The Briefing Room
General Category => Trump Legal Investigations => Topic started by: mystery-ak on March 15, 2019, 01:03:42 pm
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The damning proof of innocence that FBI likely withheld in Russian probe
By John Solomon, opinion contributor — 03/14/19 04:00 PM EDT
If President Trump declassifies evidence in the Russia investigation, Carter Page’s summer bike ride to a Virginia farm and George Papadopoulos’s hasty academic jaunt to London may emerge as linchpin proof of FBI surveillance abuses during the 2016 election.
The two trips have received scant attention. But growing evidence suggests both Trump campaign advisers made exculpatory statements — at the very start of the FBI’s investigation — that undercut the Trump-Russia collusion theory peddled to agents by Democratic sources.
The FBI plowed ahead anyway with an unprecedented intrusion into a presidential campaign, while keeping evidence of the two men’s innocence from the courts.
Page and Papadopoulos, who barely knew each other, met separately in August and September 2016 with Stefan Halper, the American-born Cambridge University professor who, the FBI told Congress, worked as an undercover informer in the Russia case.
Papadopoulos was the young aide that the FBI used to justify opening a probe into the Trump campaign on July 31, 2016, after he allegedly told a foreign diplomat that he knew Russia possessed incriminating emails about Hillary Clinton.
more
https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/434054-the-damning-proof-of-innocence-that-fbi-likely-withheld-in-russian-probe
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...First, the FBI must present evidence to FISA judges that it has verified and that comes from intelligence sources deemed reliable. Second, it must disclose any information that calls into question the credibility of its sources. Finally, it must disclose any evidence suggesting the innocence of its investigative targets.
Thanks to prior releases of information, we know the FBI fell short on the first two counts. Multiple FBI officials have testified that the Christopher Steele dossier had not been verified when its allegations were submitted as primary evidence supporting the FISA warrant against Page.
Likewise, we know the FBI failed to tell the courts that Steele admitted to a federal official that he was desperate to defeat Trump in the 2016 election and was being paid by Clinton’s campaign and the Democratic National Committee (DNC) to gather dirt on the GOP candidate. Both pieces of information are the sort of credibility-defining details that should be disclosed about a source....
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My reporting suggests a much bigger scandal — the intentional misleading of the nation’s federal intelligence court — soon may eclipse the Russia narrative that has dominated the media the past two years.
Solomon is doing an amazing job of getting this out.
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:#@$%:
I continue to anxiously await the LONG parade of orange jumpsuits!
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Wait a second. Does the DoJ have to provide exculpatory evidence to get a warrant? FISA is not a trial court, so maybe DoJ just needs to cross the low bar of "Probable Cause?"
@edpc
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Wait a second. Does the DoJ have to provide exculpatory evidence to get a warrant? FISA is not a trial court, so maybe DoJ just needs to cross the low bar of "Probable Cause?"
@edpc
Yes, they have to inform the court of any potentially exculpatory evidence.
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Yes, they have to inform the court of any potentially exculpatory evidence.
Absolutely they are.
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Yes, they have to inform the court of any potentially exculpatory evidence.
Absolutely they are.
Thanks!
@Sanguine @Bigun
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Wait a second. Does the DoJ have to provide exculpatory evidence to get a warrant? FISA is not a trial court, so maybe DoJ just needs to cross the low bar of "Probable Cause?"
@edpc
It's called "Brady Material", and yes, they have to provide it. If withheld during discovery, it is a Felony.
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It's called "Brady Material", and yes, they have to provide it. If withheld during discovery, it is a Felony.
I heard a widely recognized legal expert say recently that at least 6 felonies had been committed in the FISA warrant process alone. Not sure if that was cumulative for all of them or not.
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I heard a widely recognized legal expert say recently that at least 6 felonies had been committed in the FISA warrant process alone. Not sure if that was cumulative for all of them or not.
Interesting.