It gets to john mccain, john mccain puts it in his safe, gives it to me and i read it. In the first thing i thought was, oh, my god. This could be russian disinformation or they could have this on trump. If you read this information in the first thing you would think it is they got something on donald trump. Its stunning, its end at salacious and its a bunch of. Senator lindsey graham, chairman of the Senate Judiciary committee talking about the steele dossier, the focus of this Inspector Generals report and this hearing in washington. Your risk withere with chris wa. I think there is a lot of damaging information about the fisa warrants on the way was carried out, and it isnt just come up with this name of a
relatively low level fbi what lawyer, i just want to read you one statement in the Opening Statement. If we are deeply concerned of that basic and fundamental errors were made by three separate handpicked Investigative Teams on one of the most sensitive fbi investigations and thats the point. That wasnt just a one off. He made mistakes when putting in the original application but they had to review the application several times. That goes to the argument that i heard Andy Mccarthy making. Can you prove beyond a reasonable doubt that there was a political bias there . No. But it sure does stink when you have three different teams and they are all pushing the same way and its all for investigating and Surveilling Carter page. On the other hand i think that in our zeal to talk about the fisa warrant, and its a serious deal, and i can understand the outrage about what was done and
the victimization of carter page, that doesnt mean the entire russia investigation was fraudulent. One of the points that pat lahey, the second ranking democrat on the committee made as he asked horowitz, how many times as carter page mentioned in the miller report . The answer, because horowitz didnt know, seven pages. So one of the points i think democrats will make is that can be true on the one hand that there was terrible misconduct or even potentially crimes in the pfizer application and the way in which carter page was treated by the federal government, but it doesnt mean that the entire russia investigation was there for illegitimacy. Obviously the Attorney General, and john durham have different thoughts about this. The Attorney General is very explicitly saying the whole thing has been turned on its head by two and a half years of what they called garbage. That certainly what he says although not as colorful or at great length, and you heard john durham, the u. S. Attorney who is conducting this investigation raising the same concern. Again i go back to when he was directly asked, did he say anything, i stood by my conclusions and he hasnt changed his position. Just to look at the political side of this, just sort of watching how all of this worked, you think about the things that President Trump said, and he was very outspoken last night at the rally as well. That sort of goes along the lines of, just because youre paranoid doesnt mean that everyone is not out to get you. We look at how this was handled and the fact that we said earlier, he was never consulted about the concerns of what was
going on in his campaign. You can sort of see, that sort of the process as it gets unveiled. Why he felt like the Intelligence Agencies or at least some of them were out to get them. He was looking at it through a political lens. And hes saying a lot of these people were threatened by me. The government agency, i just want you to know how much we appreciate your work and your teams work. Likewise, i think its important even though we are critical of the leadership of the fbi during the last administration, their
colleagues in the Intelligence Committee need to know that we are there. For them and support them in the faithful discharge of their responsibility. We i have the privilege of serving on the Judicial Committee and i would like to think there is no more ardent supporter. I believe that general hayden, when he wrote his book about the experience of the cia had it right, it was called playing to the edge. Playing to the edge of the authorities. Not over the line but up to the edge in interest of national security. But i think that also makes it important for us to root out illegality, deception and the exercise of the authorities that are given to our intelligence
committee. So let me ask you a little bit about that. Because i cant think of anything more damaging to the Intelligence Committee, the fbi and the doj then what you have uncovered in this 400 page report, and what weve seen here. It really is very troubling. Can i ask you, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court as you have pointed out considers the application of a foreign Intelligence Surveillance warrant by the fbi working with the national disk Security Division and department of justice. Do you believe that the court knew what you know now, that it would have everet ever issued ta warrant in the first place . We are careful not to predict what judges would do . I know that they would not sign a warrant if they were told not
all relevant information was included. Or, if they were lied to. Certainly if they were lied to. Do you know if the court is considering this matter . I know the court, if they have the report and they have a followon letter from the department about this matter. While i hope they will not let this pass because this misbehavior, this illegality and deception, it becomes a routine. I agree with senator senator grt it will be the end of the authorities that congress has granted under the foreign Intelligence Surveillance act which i think would be damaging to our national security. The foreign Intelligence Surveillance act includes the word surveillance, obviously. You cant surveillance and American Citizen for intelligence purposes except under very specialized and exacting circumstances. Would you agree with that . Thats correct. Because the rights are laid out in the bill of rights and there is a higher standard with regard to getting a warrant, lets say to wiretap or investigate an American Citizen then there would be a foreign agent. Is that correct . There are particularly sensitive circumstances around surveilling a u. S. Person. So that the there by which the Court Authorizes the surveillance of mr. Page was based on some proof for some indication or some suspicion he was an agent of a foreign power, correct . Correct. We had probable cause to believe he was an agent of a foreign power. But as you pointed out there
was disbelief in that process, correct . So whats the difference between surveillance and spying . Surveillance is whats in the law. The foreign Intelligence Surveillance act. You dont like my vernacular . I will stick to what we do as igs. Although its legally authorized, it is an act of Covert Intelligence gathering against if you are a foreign power or agent of a foreign power. Let me ask you about the Defensive Briefing. You have explained in response to senator grahams questions
come up the difference between a Counterintelligence Investigation and a Criminal Investigation. I believe at some point during the last few years i remember loretta lynch, the former Attorney General say, if that was the retaining Counterintelligence Investigations, would you agree with that . I dont have enough experience to tell you one way or the other. Ive heard that they said but i dont know specifically. But you dont have a reason to disagree. No reason to disagree. So the decision by the head of the Counterintelligence Division of the fbi not to provide an extensive Counterintelligence Briefing or Defensive Briefing to canada trumpet or his campaign would be unusual. If its usual and not doing it, i agree it would be unusual. What was even more unusual is the fact that the director of National Intelligence went to provide what turned out to be a
perfunctory briefing to the Term Campaign, lasted about 13 minutes, i think you indicated in your report. They had implanted into that group and agent, and fbi agent that was part of the Investigative Team for a cross fire hurricane, is that correct . Thats correct. There was one fbi agent there and they chose agent from the Counterintelligence Investigation. To arm them with information, so that they could prevent the russians and infiltrating their campaign, the briefing such as it was had a dual purpose. They actually prepared themselves going through mock briefings. Headed by peter strzok, lisa page, and possibly this
was not just an incidental sort of thing, obviously there were plans made for the agent to go in and as part of this Defensive Briefing and perhaps get general flynn to inadvertently offer information that might be helpful to the fbi in their investigation. And as explained to us it was dualpurpose. One thing that was said in response to the briefing, purposes immediately but also as the agents told us, for purposes of a future interview of mr. Flynn. So mr. Flynn was clearly the target. He was certainly of the three people there and from the Trump Campaign the only one of the three about home was the subject of an fbi investigation at the time. And he wasnt told that he was under investigation or that the agent was there, hoping to bait him into providing increments or information, and the agent can provide him any declaration or admonishment of his miranda rights, correct . He certainly wasnt told there was a dual purpose. While he pointed out, this will never happen again. Is that correct . Thats correct. So let me ask you. Are you familiar with the fact that Director Comey had a meeting with President Trump in January Of 2017 to talk to him about the steele dossier . I am and we actually referenced out in a report about his preparation and handling of the memos that came out of that meeting. Why should we believe that Director Comeys socalled Defensive Briefing, if you want to call it that, of the president in january 2017 was
anything more than an attempt to try to beat the president into providing Incremented Tory information which would be useful to the fbi and its Counterintelligence Investigation, or potentially some future Criminal Investigation . As mentioned earlier, one of the concerns with doing that here is it leaves open the possibility that people might ask, did it happen elsewhere . It strikes me as fraught with danger, just like it was for general flynn and the director to go in to the white house, the oval office and the white house not to tell the president that anything he said could be used against him in a potential investigation including criminal charges. The final thing i would say is, if this could happen to the president ial candidate, what kind of protection t to do the
average American Citizens have where the government wont array the vast power against them and essentially ruin their lives . To me that the profound concern as a result of your investigation. Thank you mr. Chairman. Picking up on that editorial comment, ive been joining Senator Lahey and senator lee for years talking about the fisa court. You now have an ample record here, and in 2002 the fisa court identified more than 75 cases in which it was misled by the fbi. Internal fbi in 2006 reveals dozens of inaccuracies and the list goes on and on. So lets have a fulsome conversation after this about the future of the pfizer cord and representations that are made to it. Let me try if we can, to go through a few points. The chairman gave an uncharacteristic, flowery,
heated opening that went on for some 40 minutes and produced a lengthy record of emails from lisa page and peter strzok which repeatedly demonstrated statements of hostilities toward candidate donald trump. He went on to say that these were the people in charge. When i read your summary of your findings we didnt find either of them to be in charge, did you . In this investigation we did not. When it comes to expletives, you also found some agents at the fbi who had exactly opposite political viewpoints, who were very positive toward Candidate Trump and very open in the use of expletives. Those individuals to be clear were in a different field office. I hope we can all concede the full point that i dont believe
anyone in this delicate capacity with life changing Decision Making single day should be so politically biased as to call into question their values and their character. Thats correct. I made that point last year when this came up. Individuals in the Justice Department are allowed to have political views and they are allowed to be voters and allowed to be engaged citizens, they should be. They cant tie the personal use to their investigative acts. And im sure thats one of the things you shared with director ray. Correct. The chairman made a point early on talking about the fact that the Term Campaign was not notified of this Ongoing Investigation until much later date after you have been initiated. I would say be careful what you wish for because there are those of us who look at the james comey october 28 public declaration about the Hillary Clinton investigation as being deadly in terms of the
outcome of this election. So the notion of the fbi publicizing investigations and making them known to many people can cut both ways. Its good to know im sure but you run the risk that as more people come to know it it becomes public knowledge, is that an issue . Who brought up last years report about the concern about what Director Comey did in that regard and you obviously want to control information and make sure that only the people who actually need to know it. The point im trying to get to is the chairmans opening suggested a bias at least in this instance of the fbi and others against donald trump that he believes was manifest in many of the things that followed. I could argue for my side of the table that we could find bias that includes Commie Statement right before the public election that really had in many of our points of view, a determinative outcome. Lets go back to rudolph giuliani. Because heres something. During the 2016 campaign, Rudy Giuliani was on the Trump Campaign surrogate brag about having access to the investigation for clintons emails. He teased in october 16 that a surprise was coming. And when Director Comey sent a letter reopening the investigation, Rudy Giuliani said, and i quote, i expected this. Did i hear about it . Youre darn right i heard about it. So how can we be dealing with that and some resolution as to whether or not he was also bluffing . As i remember, one of his rationales for his public announcement was, i couldnt do it for the new york office because it leaks like a sieve. Was there no investigation or has there been no investigation into this . As i mentioned last year when we released our report on the clinton investigation, we were looking at and we are looking at
still that question and the challenge of that investigation, proving who spoke to whom, and when, based on records at the fbi. And understanding that there is rarely going to be substantive information that we will get. For example from toll records or others, but we will find out contexts. Weve issued two reports so far about findings that we had about leaks and misconduct, and we have investigations that are ongoing. Mr. Giuliani no professes to be President Trumps lawyer. Are there any concerns about continuing to obtains sources not authorized to provide it . I want to talk about what weve learned and im not investigating matters related to the ongoing ukraine issues that i think youre referencing. Let me ask if i can on this question, and the problems within this case particularly as they relate to the treatment of individuals who are engaged in it. And im thinking particularly of ongoing questions about whether or not one particular individual is treated fairly here. Is it your conclusion that he was not mr. Page was not a russian agent or did not have important contacts that were not in the best interest of the United States with russian leadership . Im not in position to assess that. What i can assess is the effort
that fbi put forth to the fisa court, a significant number of pieces of evidence do not support their theory of the case and that was never told to the Justice Department lawyers who are the ones who are the gatekeepers and have to be able to make that decision. They are the experts, not me. Can we speak for a moment to the steele dossier . I believe we have a new a definitive statement about what impact that had on the initiation of this investigation. What was your conclusion . In terms of the initiation, it was not known to the team that open the investigation at the time they opened it. So you have concluded in several different ways that there is no evidence of political influence for the opening of this cross fire hurricane investigation. Is that correct . Thats correct. One thing thats interesting here, and senator lee is not with us at this moment, but hes introduced a bill which im cosponsoring which would give the Inspector Generals Office in this circumstance The Authority to investigate attorneys in the department. Right now thats not allowed under the law, is it . Thats correct, it is not. And thank you for cosponsoring the bill. Do you know what the theory is behind it being separate and not subject to the investigation . This is a legacy of history, when the ig was created of justice, the compromise was that an attorney would be carved out. And we would have jurisdiction over everybody else. After the aldrich ames spy scandal, gave us The Authority over fbi. Attorneys still we are the only ig that cant reveal
conduct of all the employees in our organization including attorneys. And Attorney General ashcroft was authorized to give that kind of option . Under the statute as it then existed he had The Authority to do that. Statutory change took that away. I think we will go to senator, but 30 seconds here. Has anybody been charged with working with the russians illegally, working with the russians that were part of the Trump Campaign that you know of . Not that i know of. Okay. Thank you very much mr. Chairman. I find the conclusion that your report, mr. Horowitz, somehow exonerates the fbi in this
matter. To be crazy, absolutely crazy. To the point where it almost makes me wonder whether those who are making this argument i have the same report that we are talking about today, perhaps they are talking about a different report. There is no planet on which i think this report indicates that things were okay within the fbi, in connection with this investigation. They most certainly were not. And yet stunningly, former fbi director jim comey took to the pages of the Washington Post to declare that this report your report, shows that the fbi fulfilled its mission protecting the American People. I dont understand that, i find it absolutely stunning that he would reach that conclusion. This is nonsense. They dont care where you fit on the political spectrum. If you are a politician or if you are a nonpolitician. If you are a liberal or conservative, liberal or democrat, regardless of your age, your views, you should be deeply concerned about what is in your report, mr. Horowitz. This report is a scathing indictment of the fbi. Of the agents that were involved. And i want to be clear about that because the fbi is an institution that has a long history of respect in this country. And as a federal prosecutor, we worked with the fbi. Many of its agents are people of the utmost integrity and thoroughness. And that is part of why im so concerned about your report and its findings. I think this really damages that and there is a lot of good in this country that comes not just from the fbi being good but also
being understood to be good. The behavior outlined in your report is at a minimum so negligent. I would actually say so reckless, that it calls into question the legitimacy of the entire pfizer program. And i dont say that lightly. I say this as someone who has long questioned the pfizer program and how it could be abused. But this really pushes us over the edge. And i will get back to that in a minute. The report concludes, way too generously in my view, that the report did not find documentary or intentional evidence on the part of misconduct on the part of the case agents who were
investigating the trump campai campaign. The report comes on to call the conduct of the agents on the supervisors involved to be serious Performance Failures which you noted were failures for which you did not receive. Serious Performance Failures. Failures without any type of jim comey astoundingly, astonishingly considers a fulfilled mission. A mission that includes among other things protecting the rights of the American People. That could be protecting the American People and upholding the constitution, i just cant understand it. And thats simply not good enough. It might be good enough for
mr. Call me but its not good enough for the American People. Many americans should be terrified by that report. The fbi team that investigated the Trump Campaign was as has been pointed out handpicked. After all, it couldnt, wouldnt and Wasnt The Case that they would just pick any ordinary investigators to investigate a president ial campaign. Especially the president ial campaign of one of the two major party nominees. Or, what was acknowledged in the report for one of the most sensitive fbi investigations. These agents were supposed to have been the best of the best and we wouldnt have expected anything less in that circumstance. They were supposed to be of the highest character and professionalism. Our privates are is not at odds with our security, our privacy is inextricably intertwined with and indeed an integral part of
our security. We certainly cant be secure in our republican form of government if after all our republican form of government is imperiled by people who criticize intelligence gatherings and Law Enforcement apparatus that our federal government has. So we are faced with two possibilities. Either one, these fbi agents purposely use the power to wage a political war against a president ial candidate that they despised, or, number two, these agents were so incompetent that they allowed a paid a foreign political operative to weaponized the pfizer program into a Spying Operation on a rival president ial political campaign. Im not sure about you but im not sure which one is worse. I am sure that neither conclusion is acceptable. They are both horrifying for slightly Different Reasons and im not sure there is a substantive distinction between the two of them. Im not sure if one can conclude not sure its possible to conclude that the biased evidence in communications between these investigators wasnt at least part of it. The fact that you say there wasnt a causal connection between them, between those communications and the opening of the investigation itself is beside the point. The fact is, these are agents who made their biased clear and they went after someone in part because they did not like his candidacy and, thats inexcusable. The report of the fbis abuse i believe its longstanding abuse, i believe its inevitable abuse of pfizer and of the fisa court to surveilled american
citizens should innocence not be of tremendous surprise to us. James madison warned us against this very kind of thing in federalist 51. He said if men were angels we wouldnt need We Wouldnt Need Rules about government. But we dont have access to angels to govern us and so we have to have auxiliary precautions. We have to have checks and balances come up to make sure that no one person or no one entity gets too much power and added to those checks and balances we also have sensitive Limitationsubstantive Limitatioe fourth amendment. Those things are there to protect us. I believe for some time as has been noted earlier in this hearing, and ive teamed up with people at the opposite end of the political and ideological spectrum that pfizer carries
with it an unexpectable, unacceptable risk of abuse. I believe these programs are subject to abuse. Ive been warning them for years that inevitably come these would result in abuse. Its not a question of if, but when, and how soon will Government Officials get caught doing it. It actually surprises me in some ways that it took us this long to find an instance where we would get caught. But then again, that is what happens. It you take a standard that is malleable, requires virtually no public accountability, you render all but a small handful of Intelligence Committee lawmakers in the house and the senate. You render all other citizens other than them and other than the Intel Community itself ineligible to review their work. Then, you make it possible for them to gather information and this kind of thing is of course
going to happen. Its never not going to happen and that scares me to death. Now Inspector General horowitz, you stated several times today both in your Opening Statement in response to questions that you did not find documentary and testimonial bias to conduct these operations. But, its certainly not soft vindictive of any bias. As to the opening, and on the
pfizer side, we found as you noted, in fact, on the one hand, Gross Incompetence and negligence. On the other hand intentionali intentionality, we werent in a position with the evidence that we had to make that conclusion. Thats on the actual evidence that we have. Thank you very much. Mr. Horowitz, you actually did make a finding on that very question, did you not . I direct you to page 14 of the
executive summary. Where you ascribe this to management and supervisory failures that were not specific to this case but that were potentially endemic. It is that not correct . Im sorry. They were made by three separate handpicked teams, significant develop mints regarding the chain of commands and supervision of the process. You then go on to describe it as failure of the managers and you go on to say that her remedy is an oid audit not only of this case they attribute the failure here to a failure of management and supervision that could well go beyond this particular case. That was attributable, can contribute elbow deep state conspiracy, we make no finding and we explain in there that we did not have Documentary Evidence that was intentional, and we also point out the lack of satisfactory explanations. From there, i cant draw any further conclusions. Other than you do what you go with. That was a failure of management and supervision over that complicated process that needs to be repaired. From top to bottom . Correct. Now whats the timeline on the Attorney General getting notice of that report . How long did it take between when he first saw this and when he credited this. Well, we first provided the
draft report for classification marketing purposes, right at the beginning of september. End of august or beginning of september. So he and his team have had it for more than a month. While over a month. So we did the normal process in a classified review and then we then incorporated the markings and then produced it back in november for the factual accuracy. The director of the fbi would have had access to it in that time frame. A complement did you on your professionalism and thoroughness and said he accepts the findings, correct . With plenty of time to review it. Then we get to mr. Durham. Did mr. Durham have access to this report during that same period of time . We did not give it to him at the end of august and september precisely because it was for classification purposes. He had no resources yet and we were very careful as to who could see it and who couldnt. We had the Department Keep lists
of who could see it and who couldnt see it and he was not on the list. We provided that to him in november as part of our factual accuracy. November win, do you remember . At have to check but it was probably roughly midnovember. Are you familiar with what he is undertaking at all . I am somewhat but i would pretend to be completely friendly with it. He notes that he does not agree with some of your reports and conclusions as to predication and how the fbi case was open. What information do you think he has access to that you did not have access to . I have no idea. When you look at the directors letter, he said that his organization the fbi provide a broad and timely access to all information requested by the oig including highly classified and sensitive material. And he accepts that the hurricane investigation was done for unauthorized purpose. Im trying to figure out where the world of evidence exists about predication that you didnt have access to and fbi director ray would not have access to. Where could john durham be going for information that is outside of the scope that you have access to or what fbi director ray has access to . I dont know and youd have to ask the Attorney General. I think we are not, we got a million records and we asked the fbi for all of the materials in their possession including from other agencies. I couldnt say if i knew. Is he going overseas to
debrief foreign agents . I would have to talk with h him. Predication involves a threshold, does it not . Correct. For opening an investigation. And when you have hit your predication threshold, more evidence as long as the evidence is adequate, more evidence doesnt take it away, correct . Correct. So im also trying to figure out how it is that, even if he had more evidence that you did not have come up that takes away from your conclusion that predication was adequate. I think youd have to ask him or the Attorney General. I cant so you describe serious Performance Failures in the pfizer process and those are likely to lead to either a
disciplinary action or to sanctions by the court. Or at least be considered by those things. And, thats a due process involved. We are not the adjudicators, that goes to the department and the court and any other entities. So we might find out more as those processes go forward in the context. Correct. Now, lets look at the Intelligence Briefing. At the time of the Intelligence Briefing, what did the fbi know about how far russian interests had penetrated into the Trump Campaign . I dont know as i sit here, the level and extent of the fbi knowledge. We were looking at the origins of the hurricane investigation in these four cases. But the fbi clearly knew that there was investigation going on. And, they knew the concerns
about carter page. They knew the investigation, they had the investigation going on in to Michael Flynn of the time. Do you know if they knew about the trump tower meeting two months before the intelligence meeting . I dont know one way or the other. And going into it, it would be reasonable, wouldnt it, to expect that the fbi did not then know how far russian penetration into the Trump Campaign went . I have no idea at what stage their investigation was at, and there was no way that they rule out people at the intelligence be briefing, or on behalf of the Trump Campaign which might have been involved in the russian operation. I have no knowledge of that but all i know as to that is they had opened the investigation on flynn. So theres no way to rule out when he was actually in that briefing, and a potential participant in the matter that they were looking into. As they said, it was bigger than the pieces they were looking at. So while we can agree that putting Cross Fire Hurricane Agent into the Intelligence Briefing of the Trump Campaign might have been overaggressive, for the fbi to be in that Intelligence Briefing would be perfectly appropriate, correct . In fact absolutely, they never they did not discuss either with anyone at the department, there was no reason it should have been at that briefing for
intelligence purposes. It also would have been perfectly appropriate for a Cross Fire Hurricane Agent to have debriefed the fbi agent, and it was information potentially relevant to the investigation, was it not . And that briefing and those briefings are for the purposes of Protecting Campaigns and allowing transitions to occur. And it was an unusual circumstance. A participant in that briefing on the part of the Trump Campaign was the subject of the fbi investigation. That is correct but it raises we should not draw the conclusion that there is no way the fbi should ever be given access to evidence that arises in the context of an Intelligence Briefing related to counterintelligence. Time has expired, thank you. The meeting of the primary sub source, wasnt there a justest official of that meeting . The hurricane people, and for parts of the interview, lawyers from the national security
division, they were there not knowing the background, necessarily. The primary sub source had a lawyer. So the fbi wanted a lawyer there in case there were lawyer issues. So we are beating up on the fbi and i think appropriately so at some points but the department of justice were in the room, too. They were in the room, and theres a number of instances where people get drivebys. And, the fbis mr. Baker told the ig and is quoted in the report as saying, the agent and not investigative briefing was not there to induce anybody to say anything. He was not there to do an undercover of operation or elicit some type of statement or testimony. Thank you. Senator cruz. Thank you mr. Chairman. I want to start by taking the opportunity for an thank you and the members of your team, the work you have done in the Inspector Generals Office is incredibly important. Reading this report, this is a 435 page report that lays out what i would consider to be a stunning indictment of the fbi and the department of justice. Of a pattern of abuse of power. And i will say, both the department of justice and the fbi for decades have had a great many honorable principled professionals with the fidelity for the rule of law. And this indictment, and that
expects me to be nonpartisan and faithful to the law and it should make them angry as well. The press has focused on your specific conclusion that you did not find evidence of political bias. Thats a judgment you have and i disagree with that judgment. But i think that judgment is in many ways the least significant component of this report. I think the facts that, then people could draw the influence as to why that pattern of abuse occurs. Do you agree with what he just said . I think the purpose of this report is to lay out the facts for the public and everybody can debate and decide what they think of this information. I absolutely agree. So this 434 page report
outlines 17 major errors and misstatements. That were made by the fbi or doj in securing the fisa warrants. A number of them are deeply, deeply troubling. These are not typos, these are not small inadvertent errors, these are grotesque abuses of power. The primary sub source, the primary sub source that indeed the first error that you note in the second, third and fourth application for the fisa warrant is the primary sub source reporting that raises serious questions about the accuracy of the steele dossier which we now know was a bunch of malarkey, to use a term thats been in the news lately. And, that the fisa court was not informed of that. Now lets get specific. The basis of the steel report
was once referred to in your report as the primary sub source. That was a principal basis. And at the fbi interviewed that primary sub source not once, not twice, but three times in january, march, in may 2017. So thats a basis of the dossier. What did the primary sub source say . The interview with the primary sub source raised significant questions about the reliability of the reporting period does not say that portions of it, particularly of the more salacious and portions were based on rumor and speculation. It says that some of the basis of that came from conversations from friends over beers and statements that were made in jest. And the primary sub source also
says to take the other sub sources with a grain of salt. The fbi had that information, and they knew that the basis of this dossier was saying it is unreliable. What do the fbi and doj do . And renewal application number two and number three, the fda advised the court the fbi found the sub source to be cooperative with zero revisions and you note that as the most significant misstatement. And that is going in front of the court of law, relying on facts that you know are unreliable without any basis. That was the number one. At the two major error in the applications was omitting carter pages prior relationships. And thats a pretty darn important fact. I dont know this guy carter page but the fact that hes talking to russians is really suspicious. The fact that he is serving as a source for u. S. Intelligence agents is pretty darn relevant, and you dont tell the court that, you are deceiving the court. But its worse than just deceiving the court. Because as the oig report details, and Assistant General Counsel and the fbi, altered on email. Fabricated evidence. And reading from the oig report, specifically the words, and not a source have been inserted into the email. At that email was then sent on to the officials responsible for making the decision to go forward and as a report said, let me read on page 256 of the report. Consistent with the Inspector General act, the attorney had altered the email that he had sent to the supervising agent who thereafter relied on it to swear out the final application. A lawyer at the fbi creates fraudulent evidence, alters an email, and that is in term used as a basis for this one statement of the court that the court relies on. You have worked on Law Enforcement a long time. As the pattern of a department of justice Employee Altering evidence and submitting fraudulent evidence that ultimately get to the court . I have not seen an alteration of an email and thats impacting a Court Document like this. In any ordinary circumstance, a private citizen did this. What he inserted was not slightly wrong, it was 180 degrees opposite of what they said. The Intelligence Agency said this guy is a source and he inserted that this guy is not a source. If a private citizen fabricated evidence and reversed what it said, in your experience, without private citizen be prosecuted for fabricating evidence, obstruction of justice, perjury . They certainly would be
considered for that if there was an intentional effort to deceive the court. On this one, i am going to defer. As we noted here in the sentence you indicated, we are reverted to the Attorney General and the fbi director for handling. Major omission that the department of justice and the fbi did not tell the court, this entire operation was funded by the dnc, funded by the Hillary Clinton campaign ad by democrats. It was an Oppo Research done. At some level, this is the most effective Oppo Research dump in history because the department of justice and fbi were perfectly happy to be hatchet men. For this Oppo Research dump. Throughout every one of the filings, doj and the fbi didnt inform the fisa court that this was being paid for by the dnc and Hillary Clinton campaign, is that right . It is not in any of the fisa
applications. Its not like doj didnt know. One of the Senior Department of justice officials, bruce ohr, his wife worked at fusion gps, the Oppo Research company being paid by the dnc. And he became the principal liaison with Christopher Steele without telling anyone at the department of justice that he was essentially working on behalf of the clinton campaign. Who at the department of justice and by the way, several democrats, its interesting seeing Democratic Senators wanting to defend this abuse of power. Several senators. Senator feinstein said the fbi didnt placed spies in the Trump Campaign. Senator leahy said something similar. It may be true, not spies in the Trump Campaign but reading for your report and page 4 of the executive summary, your report says thereafter the cross fire
hurricane team use the intrusive techniques including confidential Human Sources to interact and consensually record multiple conversations with paige and papadopoulos before and after they were working with the Trump Campaign as well as on one occasion with a highlevel Trump Campaign official who was not the subject of the investigation. They didnt place spies in the campaign but they sent spies to record senior members of the campaign in the middle of a president ial campaign when that candidate was the nominee for the other major party that was the opposing party to the one in power. Is that right . They sent confidential Human Sources into do those. Did anyone at doj, who at doj knew about it . Did the Attorney General know . Did the white house no . Based on what we found, nobody had been told in advance. The only evidence that somebody
new worthy Lion Attorneys in the national Security Division when they were told selective portions of what had occurred. Nobody knew beforehand. Nobody had been briefed. Frankly, that was one of the most concerning things. Nobody needed to be told. I can tell you from my time at the department of justice and from my time in Law Enforcement, any responsible leader when hearing that youre talking about sending in spies and sending it a wiretap on any president ial nominee should say what in the hill are we doing . The people up the chain who are saying we didnt know, if you had responsible leadership, there is no more important decision to make. When i was at doj if someone had said lets tap bill clinton or john kerry, the people would have said what in the hell are we talking about . This wasnt jason bourne. This was beavis and butthead. I want to tone things down a