Thank you all, very much. Mr. Horowitz, thank you. I really appreciate what have you done. Do you have your team here with you . I do. Would it be okay if they raise their hands, is that right . If theyre okay with it, im okay with it. Thank you all. You have labored hard. Your work product is impressive. I want to thank you all 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. Might take a little longer to lay out what i think is before us as a nation. Crossfire hurricane was probably the best name the name of an investigation is the best weve because thats what we ended up with, a crossfire and a hurricane. Theres been a lot of media reports before it was issued. I remember reading all these headlines. Lawful investigation with regularities. Everything okay. Lowlevel people kind of got off track. If thats what you get out of this report, you clearly didnt read it. If thats your takeaway that this thing was lawfully predicated and thats the main point, you missed the entire 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 had 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. Biased agents cut corners. Lied to court. Ignore exoneration. So the first thing i want you to know is how the cake is baked here. And my goal is to make sure 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 you will 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 open one was 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 protect us, not to surveil us. And heres what i want every american to know. From the time they opened up crossfire hurricane until this debacle was over, 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 longtime 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 campaigns as a volunteer, you really 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 . I hope all of us would appreciate, if you really believe theres somebody 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. But 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 against 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, 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. Because 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 in their own hands. And when i say defraud the fisa court, i mean it. To your team, you were 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. 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 Deputy Assistant director for counterintelligence is 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 these are two central characters 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 for 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 3, 2016, page, god, trump is a loathsome human. Strzok, oh, my god, hes an idiot. You know what . Newsrooms all over the country, people are nods. 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 at the fbi. If you were in the military and said anything like this about a commander in chief, youd be charged with a crime. Remember the mcchrystal debacle where they had a barroom discussion with a reporter from the Rolling Stone . Whats the takeaway . Dont go to the bar with a Rolling Stone reporter. They talked 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. But 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 happens. Wow, donald trump is an enormous douche. Again, a lot of people agree with that. 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 presidency would be. A lot of people believe that. 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 ensure 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 that the American People will pick their president , 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 support. People in charge. October 11, 2016. Currently fighting 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 an 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 23, 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 pages 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, and 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 and i both know the odds are nothing if i thought it was likely, id be there id be 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 22, 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, i will never know. Im jumping ahead here. But when you read this report, what they find is that a lawyer supervising the fisa 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, whos 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 minute. In that dossier provided by Christopher Steele, and well talk about him in a minute, they claim that carter page meets with three people known to be russians, russian agents. People associated with russia. Carter page while being wiretapped 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 him. 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 him. 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 and 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. This is the lawyer supervising the warrant 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 guy. 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 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 last 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. This is what the guys saying, right after the election. And its just hard not to feel like the fbi calls some of this, it was a razorthin 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 the 22nd, shortly after the election of donald j. Trump, the fbi lawyer in charge of supervising the fisa process, tweeting out to friends, viva la resistance. What are the odds this guy might do something wrong . Would you have to be part of a rightwing conspiracy to predict in the future maybe this guy will get off script . Folks, if these are a few 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 believe 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. Now, how the hell did this whole thing start . What got us here today . They open up a counterintelligence investigation in july. We know the russians are messing in our election. And it was the russians, ladies and gentlemen, who stole the Democratic National committee emails, poe podests 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 you will not accuse him of is being james bond. This poor guy, papadopoulos, picked by sam clovis to be part of Trumps National security team. This 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 the reasonable articulation is this small, but to get a warrant from a court, you have to have probable cause. So the lawyers are saying, you dont have it. 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. Just stay tuned. Well talk about that in a minute. So on september 19th, for the first time, they introduce the steele dossier into the warrant application process. It worked. September the 21st, they get a signoff, 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 nowhe 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 a 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. Do we have it . 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 it 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 publish 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 a Ritzcarlton Hotel in russia. Let me tell you how i came about to find Christopher Steeles work product. In december of 2016, john mccain goes to the National Security conference in canada, and somebody tells him about the steele dossier, and it is bad and you need to know about it. And it gets to john mccain. And john mccain puts it in his safe. He gives it to me, and i read it. The first thing i thought of was, oh, my god. One of two thing, this could be russian disinformation or they may have something on trump. If you read this document, the first thing that you would think of is that they have something on donald trump. It is stunning. It is damning, and it is salacious, and it is a bunch of crap. They finally find the guy that prepared all of the information, but a little bit about steele. In 2015, the British Intelligence service said that you need to watch this guy. He is not reliable. They take time to go to london to check steele out. And they are told that he demonstrates lack of selfawareness for judgment, keen to help, but underpinned by poor judgment, and putting people at political risk, but no intel value. If you spent 30 minutes to look at Christopher Steele, you would have said he is bias and ax to grind and on the payroll of the opposing party and take anything that he says with a grain of salt. In january of 2017, the fbi figures out who the subsource of the steele dossier is. What you need to know is that 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 of 2017. Where is that summary . Five people interview the primary subsource, the guy that provided steele with everything. And they showed him the dossier. Read pages 186 to 190. What does the russian guy tell the fbi about the fbi about the dossier . That steele misstated or exaggerated the prime subsources statement, that trumps alleged sexual activities at the Ritzcarlton Hotel at moscow was rumor and speculation. And he went on the say that he heard it at a bar. And in the report, it suggests that a western employee of the ritzcarlton confirmed this escapade by then private citizen trump. When he read that, he said that is not true. I never told steele that somebody working for the ritzcarlton confirmed this. I heard it at a bar. Primary subsource dated, and they never expected the steeles subsources primary statements in report as fact. They were word of mouth and hearsay, and conversations had with friends over beer where statements were made in jest that should be taken with a grain of salt. So in january of 2017, the person who did all of the assembly 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 have it . That the fbi would slow down, because this is the outcome determinative document that is just having a hole blown through it . They dont slow down. They use the document that is now they know to be a bunch of garbage and twice more to get a warrant against carter page. I hope that carter page gets a lawyer and suing the hell out of the fbi and the Justice Department. Two more warrants were obtained by the fbi and department of justice after being told in january that it is all a bunch of bull. But it gets worse. Heres how they deskrcribe the interview to the court. The fbi found that the russianbased subsource to be truthful and cooperative. Nothing about and oh, by the way, he said that everything in there is a bunch of bull. You knew in january of 2017 if there was no doubt before that you know by the guy who prepared it that he had disavowed everything that it is not true and a grain of salt and it is not something that i should have said all of these thing, and instead of stopping, they keep going, and instead of telling the court the truth what they are 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 . And the 23re7d he friends in th business, how would you like this to be your news organization. In january of 2017, there is no benefit of the doubt to be given. The five people from the department of justice and the fbi have been told by the one guy who did all of the work that it is a bunch of garbage. And the question is how far up of the system did it go . Why did they apply for a warrant twice more . Why didnt they stop . Everybody wants to know if there is 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. That is what they were doing, to protect all of us smelly people from donald trump. That is what this is about. Whether you believe it or not, i believe it. And you know what, it could happen to yall next time. There is some pretty passionate on our side that i would not want to be investigating any of you. So what happens next . They get a warrant twice more when they know it is a bunch of gar bang abage and they lie to court, and i dont know what comey and mccabe knew, but i am dying to find out and should they have known. June 2017, and this is the next time they take the law into their own hands. Mr. Kline smith, six months after being told that the dossier is a bunch of garbage, kline smith alters an email from the he is to he is not to the court, because if they had told the court that page was working for the cia, it is going to explain the context of the dossier. Mr. Kline smith had a chance, and in his mind to make things right, and he took it. Why did he take the law into his own hands . Why did he doctor to email . 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 that you found out what he did. I am glad that you told the country what he did, because i am hoping that nobody will ever do it again. So, mr. Horowitz, 17 irregularities that you found, and some of them are earthshattering. 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. We are better than this. Like many of you, i have worked with the fbi a lot of my time in government. I have a Great Respect for it. Director wray, you have a problem. And for this hearing to mean anything, we have 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 that this never happens again to any politician in this country. It is trump today and 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 in a year or five years, and i dont know when. I hope he gets reelected, but we cant write this off as being just about one man or one event. We have to understand how the rails of the system guides. I will leave with some optimism here. I think that democrats and republicans are willing to make sure that this never happens again. That if you open up a Counter Intelligence investigation on a president ial campaign in the future, there needs to be more checks and balances. I want you to audit the fisa process. Mike lee and senator leahy are probably the standard bearers for civil liberties, and cruz and 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. They are worried about metadata, and while i may not agree with all of the concerns or the 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 does not take corrective action and do something about being manipulated and lied to, you will lose my support. I know a lot about what is going on out there to hurt us. And there are real threats, and there are real agents, and there are really bad actors out there. Id hate to lose the ability of the fisa court to operate at a time when we need it the most. But after your report, i have serious concerns about whether the fisa court can continue unless there is fundamental reform. After your report, i think that we need to rewrite the rules of how you start a Counter Intelligence 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 another. We have to address the underlying problem, the system in the hands of a few bad people can do a lot of damage. Thank you very much. The opening testimony, the Opening Statement this morning from senator lindsey graham, the chair of the Senate Judiciary committee, and they will continue their hearing with the Inspector General of the Justice DepartmentMichael Horowitz testifying on his report, the report dealing with the origins of the fbis inquiry into rus a russias interference of the 2016 election and the fisa system abuse. It should resume shortly