fiction). That’s a very different narrative from the impossibly, “incredibly vague tip” that was the basis for the Papadopoulos opening of Crossfire Hurricane. In fact, it was all tailor made to persuade a FISC judge to sign off on an outrageous FISA on a presidential candidate—which happened four times.

I think that sheds light on why the FBI was eager to conceal the source of that FISA probable cause, and so kept it out of the opening communication. If the opening communication came to light—as it eventually did—they could always say, well, who knew about this Papadopoulos character? He seemed dodgy. Maybe we were overly zealous, but we meant well. Not so much with the Steele material, because Steele had a track record with MI6, with McCabe, and political and journalistic connections in DC. Page also led back to the FBI and CIA. Far better to conceal Steele and Page in the highly secret FISA affidavit than risk it in the opening communication. Well, that all blew up, and now Trump has to do something about it.

[2] As for not having the predication for the investigation that McCabe opened in May, 2016, I think we actually have a very good idea. That was triggered by the firing of Comey—as Maté points out. BUT, the predication remained the same as for Crossfire Hurricane. That’s what I’ve referred to as piggybacking. The naming of Trump as a subject by McCabe was based on Trump’s firing of Comey being construed as obstruction of the ongoing Crossfire Hurricane investigation—yes, the same investigation regarding which Peter Strzok said “there’s no there there.” Rod Rosenstein says so in his authorization of the Mueller Witchcraft, dated shortly after McCabe informed Rosenstein of the “new” investigation (prompting Rosenstein to offer to “wear a wire” against Trump): May 17, 2016, a day that lives in infamy. Read it here:

The Special Counsel is authorized to conduct the investigation confirmed by then-FBI Director James B. Corney in testimony before the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence on March 20, 2017, …

The memo also authorizes investigation of matters “arising from” the investigation of “these matters”—I take that to be a somewhat cute authorization to investigate Trump for obstruction for firing Comey. But the major point is that Comey, in March, was simply confirming Crossfire Hurricane as a still open investigation, and McCabe and Rosenstein simply continued that. It all rested on the “incredibly vague tip” from Papadopoulos. But by then they already had had their noses rubbed in the BS of the Steele dossier, but continued to use it for one more FISA. Call it a flip of the coin, if they were able to “get” Trump with the final FISA they’d be sure to get away with it. If they didn’t, he’d be too damaged to take revenge.

By the way, this blast from the past may still make interesting reading:

UPDATED: McCabe's Remarkable Rosenstein Memo

[3] This is not exactly correct. A full investigation doesn’t “come with” “sweeping surveillance powers” if that means—and it surely does in this context—authorization to conduct FISA surveillance. A full investigation is a prerequisite for applying for a FISA order, but it doesn’t guarantee issuance of a FISA order. The probable cause required by FISA goes beyond what is required to open a full investigation. Let me give you an idea of how the wheels worked within the wheels, by quoting a long ago post:

If this is, indeed, how things went down, ​it's easy to imagine the disappointment at the FBI and DoJ. The mining of NSA data for political intelligence had been shut down by NSA's Mike Rogers. The targeting of Trump campaign associates wasn't producing the type of results that would have a guaranteed impact on the Trump campaign. And now, the best opportunity so far of delivering a killshot to the Trump campaign had flopped. What was really needed was a FISA that could be used against the Trump campaign, but to have even a chance at FISA they first needed a Full Investigation on someone close to the campaign. There were two possibilities, it seems. The FBI could resurrect 10 year old charges against Paul Manafort. Sharyl Attkisson tells us that at the time of the Trump Towers meeting the FBI had no FISA on Manafort but that it soon afterwards restarted a FISA on him. Obviously, a FISA on Trump's campaign manager would be a gold mine of political intelligence. And then, conveniently, there was the Carter Page angle: Christopher Steele had begun submitting his memos that became the famous "dossier," and by July, thanks to Page's trip to Moscow, the FBI was able to open a Full Investigation on Page--their former informant.

It's possible that by this time--with a restarted FISA on Manafort either in place or in contemplati​o​n--the FBI felt they were making progress, getting back into the position that they had lost when NSA pulled the plug on them. But all was not well, as the FBI may have already been aware. In fact, by August 16 we find Strzok/Page texting about the need for an "insurance policy." Could that need have been triggered by Manafort's rapidly declining influence in the Trump campaign? Indeed, Wikipedia tells us that the very next day Manafort was on the outs and resigned two days later:

In August 2016, Manafort's connections to former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych and his pro-Russian Party of Regions drew national attention in the US, where it was reported that Manafort may have illegally received $12.7 million in off-the-books funds from the Party of Regions.

On August 17, 2016, Donald Trump received his first security briefing. The same day, August 17, Trump shook up his campaign organization in a way that appeared to minimize Manafort's role. It was reported that members of Trump's family, particularly Jared Kushner who had originally been a strong backer of Manafort, had become uneasy about his Russian connections and suspected that he had not been forthright about them. Manafort stated in an internal staff memorandum that he would "remain the campaign chairman and chief strategist, providing the big-picture, long-range campaign vision". However, two days later, Trump announced his acceptance of Manafort's resignation from the campaign ...

And that's when the FBI began scrambling to get a FISA on Carter Page.

As we know, initiation of a Full Investigation is required before a FISA order can be obtained, and the FBI had the required Full Investigation in place, against Carter Page. The initiation of that Full Investigation had undoubtedly required some pushing of the envelope, since the the predication for the Full Investigation, the "articulable factual basis," had almost certainly been the Steele "dossier", now known to be unverified. Even with the Full Investigation in place, however, a FISA was far from a certainty. ….

The problem is that FISA requires a showing that the person targeted (Carter Page) is "knowingly engage[d] in clandestine intelligence gathering activities for or on behalf of a foreign power, which activities involve or may involve a violation of the criminal statutes of the United States." That​'​s a tough hill to climb and, as I've argued in the past, the FBI's FISA application likely went well beyond "pushing the envelope" into the realm of sheer invention--as witness ​James ​Comey's admission that the dossier remains "unverified," even though, according to ​Andrew ​McCabe, it was crucial to ultimately obtaining the FISA (late October, 2016). …

For enough more to choke a horse, see the archives. These two could get you started on another life:

What The Carter Page Case Tells Us About The Flaws In FISA

Homerun McCarthy!

The FISA requirements for demonstrated “clandestine intelligence activity” as well as predication for an actual criminal violation of US laws is what makes obtaining a FISA so much more difficult. The mere allegation that someone is violating FARA, for example, doesn’t cut it. Being an agent of a foreign power doesn’t necessarily involve “clandestine intelligence activity.” Now is it necessarily a criminal act.