James Comey

[soonernvolved]

www.breitbart.com/clips/2020/05/08/schiff-trump-barr-cant-gaslight-history-flynn-was-a-prime-counterterrorism-risk/

Schiff: Trump, Barr ‘Can’t Gaslight History’ — Flynn Was a ‘Prime Counterterrorism Risk

Friday on MSNBC’s “The Beat,” House Intelligence Committee chairman Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) said Attorney General Bill Barr’s Justice Department doing President Donald Trump’s “dirty work” by dropping the case against former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn was an attempt to “gaslight history.”

Melber said, “What is your response first to the legal development of the Justice Department taking this unusual step, trying to cancel a guilty plea that already existed?”




Schiff said, “Well, the usual response to so many events within the Trump administration, shock, being aghast, and yet not at all surprised because this is the history of this president and this attorney general who views his job as essentially carrying out the dirty work for the president. Let’s remember what was at stake here. The president of the United States, then Barack Obama, imposes sanctions on Russia for interfering in a U.S. election. One of the chief surrogates of Donald Trump, who the Russians have just helped get elected, has secret conversations with the Russians designed to undermine those sanctions. And then he lies about it. Lies about it to the vice president. The vice president goes out and misleads the country about it, and the FBI becomes concerned that Flynn is compromised because, of course, the Russians know that he’s lied. And those lies have now been amplified by the vice president’s statements. That is a prime counterterrorism risk and the subject of a more than valid counterintelligence investigation.”

He continued, “What Bill Barr said in dismissing this case is no, we shouldn’t look into those things. And what’s more, if you lie to the FBI about those things, it’s perfectly fine. But what he’s really saying is if you are a friend of the president, then justice doesn’t matter anymore in this country. In that respect, I think we have rolled the clock back half a century to the days of Watergate, and we have really invalidated so many of the reforms we have put in place to protect the independence of the Justice Department.”

Melber said, “If this rolls back one of the convictions, one of the legal victories of the Mueller probe, and the president gets away with this and continues, and Bill Barr says out in the open, well, might makes right. The victors write history, not something we are supposed to hear from a nonpartisan Justice Department. What do you say to people who are concerned that the president is basically getting away with it all?”

Schiff said, “First of all, I would say to Bill Barr, you can’t gaslight history. I don’t think the fact that you tried to create this false narrative is ultimately going to succeed. Over much of the obstruction of the administration, we have uncovered a great deal of the president’s misconduct vis-a-vis Russia and Ukraine, and we will uncover the misconduct going forward. So I don’t think he is right about that, as brash as it is and ugly to hear from an attorney general. In terms of the president and his threats of vengeance and whatnot, none of that, Ari, as you know, is new. And we’re going to have to defend the institutions of this democracy until this threat no longer persists. There is reason why this case is being dismissed under the cloak of a pandemic under the cloak of night, and it’s because they don’t want these things to really see the light of day. Even during a pandemic.”

[soonernvolved]

www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/05/08/report-obama-warns-rule-of-law-is-at-risk-after-flynn-charges-dropped/

Leaked Call: Obama Warns ‘Rule of Law Is at Risk’ After Flynn Charges Dropped

Former President Barack Obama on Friday stated the “rule of law is at risk” in response to the Department of Justice dropping its criminal charges against retired Army Lieutenant General Michael Flynn, according to an audio call obtained by Yahoo News.

“The news over the last 24 hours I think has been somewhat downplayed — about the Justice Department dropping charges against Michael Flynn,” Obama said during a virtual discussion with members of the Obama Alumni Association. “The fact that there is no precedent that anybody can find for someone who has been charged with perjury just getting off scot-free. That’s the kind of stuff where you begin to get worried that basic — not just institutional norms — but our basic understanding of rule of law is at risk. And when you start moving in those directions, it can accelerate pretty quickly as we’ve seen in other places.”

During his remarks on Flynn, Obama erroneously said the former White House national security advisor pleaded guilty to perjury. Rather, he was charged for lying to the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) about his contacts with then-Russian Ambassador Sergei Kislyak during President Trump’s transition period. Flynn pleaded guilty in 2017 as part of then-special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into now-debunked collusion between the Kremlin and the Trump campaign. In January, the Justice Department changed its sentencing recommendation for Flynn from probation to six months in jail, prompting the former Trump official to withdraw his guilty plea, citing prosecutors breaking their plea agreement.

Obama criticized the Trump administration’s handling of the Chinese coronavirus pandemic, referring to it as an “absolute chaotic disaster.”

Obama also discussed the importance of the presidential election in November, vowing to campaign vigorously for the presumptive Democrat nominee Joe Biden, who served as his vice president.

“This election that’s coming up on every level is so important because what we’re going to be battling is not just a particular individual or a political party,” the former president said. “What we’re fighting against is these long-term trends in which being selfish, being tribal, being divided, and seeing others as an enemy — that has become a stronger impulse in American life.”

“That’s why, I, by the way, am going to be spending as much time as necessary and campaigning as hard as I can for Joe Biden,” he added.

Obama’s comments regarding Flynn come after newly released documents show the former president was aware of the details of Flynn’s intercepted December 2016 telephone calls with Kislyak.

Breitbart News reported:

The documents from the government’s motion to dismiss their case against Flynn show, however, that at a January 5, 2017, Oval Office meeting with then-Vice President Joe Biden, then-CIA Director John Brennan, then-Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, then-FBI Director James Comey, then-Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates, Obama had asked Comey and Yates to “stay behind.”

Obama told them he had “learned of the information about Flynn” and his conversation with Kislyak, where they discussed sanctions his administration had levied against Russia. (A memo penned by then-National Security Adviser Susan Rice also showed that Biden stayed behind as well.)

Obama “specified he did not want any additional information on the matter, but was seeking information on whether the White House should be treating Flynn any differently, given the information.”

The Justice Department’s Thursday decision to drop its case against Flynn comes after handwritten notes written by FBI officials questioned whether the “goal” was “to get [the Trump official] to lie, so we can prosecute him or get him fired.”



Ahead of the filing’s release, prosecutor Brandon Van Grack moved to withdraw from the case.

In an interview with CBS News, Attorney General William Barr defended the decision, saying he was “doing the law’s bidding’

“A crime cannot be established here. They did not have a basis for a counterintelligence investigation against Flynn at that stage,” Barr said in reference to the FBI.

“People sometimes plead to things that turn out not to be crimes,” he added.

President Trump praised the DOJ’s decision, calling Flynn an “innocent man,” and a “great gentleman.”

“He was targeted by the Obama administration and he was targeted in order to try and take down a president,” the president said. “I hope a lot of people are going to pay a big price, because they’re dishonest, crooked people. They’re scum, and I say it a lot, they’re scum, they’re human scum. This should never have happened in this country.”

[soonernvolved]

www.breitbart.com/radio/2020/05/08/tom-fitton-michael-flynn-got-justice-because-he-had-lawyers-willing-to-push-back-against-doj-fbi/

Tom Fitton: Michael Flynn Got Justice Because He had Lawyers Willing to Push Back Against DOJ, FBI

President of Judicial Watch Tom Fitton told Breitbart News that General Michael Flynn only got justice because he had lawyers who “insisted upon it” and pushed back “against the entire political class” in Washington, D.C. Fitton spoke to SiriusXM’s Breitbart News Daily host Alex Marlow on Friday.

“This FBI, this Justice Department, they would’ve sent Flynn to jail,” said Fitton. “Flynn only got justice because he had a lawyer who insisted upon it.”




“It was only because they had one, two lawyers push back against them, against the entire political class here in town, including the current Justice Department and FBI,” he added.

Listen below:



Last month, Covington & Burling — General Flynn’s previous law firm — ended up handing over files to Flynn’s new legal team after “inadvertently” missing them earlier, according to a report by Law.com.

Flynn is now represented by Sidney Powell, who fought against prosecutors and the media — and appears to have won.

“The political left is more than willing to violate the civil liberties of their political enemies — as Flynn demonstrates, as the targeting of Trump by Mueller demonstrates, as the coup demonstrates — the constitution, our civil rights, they don’t matter,” Fitton affirmed.

“They would put us in jail because they don’t like our politics,” he added. “They don’t like our ideology. We’re getting in the way of whatever power plays they want.”

Fitton noted that the documents show the FBI “didn’t go after Flynn because they were interested in justice.”

“They were interested in getting him fired,” he said. “And sure enough, they had every indication to believe that he didn’t lie.”



“Even Comey said, ‘Well you could make an argument he lied,'” added Fitton of the disgraced former FBI director James Comey.


“The idea that anyone would go to jail because someone says you can make the argument you lied — that’s no way to run a railroad if you’re the director of the FBI,” said Fitton, adding that Comey “is the most corrupt FBI director in the modern era.”

The Judicial Watch president went on to explain why the left’s argument that General Flynn “pled guilty” is invalid.

“The left’s big argument is, ‘Well, Flynn pled guilty,'” said Fitton. “It’s one thing for a hack to say that, but to hear a lawyer say that — it’s disturbing, it shows you that they’re willing to distort the law to destroy their enemies.”

Fitton elaborated:

You can only confess to something under law if it’s voluntary and knowing. And it’s clear that General Flynn did not know that he was set up like he was. He did not know when he made his plea that the Justice Department and FBI — the FBI concluded that he hadn’t lied, and obviously it was coerced because they were going after his son.

So that’s not a legitimate plea, he didn’t plea guilty under the law, because it was A. involuntary, and B. it was not knowing — meaning he didn’t know all the information that we now know about why he was targeted.

Fitton also noted that General Flynn himself has said that he wouldn’t have pled guilty if he had known all the details.

“People should go back and read General Flynn’s declaration he filed that became public just recently, [in which] he said, ‘I would’t have done this if I had known this,'” he said.

“And legally that’s significant, it was a coerced, involuntary plea that was done in ignorance, and under the law, it’s no plea at all,” added the Judicial Watch president.

Fitton also mentioned that former president Barack Obama should be, at the very least, questioned about the matter.



Someone should ask him a question about it. I mean, the media has completely protected this man, and he orchestrated, and was behind, and is ultimately responsible for the worst corruption scandal in American history. He makes Richard Nixon look like a piker.

He not only authorized — and obviously approved — unprecedented spying on the candidate that was seeking to succeed him from the opposite Party. But then after the president was elected, he rushed out and targeted this president with this all hands on deck effort to smear him on this Russia collusion crap, and then continued — in my view — in a seditious way to try to undermine and destroy his presidency on his way out the door.

Fitton went on to remind listeners that the left using the Logan Act to attack incoming Republican presidents and their transition teams is nothing new.

“The idea that the Logan Act applies to the transition team of an incoming presidency is absurd, but of course, its typical of the left” he said. “We always think these things are new, but they’ve been doing this for years.”

Every time a Republican replaces a Democrat, they accuse them of stealing the election or cheating with foreigners. That’s what they said about Reagan with the Iranians. They then kept on pushing it when George W. Bush was running — they’ve been doing it repeatedly in the modern era. Johnson went after Nixon about the same issue.

“It’s typical of the left,” he added. “The left can’t stand to lose — the Constitution is a means to an end, and as soon as it gets in the way, they don’t care.”

“So elections, the Constitution, your civil liberties, they pretend to believe in them, but it’s all about power,” said Fitton. “And they’ll throw them out the door — and we’ve seen it with Trump and Flynn — in a heartbeat.”

[soonernvolved]

thefederalist.com/2020/05/08/the-corruption-behind-the-michael-flynn-case/

The Corruption Behind The Michael Flynn Case
MAY 8, 2020 By The Federalist Staff
SUBSCRIBE TO THE FEDERALIST RADIO HOUR HERE.

Federalist Senior Contributor Margot Cleveland joins Ben Domenech on another edition of The Federalist Radio Hour to discuss the corruption that led to the case against Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn.


Cleveland’s work has been instrumental in highlighting the wrongdoings of the Obama Administration’s mistreatment and mishandling of the case against Flynn.

In her latest article, Cleveland explains the importance of the FBI’s memo exonerating Flynn.

“The unsealing of the FBI’s closing memo on the Flynn investigation made two things clear: The FBI had no proper predication for investigating Flynn, and the confidential human source should be investigated for making false statements to the FBI,” Cleveland wrote.

Cleveland and Domenech break down the timeline and corruption behind the Flynn case.

[soonernvolved]

May 8, 2020 9:26:47 GMT -6 Dotard is toast said:

Wanna know what’s really sad? 75,000 Americans are dead. 1.5 million are infected. We have depression-level unemployment and cripplin’ debt, but the Right thinks America’s been saved because Trump’s toadie Attorney General dismissed charges against a traitor.

Let's take this one step by step shall we?

Wanna know what’s really sad? 75,000 Americans are dead. 1.5 million are infected.

Want to know something more sad than this? The CDC estimates that influenza has resulted in between 9 million – 45 million illnesses, between 140,000 – 810,000 hospitalizations and between 12,000 – 61,000 deaths annually since 2010. Yet, one never hears any outcries over this now do they? Wonder why? (Could it be that COVID mirrors the flu in terms of mortality rate, etc and that kills the media driven narrative?).

Also, let's overlook that the numbers are being spiked by having unaffiliated deaths and liberal governor incompetence spiking the numbers. Carefully read the following and see where the fault lies:

www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/coronavirus-spreads-new-york-nursing-home-forced-take-recovering-patients-n1191811

Coronavirus spreads in a New York nursing home forced to take recovering patients

“It’s reckless and careless,” said the granddaughter of a 96-year-old man whose family withdrew him from a Long Island nursing home.

The coronavirus patients began arriving the last week of March, transferred to the Gurwin Jewish Nursing and Rehabilitation Center under a New York state mandate requiring nursing homes to accept those recovering from COVID-19, even if they still might be contagious.

www.kpbs.org/news/2020/may/06/state-will-pay-assisted-living-coronavirus/

State Ready To Pay Assisted Living Facilities To Take Coronavirus Patients

The Newsom Administration has approved a plan to pay assisted living communities to take in COVID-19 patients — a move that doctors, nurses and other advocates for elderly people say is unnecessary and dangerous.



The California Department of Social Services is offering to pay assisted living facilities with six or fewer residents $1,000 a day from the time the first coronavirus patient is placed, according to a May 1 notice issued by the agency. Rates for communities with more than six beds will be set on a case-by-case basis.

So, where's the moral outrage, etc from placing sick/infected people in the same facilities that house those who are most vulnerable to this disease. (i.e. elderly/chronically ill)?

We have depression-level unemployment and cripplin’ debt,

Hmmm, let's see here. The Democrats want to pass mail in voting, money to illegals, etc but not come back to work in DC? So, who exactly is holding up the ability for government to function and give assistance to those who desperately need it, (small buisnesses, out of work Americans, etc) and are wanting to change America and take advantage of this pandemic to further their goals. 

Also, let's overlook the slight fact that the President & the red states are the ones that are opening back up, putting people back to work and getting the economy going again, however, the blue states and their liberal governors are extending the down time another month to month and a half.  So, who is trying to correct the situation and who is trying to make it worse again? (Let's also overlook the fact that several of these blue state leaders are currently facing lawsuits about their unconstitutional overreach during this time).

but the Right thinks America’s been saved because Trump’s toadie Attorney General dismissed charges against a traitor.

Wrong again. We are happy that an innocent man was proven as such and that the process to get him to his plea was illegal and unconstituitional. Factor in also that the whole Mueller/Russia thing has blown up big time on the left and shown to be nothing but a fake dossier based on Russian disinformation and was bought by Hillary Clinton and the DNC. 

Again, Clapper, etc have stated there was no proof of Trump or anyone in his circle working with Russia. Rosenstein, (another swamp creature that dislikes the President), said no votes were altered due to Russia's weak interference. All that happened was the MSM, Democrats, etc fed their followers a massive lie about Russia and it has blown up in their faces and now they are not happy about it.

However, your side does have a great honor bestowed upon it. Your hyprocrisy over the Biden rape allegations have effectively rendered the MeToo movement, etc as deceased. Kudos.

[soonernvolved]

Her testimony was released and it proved she was right and the "journalist" was wrong.

[soonernvolved]

Disgraced former President Barack Obama appears to be in a panic. General Flynn is now in the clear and the Durham investigation is ongoing. More documents are about to drop.
Advertisement - story continues below


There are rumblings that former members of his FBI (e.g. FBI General Counsel James Baker) have flipped and are working with Durham.
Obama’s Deep State henchmen who set up General Flynn and the crooked politicians and media hacks who supported them are terrified.
An audio of former President Barack Obama, whose Administration spied on the Trump team and Administration, was released by deep state reporter Michael Isikoff at Yahoo News on Friday night.

In the “call” which appears totally set up, Obama is concerned about the rule of law.

Here is the transcript:

“The news over the last 24 hours I think has been somewhat downplayed — about the Justice Department dropping charges against Michael Flynn,” Obama said during a virtual discussion with members of the Obama Alumni Association. “The fact that there is no precedent that anybody can find for someone who has been charged with perjury just getting off scot-free. That’s the kind of stuff where you begin to get worried that basic — not just institutional norms — but our basic understanding of rule of law is at risk. And when you start moving in those directions, it can accelerate pretty quickly as we’ve seen in other places.”



Obama is completely panicked.
He knows he was caught.
Obama hopes these “leaked” comments will help him save face.

President Trump was on FOX and Friends on Friday morning and he shared the following (at the 5:40 mark) regarding the crooked actions taken by the Obama Administration:

It’s a very, very sad thing for our country. That’s why Schiff, Shifty Schiff, that’s why he didn’t want to release any of those documents. And there’s more to come, from what I understand and they’re going to be far greater than what you’ve seen so far. And what you’ve seen so far is incredible, especially as it relates to President Obama. Because if anyone thinks that he and sleepy Joe Biden didn’t know what was going on they have another thing coming.



President Trump also tweeted out a message to the Deep State and members of the crooked Obama Administration:

[soonernvolved]

thefederalist.com/2020/05/09/barack-obama-forgets-that-bill-clinton-got-away-with-perjury/

Barack Obama Forgets That Bill Clinton Got Away With Perjury
Barack Obama says there is no precedent for anyone getting away with perjury. He forgot about his buddy Bill Clinton.
MAY 9, 2020 By David Marcus

As we get closer and closer to November’s election, a ghost of presidential past is beginning to haunt the political discourse. Barack Obama is back. Beginning last month on Twitter, he started attacking president Trump directly. Now audio of a phone conversation has been “leaked” in which Obama has more to say about what he views as Trump’s failures. In the remarks, one thing stood out: his remarkable take on the exoneration of Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn.

Here’s what the 44th president had to say on the matter:

The news over the last 24 hours I think has been somewhat downplayed — about the Justice Department dropping charges against Michael Flynn, and the fact that there is no precedent that anybody can find for someone who has been charged with perjury just getting off scot-free. That’s the kind of stuff where you begin to get worried that basic — not just institutional norms — but our basic understanding of rule of law is at risk.


Let’s focus in on this idea that nobody has ever gotten off scot-free after being charged with perjury. The year was 1999, “Armageddon” was the highest grossing film in America, the New York Yankees were World Series champions, and President William Jefferson Clinton was impeached for committing — wait for it — perjury.

Let’s back up for second because, in fact, Flynn was never actually accused of perjury. He was not under oath when he was questioned by the FBI and, according to the Justice Department, told no material lies. Clinton, on the other hand, blatantly lied under oath to a grand jury about the exact allegation of sexual misconduct he was facing.

Not only did Clinton face no criminal charges for his blatant act of perjury, he wasn’t even convicted by the Senate. One might even say he “got off scot-free.” Of course, it’s fairly unlikely that Obama actually forgot that Clinton lied under oath; rather he is applying the requisite double standard for actions committed by Republicans and Democrats.

We are all familiar with this by now. If a claim of sexual assault is made against Brett Kavanaugh, he is unfit for the Supreme Court. If a claim of sexual assault is made against Joe Biden, then #BelieveBiden. Likewise, Clinton didn’t really commit perjury, he just told a little white lie about a consensual sex act with an intern, but Flynn should be rotting in jail.

Barack Obama is making it crystal clear that he does not intend to abide by the tradition of former presidents staying above the political fray. That’s fine, but let’s hope the next time he decides to pontificate, he does so in a way that is accurate and that makes the slightest bit of sense.

[soonernvolved]

May 9, 2020 7:47:36 GMT -6 soonernvolved said:

May 8, 2020 9:26:47 GMT -6 Dotard is toast said:

Wanna know what’s really sad? 75,000 Americans are dead. 1.5 million are infected. We have depression-level unemployment and cripplin’ debt, but the Right thinks America’s been saved because Trump’s toadie Attorney General dismissed charges against a traitor.

Let's take this one step by step shall we?

Wanna know what’s really sad? 75,000 Americans are dead. 1.5 million are infected.

Want to know something more sad than this? The CDC estimates that influenza has resulted in between 9 million – 45 million illnesses, between 140,000 – 810,000 hospitalizations and between 12,000 – 61,000 deaths annually since 2010. Yet, one never hears any outcries over this now do they? Wonder why? (Could it be that COVID mirrors the flu in terms of mortality rate, etc and that kills the media driven narrative?).

Also, let's overlook that the numbers are being spiked by having unaffiliated deaths and liberal governor incompetence spiking the numbers. Carefully read the following and see where the fault lies:

www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/coronavirus-spreads-new-york-nursing-home-forced-take-recovering-patients-n1191811

Coronavirus spreads in a New York nursing home forced to take recovering patients

“It’s reckless and careless,” said the granddaughter of a 96-year-old man whose family withdrew him from a Long Island nursing home.

The coronavirus patients began arriving the last week of March, transferred to the Gurwin Jewish Nursing and Rehabilitation Center under a New York state mandate requiring nursing homes to accept those recovering from COVID-19, even if they still might be contagious.

www.kpbs.org/news/2020/may/06/state-will-pay-assisted-living-coronavirus/

State Ready To Pay Assisted Living Facilities To Take Coronavirus Patients

The Newsom Administration has approved a plan to pay assisted living communities to take in COVID-19 patients — a move that doctors, nurses and other advocates for elderly people say is unnecessary and dangerous.



The California Department of Social Services is offering to pay assisted living facilities with six or fewer residents $1,000 a day from the time the first coronavirus patient is placed, according to a May 1 notice issued by the agency. Rates for communities with more than six beds will be set on a case-by-case basis.

So, where's the moral outrage, etc from placing sick/infected people in the same facilities that house those who are most vulnerable to this disease. (i.e. elderly/chronically ill)?

We have depression-level unemployment and cripplin’ debt,

Hmmm, let's see here. The Democrats want to pass mail in voting, money to illegals, etc but not come back to work in DC? So, who exactly is holding up the ability for government to function and give assistance to those who desperately need it, (small buisnesses, out of work Americans, etc) and are wanting to change America and take advantage of this pandemic to further their goals. 

Also, let's overlook the slight fact that the President & the red states are the ones that are opening back up, putting people back to work and getting the economy going again, however, the blue states and their liberal governors are extending the down time another month to month and a half.  So, who is trying to correct the situation and who is trying to make it worse again? (Let's also overlook the fact that several of these blue state leaders are currently facing lawsuits about their unconstitutional overreach during this time).

but the Right thinks America’s been saved because Trump’s toadie Attorney General dismissed charges against a traitor.

Wrong again. We are happy that an innocent man was proven as such and that the process to get him to his plea was illegal and unconstituitional. Factor in also that the whole Mueller/Russia thing has blown up big time on the left and shown to be nothing but a fake dossier based on Russian disinformation and was bought by Hillary Clinton and the DNC. 

Again, Clapper, etc have stated there was no proof of Trump or anyone in his circle working with Russia. Rosenstein, (another swamp creature that dislikes the President), said no votes were altered due to Russia's weak interference. All that happened was the MSM, Democrats, etc fed their followers a massive lie about Russia and it has blown up in their faces and now they are not happy about it.

However, your side does have a great honor bestowed upon it. Your hyprocrisy over the Biden rape allegations have effectively rendered the MeToo movement, etc as deceased. Kudos.

Adding to this post:


www.dailywire.com/news/reported-number-of-covid-19-deaths-prompt-debate-over-accuracy

Reported Number Of COVID-19 Deaths Prompt Debate Over Accuracy

As of Saturday morning, there have been 1,286, 833 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the U.S. according to the Johns Hopkins Center for Systems Science and Engineering. The widely cited source also says 77,280 Americans have died from the coronavirus that first emerged in Wuhan, China.





Or did they?



New questions emerged this week about the accuracy of the numbers reported daily by the media, with some claiming they’re undercounted and others, including U.S. government officials, saying they’re being inflated to make the pandemic appear worse, KOMO-TV in Washington state reported.



The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has issued guidance to public health officials to aid them in determining COVID-19 deaths, the station reported.



“If COVID–19 played a role in the death, this condition should be specified on the death certificate,” the CDC said. “In many cases, it is likely that it will be the [underlying cause of death], as it can lead to various life-threatening conditions, such as pneumonia and acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS). In these cases, COVID-19 should be reported on the lowest line … with the other conditions to which it gave rise listed on the lines above it.”





In an update on the guidance, the CDC said “The underlying cause depends upon what and where conditions are reported on the death certificate. However, the rules for coding and selection of the underlying cause of death are expected to result in COVID19 being the underlying cause more often than not.”



When reporting the number of COVID-19 certified deaths, they may seem undercounted because the information usually lags a week or two, according to the CDC, KOMO reported.



Deputy St. Joseph County health officer Dr. Mark Fox expressed confidence that COVID-19 death numbers were accurate, while acknowledging that the reporting process can be tricky, WNDU-TV in Indiana reported on Monday.



Fox told the station that if a patient dies from a heart attack but has tested positive for COVID-19, it’s up to that patient’s physician to decide if it is coronavirus-related.



The numbers have prompted questions. During the 2017-18 winter, pneumonia- and flu-related deaths hit 10%. But in the week ending April 11, COVID-19 deaths hit a record 23.5%, the station reported.



There’s incentive for hospitals to classify some deaths as COVID-19 related. Sen. Scott Jensen (R-MN) said last month on “The Ingraham Angle” that hospitals get paid more if Medicare patients are listed as having the virus.



“Hospital administrators might well want to see COVID-19 attached to a discharge summary or a death certificate. Why? Because if it’s a straightforward, garden-variety pneumonia that a person is admitted to the hospital for – if they’re Medicare – typically, the diagnosis-related group lump sum payment would be $5,000. But if it’s COVID-19 pneumonia, then it’s $13,000, and if that COVID-19 pneumonia patient ends up on a ventilator, it goes up to $39,000.”



A USA Today fact check deemed that claim “true.”

[soonernvolved]

www.nationalreview.com/2020/05/flynn-and-the-anatomy-of-a-political-narrative/

Flynn and the Anatomy of a Political Narrative
By ANDREW C. MCCARTHY
May 9, 2020 1:09 PM

Obama officials and FBI collaborated to invent the ‘Russian collusion’ narrative


The FBI coordinated very closely with the Obama White House on the investigation of Michael Flynn, while the Obama Justice Department was asleep at the switch. That is among the most revealing takeaways from Thursday’s decision by Attorney General Bill Barr to pull the plug on the prosecution of Flynn, who fleetingly served as President Trump’s first National Security Advisor. Flynn had been seeking to withdraw his guilty plea to a false-statements charge brought in late 2017 by Special Counsel Robert Mueller.

While working on the Trump transition team in December 2016, Flynn spoke with Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak, in conversations that were intercepted by our government (because Russian-government operatives, such as Kislyak, are routinely monitored by the FBI and other U.S. intelligence agencies). Among the topics Flynn and Kislyak discussed was the imposition of sanctions against Russia, which President Obama had just announced.

That these conversations took place has been known for over three years — ever since a still-unidentified government official leaked that classified information to the Washington Post. For almost as long, it has been known that the FBI became aware of the Flynn–Kislyak discussions very shortly after they happened. What was not known until this week was that then–acting attorney general Yates was out of the loop. She found out about the discussions nearly a week afterwards — from President Obama, of all people.

This was at a White House pow-wow on January 5, 2017. That was the day when the chiefs of key intelligence agencies briefed top Obama White House officials on their assessment of Russia’s meddling in the campaign. After the main briefing, the president asked Yates and FBI director James Comey to stick around to meet with him, along with Vice President Biden and National Security Advisor Susan Rice. Yates was taken aback when Obama explained that he had “learned of the information about Flynn” and his conversation with Kislyak. She was startled because, she later told investigators, she “had no idea what the president was talking about.”

Yates had to figure things out by listening to the exchanges between President Obama and FBI director Comey. The latter was not only fully up to speed, he was even prepared to suggest a potential crime — a violation of the moribund Logan Act — that might fit the facts.

According to an FBI report, which was appended (as Exhibit 4) to the Justice Department’s motion to dismiss the Flynn case, Yates later said she was “so surprised by the information she was hearing that she was having a hard time processing it and listening to the conversation at the same time.”

I’ll bet.

That Yates was in the dark was not the FBI’s fault. Two days earlier, the bureau’s then–deputy director, Andrew McCabe, had briefed Assistant Attorney General Mary McCord, the head of DOJ’s National Security Division, about the Flynn–Kislyak discussions. Evidently not appreciating what the FBI regarded as the urgency of the matter, McCord did not pass the information along to the acting AG before her White House meeting.

Ms. Yates’s astonishment at how well-informed the bureau was keeping the president calls for revisiting something to which I’ve called attention before. It now seems even more significant.

When General Flynn was forced to resign as national-security adviser after just three weeks on the job, the New York Times did its customary deep dive, in which seven of its best reporters pressed their well-placed sources for details. It was a remarkable report, which recounted — as if it were totally matter-of-fact — that Flynn’s communications with Kislyak had been investigated by the FBI in real-time consultation with President Obama’s aides. For example (my italics):

Obama advisers heard separately from the F.B.I. about Mr. Flynn’s conversation with Mr. Kislyak, whose calls were routinely monitored by American intelligence agencies that track Russian diplomats. The Obama advisers grew suspicious that perhaps there had been a secret deal between the incoming [Trump] team and Moscow, which could violate the rarely enforced, two-century-old Logan Act barring private citizens from negotiating with foreign powers in disputes with the United States.

Interesting. The FBI tells Obama “advisers” about Flynn’s discussions with Kislyak. Between this and their surprise that Russian dictator Vladimir Putin did not retaliate when Obama imposed sanctions, the Obama “advisers” dream up a non-existent pact between Trump and the Kremlin — collusion! And they’re already thinking about nailing Flynn on the Logan Act . . . an obsolete, unconstitutional vestige of the President John Adams administration that has never, ever been prosecuted in the history of the Justice Department (the last case appears to have been in 1852; DOJ was established 18 years later).

Who came up with that? Well, Ms. McCord (whose interview is Exhibit 3 in DOJ’s Flynn dismissal motion) later told investigators that the Logan Act flyer originated in the office of Obama’s director of national intelligence, James Clapper — specifically proposed by ODNI’s general counsel, Bob Litt. Obviously, by January 5, Comey was already discussing it with Obama.

Let’s look at some more of that Times report on Flynn’s downfall. For the legal analysis of Flynn’s exchanges with Kislyak, the president’s aides consulted the FBI, not DOJ:

The Obama officials asked the F.B.I. if a quid pro quo had been discussed on the call, and the answer came back no, according to one of the officials, who like others asked not to be named discussing delicate communications. The topic of sanctions came up, they were told, but there was no deal.

So no misconduct. To the contrary, the incoming national-security adviser asked a Russian counterpart to discourage his government from escalating tensions, which is what we would want any American diplomat to do. “There was no deal.” Sanctions were merely mentioned, as one would expect since they’d just been imposed, but Flynn made no agreement to accommodate the Kremlin in any way.

But see, those are the actual facts. Who cares what actually happened? What matters, it turns out, is what “Obama advisers” and their FBI co-creators could imagine it into: There must be Trump collusion with Russia because we’ve concluded Putin would otherwise have retaliated.

This was nothing new for the FBI. Remember, at that point, they’re already in the FISA court (and at that time, were about to go back for a renewal warrant) telling the judges they suspect members of Donald Trump’s campaign are in a “conspiracy of cooperation” with the Putin regime. Their proof of that? The Steele dossier — uncorroborated Democratic-party- and Clinton-campaign-sponsored propaganda that they already have immense reason to know is claptrap.

Meanwhile, with Yates at the helm, the Justice Department had major reservations about the FISA warrants’ reliance on the Steele dossier, but swallowed hard and went along with it. The Justice Department had major reservations about the Logan Act as a predicate for investigating Flynn, but Yates was too startled to speak up at the White House meeting. The Justice Department wanted Comey to alert the Trump White House about the Flynn–Kislyak discussions, but the FBI refused . . . and Yates did nothing. By the time, after days of temporizing, she finally decided to put her foot down, Comey told her he had already dispatched agents to do an unauthorized ambush interview of Flynn. Yates was “dumbfounded,” McCord recalled.

The Justice Department appears to have spent much of its time “flabbergasted,” to quote McCabe again. But in the end, it would always go with the collusion flow. Meanwhile, empowered and emboldened, the FBI ran rings around its nominal superiors.

So what did President Obama make of all this theorizing from the FBI and his “advisers”? Well, intriguingly, as she was leaving her office for the last time, Obama’s top adviser, Susan Rice, decided that her last official act, moments after Trump was inaugurated, would be to craft — 15 days after the fact — an email memorializing Obama’s directive at the January 5 meeting:

President Obama said he wants to be sure that, as we engage with the incoming [Trump] team, we are mindful to ascertain if there is any reason that we cannot share information fully as it relates to Russia.

Hmm, you mean a reason like “Trump and his minions just might be colluding with the Kremlin”?

You’d almost think the Obama White House and its intelligence apparatus was weaving a political narrative out of . . . nothing.

[soonernvolved]

dailycaller.com/2020/05/09/james-comey-michael-flynn-lie-fbi/

Comey Told Congress He Didn’t Know If Michael Flynn Lied To FBI: Transcript

A congressional transcript released Thursday shed light on what James Comey told lawmakers regarding the investigation of Michael Flynn.
Comey told lawmakers that he did not know if Flynn lied to the FBI regarding his contacts with Russia’s ambassador.
FBI agents who interviewed Flynn did not detect any discernible signs that Flynn knew he was lying, he said.
The Justice Department released the March 2, 2017, transcript of Comey’s briefing to Congress as an exhibit in Flynn’s legal case.
A congressional transcript from March 2017 released Thursday showed that then-FBI Director James Comey was uncertain whether Michael Flynn had knowingly lied to the FBI during a White House interview weeks earlier.

Comey questioned a Justice Department official’s theory that Flynn was vulnerable to Russian blackmail, according to the transcript.


Comey’s statements to the House Intelligence Committee on March 2, 2017, have been the subject of intense speculation over the past several years, particularly regarding his comments on Flynn.

The Justice Department released the transcript Thursday as an exhibit to a motion to drop charges against Flynn for making false statements to the FBI.

Flynn pleaded guilty on Dec. 1, 2017, to lying to the FBI about discussing sanctions in December 2016 with Sergey Kislyak, who then served as Russia’s ambassador to the United States.

The former national security adviser has since retracted his claim to have lied to the FBI, saying he pleaded guilty in order to protect his son from prosecution in a separate investigation. The Justice Department submitted a motion to drop charges against Flynn, citing the recent discovery of FBI documents related to the Flynn investigation.


One of the documents is an FBI memo dated Jan. 4, 2017, showing that the bureau was poised to shut down a counterintelligence investigation of Flynn. Other documents show FBI officials strategizing about how to conduct a White House interview with Flynn.

Comey authorized the interview of Flynn. Andrew McCabe, who then served as deputy director of the FBI, called Flynn to arrange the interview, and convinced Flynn to speak with the FBI agents without lawyers present. (RELATED: AG Barr: FBI Set Flynn Up In A ‘Perjury Trap’)

FBI officials decided not to warn Flynn about penalties for lying to federal agents during the interview, other FBI documents show.

The transcript of Comey’s briefing to lawmakers shows that the question of whether Flynn lied during the interview was far from an open-and-shut case.


“Do you believe that Mr. Flynn lied?” Rep. Jackie Speier asked Comey.

“I don’t know,” Comey replied. “I think there is an argument to be made that he lied. It is a close one.”

Comey told lawmakers that the agents who interviewed Flynn — Peter Strzok and Joseph Pientka — did not see any outward signs that Flynn knew he was lying about his calls with Kislyak.

“And the agents — and the reason I mention their experience is because I talked to them about this — they discerned no physical indications of deception. They didn’t see any change in posture, in tone, in inflection, in eye contact,” Comey said.

“They saw nothing that indicated to them that he knew he was lying to them.”



James Comey testimony to the House Intelligence Committee, March 2, 2017.

Flynn’s defenders have questioned why Flynn would have knowingly lied in the interview given that he knew that the FBI likely had a transcript of his phone calls with Kislyak.

Attorney General William Barr, who authorized the Justice Department to withdraw charges against Flynn, said in an interview Thursday that Flynn’s calls with Kislyak were legal.

“There was nothing wrong with it whatever. In fact, it was laudable,” Barr said. “So there was no mystery about the call.”

Comey and other FBI officials set Flynn up in a “perjury trap,” Barr said.

Comey undercut another allegation about the Flynn investigation promoted by former Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates.

Yates told the Senate Judiciary Committee on March 8, 2017, that she briefed the White House on Jan. 26, 2017, about Flynn’s calls with Kislyak in part because she was concerned that the Russian government could blackmail the retired general over the phone calls.

“We believed that General Flynn was compromised with respect to the Russians,” Yates testified. “To state the obvious, you don’t want the national security adviser compromised by the Russians.”

While it was “possible” that Flynn was vulnerable to blackmail, the theory was a “bit of a reach,” Comey told lawmakers.

Yates was highly critical of Comey’s handling of the Flynn interview, according to documents released Thursday.

She told the FBI during an interview on Aug. 15, 2017, that she admonished Comey when he called to tell her that he had sent two FBI agents to the White House to speak with Flynn.

Justice Department officials “hit the roof” when Yates told them of Comey’s maneuver, she said.



FBI notes of Sally Yates’s Aug. 15, 2017 interview.

“Yates added the interview was problematic to her because as a matter of protocol and as a courtesy, the White House Counsel’s Office should have been notified of the interview,” the FBI’s notes from the Yates interview read.

“The FBI’s approach was inconsistent with how things had been done.”

[soonernvolved]

Oh look, MSNBC is back to beating the dead & rotting corpse of the horse that is the Russian narrative:

www.dailywire.com/news/it-never-ends-now-msnbc-suggests-vladimir-putin-was-behind-doj-dropping-case-against-michael-flynn

It Never Ends: Now MSNBC Suggests Vladimir Putin Was Behind DOJ Dropping Case Against Michael Flynn

The media over the past few years has reported a false narrative that President Donald Trump colluded with Russia during his 2016 campaign to steal the election.


That narrative was proven false after a lengthy special counsel investigation found no evidence of such collusion. Media outlets and their Democrat supporters refused to acknowledge that they got the story wrong or that they were biased in their reporting. They are continuing that behavior now that the Department of Justice dropped its charges against former Trump national security adviser Michael Flynn.

FBI agents, in handwritten notes, questioned what the goal was of their January 24, 2017 interview with Flynn, writing: “What is our goal? Truth/Admission or to get him to lie, so we can prosecute him or get him fired?”

Former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe (fired for lying to the FBI) would later say the interview with Flynn was “very odd” because “it seemed like [Flynn] was telling the truth.”

But even though Flynn appears to have been vindicated and the victim of FBI entrapment, MSNBC host Andrea Mitchell had a different take: That Russian President Vladimir Putin was behind the DOJ’s charges being dropped.


Seriously.

As Newsbusters reported, Mitchell was interviewing former FBI Assistant Director for Counterintelligence and current MSNBC contributor Frank Figliuzzi about the charges against Flynn being dropped. Mitchell said the decision to drop the charges was “stunning” and “unprecedented,” even though the documents showing the FBI interviewed Flynn with the goal of getting him fired were released weeks earlier. Mitchell then connected the dropped charges to President Donald Trump’s phone call with Putin on Thursday, the day the charges were dropped.

“Frank, first, all of the implications here, and the fact that he then called Vladimir Putin yesterday, and according to the White House announcement of this and description of it, there was no mention of the Russia probe and the election probe. But the president himself discussed that with Vladimir Putin, and the facts that in his view now that the Russian hoax was dispelled, they could get back to business,” Mitchell said, according to Newsbusters.

Figliuzzi was all too happy to agree that Putin was behind the DOJ’s decision.

“Yeah, I think they’re actually linked. The dismissal of charges against Flynn and conversation by the president with Vladimir Putin, stone cold adversary of the United States on the very same day, that’s not a coincidence,” Figliuzzi said.

The contributor went on to claim that the investigation into Flynn was important for national security.

“The Flynn interview that is at issue here by the FBI was all about resolving the question of whether Mike Flynn was a counterintelligence threat to the nation as he entered into the national security adviser role. It was about figuring out how to neutralize, resolve and counter that threat. So when the president gets on the phone with Vladimir Putin and the topic comes up in the same conversation, the concerns have not yet been resolved,” he said.

Documents revealed the FBI had no basis to interview or investigate Flynn. Further, Trump’s phone call with Putin occurred the same day the charges were dropped, yet U.S. Attorney Jeff Jensen recommended those charges be dropped a week earlier.

[soonernvolved]

www.dailywire.com/news/supercut-highlights-media-calling-claim-that-michael-flynn-was-set-up-by-fbi-a-conspiracy-theory

Supercut Highlights Media Calling Claim That Michael Flynn Was Set Up By FBI A ‘Conspiracy Theory’

Now that it has become clear the FBI was looking to get former Trump administration National Security Adviser Michael Flynn fired and that it had no reason to interview him in the first place, it’s time to look back at the media pundits who claimed it was a “conspiracy theory” to suggest Flynn was set up.


Grabien founder Tom Elliott created a supercut of pundits and media hosts insisting Flynn was guilty and the FBI did nothing wrong.

news.grabien.com/story-media-idea-fbi-setup-mike-flynn-conspiracy-theory-supercut

The video begins with the notoriously wrong CNN host Don Lemon, claiming conservatives were repeatedly “ignoring the truth and pushing phony conspiracy theories.” Brookings Institution fellow Benjamin Wittes said there were “all kinds of conspiracy theories about how [Flynn] was entrapped.”

An MSNBC guest said “The FBI agents didn’t do anything wrong here,” possibly the most incorrect of all the statements presented in the video.

As The Daily Wire previously reported, handwritten notes made on the day of Flynn’s January 24, 2017 interview with the FBI asked what the Bureau’s goal was for Flynn. “What is our goal? Truth/Admission or to get him to lie, so we can prosecute him or get him fired?” the notes said.


The notes indicated to Flynn’s supporters that he was set up by the FBI in order to get him fired. Flynn pleaded guilty to making false statements to the FBI, allegedly to protect his son from prosecution. Flynn tried to get his plea withdrawn, but the issue became moot last week when the Department of Justice announced it was dropping the criminal case against the former lieutenant general.

As The Daily Wire reported:


Court documents released Thursday, obtained exclusively by The Associated Press, reveal the DOJ decided to drop the case “after a considered review of all the facts and circumstances of this case, including newly discovered and disclosed information.” The court documents further revealed that the DOJ concluded that the ill-fated FBI interview of Flynn on January 24, 2017 was “untethered to, and unjustified by, the FBI’s counterintelligence investigation into Mr. Flynn” and “conducted without any legitimate investigative basis.”

Jeff Jensen, the U.S. attorney assigned to review Flynn’s case, said in a statement that he had recommended the case be dropped to Attorney General William Barr last week. Jensen formalized the recommendation this week.

“Through the course of my review of General Flynn’s case, I concluded the proper and just course was to dismiss the case,” Jensen said. “I briefed Attorney General Barr on my findings, advised him on these conclusions, and he agreed.”

In the Grabien supercut, MSNBC host Joe Scarborough asked if the “conspiracy theories” about Flynn were passed around using fax machines. CNN political analyst David Gregory begged people to “stop with the conspiracy theories.”

[kcrufnek]

May 7, 2020 19:14:59 GMT -6 soonernvolved said:

Yeah. Not a good look. I wonder if someone will talk.

[kcrufnek]

May 7, 2020 19:37:47 GMT -6 soonernvolved said:

www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/05/07/transcript-james-clapper-admitted-no-direct-evidence-of-russia-collusion/

Former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper admitted to the House Intelligence Committee in July 2017 that he was not aware of any direct evidence of collusion between Russia and the Trump campaign.

In a closed-door session on July 17, 2017, Clapper told the committee: “I never saw any direct empirical evidence that the Trump campaign or someone in it was plotting/conspiring with the Russians to meddle with the election.”

intelligence.house.gov/uploadedfiles/jc7.pdf

Remember when Clapper, Brennan, Comey, etc. were on TV all the time lying about everything? Where are they now?

[kcrufnek]

May 9, 2020 6:15:24 GMT -6 soonernvolved said:

Tucker Carlson slams ‘sociopath’ Schiff, calls for resignation over Russia investigation

Tucker Carlson blasted the Washington establishment Friday night for getting bogged down in the Russia investigation for three years and ignoring other important issues that have come to light as a result of the coronavirus pandemic.

“Issues like the dangerous rise of Chinese global dominance, the porousness of our domestic borders, this country’s crumbling infrastructure, government corruption and incompetence,” Carlson said on “Tucker Carlson Tonight.” “We’re talking about all of this.

Over the past two months, you may have asked yourself, ‘Why weren’t we talking about these things before? They’re important.’ Well, it’s a good question, and there’s a simple answer to it.

“The answer is, we didn’t have time. There was no time to consider the fundamental health of America because we were busy talking about Russia,” Carlson went on. “In Washington, Russia is all we talked about for three years. All normal business in the capital city came to a halt as we embarked on a bizarre scavenger hunt in search of Vladimir Putin’s spies.”…

“Adam Schiff is a sociopath. He will do or say anything to achieve power. He is unfit to hold office. He should resign,” Carlson said.

We saw him out there.everyday lying during the impeachment circus. Every time he spoke he was lying. Same with Pelosi. She's doubled down.  Crickets. Can we really believe that things will change?

[soonernvolved]

Jonathan Turley schools Law student Obama:

Jonathan Turley tweeted: President Obama is being quoted on Flynn, saying “There is no precedent that anybody can find for someone who has been charged with perjury just getting off scot-free.” It is a curious statement. First and foremost, Flynn was not charged with perjury. Second, we now know Obama discussed charging Flynn under the Logan Act which has never been used successfully to convict anyone and is flagrantly unconstitutional. Third, this reaffirms reports that Obama was personally invested in this effort. Finally, there is precedent. There is a specific rule allowing for this motion under Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 48(a). There are specific Supreme Court cases like Rinaldi v. United States addressing the standard for such dismissals. The Justice Department has dismissed cases in the past including the Stevens case.That was requested by President Obama’s own Attorney General Eric Holder for the same reason: misconduct by prosecutors. It was done before the same judge, Judge Sullivan. How is that for precedent?

[soonernvolved]

Hey, Brennan finally appeared to comment:

[soonernvolved]

www.dailywire.com/news/graham-hollywoods-heroic-comey-story-collapses

GRAHAM: Hollywood’s Heroic Comey Story Collapses

If the “first rough draft of history” in the news media sounds dubious, the second draft made by Hollywood will almost certainly be worse. I’m not talking about documentaries, which can be judged as journalism. I’m talking about movies and TV shows, which will inevitably be pressed to dramatize things so they are evermore loosely “based on real events.”


CBS has been preparing a miniseries based on former FBI Director James Comey’s memoir, pompously titled “A Higher Loyalty.” In the memoir, he lectured, “Ethical leaders choose a higher loyalty to those core values over their own personal gain.” But the personal gain was sweet for Comey.

First came the high-roller book deal with 850,000 copies, heavily promoted by all the Democrat-repeating networks. In Comey’s case, that included an hourlong prime-time ABC “news” special during which he was interviewed by that nonpartisan George Stephanopoulos. The book sold like hotcakes to Trump haters. Add some more millions for his optioning the book to Hollywood for “entertainment.”

Production was slated to begin last November, but there’s no word if it was anywhere near done before the coronavirus pandemic kicked in. Apparently, CBS Television Studios hasn’t even decided where this Heroic Comey miniseries will land, either on Showtime or the CBS All Access streaming service, where it would be an easy match with the network’s Trump-trashing drama “The Good Fight.”

Comey will be played by Trump-hating actor Jeff Daniels, who recently made the New York media swoon by starring as heroic lawyer Atticus Finch in “To Kill a Mockingbird” on Broadway. The miniseries director, Billy Ray, said Daniels was picked because he had “instant integrity, loads of warmth, intelligence, complexity and gravitas.” That’s obviously how they expect to portray Jim Comey: as another heroic lawman on the actor’s resume.


Ray promised he would make a “fair, responsible and comprehensively documented account of real-life events,” CBS said in a press release. But current events are intruding on Comey’s memoir and his picture of a heroic and nonpartisan FBI battling a president with no respect for the rule of law. For example, new documents have surfaced that purport to show the FBI agents who investigated President Donald Trump’s former national security adviser Michael Flynn sought “to get him to lie” so they could “prosecute him or get him fired.” Does that sound nonpartisan?

Comey bragged to MSNBC’s Nicolle Wallace in 2018 that he flouted the usual protocols for interviewing a top White House official. Usually, the White House counsel is contacted and an interview is carefully arranged. In this case, Comey just sent in his agents, the ones scheming to “prosecute him or get him fired.” Former Comey aide Josh Campbell admitted in his own memoir that Comey said, “We just decided, you know, screw it.”


Flynn didn’t see the attack coming. He said sure and did the FBI interview — without a lawyer present. He walked right into shark-infested waters and lied to the sharks, turning his life upside down.

Attorney General William Barr has decided to vacate Flynn’s conviction, finding the adventurous FBI interview was “untethered to, and unjustified by, the FBI’s counterintelligence investigation into Mr. Flynn.”


I think we can guess the CBS miniseries will glide right over the latest developments to keep its focus on Heroic Comey, no matter how much that narrative is collapsing. It’s likely the series will be the latest in a line of conservative-smearing historical dramas aired by CBS/Showtime, from the Clarence Thomas-whipping “Strange Justice” to “The Reagans.”

But CBS — the Dan Rather network — lectures the rest of us to stop spreading disinformation.

[soonernvolved]

And now thanks to Italian reporter Giulio Occhionero we know that Mifsud admitted to being a member of the Clinton Foundation back in November 2017.

Via la Repubblica (translated):

www.repubblica.it/esteri/2017/11/01/news/russiagate_mystery_professor_joseph_mifsud_speaks_out_dirt_on_hillary_clinton_nonsense_-179948962/?refresh_ce

Under his feet, people talk about the “Heart of the European cybersecurity” at the summit organized by Enisa, the European Network and Information Security Agency. Above his feet, the academic who is said to have offered to Donald Trump’s aides, during the electoral campaign, thousands of Hillary Clinton’s hacked emails, kindly smiles: “Sorry, I cannot comment”, he replies while his phone is receiving calls from all over the world. “And I have decided to get hide in my office”, he will smile again one hour after this interview he didn’t want to give.

Joseph Mifsud is the Maltese professor who, according to the rumors and anticipations of the Russiagate investigation, has approached George Papadopoulos, an aide of Donald Trump during his presidential campaign, to help him to contact Russian authorities in the Kremlin, even for organizing a meeting between Trump and Putin. Mr. Mifsud is said to have given to the aide “dirty information” on Mrs. Clinton collected by the Russian. “This is nonsense”, Mifsud comments, “friendship is friendship but Papadopoulos doesn’t tell the truth. The only thing I did was to facilitate contacts between official and unofficial sources to resolve a crisis. It is usual business everywhere. I put think tanks in contact, groups of experts with other groups of experts”, he states.

“I am a member of the European Council on Foreign relations”, he adds, “and you know which is the only foundation I am member of? The Clinton Foundation. Between you and me, my thinking is left-leaning. But I predicted Trump’s victory as well as Brexit. Everyone of us wants peace. If the governments don’t talk each other, we citizens must keep talking”.

Ok. But what about the emails stolen from Mrs. Clinton? “The dirty job” offered to Papadopoulos? “I don’t know. I strongly deny any discussion of mine about secrets concerning Hillary Clinton. I swear it on my daughter. I don’t know anyone belonging to the Russian government: the only Russian I know is Ivan Timofeev, director of the think tank “Russian International affairs council”. Which is based at The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation. “But this is meaningless”, Mifsud says.

And now Joseph Mifsud is missing after being connected to the Clintons.

[soonernvolved]

John Podesta was Hillary Clinton’s campaign chairman in 2016.
CNN reported in October 2017 that Podesta and then DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz

edition.cnn.com/2017/10/26/politics/john-podesta-fusion-gps/index.html

both denied denied to congressional Russia investigators that they had any knowledge about an arrangement to pay for opposition research on President Donald Trump, three sources familiar with the matter told CNN.”

But that is not what John Podesta told House Intelligence investigators under oath in his December 2017 testimony.

John Podesta admitted under oath that the DNC and the Hillary Campaign split the cost of the Trump-Russia dossier.

Now we know.

[soonernvolved]

[soonernvolved]

General Flynn’s attorney Sidney Powell on Sunday said Barack Obama was involved in the conspiracy to entrap Flynn.

Advertisement - story continues below
Powell told “Sunday Morning Futures” host Maria Bartiromo that former DNI James Clapper briefed Barack Obama on the transcripts of the December 2016 Flynn-Kislyak phone calls.

The Justice Department dropped its case against General Mike Flynn Thursday after bombshell documents released proved he was framed by Comey’s FBI.

The DOJ said in its motion to dismiss that “The interview of Mr. Flynn was untethered to, and unjustified by, the FBI’s counterintelligence investigation into Mr. Flynn.”

TRENDING: NOW WE KNOW: John Podesta Admits in Testimony Both DNC and Hillary Campaign Split the Cost for Bogus Trump-Russia Dossier That Launched the Coup

The DOJ was referring to the January 24, 2017 ambush FBI interview conducted by FBI counterintel chief Peter Strzok and FBI special agent Joe Pientka.

“These agents specifically schemed and planned with each other how to not tip him off, that he was even the person being investigated,” Powell said of Strzok and Pientka.

Advertisement - story continues below
According to newly declassified documents, then-Deputy AG Sally Yates said she first learned of the December 2016 calls between Flynn and Kislyak from Barack Obama in the January 5, 2017 Oval Office meeting.

“The whole thing was orchestrated and set up within the FBI, Clapper, Brennan, and in the Oval Office meeting that day with President Obama,” Powell said referring the secret Oval Office meeting on January 5, 2017.

Maria Bartiromo asked Powell, “So you think this goes all the way up to the top to President Obama?”

Powell responded: “Absolutely.”

WATCH

[soonernvolved]

What’s this? Putin favored Hillary over Trump & Brennan buried it? I’m shocked, I tell you

dailycaller.com/2020/04/23/fred-fleitz-john-brennan-buried-evidence-putin-favored-hillary/

Former NSC Chief Of Staff: John Brennan Buried Evidence That Putin Actually Favored Hillary In 2016

Former CIA officer and National Security Council Chief of Staff Fred Fleitz said Wednesday that former CIA Director John Brennan ignored intelligence that Russian President Vladimir Putin actually wanted Hillary Clinton to win the the 2016 presidential election.

Fleitz called Brennan “the most politicized intelligence chief in American history” in a Fox News op ed that addressed a report released Tuesday from the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. That document supports the U.S. intelligence community’s conclusion that Russia meddled in the 2016 presidential election to promote the victory of then-candidate Donald Trump.

The committee released the document in a highly edited form that does not include any reference to recently declassified files that point to a possible Russian disinformation campaign that attempted to malign Trump. (RELATED: Former NSC Chief Of Staff: Schiff ‘Broke’ Rules, ‘Should Recuse Himself’ From Impeachment Inquiry’)

Fleitz notes that the Senate report directly contradicts the March 2018 findings of the House Intelligence Committee, which accused the intelligence community assessment of being tainted by anti-Trump forces.
While recognizing that “the political establishment and anti-Trump journalists gloated about the new Senate Intelligence Committee report as bolstering their biases,” Fleitz contends the committee did not follow proper procedures in their investigation and based their conclusions on too few intelligence sources — and too much on the potentially tainted observations of the CIA.

“The Senate Intelligence Committee report falsely claims that ‘all analytical lines are supported with all-source intelligence’ and that analysts who wrote the intelligence community assessment consistently said they ‘were under no politically motivated pressure to reach specific conclusions.’”

Fleitz says House Intelligence Committee staff members discovered exactly the opposite and told him that there is ample evidence that Russia may have interfered in the 2016 election, but not necessarily on behalf of Trump. (RELATED: Former NSC Chief Of Staff Suggests Whistleblower Had Help From Democrats In Crafting Complaint)

More gravely, they said that [then-] CIA Director John Brennan suppressed facts or analysis that showed why it was not in Russia’s interests to support Trump and why Putin stood to benefit from Hillary Clinton’s election. They also told me that Brennan suppressed that intelligence over the objections of CIA analysts.”

The former NSC chief of staff further stated that “Brennan suppressed high-quality intelligence suggesting that Putin actually wanted the more predictable and malleable Clinton to win the 2016 election.”

Fleitz suggested that Brennan relied upon “low-quality intelligence that failed to meet intelligence community standards to support the political claim that Russian officials wanted Trump to win … ”

[soonernvolved]

thefederalist.com/2020/05/11/why-did-obama-tell-the-fbi-to-hide-its-activities-from-the-trump-administration/


Why Did Obama Tell The FBI To Hide Its Activities From The Trump Administration?
Even after Barack Obama had left office and James Comey had a new commander-in-chief to report to, Comey obeyed Obama by withholding intel from President Trump.
Margot Cleveland
By Margot Cleveland
MAY 11, 2020

In 1980, 15-year-old Amy Carter left a burnt cake in the oven of the White House’s family quarters in a reflex of childish revenge for her father’s landslide loss to Ronald Reagan. In 2017, Barack Obama and Joe Biden avenged Donald Trump’s surprise victory over Hillary Clinton by leaving what they claim was a Russian agent in the West Wing.

That conclusion inevitably follows if one accepts as credible the FBI’s supposed predicates for launching the Crossfire Hurricane investigation into the Trump campaign and the four related probes into George Papadopoulos, Carter Page, Paul Manafort, and Michael Flynn.


On July 31, 2016, the FBI opened the Crossfire Hurricane counterintelligence investigation of the Trump campaign, purportedly to learn if members of the Trump team were “coordinating or cooperating” with the Russian government to influence or interfere with the 2016 elections. By August 16, 2016, the FBI had opened four subsidiary investigations on individuals connected to the campaign, claiming their connections to Russian businesses, pro-Russian factions, or Russian-owned entities “reasonably indicated” they “may wittingly or unwittingly be involved in activity on behalf of the Russian Federation which may constitute a federal crime or threat to the national security.”

Let the ‘Russian Spy’ Keep Spying
The FBI maintained that it opened the Crossfire Hurricane investigation, rather than providing Trump a defensive briefing on the report from a “friendly foreign government” that Russia had reached out to a member of his campaign to release damaging information on Hillary Clinton, because agents “had no indication as to which person in the Trump campaign allegedly received the offer from the Russians.” According to Counterintelligence Division Assistant Director E.W. “Bill” Priestap, “had we provided a defensive briefing to someone on the Trump campaign, we would have alerted the campaign to what we were looking into, and, if someone on the campaign was engaged with the Russians, he/she would very likely change his/her tactics and/or otherwise seek to cover-up his/her activities, thereby preventing us from finding the truth.”

Former deputy director of the FBI Andy McCabe likewise told Inspector General Michael Horowitz “that he did not consider a defensive briefing as an alternative to opening a counterintelligence case” because, “based on the [Friendly Foreign Government] information, the FBI did not know if any member of the campaign was coordinating with Russia and that the FBI did not brief people who ‘could potentially be the subjects that you are investigating or looking for.’”

McCabe further explained that “in a sensitive counterintelligence matter, it was essential to have a better understanding of what was occurring before taking an overt step such as providing a defensive briefing.”


While “there are plenty of problems with Priestap and McCabe’s rationale, as well as the entire predicate for Crossfire Hurricane,” a bigger problem arises if you take them at their word, because by the time Americans elected Trump president on November 8, 2016, the FBI had “a better understanding of what was occurring,” and had identified four individuals of concern. But still the FBI did not provide president-elect Trump a defensive briefing.

Instructing Holdovers to Keep Serving Obama
Then came the January 5, 2017, meeting in the Oval Office where Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates, FBI Director James Comey, CIA Director John Brennan, and Director of National Intelligence James Clapper briefed President Obama, Vice President Joe Biden, and National Security Advisor Susan Rice on Russia-related issues.

Rice later wrote an email to herself on January 20, 2017—Trump’s inauguration day and her last day in the White House—purporting to summarize that meeting. “On January 5, following a briefing by IC leadership on Russian hacking during the 2016 Presidential election,” Rice wrote, “President Obama had a brief follow-on conversation with FBI Director Jim Comey and Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates in the Oval Office. Vice President Biden and I were also present.”

According to Rice, “President Obama began the conversation by stressing his continued commitment to ensuring that every aspect of this issue is handled by the Intelligence and law enforcement communities ‘by the book.’” But then she added a significant caveat to that “commitment”: “From a national security perspective, however, President Obama said he wants to be sure that, as we engage with the incoming team, we are mindful to ascertain if there is any reason that we cannot share information fully as it relates to Russia.”


The next portion of the email is classified, but Rice then noted that “the President asked Comey to inform him if anything changes in the next few weeks that should affect how we share classified information with the incoming team. Comey said he would.”

At the time Obama suggested to Yates and Comey—who were to keep their posts under the Trump administration—that the hold-overs consider withholding information from the incoming administration, Obama knew that President Trump had named Flynn to serve as national security advisor. Obama also knew there was an ongoing FBI investigation into Flynn premised on Flynn being a Russian agent.

Yet, rather than direct his team to provide the president-elect a briefing on the Russia investigation as it related to Flynn, Obama suggested it would be appropriate to withhold such information from the Trump administration.

That is just what Comey did. The following day, Comey provided “an ostensibly similar briefing about Russian interference efforts during the 2016 campaign,” and then “fter that briefing, Comey privately briefed Trump on the most salacious and absurd ‘pee tape’ allegation in the Christopher Steele dossier.”

Lying to the President

While Comey found it important to tell the incoming commander-in-chief of the ridiculous “pee tape” “intel,” following Obama’s guidance the then-FBI director did not tell Trump that the FBI had an active investigation into Trump’s incoming national security advisor predicated on the idea that Flynn was potentially a Russian agent.

Even after Obama had left office and Comey had a new commander-in-chief to report to, Comey continued to follow Obama’s prompt by withholding intel from Trump. Recently released documents included as exhibits to the Department of Justice’s motion to dismiss the criminal charges against Flynn reveal this reality.

During that same January 5, 2017, Oval Office meeting in which Obama counseled Comey to be cautious in sharing information about Russia with the Trump administration, Obama and Comey discussed Flynn’s late-December telephone calls with the Russian ambassador.

Following Trump’s inauguration, Comey remained adamant that Trump not be briefed of the details of Flynn’s call with the Russian ambassador, and then “broke every protocol” to preempt Yates’s directive that he inform the White House of the conversation, by sending agents to interview Flynn in the West Wing on January 24, 2017.

But it wasn’t just Obama and Comey’s secreting of the supposed intel about Flynn that shows they put damaging the incoming Trump administration above protecting the country from purported Russian agents. The Flynn investigation was but one aspect of the Crossfire Hurricane probe, and Trump was not briefed on the other investigations either—most significantly the continuing investigation of Carter Page.

Secrets and Lies
The FBI’s targeting of Page included the use of four constitutionally defective Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act surveillance warrants. The recent declassification of additional aspects of the four FISA applications exposes that the FBI believed Page continued to communicate with higher-ups in the Trump administration: The April 7, 2017 and the June 28, 2017, FISA renewal applications that sought continued surveillance on Page stated that “the FBI assesses that Page continues to have access to senior U.S. Government officials.”

They put damaging the incoming Trump administration above protecting the country from purported Russian agents.
The renewal applications added that “the FBI further assesses that Page is attempting to downplay his contacts with the Russian Government and to dispel the controversy surrounding him, so as to make him more viable as a foreign policy expert who will be in a position, due to his continued contacts with senior U.S. Government officials, to influence U.S. foreign policy towards Russia.”

Yet the FBI did not brief Trump on its supposed belief “that Russia sought to use Page’s connections with administration officials to influence America’s foreign policy. Instead, as the newly declassified information reveals, following Trump’s inauguration, the FBI sought to, and apparently succeeded in, intercepting communications between Page and members of the Trump administration.”

So, not only was the FBI content with leaving a supposed Russian agent in the West Wing, it had no qualms about allowing another purported Russian agent to communicate with “senior U.S. Government officials” with the goal of influencing the Trump administration’s foreign policy.

Obama Told Us To
The FBI, however, is not solely to blame for keeping this “important” information from Trump: They were only following the counsel of former President Barack Obama.

While a young Amy Carter can be forgiven for her juvenile vision of departing the White House “content with the picture of Nancy Reagan struggling to clean out the oven,” there is no excuse for an outcoming president to withhold “intel” on supposed Russian agents from the president-elect. And there is no excuse for an outcoming president to advise hold-over high-ranking officials to do likewise once the new president has taken office.

Or, rather, the only excuse is an equally scandalous one: Obama knew the Russia investigation was a hoax from the get-go.

[soonernvolved]

dailycaller.com/2020/05/11/cnn-brian-stelter-right-wing-media-coverage-mike-flynn-vindication-russia-collusion-hoax-coronavirus/

Brian Stelter Fumes Over ‘Right-Wing Media’ And Its ‘Obsession’ With Flynn Vindication And Exposure Of Russia Collusion Hoax

CNN “Reliable Sources” host Brian Stelter vented Sunday about the amount of coverage “right-wing media” are devoting to the Russia collusion hoax and the vindication of former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn.

“It’s so disappointing to look at what we’re seeing from right-wing media these days, there’s such an obsession with the deep state and these revelations about the Russia probe and the decision about Michael Flynn,” Stelter told viewers.

House Intelligence Committee transcripts released last week showed how FBI officials entrapped Flynn — even though they knew the former Army lieutenant general had not colluded with Russia. As a result of the revelation, the Department of Justice has decided to drop Michael Flynn’s case. (RELATED: Flynn’s Lawyer Says Obama Was Part Of Conspiracy To Entrap Former National Security Advisor)

Stelter objected to the coverage because he said it should not be overshadowing reporting on the ongoing coronavirus pandemic that is like the “New Orleans floods every day” or “like the planes go into the [twin] towers every day.”

“They’re treating the Michael Flynn story like it’s a bigger deal than it is the deaths of 2,000 Americans a day … When the president called in to ‘Fox and Friends’ … Friday morning, right before the unemployment rate numbers came out, he talked about the Flynn case for 20 minutes before he was asked about the pandemic,” Stelter noted, adding that he didn’t believe “any political scandal, any Department of Justice story” was more important “than the pandemic that’s raging.”

“Look, ultimately it’s about news judgment, it’s about lack of judgment — but I find it befuddling that some people are acting like this death toll is just normal, and accepted, and common, just another day now. Imagine if 1,000 to 2,000 Americans were dying every day from terror attacks? Imagine the president’s response?” (RELATED: ‘Do You Know Anybody Who Trusts The Government Anymore?’: Tucker Carlson Blames ‘Official Washington’ For Russia Collusion Hoax)

[kcrufnek]

For any of us here we know this was what happened for a long time. I've been following people like Sara Carter, Andy McCarthy, Dan bongino, Kim Strossel, John solomon. Most of them have been covering this from the start and have been right on the money. Now as the shit approaches the fan I just wonder what is going to come of this. These people have been lying for over three years. To anyone they talked to. Will something happen to Obama? No. But I wonder where it will begin. Will someone roll? Once this begins I wonder what the coverage will be. What about Biden? Are to believe he knew nothing? He was at that Jan 4 meeting with everyone at the WH. Was he sleeping? Maybe he drank a lot of tea that day and kept having to go. We can only hope.

Rush just said that Barr talks to Durham everyday and that the word is this report isn't going to be pretty. How is the media going to discredit this?

[kcrufnek]

Chuck Todd? No way!!

[soonernvolved]

dailycaller.com/2020/05/11/michael-flynn-leak-david-ignatius-washington-post/

Documents Shed Light On Media Leak Central To Michael Flynn Case

A leak to The Washington Post in January 2017 proved central to the investigation of Michael Flynn, the former national security adviser.
Documents in Flynn’s case show which Obama administration officials were aware of the information that leaked to WaPo. Transcripts of congressional interviews released Thursday also show that several Obama administration officials denied being the source of the leak.
The Justice Department filed a motion to drop charges against Flynn.
Sidney Powell, a lawyer for Flynn, told the Daily Caller News Foundation that the sources behind the leak should be investigated for a conspiracy against Flynn.

Documents released last week have helped fill in the timeline of events that preceded a leak to The Washington Post that is central to the federal case against Michael Flynn, the former national security adviser.

House Intelligence Committee transcripts released Thursday show that several Justice Department officials, Obama White House officials and others in the administration denied being the source of the leak, which WaPo columnist David Ignatius published on Jan. 12, 2017.

The Justice Department also released emails and interview transcripts that show when FBI officials began discussing the Logan Act, an obscure law that the FBI and Justice Department initially wanted to apply to Flynn’s case.

Ignatius made a passing reference in his column to Flynn’s phone calls in late December 2016 with Sergey Kislyak, the Russian ambassador to the United States.

The veteran columnist cited a “senior U.S. government official” who said that Flynn called Kislyak multiple times on Dec. 29, 2016, the same day that the Obama administration announced it was kicking 35 Russian officials out of the United States as retaliation for the Russian government’s hacking of U.S. political campaigns. (RELATED: DOJ Drops Case Against Michael Flynn)

“What did Flynn say, and did it undercut the U.S. sanctions?” Ignatius asked in the column.

He brought up the Logan Act, which “bars U.S. citizens from correspondence intending to influence a foreign government about ‘disputes’ with the United States.”

“Was its spirit violated?” Ignatius asked of the law, which has never been successfully prosecuted.

Ignatius’s column set off a chain of events that culminated in a White House interview with Flynn on Jan. 24, 2017.

The retired general pleaded guilty to making false statements to the FBI in that interview. The Justice Department filed a motion Friday to drop those charges, citing a slew of new documents in Flynn’s case.

Sidney Powell, Flynn’s personal attorney, said that the sources behind the leak should be investigated for a possible conspiracy to target Flynn.

“The leak of the Kislyak transcript is a felony that should be prosecuted to the max including a conspiracy charge for all those who decided to make it happen as part of the setup and framing of General Flynn,” she told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Trey Gowdy, the former congressman, noted in an interview Sunday on Fox News that the penalty for leaking classified information such as the Flynn-Kislyak call is steeper than that for making false statements to the FBI.

“That is a 10-year felony to disseminate classified information,” Gowdy said. “Michael Flynn was the victim of that crime.”

Republicans have speculated about the leak in the three years since it appeared in Ignatius’s column.

The leak seemingly would have sprung between Jan. 4, 2017, when government officials first received a classified transcript of Flynn’s call with Kislyak, and Jan. 12, 2017.

Flynn’s phone call with Kislyak was on Dec. 29, 2016, but a transcript of the phone call was not provided to the FBI until several days later.

Ignatius’s reference to the Logan Act could be a potential clue as to the source for the Flynn information.

The Justice Department released FBI emails Thursday showing that top officials at the bureau researched the Logan Act nearly as soon as investigators learned of the Flynn-Kislyak transcript.

The emails show that on Jan. 4, 2017, FBI attorney Lisa Page and deputy counterintelligence chief Peter Strzok exchanged emails regarding the Logan Act. Page forwarded one email on the topic to James Baker, who served as FBI general counsel. She also sent an email to an address that appears to belong to McCabe, the documents show.



Lisa Page email to Peter Strzok related to Logan Act, Jan. 4, 2017.
Flynn’s call with Kislyak breathed new life into the FBI’s investigation of Flynn. The FBI’s Washington Field Office on Jan. 4, 2017, recommended that an open counterintelligence investigation of Flynn be closed due to lack of evidence that he was a Russian agent. But after the FBI received the Flynn-Kislyak transcript, Strzok intervened to keep the investigation open.

James Comey, who then served as FBI director, was aware of the Flynn call. He told the House Intelligence Committee on March 2, 2017, that he briefed James Clapper on the Flynn information. He testified that Clapper briefed President Barack Obama about the contents of the transcript.

Transcripts from the House Intelligence Committee released on Thursday show how the intelligence on the Flynn-Kislyak transcript spread through the Obama administration.

Several Obama White House and administration officials denied being the source of the Flynn leak during their House Intelligence Committee interviews.

Ben Rhodes, a senior Obama adviser, Susan Rice, the national security adviser for Obama and Samantha Power, the ambassador to the United Nations, all denied being the source for the story. Clapper said he “didn’t leak anything” and didn’t know who did.

Justice Department officials Loretta Lynch, Sally Yates and Mary McCord denied being behind the leak.

McCord, who served as assistant attorney general for national security, said that she and Justice Department officials she met with a day after Ignatius’s story said they “were all pretty shocked” to see the Flynn information.

McCord told the FBI in an interview that she first heard of the Logan Act in relation to the Flynn case from Bob Litt, who then served as general counsel of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.

Litt told the DCNF that he was not the source of the leak and that he brought up the Logan Act on his own.

“I’ve never spoken to David Ignatius about anything connected with Flynn or the Russia investigation,” Litt told the DCNF.

“I identified the Logan Act issue on my own. I may or may not have mentioned it to others at ODNI — no recollection either way — but I know I spoke about it to people at DOJ and FBI as it was their issue not ODNI’s.”

Yates testified that she learned of the Flynn-Kislyak phone call on Jan. 5, 2017, following a meeting in the Oval Office. She said that Obama told her and Comey that he was aware of the information about Flynn. Comey then raised the issue of the Logan Act with Yates.

“Yates recalled Comey mentioning the Logan Act, but can’t recall if he specified there was an ‘investigation.’ Comey did not talk about prosecution in the meeting,” reads an FBI summary of an interview with Yates.

Yates told the FBI that McCord and George Toscas, a deputy assistant attorney general in the national security division, had been briefed on the Flynn information by the FBI.

Congressional investigators are still interested in finding out who leaked the Flynn information to WaPo.

“We’re getting a starkly different view of what the FBI and DOJ was up to as the curtain is being pulled back, and more transparency is still needed,” one Senate aide told the DCNF.

“If the government pursued leakers of classified information with half as much spirit as it put into taking down Flynn, the public would be subjected to far less spin at the expense of national security,” added the aide, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to speak publicly.

A 2018 interview that resurfaced over the weekend suggests that Ignatius might not have been the original recipient at WaPo of the leak. Adam Entous, a national security reporter who worked at the newspaper, said at an event in 2018 that he heard “whispers” of the Flynn-Kislyak phone call, and discussed it as a possible news story during meetings at the publication.

[soonernvolved]