[cameras shuttering] thank you very much. Mr. Horowitz, thank you. I appreciate what you have done. The new have your team with you . Would it be ok if they raised their hands . If they are ok with it, him ok with it. Thank you all. Have labored hard and your work product is impressive. I just want to thank you all for what you have done for the country. Eally appreciate what you have done. Do you have your team here with you . Would it be okay if they raised their hands, is that all right . If theyre okay with it, im okay with it. Thank you all. You have labored hard and your work product is impressive. I just want to thank you all for what youve done for the country. Mr. Horowitz im dying to hear from you, but i bet i havent made 20 minutes of Opening Statements in a year. Im going to take a little longer to lay ow what i think is before us as a nation. Crossfire hurricane was probably the best name ever given to an investigation in the history of investigations, because i think thats what we wound up with, a crossfire in a hurricane. Theres been a lot of media reports about your report before it was issued. I remember reading all these headlines, lawful investigation with a few irregularities. Low level people kind of got off track. If thats what you get out of this report, you clearly didnt read it. If thats your take away, that this thing was lawfully predicated and thats the main point,iority you missed the ent report. How do you get a headline like that . Thats what you want it to be. You want it to be that and nothing more. I can assure you if this has been a democratic president going through what President Trump had gone through, that would not have been the headline. The headline would be the fbi takes law into its own hands. Biassed agents cut corners. Lied to court. Ignore exoneration. So the first thing i want you to know is how the cake is baked here. My goal is to make sure that people, when this is over, whether you like trump, hate trump, dont care about trump, you look at this as more than a few irregularities. If this becomes a few irregularities in america, then god help us all. Now, the people that were in charge of this investigation were handpicked by mr. Mccabe, who is now a cnn analyst. High up in the fbi, the number two guy. The first question ill ask in a bit, is this the best of the best . Are these people normal representatives of the department of justice and the fbi . I hope youll say no. Because i believe it to be no. And if i believed otherwise, i would be incredibly depressed. So ladies and gentlemen, im going to assume something for the sake of argument. That there was a lawful predicate to open up a counterintelligence investigation. I want you to know the standard to opening one up is about like that. I also want you to know a counterintelligence investigation is not a criminal investigation. Theyre not trying to solve a crime. Theyre trying to stop foreign powers from interfering in america. That a counterintelligence investigation is designed to protect americans from foreign influence. I want the American People to know there was an effort to affect Hillary Clintons campaign by foreign actors. The fbi picked up that effort, they briefed her about it, and they were able to stop it. We will be receiving a defensive briefing tomorrow as a committee from the fbi. To tell us all about what we should be watching for. And they may be some specific threats against us, i dont know. But i know theyre going to brief us to product us, not to surveil us. And heres what i want every american to know. From the time they opened up cro crossfire hurricane, they never made any effort to brief donald trump about suspected problems within his campaign. They had one briefing talking about, you know, the russians are out there. You better beware. Nothing about carter page. Nothing about papadopoulos. Nothing about the other people that they thought might be working with the russians. Why did they not tell him that . I hope you can give us an answer. Bottom line, ladies and gentlemen, a counterintelligence investigation is a good thing until it becomes a bad thing. Because it doesnt take much to open one, and the worst thing that can happen is for people to open one up whose real purpose is not to protect an american, but to surveil them. Senator feinstein found herself in a situation all of us may one day find ourselves in. A long Time Employee was suspected of having ties to a Foreign Government. They informed her and she took appropriate action. How easy would it be for somebody to come into our campaign as a volunteer, you dont know who they are, you just appreciate any help you could get. How easy would it be for all of us to get caught up in this scenario . If you really believe theres someone in my Campaign Working with a foreign power, please tell me so i can do something about it. Why didnt they tell trump . Well figure that out later. I think its a question that needs to be asked. So for a moment, lets assume there was a lawful predicate to open up a counterintelligence investigation. Whats been described as a few irregularities becomes a massive criminal conspiracy over time to defraud the fisa court, to illegally surveil an american citizen and to keep an operation open gets a sitting president of the United States, violating every norm known to the rule of law. Many of your prosecutors, many of you have been u. S. Attorneys, americ many of you have been defense attorneys. Trumps time will come and go. But i hope we understand that what happened here can never happen again. What happened here is not a few irregularities. What happened here is the system failed. People at the highest level of our government took the law into their own hands. When i say defraud the fisa court, i mean it. To your team, youre able to uncover and discover abuse of power i never believed would actually exist in 2019. How bad is it . It was as if j. Edgar hoover came back to life. The old fbi. The fbi that had a chip on its shoulder and wanted to intimidate people and find out what was going on in your life and the law be damned. Mort Martin Luther king and just fill in the names. So who ran this thing . The people were handpicked by mccabe. The number two guy at the fbi. The supervisory agent, the director for counterintelligence, peter strzok. Hes a big player and all things crossfire hurricane. Lisa page, you may have heard of her. Who is she . She was an fbi lawyer working for mccabe. These are two central figures in this debacle. Let me tell you a little bit about who these people are and where theyre coming from. Thanks to a lot of hard work by people from mr. Horowitz, the fbi and others, heres what we know. Strzok, the front line supervisor. February 12th, 2016. Oh, hes, trump, abysmal. I keep hoping the charade will end and people will just dump him. The problem then is that rubio will likely lose to cruz. I never quite made it. I can understand why they would not consider me a serious candidate. The Republican Party is utter shambles. When was the last competitive ticket they offered . March 3rd, 2016, page, god, trump is a loathsome human. Strzok, oh, my god, hes an idiot. You know what . Newsrooms all over the country, this represents the attitude of a lot of people in america. You can have that attitude but you shouldnt be in the journalism business, you shouldnt be in the fbi. If you were in the military and said anything like this about a commander in chief, youd be charged with a crime. Whats the take away . Dont go to a bar with a Rolling Stone reporter. They started talking about how they didnt like joe biden. I was one of the first people to say that is out of bounds. You can have all the political opinions you want, but if youre an officer in the United States military, you will park those opinions and you will not speak ill of the commander in chief. That, obviously, is not a rule at the fbi, department of justice. March 16, 2016. I cannot believe donald trump is likely to be an actual serious candidate for president. July 16th were getting closer to when this thing opens. Wow, donald trump is an enormous douche. A lot of people agree with you. Trump barely spoke, but the first thing out of his mouth was were going to win so big. The whole thing is like living in a bad dream. July 19th, 2016. Trump is a disaster. I have no idea how destabilizing his presence would be. Youre entitled to believe that but you should not be an investigator. July 30th. Investigation is opened. Damn, this feels momentous, about the investigation. Because this matters. The others one did too, but that was to insure we didnt f something up. This matters because this matters. So super glad to be on this voyage with you. I hope you understand what this voyage was about. August 8, 2016. Three days before strzok was named the front line supervisor. Hes not ever going to become president , right . Page to strzok. Strzok, no. No he wont. Well stop him. These are the people in charge. August 15, 2016. I want to believe the path you threw out for consideration in andys office that theres no way he gets elected. But im afraid we cant take that risk but the america people will protest is what theyre saying. Its like an insurance policy in the unlikely event you die before youre 40. August 26th, 2016. Just went to southern just went to a southern virginia walmart. I could smell the trump supporters. People in charge. October 11, 2016. Currently fight ing with stu for the fisa. Stu was a lawyer who thought this thing was not on the up and up. Stood his ground until he couldnt stand it anymore. Eventually got run over. October 19th. Im all riled up, trump is san fing idiot. Hes unable to provide a coherent answer. The New York Times probability numbers are dropping every day. Im scared for our organization. November 3rd, 2016. Oh, my god. This is fing terrifying, referencing an article entitled a victory by trump remains possible. November 9th, 2016. Are you ever going to give out your calendars . Some kind of depressing. Maybe it should be the first meeting of the secret society. November 13th. I bought all the president s men. I figure i needed to brush up on watergate. November 13th, 2016. Finally two page away from finishing all the president s men. Page to strzok. Did you know the president resigns at the end . Strzok, what . God that would be so lucky. May 18th, 2017. The date page accepted a position on the special counsels team. For me and this case i personally have a sense of unfinished business. I unleashed with mye, whatever that means. Now i need to fix it and finish it. Strzok. Who gives an f . One more assistant director or whoever, an investigation leading to impeachment. May 2017. You know and i both know the odds are nothing if i thought it was likely id be there id be there, no question. I hesitate in part just because of my gut sense concerning there is no big there there. Talking about impeachment. May 22nd, 2017. Im torn. I think no, i am more replaceable than you are in this. Im the best for it, but there are others who can do it okay. Youre different and more unique. This is yours. Talking to page. All right. Thats the front line supervisor and the lawyer to mccabe. Theres a guy named cline smith who eventually alters an email from the cia through the department of justice and fbi. And mr. Horowitzs team found this out and how they did it ill never know. Im jumping ahead now. But when you read this report, what they find is that a lawyer supervising the process at the fbi, according to mr. Horowitz, doctored an email from the cia to the fbi and hes going to be referred for criminal prosecution. Why is that important . Carter page, who has been on the receiving end of all this, the foundation to believe he was a Foreign Agent comes from a dossier that well talk about in a minutie. In that dossier provided by Christopher Steele, they claim that carter page meets with 3 people known to be russians, russian agents. Carter page, while being wirestappwire tapped by his government says i dont know two of these people and to this day there is no proof that he ever met two of those three. The third person he says, yeah, i met him. I told the cia about my meeting because i was a source for the cia. So they would have you believe that carter page is working against our government. Not with our government. So carter page in the summer of 2017 is trying to tell anybody and everybody i was working with the cia. I reported my contact with this person and nobody believed it. The cia had told the fbi it was true earlier. But it never made it through the system. Somebody got so rattled at the fbi, they asked mr. Cline smith to check it out. He checks it out. He communicates with the cia. Is carter page a source for you . In an email exchange, they say yes, he is. What does mr. Cline smith do . He alters the email to say no, hes not. And you caught it. I dont know how you caught him, because you got to dig into this email chain. It would be like getting a lab report from the fbi, the fingerprints dont match, but the agent says they do. Thats how bad this is. So now let me tell you a little bit about mr. Cline smith, if i can find it. All right. This is the lawyer supervising the process. The guy that altered the cia email because he didnt want the court to know that carter page actually was a source. Why does that matter . Because if the court had known then theres a lawful reason for mr. Page to be talking to the russian gine. He wasnt working against his country, he was working with his country. Which undercuts the idea hes a Foreign Agents. Thats why cline smith lied. Because he didnt want to stop this investigation. All right. This is after the election. Im so stressed about what i could have done differently. The day after the election. Im just devastated. I cant wait until i can leave today and just shut off the world for the next four days. Im sure a lot of people felt that way after trump got elected. Maybe you still feel that way. But you shouldnt be in charge of supervising anything about donald trump if you feel that way. I just cant imagine the systematic disassembly of the progress weve made over the past eight years. The Obama Administration. The crazies won finally. This is the lawyer that they put in charge of supervising the warrant process. This is the tea party on steroids. Im sure there are newsrooms all over america saying thats absolutely right. What is wrong with that . Oh, also, pence is stupid. Whatever. This is what the guys think. Right after the election. And its just hard not to feel like the fbi calls some of this, who was a razor thin in some states. Plus, my god damn name is all over the legal documents investigating trumps staff. And this is the one that gets me the most. November 22nd, shortly after the election of donald j. Trump, the fbi lawyer in charge of supervising the fisa process tweets out to friends, viva la resistance. What are the odds this guy might do something wrong . Would you have to be part of a right wing conspiracy to predict in the future maybe this guy will get off script . Folks, if these are a few igregulariti igregularities, the rule of law in this country is dead. Heres the good news. These are not a few irregularities. These are a few bad people. They couldnt believe trump won, didnt want him to win and when he won, couldnt tolerate the fact that he won. And all these smelly people elected him. This is bad stuff. So if you get out of this report lawful investigation with a few irregularities it says more about you than mr. Horowitz. How the hell did this whole thing start . What got us here today . They opened up a counterintelligence investigation in july. We know the russians are messing in our elections. And it was the russians, ladies and gentlemen, who stole the Democratic National committee emails, podestas emails, and screwed around with Hillary Clinton. It wasnt the ukrainians. It was the russians. And theyre coming after us again. So to be concerned that the russians are messing with president ial campaigns was a legitimate concern. So if they looked around at the Trump Campaign and said, well, lets see if we can protect the Trump Campaign. Carter page went to moscow a lot, made speeches. If youve ever met carter page, one thing youll not accuse him of is being james bond. This poor guy, papadopoulos, picked to be part of Trumps National security team. The National Security team was literally picked up off the street. If youve had a photo with donald trump, you spent more time with donald trump than papadopoulos and page. Theyre not paid, theyre volunteers. But the fbi thinks we need to watch these guys so manafort as well as who is the other one . Flynn. General flynn. So they open up a counterintelligence investigation. Lets assume for a moment that the small predicate you need has been met. What the hell happened after they opened it up . What did they find . Were their suspicions validated . Or did they find at every turn its really not true and they ignored it . So one of the first things they tried to do was to get a warrant under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to follow carter page, a volunteer for the campaign, an american citizen. They applied for the warrant internally in august of 2016 and the lawyers say you dont have enough. Why . Because they had nothing. Maybe theres reason is articulation is this spamall. The lawyers are saying you dont have probable cause. Everybody is now frustrated, folks. Thats not the right answer. So mccabe suggests the number two guy at the fbi, lets go look at this steele dossier. Maybe that will get us over the hump. Stay tuned. Well talk about that in a minute. So september 19th, for the first time, they introduce the steele dossier into the warrant application process. It worked. September 21st, they get a sign off lets go get a warrant. The dossier got him to where they wanted to go. As you say, mr. Horowitz, it was central and basically outcome determinative. Without this dossier, they go nowhere with it, theyre off to the races. Who is Christopher Steele . You thought these other people were bad. Wait till you hear about this guy. Christopher steele was a former mi6, is that right . 6, 5, whatever it is. He was a british agent. Retired. He had a new line of business. He was hired by a Company Called fusion gps to investigate donald trump. Okay. You want to look at foreign influence, youre about to find it. Fusion gps is on the payroll of the Democratic National party. Christopher steele is working for a company to find dirt on trump and the money comes from the Democratic Party. Did they tell the court this . No. Is that a bit unnerving . Would be to me. So Christopher Steele is on the payroll of the Company Funded by the Democratic Party. Heres what bruce ohr tells the fbi about Christopher Steele. He was desperate that donald trump not get elected and was passionate about him not being the u. S. President. This is the guy that gave them the work product to get the warrant. Steele told ohr that if trump won the elections, steeles Source Network may be in jeopardy by a new fbi director and new agency heads appointed by trump who would have a higher degree of loyalty to the new president and could decide to take action against steele and his Source Network. Let me tell you about Christopher Steele. Ohr was right. He was on a mission to get donald trump. Not only did he provide the dossier that made the difference in getting a warrant, his vices were well known. He was shopping the dossier. To anybody and everybody in the media and in politics to see if they would print it. The reason the fbi cut him loose is because they found out he was shopping this thing around to Media Outlets rather than being a valid source. But after they knew he was shopping around, they kept him around anyway because mr. Ohr kept talking to him. You think thats bruce ohrs wife worked with Christopher Steele. She was employed by fusion gps. The wife of the number four guy at the fbi. Christopher steele went all over the United States trying to get Media Outlets to public this garbage. The first thing is about the golden shower, about the sexual encounter that President Trump supposedly had in a Ritz Carlton Hotel in russia. In december of 2016, john mccain goes to a National Security conference in canada. And somebody tells him about the steele dossier and its bad and you need to know about it. And it gets to john mccain. John mccain puts it in his safe. He gives it to me and i read it. And the first thing i thought of was, oh, my god. One of two things, this could be russian disinformation or they may have something on trump. If you read this document, the first thing you would think of is they got something on donald trump. It is stunning, it is damning, its salacious. And its a bunch of crap. They finally find the guy that prepared all the information. But a little bit about steele. In 2015, the British Intelligence service said you need to watch this guy, hes not reliable. They take time to go to london to check steele out. And theyre told he demonstrates lack of selfawareness or judgment. Keen to help, but underpinned by poor judgment. Judgment pursuing Political Risk but no intel value. If youd spend 30 minutes looking at Christopher Steele, you would understand this guy is biassed. Hes got an axe to grind. Hes on the payroll of the opposing party. Take anything he says with a grain of salt. In january 2017, the fbi figures out who the subsource of the steele dossier is. What you need to know, this is not what steele found himself. This is what he gathered from one person. They finally found out who this one person is. They go talk to him in january 2017. Five people interview the primary subsource, the guy who provided steele with everything. They showed him the dossier. Read pages 186190. What does the russian guy tell the fbi about the dossier . That steele misstated or exaggerated the prime subsources statements. That trumps alleged sexual activities at the Ritz Carlton Hotel in moscow was rumor and speculation. He went on to say he heard it at a bar. And in the report, it suggests that a western employee of the ritz carlton confirmed this escapade by then private citizen trump. When he read that he said thats not true. I never told steele that somebody working for the ritz carlton confirmed this. I heard it at a bar. Primary subsource stated they he never expected steele to put the primary subsources statements in reports or present them as facts. They were word of mouth and hearsay. Conversations had with friends over beers. Statements made in jest that should be taken with a grain of salt. So in january 2017, the person who did all the assembling of the information for the now famous steele dossier tells the fbi i disavow everything in there. Now what should happen . Timeout. Lets reassess. Maybe we got this wrong. What would you hope to happen . That the fbi would slow down, because this is the outcome determinative document thats had a hole blown through it. They dont slow down. They use the document that they now know to be a bunch of garbage to use twice more. I hope carter page gets a lawyer and sues the fbi. Two more warrants were obtained by the department of justice and fbi after being told in january by the russian guys its all a bunch of bull. But it gets worse. Heres how they describe the interview to the court. The fbi found the russian based subsource to be truthful and cooperative. By the way, he said everything in there is a bunch of bull. You knew in january 2017 that there was no doubt before, you know by the guy who prepared it that he disavowed everything thats not true, its grain of salt, you shouldnt i didnt say all these things. Instead of stopping, they keep going. Instead of telling the court the truth what theyre required to do, they lie to the court. A few irregularities. How would you like this to happen in your life . How would you like to be on the receiving end of this . To our people in the news business, what would you like how would you like this to be your News Organization . January 2017. There is no benefit of the doubt to be given. These five people from the department of justice and fbi have been told by the one guy who did all the work its a bunch of garbage. And the question is, how far up to the system did it go . Why did they apply for warrants twice more . Why didnt they stop . Everybody wants to know was there any bias here . What motivated these people . Why do you think they kept going . Maybe because they were on a mission not to protect trump, but to protect us from trump. Thats what they were trying. Protect all of us smelly people from donald trump. Thats what this is about. Whether you believe it or not, i believe it. You know what . It could happen to yall next time. Theres passionate people on our side i wouldnt want to be investigating any of you. So what happens next . They get a warrant twice more when they know its a bunch of garbage. They lie about the actual interview. I dont know what mccabe and comey knew but im dying to find out and should they have known. June 2016. 2017. This is the next time they take the law into their own hands. Mr. Cline smith. Six months after being told the dossier is a bunch of garbage, cline smith alters an email from the cia to change it from he is to hes not. Because if they had told the court that page was working for the cia, it explains the content in the dossier. Mr. Cline smith had a chance in his mind to make things right when he took it. Why did he take the law in his own hands . Why did he doctor the email sth d did it have anything to do with the way he sees Donald Trumps presidency . You know what, it really doesnt matter what he was thinking. It matters what he did. And im glad you found out what he did. Im glad you told the country what he did. Because im hoping that nobody will ever do it again. So, mr. Horowitz, 17 irregularities that you found, some of them are earth shattering, some of them should scare the hell out of all of us. I just want to end sort of where i began. This is not normal. Dont judge the fbi and the department of justice by these characters. Were better than this. Like many of you, ive worked with the fbi a lot in my time in government. I have a Great Respect for it. Director wray, youve got a problem. For this hearing to mean anything, weve got to fix it. And the way we fix it is listen to mr. Horowitz. Get the director of the fbi in here to try to find out a way to make sure this never happens again to any politician in this country. Its trump today, it could be you or me tomorrow. And imagine, ladies and gentlemen, if they can do this to the candidate for the president of the United States, what could they do to you . So the Trump Presidency will end a year or five years, i dont know when. I hope he gets reelected. But we cant write this off as being just about one man or one event. Weve got to understand how off the rails the system got. Ill leave with some optimism here. I think democrats and republicans are willing to make sure this never happens again. If you open up a counterintelligence investigation on a president ial campaign in the future, there needs to be more check and balances. I want you to audit the fisa process. Mike lee and senator leahy are probably the standard bearers for Civil Liberties, cruz, a lot of people, we all care. But these are the two that constantly want to make sure that somebodys watching those who watch us. Theyre worried about meta data. I may not agree with all your concerns or all of your solutions, i respect the fact that you care. I hope you wont treat this report as finding a lawful investigation with a few irregularities. Im a pretty hawkish guy. But if the court doesnt take corrective action and do something about being manipulated and lied to, youll lose my support. I know a lot about whats going on out there to hurt us. And theyre real threats and theyre real agents and theyre really bad actors out there. Id hate to lose the ability of the fisa court to operate at a time probably when we need it the most. But after your report, i have serious concerns about whether the fisa court can continue unless theres fundamental reform. After your report, i think we need to rewrite the rules on how you start a counterintelligence investigation and the checks and balances that we need. Mr. Horowitz, for us to do justice to your report, we have to do more than try to shade this report one way or the other. We have to address the underlying problem. The system and the hands in a few bad people can do a lot of damage. Thank you very much. Thank you, mr. Chairman. I assume there is no time limit . Take all the time you need. Well, i wont take a long time. But ive been reading these reports, ladies and gentlemen, now for 25 years. And i have great appreciation for this Inspector General. I just want to make those personal remarks. This is a tough arena. As you can see, there are very tough people, part of that arena. But to have an Inspector General who tells it as they see it and does this year after year is a saving grace. I hope people will get this report. If i have a grievance, its that the print is too small. I agree with that. Thank you very much. And it is heavy to carry around. But last year this Inspector General pledged to congress that he would examine whether political bias played a role in the fbis decision to investigate ties between russia and the Trump Campaign. The Inspector General kept his promise. His Office Conducted a 19 month investigation. They interviewed more than 100 witnesses, reviewed more than a million documents, and issued this 434 page report that contains several important findings. First, on the question of bias, Inspector General horowitz found no evidence that political or antitrump bias was at play. According to the igs report, the fbi complied with existing department and fbi policies in opening the investigation. And the ig, did not find documentary or testimonial evidence that political bias or improper motivation influenced this decision, end quote. Or any specific investigative steps taken by the fbi. Thats the finding. And this is important. Why . In public statements beginning last spring, the attorney general expressed his belief that senior government officials may have, quote, put a thumb on the scale, end quote, because of political bias against trump. His comments echoed the president , who has repeatedly alleged that there is a deep state within the government against him. He has used this to dismiss the entire russia investigation as a witch hunt and a hoax. The igs report conclusively refutes these claims. This was not a politically motivated investigation. There is no deep state. Simply put, the fbi investigation was motivated by facts, not bias. Secondly, the Inspector General confirmed that there was an adequate predicate, meaning a legitimate factual and legal basis to investigate. The basis was not, as some have claimed, the socalled steele dossier. In fact reporting for mr. Steele played no role in opening the investigation. Instead, this report confirms that the fbi opened the investigation after being told by australia, a trusted foreign ally, the trump adviser, george pap dop lois, had learned in 2016, the month of april, that russia had and was willing to release, quote, information during the campaign that would be damaging to candidate clinton, end quote. The ig report found that, quote, this information provided the information with a factual basis, that if true, quote, indicated activity constituting either a federal crime or a threat to National Security or both may have occurred or may be occurring. The ig also found that when the fbi learned that in late july 2016, the bureau was aware of russian efforts to interfere in the 2016 elections, including russian hacking of Democratic Campaign computers, materials stolen by russia had been released online, including by wikileaks, and the u. S. Intelligence community ache sse in august of 2016 that quote, russia was considering further intelligence operations to impact and disrupt elections, end quote. Against this backdrop, the fbi was obligated to investigate possible ties to the Trump Campaign. According to bill prestat, the fbi assistant director who authorized opening the investigation. Other officials conveyed a similar obligation and sense of urgency to investigate. David loveman, a National Security division chief said it would have been, and i quote, a dereliction of duty and responsibility of the highest order not to commit the appropriate resources as urgently as possible to run these facts to the ground and find out what was going on, end quote. The decision to open the investigation was unanimous. Not a single official disagreed. As a result, america ultimately learned extensive details about russias sweeping and systemic attack on the 2016 election, including that the Trump Campaign knew about, welcomed and, quote, expected it would benefit electorally, end quote, from russias efforts. The Inspector Generals report also identifies several errors made by fbi and Justice Department line personnel when seeking warrants for surveillance on carter page from the fisa court. Fbi director wray submitted a written response, accepting the igs findings, including the key finding that the fbi had sufficient cause to investigate the Trumps Campaign ties to russia. Director wray also said that the igs findings of fisa errors are, and i quote, constructive criticism that will make us stronger as an organization. And that he has already taken action to address the igs recommendations. By contrast, attorney general barr issued a press release that continues to criticize the fbi for investigating the Trump Campaign. Its really extraordinary that the attorney general continues to make unsupported attacks on the agency that he is responsible for leading. I believe strongly that its time to move on from the false claims of political bias. And those who showed great interest in the question of politicallymotivated investigations against President Trump should show the same concern about politically motivated investigations requested by the president or his attorney general. Inspector general horowitz, i want to thank you on behalf of this side and your staff for the hard work. We look forward to hearing from you. Thank you. Chairman graham, senator feinstein, members of the committee, thank you for inviting me to testify today. The report that my Office Released this week is the product of a comprehensive and exhaust ib review conducted over the past 19 months by an oig team that examined more than one million documents including documents, other u. S. And Foreign Government agencies had provided to the fbi. Our team conducted over 170 interviews involving more than 100 witnesses, and we documented all of our findings in the 43 444page report we issued. I would encourage everybody to read the report. Although i understand 430 plus page reports are difficult. We do have a 19page summary of it. I would encourage you to read at a minimum. I want to commend the tireless efforts of our outstanding review team for conducting independent oversight. Thats exactly what we are supposed to do as inspectors general. The fbi investigation thats the subject of this report crossfire hurricane was opened on july 31, 2016 days after it reefbd reporting from a friendly Foreign Government. It stated that in a may 2016 meeting with the friendly Foreign Government, trump Campaign Foreign policy adviser George Papadopoulos suggested the trump team had received some kind of a suggestion, closed quote, from russia that it could have sift in the election process with the anonymous release of information during the campaign that would be damaging to candidate clinton and then president obama. Following ret of that information, the fbi opened crossfire hurricane. Give the nature and sensitivity, we would have expected fbi personnel to faithfully adhere to the fbis detailed policies, practices and norms. The fbi has developed and earned a reputation as one of the worlds premier Law Enforcement agencies in significant part because of its adherence to those policies and its tradition of professionalism, impariality. Our review identified significant concerns with how certain aspects were conducted and supervised, particularly the fbis failure to adhere to its own standards of accuracy and completeness with filing applications wi applications for foreign Intelligence Surveillance ability authority, fisa, so carter page, who was connected to the president s campaign. We determined that the decision to open crossfire hurricane was made by the thenfbi counterintelligence assistant director bill prestat and his decision was a consensus reached after multiple days. We reviewed department and fbi policies and concluded that assistant director prestats exercise of discretion in opening the investigation was in come plooips with those policies. We also reviewed as we detail in the report the emails, Text Messages and other documents of those involved in that decision, and we did not find documentary or testimonial evidence that indicated political bias or improper motivation influencing his decision to open the investigation. While the information in the fbis possession at the time was limited, in light of the low threshold established by department and fbi predcation policy, which by the way is not a legal requirement but rather a prudential one, we found crossfire hurricane was opened for an authorized investigative purpose and with sufficient factual predcation. This condition to open crossfire hurricane which involved the activities of individuals associated with a National MajorParty Campaign for president was under department and fbi policy a discretionary judgment left to the fbi. As we point out in our report there was no requirement that Department Officials be consulted or even notified of that decision prior to the fbi making that decision. Consistent with this policy the fbi advised supervisors in the National Security division of the investigation days after it had been opened. As we detail in our report high Level Department notice and approval is required in other circumstances where investigative activity could substantially impact certain Civil Liberties and that notice allows senior officials to consider the potential constitutional and prudential complications in advance. We concluded that similar notice should be required in circumstances such as those present here. Shortly after the fbi opened the crossfire hurricane investigation and conducted the fbi conducted several consensually monitored recorded meetings between human sources which refer to as chss and individuals affiliated with the Trump Campaign including a highlevel Campaign Official who is not a subject of the investigation. We found that the chs operations received the necessary approvals under fbi policy, that an fbi assistant director, mr. Prestat, knew about and approved of each operation, even in circumstances where what was only required was first level supervisory agent approval and that the operations were permitted under department and fbi policy because their use was not for the sole purpose of monitoring activities protected by the First Amendment or the lawful exercise of other rights secured by the constitution or laws of the United States. We did not find documentary or testimonial evidence that political bias or improper motivation influenced the fbis decision to conduct those chs operations. Additionally, we found no evidence that the fbi attempted to place chss within or report on the Trump Campaign or recruit members of the Trump Campaign as chss. However we were concerned that under amicable department and fbi policy, it would have been sufficient for a first level fbi supervisor to authorcize the Sensitive Information undertakeu tain in crossfire hurricane and there is no amicable policy requiring the fbi to notify officials of a decision to task a confidential human source to consensually monitor in other words record conversations with members of a political campaign. Just in terms that have, its worth noting that had in the the clinton or in this investigation, the fbi could have at the supervisory agent level, one level removed from the line agent, authorized a confidential human source to have a con shentially monitored conversation with either of the candidates with no items to the department of justice or any laur in the department of justice. In crossfire hurricane where each of the operations had the potential to gather sensitive Campaign Information protected by the First Amendment, we found no evidence that the fbi consulted with officials before conducting those and no policies requiring them to do so. We concluded that Current Department and fbi policies are not sufficient to ensure appropriate oversight and accountability when such operations potentially implicate sensitive constitutionally protected activity and requiring constitution at a minimum would be appropriate. We make a recommendation to that effect. One investigative tool which the department and the fbi policy does expresley require, express advance approval by a Senior Department official is the seeking of a court order under fisa. When the Crossfire Hurricane Team first proposed seeking a fisa order targeting carter page in midaugust 2016, fbi attorneys considered it a close call and the fisa order was not requested at the time. However in september 2016, immediately after the Crossfire Hurricane Team reporting from Christopher Steel concerning the activities with russian officials, fbi attorneys advised the department it was ready to move forward to obtain fisa authority to sur vail page. Officials told us it pushed the fisa proposal over the line in terms of establishing probable cause, and we concluded that the steele reporting played a central and an essential role in the decision to seek a fisa order. Fbi leadership supported relying on steeles reporting to seek a fisa order after being advised of concerns expressed by a Department Attorney that steele may have been hired by someone associated with a rifle candidate or campaign. Surveillance authority under fisa can significantly assist the governments efforts to combat terrorism, clandestine intelligence actifbtd and other threats. At the same time, the use of this authority unavoidably raises civil liberality concerns. It can be used to sur vail u. S. Persons and in some cases the surveillance will foreseeably such as carter pages legitimate activities on behalf of a president ial campaign. Moreover, proceedings before the foreign Intelligence Surveillance court which is responsible for ruling on applications for eyesa orders, are ex parte, meaning that unlike most court proceedings, the government is the only party present for the proceedings and fisa orders have not been subject to scrutiny through subsequent adversarial proceedings like search warrants and wire taps are all are potentially through the criminal process. The policies and procedures have established important safeguards to protect the fisa application process from irregularities and abuse. Among the most important are the requirements in fbi policy that every fisa application must contain a quote, full and accurate, closed quote, presentation of the facts. And that agents must ensure that all factual statements and fisa applications are quote, scrupulous low accurate, closed quote. These are the standards for all fisa applications regardless of the sensitivity, regardless and it is incumbent upon the fbi to meet them in every application. Nevertheless we found that investigators failed to meet their basicablegations of ensuring that the fisa applications were scrupulously accurate. We identified significant inaccuracies and owe fissions in each of the four applications, seven in the first and a total of 17 by the final renewal application. For example, the Crossfire Hurricane Team obtained information from steeles primary sub source in january 2017 that raised significant questions about the reliability of the report. This was particularly noteworthy because the fisa applications relooird entirely on information from the steele from the primary subsources reporting to support the allegation that page was coordinating with the russian government on 2016 u. S. President ial election activities. However, the fbi did not share this information with Department Lawyers and it was therefore admitted from the last two renewal applications. All of the applications also submitted information that the fbi had obtained in august 2017 2016 from another u. S. Government agency detailing its prior relationship with page, with carter page, including that carter page had been approved as an operational contact for that other agency from 2008 to 2013, that page had provided information to the other agency concerning his prior contacts with certain russian ints jens officers, and that an employee of that other agency assessed that carter page had been candid with them. The fbi never followed up on that information. As a result of these seven significant inaccuracies and omissions, relevant information was not shared with and consequently considered by Department Lawyers in the fisa court. And the fisa applications made it appear as though the evidence supporting probable cause was stronger than was actually the case. We also found basic fundamental and Serious Problems. The woods procedures are designed to ensure that fisa applications provide a full and accurate presentation of the facts. Department lawyers and the court should have been given complete and Accurate Information so they could have meaningfully evaluated probable cause before authorizing the surveillance of a u. S. Person associated with a president ial campaign. That did not occur. And as a result, the surveillance of carter page continued even as the fbi gathered information that weakened the assessment of probable cause and made the fisa applications less accurate. We concluded that investigators did not give appropriate consider asian or attention to facts that cut against probable cause, and as the investigation progressed and more information tended to undermine or weakern the assertions in the fisa applications, investigators did not reassess the information supporting probable cause. Further, the agents and supervisory agents did not follow or even appear to know certain basic requirements in the woods preyedures. We did not find documentary or testimonial evidence of intentional misconduct, we also did not receive satisfactory explanations for any of the errors or omissions we identified. We found and as we outlined here, are deeply concerned that so many basic and fundamental errors were made by three separate handpicked investigative teams on one of the most sensitive fbi investigations after the matter had been briefed to the highest levels within the fbi even though the information sought through the use of information related to closely to an ongoing president ial campaign and even though those involved with the investigation knew that the reactions would likely be subjected to close scrutiny. The circumstances worry flect the failure as we outline in the report not just by those who prepared the applications but also by the managers and super vooifrds including fbi officials who were briefed as the investigation progressed. We believe that in the fbis most sensitive and high priority manners and especially when seeking Court Permission to use an intrusive tool like this, its incumbent upon the entire chain of command at the organization, including senior officials, take the necessary steps to ensure they are familiar with the facts and circumstances supporting and potentially undermining a fisa application in order to provide effective oversight consistent with their level of supervisory responsibility. Such oversight requires greater familiarity with the facts than we saw in this review where time and again during our oig interviews, managers, supervisors and senior officials displayed a lack of understanding or awareness of Important Information concerning many of the problems that we identified. That is why, as you have seen in the reports, our final recommendation was to refer the entire chain of command that we outline here to the fbi and the department for consideration of how to assess and address their performance failures. Additionally, in light of the significant concerns we identified, the oig announced this week that we were initiating an audit that will further examine the compliance with the woods procedures in eyesa applications that target u. S. Persons not only in counterintelligence but also in counterterrorism investigations. The oig report made a number of other recommendations to the department and fbi. We believe implementation of those recommendations including those that seek individual accountability for the failures identified in our report will improve the fbis ability to utilize its important National Security authorities like fisa while also striving to safeguard the Civil Liberties and privacy of impacted u. S. Persons. It will continue to conduct oversight of these matters in the months and years ahead including the recommendation thats we made in this weeks report. That concludes my statement, and id be pleased to answer any questions the committee may have. Thank you very much. And again to your team, thank you for the service youve done for the country here. The fbi or former fbi director james comey said this week that your report vindicates him. Is that a Fair Assessment of your report . I think the activities dont vipdcate anybody who touched this. Lets run a clip here. This is what comey said in 2018. It would be nice to have sound. Do we have sound . Never mind. Ill read it. Director comey, the reporter is asking him, can i ask you a question on fisa abuse . Its a major issue for the republicans. Do you have a total confidence in the dossier when you used it to secure surveillance warrant and also in the subsequent revooulz . This was asked in december of 2018. About a year ago. Comey, i have total confidence that the fisa process was followed, that the entire case was handled with a thoughtful responsible way by doj and the fbi. I think the notion that fisa was abused here is nonsense. Would it be fair to say that you take issue with that statement . Certainly our findings were that there were significant problems. So when comey speaks about fisa, you shouldnt listen. You should listen to mr. Horowitz. Hes not vindicated. And to be concerned about the fisa warrant process is not nonsense. Lit fooer steele, is it fair to say that he had a political bias against donald trump . Given who he was paid for, there was a bias that needed to be disclosed to the court. Does it seem that he personally had advice, not just because hes on the payroll of the Democratic Party but well, we found in the course of this and heard from mr. Orr about his comment that he was desperate to prevent mr. Trumps election. Again, this is the guy that provides the dossier that gives the warrant over the top against carter page. Hes paid for by the Democratic Party, and he personally believes its bad for donald trump to win. Hes marketing the dossier which is a bunch of garbage, to anybody and everybody. To me thats important. Is that important to you . Any evidence of bias is supposed to be disclosed to the court and to the Department Lawyers. So lets play this out. In january 2017, when they figure out the primary sub source and they talk to the russian guy that provided steele all the information, what should the fbi have done at that moment . Two things. Rekrd internally where it stood and most importantly told the lawyers at the Justice Department who they were asking to help them get a fisa. And there are five people in that interview . Correct. Are you going to make sure those five people are known to the higherups . They are all part of the referral i mentioned earlier. Okay. Did nevthey have a duty to repo to their supervisors and the court exculpatory information . Absolutely. They did not. They did not. Why . Thats the question i cant specifically answer for you. Can you say it wasnt because of political bias . On decisions regarding those fisa matters, i do not know their state of mind at this point. Fair enough. Were talking about actions and trying to figure out what would motivate people. Do you think comey mccabe should have known . Thats a challenging question as we explain in the report there were multiple briefings up the chain including to the director and Deputy Director. We dont have a clear record as what they were told. Would you be surprised if it didnt make it up the system . This earth shotering . Im not going to speculate as to what might or might not have. Did strop know . Mr. Struck there were three iterations. His transactiontions. In february he mentions that steele cant verify . Correct. Pretty clear to me it got up. The court should have been told they were not . Correct. How did they describe this meeting to the court in the warrant application . In the second and third renewals, the last two am cages, they told the court that they had interviewed steelos primary resource upon whom he relied in writing the reporting, and that they found the primary subsource to be credible. They did not tell the court or the Department Lawyers any of the information which would have allowed them to know that if you found the primary subsource credible, you couldnt have also found the steele reporting credible. Did they mislead the court . That was misleading to the court and to the department, to not they did two things in january of 2017, they failed to report obviously exculpatory information and when they did report that the court about the intview they lied about it . But let me add also. Okay. That a year later, in february in june of 2018, when the department sent a rule 13 letter to the court finformig them of other information that had not been provided to the court, the Department Still didnt know about the primary subsource information. And so when the department in its letter said that it still stood behind the fisa application very interesting. They referenced the primary subsource again and the fact that the fbi found that so are these the best and brightest we have . Well certainly the fbi the acsgss of the fbi were not. Mccabe hand pikz these people, are they representative of the department as a whole in your view . I certainly hope that that is not the way others are following these practices. Yeah, me too. Okay. So lets fast forward now to june of 2016. Mr. Clinesmith, whos he . Im going to defer on speaking about people who we dont name specifically in the report. Whos the guy tell me about the guy that altered the email from the cia. So there was a lawyer in the office of general counsel at the f fwr fbi who was the line attorney working with the agent and counterparts at the Security Division on the fisa. And that individual in june of 2017, as the last application was being prepared, and immediately following mr. Page, carter page, going to news outlets after word of the fisas hit the news media, and said to the news media, i was someone who worked with u. S. Intelligence agencies, not someone who worked against them, loir lawyers and agents said weve got to figure out what is the story. Is that what happened . The lawyer reached out to a lee aceon at the other Government Agency who was at issue, asked the question, was mr. Page a source or a contact of some sort for your organization . The report back in the email referenced the august 2016 memorandum that that agency had provided to the fbi that i mentioned in my Opening Statement the fbi did no followup on, and said that what lee aceons general recollection was, that mr. Page was or is someone who had a relationship with the entity, with the other Government Agency, but that the lawyer should go look at the report for confirmation. The lawyer then had a conversation with the fbi agent who was going to be the the person who swore out that final application, fisa application. The agent told us in his detailed in here was concerned about what he had learned about what page said publicly and wanted a definitive answer, as he put it. If the agent if carter page wads actually telling the truth, it changes one of the pred katsz to consider him a Foreign Agent . That was the concern of the agent and it was going to be the agent who was going to be if true it would be helpful to mr. Page . True, it certainly could have been very helpful. But at a minimum without any doubt it should have been known, should have been followed up on. What did this lawyer do . When the lawyer had the discussion with the agent and the agent said i want to see it, do you have it in writing, the lawyer said he did, and he forwarded the liaisons email but altered it to insert the words, and not a source, into the email. He doctored it . He doctored the original email from the liaison. And made it look like the cia denied knowing mr. Page . It flatly stated he was not a source. Just imagine, folks, youre representing as a defense attorney and they do this to one of your clients. I hope somebody pays the price for this, whether you like trump or not. So why did mr. Clinesmith, thats who were talking about, you do ent have to say it, ill say it, what motivated him to do that . It is unknown as to precisely why he did it. This is the viva la resichbts, guy . I was going to mention but we reference in here the Text Messages you mentioned, and we have not made a determination but rather as we note in here when we learned this, we notified the attorney general and fbi director and referred it to them. You did a great job. If you wake up and theres the lawn is wet, you can assume it rained. Fl you got a good who hates trumps guts from day one, thinks pence is stupid and everybody who voted for trump is an idiot and you give him power over trump maybe youre making a mistake. Or again maybe you know all these people who had these biases did nothing about it. Maybe. Maybe not. It doesnt matter. We know what they did. Is it fair to say that after january 2017 when the guy who gave steele all the information disavouz the dossier, that not only they should have told the court, they should have slowed down, do you think the second and third warrants had illegal basis after that point . , you know, we dont reach that conclusion. Would you have submitted a warrant application as a lawyer . Let me put it this way. I would not have submitted the one they put in. No doubt about it it had no business going in. What i want you to know in january 2017, the whole foundation for sur vailing carter page collapses exculpatory information is ignored, they lie to the court about what the interview was all about. Is that a fair summary so far about the zwrjanuary 2017 . It was misleading to the court. Fair enough. In january about six months later when they find more information that could be help tofl mr. Page they lie about it. Do you feel like mr. Page was treated fairly by the department of justice and the fbi . I dont think the department of justice fairly treated these fisas and he was on the receiving end. You would not want to be on the receiving end, would you . I would not want agents or anybody failing to put i was in asa. Ive seen what can happen. I would be very comfortable with you investigating anybody. Because i think you know the difference between getting somebody and trying to find the truth. Thats what this is all about. Counterintelligence investigations, whats the purpose of the counterintelligence investigation . Its to identify potential threats to the nation. Okay. This was opened up as a counterintelligence investigation, right . Correct. And we know the russians were screwing around with the democrats, right . Correct. Thats one of the concerns. It was the russians who hacked into the dnc . Correct. Its okay for everybody to be concerned, what are the russians up to . I get that. Its okay to look at whats the standard to start one of these things . There are two types of investigations. Both of them have relatively low thresholds as we point out here for predcation. Okay. Lets assume for a movement that relatively low threshold wads met. Would it be fair to say that if you top there in looking at your report, youre making a mistake . You would be making a mistake. There is 400 pages here for a reason. Theres a mountain of misconduct. Please dont ignore it. My point is, if this is a counterintelligence investigation, who are they trying to protect . Who should they be trying to protect . Well, if its the threat outlined in the fwrendly Foreign Government information, you would be looking to protect the election process. Right. Which would include. The candidate . The campaign, the candidate and the American People. Okay. So did they ever brief Hillary Clinton about efforts to foreign influences involving her campaign, do you know . Ive heard that but i dont know for a affefact. They did. Good for them. And they stopped it. Was there ever a defensive bereaving given by the fbi to donald trump about the concerns . There was not. What would you call a counterintelligence investigation that never had a protective element . Im not sure. Sorry, mr. Chairman. If, without eventually trying to protect the entity being influenced, is it legitimate . It would depend on each fact and circumstance. Heres what im trying to tell you. If youre opening up a counterintelligence investigation to protect somebody, you should do it. Did they ever try to protect donald trump from foreign influence . They did not and we lay out when they went in and gave a vanilla briefing, the russians are out there, beware, didnt they have an fbi agent do a 302 on the defensive briefing . They sent one from the crossfire hurricane to the brieftion, and that agent prepared a report to the file of the briefing. About what trump said . About what mr. Trump said and what mr. Flynn said. When we get defensively briefed tomorrow, would it be okay for fbi agents to open up 302s on what we said . We have very significant concerns about that. I would note in director wrays response he underlined that would not be set aside how you feel about trump for a minute. Under the guys of protecting the campaign from russian influence, they never lift a finger to protect the campaign. Every time they had information that the that suspected were working for the russians it went the other way and they kept going. When they did generically brief candidate trump, they sent an fbi agent in to do a 302. If this doesnt bother you, you hate trump way too much. Was that fbi agent spying on donald trump when he went in there . It was a pretext meeting that im not the process by which they have to do these meetings if you dont have a foundation for a warrant sorry. Go ahead. Were you do you need to say anything else . Im sorry. Theres no okay. The incident, the event, the meeting, was a briefing, and the fbi considered and decided to send that agent there to do the briefing. So the agent was actually doing the briefing but also using it for the purpose of investigation. Okay. I hope that doesnt happen to us tomorrow. Ill be really disspissed if it does. Lets play this out. They never told trump about the concerns. Is it fair to say there came a point to where sur vailing carter page became unlawful . I will let the court decide that. The court has this report and will make that decision. Lets put it this way. If you dont have a Legal Foundation to sur vail somebody and you keep doing it is that bad . Absolutely. Is that spying . Its illegal surveillance. Its not court authorized. Whatever legal surveillance means, they did it. So all this stuff that they didnt illegally sur vail Trumps Campaign, they did because they had no legal basis after the january 2017 data dump by the russian guy, to believe that the dossier was reliable. They alter exculpatory information in june of 2017 that would have further proven that carter page is not a russian agent. He was actually working with the cia. Do you believe carter page is or ever was a russian agent trying to do harm to this country . Im going to refer to the evidence. Thank you. At the end of this, the fbi at the end of these fisas told us they had found no evidence to corroborate the allegations in the steele dossier related to him. Its not that clean, folks. They knew and they ignored it and they continued to sur vail him. Why . Why did they doctor the email . The people who continued getting warrants after they knew it wasnt legitimate had a bias that reeked. How this thing was opened, i dont know. But i can tell you mr. Durham has a different view. I respect your view they may have had a lawful view. One of the people pushing this was peter struck. We have a task at hand here to make sure this never happens again. To hold people accountable, change our laws, save the fisa court if we can, and i hope this chapter in American History is never repeated. And finally if you report that this 434page report says lawful investigation with a few irregularities, youre doing a great disservice to the American People. Thank you very much. Thank you, mr. Chairman. As we spoke, Inspector General, pointed out your office spent 19 months and interviewed 100 witnesses. And your report concluded that the fbi had an adequate predicate reason to open the investigation on the Trump Campaign ties with russia. Could you quickly define that predicate . Yeah. So the predicate here was the information that the fbi got at the end of the july from the friendly Foreign Government that reflected a meeting that the friendly Foreign Government had with mr. Papadopoulos in may. Who was the friendly government . We dont mention that in the report, so im going stick is that classified . That is, my understanding, is still classified. Thank you. As i sit here, i am only going to speak to whats in the report. Okay. Okay. Go ahead. And as i mentioned in my statement, the comment was that mr. Pop doplous had made a suggestion that there had been a suggestion to the Trump Campaign that the russian government could provide information that would be damaging to candidate clinton and then president obama. So your report states that you didnt find documentary or testimonial evidence that political bias or improper motivation played a role . Thats correct. Thank you. And you didnt find a deep state conspiracy against candidate or President Trump . As to the opening, we found no bias, no testimonial documentary on that. And no rationale for a deep state . We looked at mr. Prestap as i noted was the Decision Maker and we did not find any evidence in his emails or texts of having engaged in any bias or having any bias. Fbi director wray provided a written response to your report accepting all of your findings. And these include the key finding that there was, quote, an authorized purpose, an actual factual predcation for the investigation. By contrast, attorney general barr expressed his doubt about the legitimacy of the fbis investigation in press statements. Did attorney general barr provide any evidence that caused you to alter this key finding that the fbi investigation had an adequate predicate . No, we stand by our finding. Thank you. During your investigation, attorney general barr stated his belief that, quote, spying on the Trump Campaign did occur, end quote. And as you said, your investigation found no evidence that the fbi placed any confidential source within the Trump Campaign or tasked any confidential source to report on the Trump Campaign. Thats correct, right . Thats correct. And further, no evidence of political bias or improper motivations influenced the decision to use Confidential Sources as part of the investigation . Thats correct. Did your office ask attorney general barr and u. S. Attorney john durham to share whatever evidence they had that might be relevant to your investigation . We asked mr. Durham to do that. And what about attorney general barr . And attorney general barr. Thank you. So nothing they could provide altered your offices conclusion that the fbi did not place spies in the Trump Campaign . None of the discussions changed our findings here. Thank you. In a press Statement Issued monday, u. S. Attorney john durham tasked by attorney general barr to also investigate the origins of the russian investigation, stated, and i quote, last month, we advised the ig that we do not agree with some of the reports conclusions, as to predcation and how the fbi case was opened. Whats your reaction to that . Well, i was surprised by the statement. I didnt necessarily know it was going to be released on monday. We did meet with mr. Durham, as i mentioned. We provided him with a copy of the report as we did others, through our factual accuracy review process. We met with him in november with regard to that. We did discuss the opening issue. He said he did not necessarily agree with our conclusion about the opening of a full counterintelligence investigation, which is what this was. But there was also an investigative means by which the fbi can move forward with an investigation. Its called a preliminary investigation. So there are two types of investigations, full and preliminary. They opened a full here. He said during the meeting that the information from the friendly Foreign Government was in his view sufficient to support the preliminary investigation. And as we note in the report, investigative steps such aze kochb dirnl human source activity that occurred here are allowed under a full investigation. Did either barr or durham present anything that altered your findings . No. I wanted to ask you, since we have the author of the whistleblower legislation very proudly sitting here, you previously told this committee that whistleblower rights and protections have been one of your highest priorities since becoming ig. As you know, there have been calls for the ukraine whistleblower to be identified publicly, even though that person was not a direct witness to the events. So what is your view . Should the ukraine whistleblowers confidentialiality be breeched and that person identified publicly . And why not . Whistleblower protections have been one of my highest priorities. Appreciated working with all of the members of committee, particularly senator grassley. We wrote a letter recently as the ig community quoting his statement on the issues and the importance of whistleblowersnd whistleblowers have a right to expect complete, full confidentialiality in all circumstances. Its in the law in the ig act that congress wrote. And its a very important provision. Thank you. In a public hearing before the house intelligence committee, deputy secretary of state george kent testified that politically associated investigations or prosecutions against opponents of those in power undermine the rule of law. Do you agree with that . Do politically motivated investigations undermine the rule of law . I agree. Any politically motivated investigation undermines the rule of law. Thank you very much. Did you find any evidence that president obama or anyone else in the white house asked the United States government to investigate thencandidate trump or his campaign . We certainly didnt see any evidence of that in the fbis files or the departments files, which was our mandate here and our authorized jurisdiction. You have a policy recommendation regarding the use of confidential human sources. Id like to ask a few questions about it. Your investigation found that the use of kochbl deshl human sources was consistent with existing rules, correct . Correct. The use of confidential human sources here was not solely to gather First Amendment protected information . Correct. And that is the standard currently in the rules. And you found no evidence that the decision to use confidential human sources was mote mated by political bias, is that correct . Correct. With regard to your toelcy recommendation, what if anything do you believe should be changed and why . So as i mentioned in my Opening Statement, i think we were surprised to learn and concerned to learn that in an investigation of any Political NationalParty Political campaign, the confidential human source usage could be approved by only a first level super vooir. In this instance some were approved at the assistant director but they could have been approved at just the line super vooir vooifr level. For an investigation of a major Party President ial campaign of either side, any side, that was concerning to us, particularly since there was not a requirement that any department lawyer, whether at the National Security division, the criminal division, the Deputy Attorney generals office, the attorney generals office, needed to be notified, at any point in time. Did you give interviews about your investigation while it was ongoing . Im sorry, did i did you give interviews . Myself, no. I did not do that. Did ni anybody on the ig team . No. And it would have been entirely inappropriate for them to do so. Id like to clear this up. What are the dangers of discussing an investigation thats ongoing . I actually wrote and we wrote a 500page report own that that we issued on the midyear investigation and among other things criticized what occurred last year with regard to the hailing of that investigation. Ongoing investigations are need to be protected from outside influence. You dont know as an investigator or you shouldnt conclude as an investigator until you are done with the investigation, you shouldnt be reaching your conclusions until that point. And so giving preliminary ideas, advice, guidance, statements, can be misleading. And you should not be reaching final conclusions until you get to the end of the investigation. There is a lot of misimpression about two people, strong and page. I want to ask this question. For the last two years, President Trump has relentlessly attacked former fbi officials as a way to undermine the investigation. For example, the president tweeted that, and i quote, how can the wicked witch hunt proceed when it was started, influenced and worked on by peter struk and lisa page who exchanged Text Messages critical of candidate donald trump . Your investigation found that while lisa page attended some of the discussions regarding the opening of the investigations, she did not play a role in the decision to open crossfire hurricane. You also found that while struck was directly involved to open, he was not the sole or even highest level conditionmakdecis. That was made by prestap as you have indicated, and by consensus after multiple days of discussions of meetings. Most importantly, you found that the decision had a proper factual basis and that there is no evidence that quote, political bias or improper motivation influenced. So based on your investigation, personal political views expressed in Text Messages did not motivate the opening of the investigation of ties between Trump Campaign advisers and russia, is that correct . Thats correct. Ultimately we concluded that those Text Messages, which we found last year, were entirely inappropriate, didnt ultimately make play the role in mr. Prestaps decision to open the investigation. Thank you. So your investigation also uncovered Text Messages between other fbi employees expressing support for candidate and President Trump, correct . Thats correct. So fbi employees held personal political views that were both favorable and unfavorable toward the candidate at that time . Thats correct. And as we note here, and we noted in last years report, we did not find the Text Messages were inappropriate solely because people expressed a view as to which candidate they support or didnt support in an election. What concerned us with the Text Messages we outlined last year and referenced again in this years report as to certain individuals, is the connection between their views and their work on the investigation. To conclude my questioning, what do you believe with your long experience, are the most important points that this 400plus page report brings forward . I think there are several. As you might expect in a 400plus page report. Thats why i still have time. Yes. I think as we outline in the executive summary, first it was opened with the proper predicate, sufficient predcation, by a person, mr. Prestap, who was not mr. Pr was not one of the text message persons, and senior to those people. Third that the confidential human source operations while permitted by fbi policy should give everybody pause as to whether that policys sufficient to provide accountability over decisions. Finally, that the fisa process here was not used appropriately, properly and the rules were not followed. Well, that concludes my questioning. I just want to say thank you and thank you to your staff. Im very grateful to the Inspector Generals office year in, year out. Thank you. Thank you. Oh, i would yield the balance of my time to senator leahy. Yes, maam. Were going to have a vote at 12 00. We will try to get through senator grassley and maybe senator leahy and take a break for lunch and come back about 30 minutes after that. Take her remaining five minutes . Sure, absolutely. Senator graham pointed out earlier senator graham pointed out earlier, senator lee and i have worked on in trying to put in some protections in fisa, United States freedom act, and so on. But the fbi accepted all of your findings, is that correct . Thats correct. And that includes where you have raised questions about the use of fisa. Correct. The five investigations you review reviewed, the only application for fisa warrant was with respect to carter page, is that correct . Thats correct. Out of the five. The 17 errors affecting the carter page fisa application came after and, thus, did not impact the broader russia investigation, which became the special counsels investigation, am i correct in that . Thats correct. Those occurred in october and later. It was not not in august when the matter was opened. So that came after and july. Investigation came after. In the Mueller Report, how many pages did the Mueller Report refer to carter page . I dont recall the exact number but it wasnt a large number. I do know because i read it. It was seven pages. That was out of 448 pages. So, very barely mentioned. Im not trying to minimize fbis mistakes here, but keep it in context. The fbis errors in carter pages case do not undermine the unanimous assessment that russia and not ukraine interfered in our election, is that correct . Yeah. We describe in the report the information about russias the conclusions about russias meddling in the 2016 election. I remember one of the political events mr. Trump was having said, russia, if youre listening, take a look at this. Well, the Trump Campaign seemed to welcome in, exploit it. Now, none of these errors, and correct me if im wrong, minimize the legitimacy of the dozens of indictments and convictions that resulted from the special counsels russia investigation, is that correct . We make very clear here the errors and Serious Problems we identify are concerning the carter page fisa and the people in that chain of command. We dont make any findings as to any other parts of ycrossfire hurricane, which was a far broader investigation. The reason i mention, i dont want these errors undermine, the mueller investigation. I do not believe they undermine the mueller investigation, is that right . Our review was not the mueller investigation. Our review was of the fisas we obtained, as we outlined here, the opening of the investigation, and the additional questions we got about mr. Orrs activities and the confidential source. Is it correct you found no evidence that the investigation was motivated by antitrump or political bias, is that correct . We found no evidence that the initiation of the investigation was motivated by political bias. It gets murkier the question gets more challenging, senator, when you get to the fisa and when you get to the other when you get to the attorneys actions, for example, in connection with that fisa. I raise that. And did you conclude there was a legitimate basis to investigate ties between Trump Campaign advisers and russia . We concluded they had the predication to open it on july 1st and the subsequent subfiles they opened about ten days later or so. And some of that came from, without naming the trusted foreign ally . Correct. The information came from the friendly Foreign Government. Yeah. Did you find the fbi complied with and exceeded current rules on who could be investigated and who has to be notified . They followed all the rules with regard to that. Does it refute the claims made by some that theres a deep state involved . It finds that it was a properly predicated investigation based on the rules of the fbi. And did you find anything where the fbi planted spies in mr. Trumps campaign . We found no use of human confidentials and placing them in the campaign or trying to place them in the campaign. I yield my five minutes. Youll get your ten minutes. No, i was taking her remaining five minutes. I just want to let senator grassley go. Sure. Thank you. Has anybody been prosecuted or charged with any in this russia investigation . Im sorry. On this matter that im yeah. Handling . No one that im aware of. Okay. Following up on a question senator feinstein asked, did the Obama Administration or president obama himself is the one im interested in, know about the counterintelligence investigation . I dont know the answer to that definitively. Our authority was over the fbi and to look at the Fbi Department activities. In january of 2018, chairman graham and i wrote to the Fbi Department, interfering Christopher Steele for potential investigation of lying to the fbi. We told the fbi, the department and the department that what the fbi told the court about steeles Media Contacts didnt match with what he told the british court. Did four questions in regard to that. Did the fbi ever ask steele whether he was a source for the september 2016 yahoo news article that cited western intelligence sources, quote unquote . If not, why not . They did not ask that question despite having the opportunity to do so. And we got a variety of explanations, including that as to some of these issues that they didnt want to offend him or jeopardize their relationship with him. Question two. On october 11th draft of the fisa application stating fbi believes steele was the source for the yahoo news article, but it was taken out in the october 14th draft. Why did the fbi originally say steele was the source and what factual basis did the fbi have to change that and tell the court that steele was not a source . This is what was so disturbing about that event, which is the initial application said, as you noted, that the fbi assessed that steele was the direct source, or was a direct source. And on october 14th the drafts changed to the exact opposite. What we found is the fbi had no basis for the first statement, no evidence in their file. It turned out the first statement was, in fact, the accurate statement. The point was, though, they had no evidence to support that. And when they flipped it, they had no evidence to support that either. Thats the kind of issue that under the basic woods procedure, the factual accuracy procedures, had someone been doing their job and following up, they would have seen that and found that. And, of course, had they bothered to ask mr. Steele, they might have found out which of the two versions was true. Maybe they werent interested in doing their job. Question three, chairman graham and i sent our referral to the fbi and the doj on january 4th, 2018. According to your report, although the fbi already knew that the British Intelligence and the fbi officials discussed litigation with director comey, the fbi never got steeles statement in that litigation until we provided them. The fbi also never considered updating the court on these statements. Why did the court learn no. When did the court learn about these contradictory statements about whether steele did or didnt have contact with the media . And did anyone in the fbi seem concerned at all that it was not updating the fisc, the court, it was knowingly providing a court with incorrect and misleading information . So, the fisa court first learned of it in a at least as i understand it, in a letter sent june 2018, a year after the last fisa authorization, when the Justice Department lawyers sent them a letter informing them of new information they learned, including from the litigation that mr. Steele had acknowledged he was a direct contact for yahoo news in that story. That was the first time the court was told about it. Okay. Would you look at footnote 461 for me. Yes. That footnote states an fbi human confidential source contacted an fbi officer in an Fbi Field Office in late july 2016 to report information from, quote, a colleague who runs an Investigative Firm hired by two entities, the Democratic National committee as well as another individual who was not named to explore Donald Trumps longstanding ties to russian entities, end of quote. Was that Investigative Firm fusion gps or did the dnc hire another firnl to peddle antitrump information to obamas fbi . I dont know definitively which it is, but i can certainly follow up and get back to you on that. But it is a question you can answer for me . I dont know. I have to double check with our folks on that. If you couldnt, would that be a case of privacy or something . No. I just dont know if we ultimately figured out the answer to that question because it was in a different field office with different people to have to interview and that sort of thing. Im want sure how much we went down that road, frankly. Thank you. Ive been asking questions since september 2017 about what kind of defensive briefings the fbi provided to the Trump Campaign. The fbi told me its briefings to both campaigns were similar and that it wasnt aware of action that it took as a result. Chairman johnson and i wrote again to the fbi two months ago. We noted that Text Messages between stuck and page indicated that the fbi may have used defensive briefings not to warn the Trump Campaign but to investigate it. Four questions along this line. Question number one, would you agree that with respect to the defensive briefings, the Trump Campaigns briefings were treated differently than those provided to the Clinton Campaign . If i could, they were called it was not an fbi briefing. The fbi went to an office of the National Director of National Intelligence briefing. It was a strategic counterintelligence briefing. I mention that because it precisely wasnt a defensive briefing. It was an intelligence briefing. And they were treated differently in that the agent rode it up to the file and put the information in the file. The briefings were identical but the net result was one was for investigative purposes and one was purely for the intelligence briefing. I think what you said touches on question two but im going to ask it anyway. Documented statements and interactions of Michael Flynn and candidate trump for the fbis investigating investigative files. Is it normal for the counterintelligence briefers to document statements and interactions of individuals theyre briefing for investig e investigative purposes . It was documented in one and not documented in the other, as you said, senator. And based on what we saw, theres actually no policy on it, but based on the reaction of the current leadership and director wrays response, where he underlined the word, this will not happen going forward, i think its pretty clear what his state of mind is on that, this should not have occurred. Question number three. Did the fbi make any investigative use of the information garnered in the defense briefing, for example, to inform its later interview with Michael Flynn . I dont know definitively whether that did occur but that was certainly the stated purpose for the agent being present. Okay. Lastly. Campaigns place trust in the fbi to provide an environment of cooperation and honest assessments about the risk of foreign threats. How can the fbi repair that trust after abusing the briefing process . Well, thats where we make the recommendation. We think the fbi has to clearly state what its policy is. It does these kind of strategic briefings, as the chairman mentioned, for members of congress, for private citizens, companies when they get attacked on their computer systems, for example, transition, for transition purposes, as was the case here. And there needs to be clear guidance and rules so that those getting the briefings understand. On another point. According to your report, bruce orr told the fbi that steeles reporting had gone to the clinton had gone to the Clinton Campaign november 2016. By january 11, 2017, key investigators knew the dossier was prepared, in part, for the dnc. By february and march 2017, quote unquote, it was broadly known in the fbi and by senior Justice Department officials simpson was working for the Democratic Party. How many people in the fbi and doj knew the steele dossier was Political Opposition Research funded by the democrats and who were they . And did any of them approve information in the fisa or any of its renewals while knowing who was paying for it . So, on the fbi side as we lay out in the report, page 258 forward, there were a number of people who knew. Its challenging, getting back to the chairmans question, to know precisely what was known at the highest levels of the fbi and when. The director, Deputy Director levels, because of the lack of any direct record of entire briefings. But there certainly was much information as we lay out here known at the fbi. At the Justice Department, much of that information was not known. One of the concerns we note in the information about what mr. Orr did is, mr. Orr was passing along this information from mr. Steele to the fbi. That information was not then being given back by the fbi to the Justice Department. So, the people, the colleagues of mr. Orrs at the Justice Department were reviewing these fisas didnt know their colleague had passed along that information to the fbi. Thank you. Well go with senator leahy and break for lunch and come back at 1 00 and well go vote. Thank you. Mr. Horowitz, its good to see you again. Ive read an awful lot of ig reports in my years here. Am i correct when the Justice Department or opponent disagrees with or has comments about an ig report, the general practice is to provide you with a written response to publish along with your report, is that correct . Thats correct. We would always include that in our appendix to our reports. My staff looked at 797 Inspector General reports filed since your tenure began. They found three dozen reports with the Justice Department component. How many ig reports under your name involve the Justice Department arguing that, in fact, it, in fact, committed more misconduct than your investigation uncovered . I dont recall that happening before. I tell you right now, none. None. And thats why i find it very unusual that attorney general barr didnt send you anything to go in the report. He just went to the Television Cameras to talk about it. There was a lot about the personal Text Messages involved in your 2018 report involving an fbi lawyer and agent involved in these investigations. You also, didnt you, in your investigation find protrump, favorable trump messages from agents who worked on the russia investigation, including one that was an exlettive written exchange where the agents were enthusiastically talking about trumps election and their desire to investigate the Clinton Foundation under President Trump. You found that, too, didnt you . Thats correct. Thats in the report. I think its potentially problematic if theyre protrump or proclinton, and there are things i assume the fbi investigators can have strong views on politics, but the question is, does it impact their work. Exactly right. I think its very important to keep in mind while they, frankly, should never be using their government devices to have political discussions, whether working on a sensitive campaign or sensitive matter or not, shg in our view, and we took the view last year, we laid it out, we were not holding or referring people for performance failure simply because they expressed support or lack of support for a candidate. It was precisely as you indicated. Connecting it protrump or proclinton, thank you. There was one occasion where i think bias did impact one or more russia work. The fbi appropriately kept quiet about the trump russia investigation during the 2016 election. The same cant be said about the clinton administration. Rudy giuliani and others appeared to receive highly sensitive leaks from the new york Fbi Field Office. Leaks that likely contributed to director comeys public announcement that he was reopening the clinton investigation just days before the election. I asked thendirector comey about these leaks. He said he was investigating. Now, we know that a number of these leaks to mr. Giuliani, which he then ran to the cameras and actually bragged about talking about, what can you tell us about the new york field offices leaks to Rudy Giuliani and others . So, as we noted publicly last year in our report, we were very concerned about that. We put in the appendix charts showing all the different contacts. Subsequent to that report and this continues to this day, we are investigating those contacts. Weve issued a couple public summaries so far about people we found violated public policy. We have other investigations ongoing that when we conclude it, we will also post summaries of. Whats proving to be very hard is to prove the actual substance of the communications between the agents and the reporters or the individuals. As every as you might guess. But we can prove the contacts. And under fbi policy you need authorization if youre going to close information and have certain contacts. Thank you. One of your central findings is the fbis investigation of russian ties that the Trump Campaign was not influenced by political bias, is that correct . The opening of the investigation we found was not connected to any of the bias texts we identified. At the president s direction, the attorney general has been combing europe to finance support for french theories to cast doubt on the russia investigation. Im not clear what legitimate Law Enforcement purpose this serves. How do we know politics is not driving the barr durham investigation . Im not sure how anybody knows what you dont know, unless you do an investigation or you review it or somebody looks lieu, for example, as we did here, a million records and exhaustive effort. But you would agree that Justice Department investigations have to be free of improper political motivation . Absolutely, 1,000 . I did public corruption investigations. I ran the public corruption unit in the Southern District of new york. You had to be straight down the yellow line in the middle of the road on anything you touched. Does it concern you the attorney general is running around europe to find any kind of theories that might cast doubt on the russia investigation . I think you have to ask the attorney general about those meetings. I dont know what those meetings were about. And, obviously, havent done any investigating. You know, im concerned because they did not follow the procedure normally if they have a question or disagreement with the Inspector Generals report by letting you know before the report comes out so you can include and would include any disagreements. Think about when investigating the politically motivated firing of ten u. S. Attorneys during the bush administration. I said Department Leaders abdicated to ensure prosecutorial decisions would be based on the law. The evidence and the department policy, not political pressure. In this case for the first ti , timtime, questions were not sent to you but given to the press, is that correct . In your experience . I dont know of another situation where we didnt get those attached in the appendix to our report. Thank you. Mr. Chairman thank you, senator leahy. Thank you for your comments about senator lee and myself. Absolutely. We will adjourn, recess until 1 00. Heres our life programming on thursday. The house meets at 9 00 a. M. Eastern to finish work on a bill allowing medicare to negotiate Prescription Drug prices. On cspan two, the senate is working on judicial and executive branch nominations. Later in the day, we will join bbcs coverage of the british general election. On cspan3 at 9 00 a. M. , the House Judiciary Committee meets to consider amon mentz amendments to the two articles of impeachment against President Trump. This morning on washington journal, we are getting your reaction as the House Judiciary Committee considers articles of impeachment against President Trump. Join the conversation all morning with your phone calls, emails, facebook comments, and tweets. Washington journal is next. Host this is the washington journal for december 12, the House Judiciary Committee meets at 9 00 to vote on the two articles of impeachment. If it passes the committee today, it will head to the full house for a vote next week. The house of representatives comes in at 9 00. If you want to see the hearing, these articles of impeachments, which starts at 9 00, you can go to our cspan 3 channel starting at 9 00 and that is where you will see shots of the room you are seeing now. If you want to follow along, you can do so at cspan. Org