ROGUE FBI ATTEMPTED COUP…“Devastating”…”Falsifications of Evidence”….”Screwed Up At Every Level”…”Doctoring of Evidence”…”Literally Inexplicable”…”Terrible Judgement”…
Ahead of this morning’s Senate Judiciary hearing on the IG report, here’s what the cable news chyrons haven’t been telling you: The DOJ Inspector General’s report confirms that the FBI falsified evidence and lied to the FISA court in order to spy on the Trump campaign, while at the same time the FBI buried real evidence that exposed the Clinton-funded fake Steele Dossier and undermined the Russia Collusion Hoax.
We’ll learn more this morning. But don’t just take our word for it.
- “The report is devastatingabout the FBI’s court-ordered surveillance of a Trump campaign aide… All told, the report cites 17 serious errors of fact and omissions in the Page surveillance warrant. … Not too long ago this was something that concerned Democrats… Now Democrats act as a firewall for that surveillance state…In 2018, [Adam] Schiff could have acknowledged the FBI’s errors in the Page warrant and sought the kinds of reforms that Horowitz recommends in 2019. Instead, Schiff decided to accuse his Republican colleagues of misleading the public about the Page warrant. Psychologists have a term for this: They call it ‘projection.’”
- “Horowitz describes at great length an FBI whose “serious” procedural problems and omissions of “significant information” in pursuit of surveillance authority all fell in the direction of expanding the unprecedented investigation of a presidential candidate(later, a president)…As a result, a “well-developed conspiracy” theory based on a report that Comey described as “salacious and unverified material that a responsible journalist wouldn’t report without corroborating,” became the driving news story in a superpower nation for two years.“
- “Despite this shockingly damning report, much of the media is reporting only that Horowitz did not find it unreasonable to start the investigation, and ignoring a litany of false representations and falsifications of evidence to keep the secret investigation going.”
Washington Examiner’s Byron York:
- “Still, the dossier’s tales were taken seriously by officials in the highest ranks of the FBI — then-director James Comey and top deputy Andrew McCabe. In January 2017, Comey briefed President-elect Trump on the dossier’s most sensational allegations. The briefing provided a hook for some news organizations to tell the public of the dossier’s existence, and then, days later, publish the entire document. The reporting did terrible damage to a new president as he took office. And now, the Horowitz report definitively shows that it was all garbage.”
Wall Street Journal’s William McGurn:
- “So another Comey tweet demanding yet another apology is entirely likely. And it points to thelow bar Mr. Comey has now set for America’s most prestigious law enforcement agency: Unless the conduct is criminal, anything goes.In practice this means overlooking a great deal of ugly behavior.”
- “…the relevant authorities approved an error-ridden surveillance applicationgrounded in little more than rumor and hearsay from a ‘friendly foreign government’ and some hastily digested material from a former foreign intelligence official paid by a rival campaign. This is apparently all the law requires for the FBI to take a hand in American presidential elections. This is incompetence on an almost indescribable scale.”
- “In spite of the triumphant football spiking from highly political former law enforcement and intelligence officials who have done significant damage to their institutions through partisan bias, poor judgment and misconduct, high-stakes and weird dishonesty and galling hubris, the IG report actually contains loads of damning information about the manner in which the Russia investigation was carried out.“
- “IG found some FBI actions literally inexplicable and did not rule out political motives.“
New York Post’s Michael Goodwin:
- “Horowitz confirmed that the Christopher Steele dossier financed by Hillary Clinton was essential to getting the warrants, even though many in the FBI knew Steele’s information was disputed by someone he identified as a source. If the secret FISA court judges had had the information, it’s probable Page never would have been spied on.”
Wall Street Journal’s Kimberly Strassel:
- “IG report says dossier played “central and essential role” in getting FISA warrants.Schiff had access to same documents as Nunes, yet chose to misinform the public. This is the guy who just ran impeachment proceedings.”
- “The FBI must also adopt higher standards for investigations involving constitutionally protected sensitive activities, such as political campaigns.”
- “Schiff, a California Democrat, downplayed the FBI’s use of information from former British spy Christopher Steele in applications for surveillance warrants against former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page… asserted that the FBI did not omit any key details about Steele from the warrant applications and that investigators went to great lengths to verify the dossier.The Justice Department inspector general’s report contradicted Schiff’s defense. It listed 17 significant omissions and errors that the FBI made in the Carter Page surveillance warrants,including derogatory information about Steele and at least one of his sources.”
Wall Street Journal Editorial Board:
- “The press corps is portraying Monday’s report by Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz as absolution for the Federal Bureau of Investigation, but don’t believe it. The report relates a trail of terrible judgment and violations of process that should shock Americans who thought better of their premier law-enforcement agency.”
- “These are alarming failures. They undercut the government’s position that FISA courts are a sufficient guardian of Americans’ civil liberties, and that the FBI is capable of responsibly exercising the vast powers granted to it. No one should feel confident that a court would block the FBI from engaging in surveillance, even if the information was flawed or faulty.”
The Federalist’s Mollie Hemingway:
- “Horowitz found that FBI and DOJ officials did in fact omit critical material information from the FISA warrant, including several items exculpatory to Page. Material facts were not just omitted but willfully hidden through doctoring of evidence.”
📺 Fox News’ Brit Hume | “You know, this is not a failure at some low level of the FBI where a few things were not properly done or so forth. This was up and down the chain of command.” (Watch)
📺 NBC’s Pete Williams | “What this is, is the FBI basically repeatedly screwed up at every level, failing to pay enough attention to potential problems with Steele, failing to tell the Justice Department. And it says at one point that the FBI decided to seek this FISA warrant even at the risk of being criticized for doing it later…” (Watch)
📺 CNN’s Jake Tapper | “The report of course also outlines some very significant errors made by FBI officials.” (Watch)