John Durham concludes FBI should NOT have investigated Trump

[DaisyDay]

And yet, Durham said they did not have enough evidence at the time to start an investigation.

And yet, Durham did say that they had enough to begin a preliminary investigation AND he recommended NO changes that had not already been made.

 

[childeye 2]

And yet, Durham said they did not have enough evidence at the time to start an investigation.

You're probably referring to where Durham says:
neither U.S. law enforcement nor the Intelligence Community appears to have possessed any actual evidence of collusion in their holdings at the commencement of the Crossfire Hurricane investigation,” Durham said in his report.

For what it's worth, I agree with Durham's above statement in bold. But I do not agree with this mischaracterization: Durham said they did not have enough evidence at the time to start an investigation. Notice that Durham's statement does not make any such determination and here's why.

The FBI doesn't need any evidence of collusion to open an investigation into a national security threat. As a national security threat, the FBI were obligated to investigate whether any Trump campaign associates were aware of Russian activities to interfere in the election in early May. Because the fact that a friendly foreign government said that in early May Papadopoulos had suggested that Russia would help Trump by releasing information damaging to Hillary constitutes a legitimate threat to National security.

The standard for opening a full investigation is "an articulable factual basis for the investigation that reasonably indicates that ... [a]n activity constituting a federal crime or a threat to the national security ... is or may be occurring ... and the investigation may obtain information relating to the activity.''

 

[Always in His Presence]

You're probably referring to where Durham says:
neither U.S. law enforcement nor the Intelligence Community appears to have possessed any actual evidence of collusion in their holdings at the commencement of the Crossfire Hurricane investigation,” Durham said in his report.

For what it's worth, I agree with Durham's above statement in bold. But I do not agree with this mischaracterization: Durham said they did not have enough evidence at the time to start an investigation. Notice that Durham's statement does not make any such determination and here's why.

What does appearing to not have any evidence mean?

 

[RocksInMyHead]

What does appearing to not have any evidence mean?

He said that they didn't have any evidence of collusion. As @childeye 2 pointed out, evidence of collusion was not needed in order to open an investigation:

The FBI doesn't need any evidence of collusion to open an investigation into a national security threat. As a national security threat, the FBI were obligated to investigate whether any Trump campaign associates were aware of Russian activities to interfere in the election in early May. Because the fact that a friendly foreign government said that in early May Papadopoulos had suggested that Russia would help Trump by releasing information damaging to Hillary constitutes a legitimate threat to National security.

The standard for opening a full investigation is "an articulable factual basis for the investigation that reasonably indicates that ... [a]n activity constituting a federal crime or a threat to the national security ... is or may be occurring ... and the investigation may obtain information relating to the activity.''

 

[KCfromNC]

And yet, Durham said they did not have enough evidence at the time to start an investigation.

Did he?

Kinda a strange opinion, given the dozens of convictions.

 

[durangodawood]

And yet, Durham did say that they had enough to begin a preliminary investigation AND he recommended NO changes that had not already been made.

Im realizing you can point this out a thousand times but it will not penetrate the cone of anti reality spell.

 

[rjs330]

None of those convictions ha

Did he?

Kinda a strange opinion, given the dozens of convictions

Which of those people were convicted of colluding with Russia to interfer with the election?

 

[stevil]

And yet, Durham did say that they had enough to begin a preliminary investigation AND he recommended NO changes that had not already been made.

It seems well worth the 4 years investigation, almost twice the duration of the Russian Special Council, to just basically say "I investigated and there is no there there"

 

[Always in His Presence]

He said that they didn't have any evidence of collusion. As @childeye 2 pointed out, evidence of collusion was not needed in order to open an investigation:

He also did not say it was a national security threat. No matter how they try to justify their actions. It was well outside of standards and practices

And now they got caught.

 

[childeye 2]

The Steele Dossier was used to acquire a FISA warrant. This extremely intrusive tech allows the FBI to pretty much monitor any sort of digital footprint you have and definitely shouldn't be based on a dossier that the FBI knew was ...

1. False.
2. Cooked up by Hillary's campaign.

To do so is essentially a crime, a unnecessary overreach that amounts to abuse of authority. I doubt Trump wants to go after Mueller, or just some FBI agent, or even Barr....there's no money in it. Still, this lying about the justification for the warrant is indeed a crime. It seems unlikely anyone will really pay for it.

I'm not keen on using the dossier either, but it wasn't all false concerning Carter Page, and it wasn't cooked up by Hillary, which is why it's called the Steele dossier. The FISA application made note that it was campaign information.

That was released later. Quite possibly also bogus. However, to know that....you'd really need to even make an attempt to corroborate it.

You're probably alluding to the Russian intel. Obviously, Trump didn't have a time machine and even if he did, that intel didn't imply the DNC hacked itself.

So when a newspaper says "sources close to the investigation" and the investigation is being done by the FBI....who do you think they're talking about? Witnesses? People potentially facing prosecution? Or the FBI??

If a newspaper said, "sources close to the investigation" and the investigation was being done by the FBI I honestly wouldn't even try to read into it who the sources are. I'm only interested in whether the information being reported is true or not.

No...it just takes a brain and full consideration of the possibilities.

Like I said, this is about reality, not possibilities. My brain knows that it's not possible that both Russia and the DNC hacked the DNC at the same time.

The Trump campaign was told that. They didn't know it.

The Trump campaign is who told us that they met with the Russians at Trump Tower to get dirt on Hillary.

And that information can be taken on its face. Or it could be that these aren't Russian contacts but rather FBI or CIA agents looking to frame the campaign. They could be paid agents who are working for HRC to pass bad info to the Trump campaign and once he uses it....expose him for collusion and treason and election tampering and anything else possible.

The Russian government representatives confirmed they were there. Don junior and Senior, and the Russians all agree it took place.

If you are really so unable to actually consider how tricky that sort of situation is....you don't have any idea what you're talking about and honestly, should quit replying.

It's an imaginary situation, and I know the difference between reality and fantasy.

It takes someone astonishingly dumb or biased to not be able to consider the full range of possibilities if someone in your campaign is approached by a total stranger offering Russian assistance in winning the election for president of the United States and all you know is they claim to be Russian and have intel...

The Trump campaign knew these people. Trump worked with this guy when he did his beauty pageant in Moscow. They were not strangers.

Who could this stranger be?

If you didn't realize the top 3 suspects include....
1. Actual Russians, could be out for themselves (blackmail) could be working for Putin.
2. FBI and CIA or any other such intel/law enforcement arms of the federal government who may be highly biased.
3. HRC, who is currently under investigation (or formerly) and is trying to throw dirt on you using her career of contacts and supporters in the government.

So that's why, despite what you claim....I don't know what they thought or knew.

Well, I know the email came from Ron Goldstone who Don junior knew, because his name is on the email exchanges, and he set up the meeting and he even said so to Mueller. One of the Russian government representatives was Natalia Veselnitskaya, and she acknowledged being there also, and she also met with Mueller.

He admitted to being contacted.

No, both Don junior and Don senior admitted the meeting with the Russians happened at Trump Tower and Don knew they were Russian government representatives.

Not really. I'm just a little smarter than some folks you speak to on here.

Hopefully you're smart enough to know the difference between deductive and inductive reasoning and the difference between theorizing the possibilities and eliminating the possibilities, and subsequently discerning reality from what is notional.

Well I know they tried to squeeze Papadopoulos. If he eventually tells you the exact thing you want him to after threatening to charge him with crimes he'll never leave federal prison for....despite all attempts to corroborate the info....you might at least consider that they were blind to their own biases.

I think eventually they did try to squeeze Papadopoulos to get him to say what he knows. That alone discounts that the FBI were motivated by a bias.

You're not doing a great job of that.

When people say things like this, they should also say why. Otherwise, it's not helpful. For all we know, we still might be mistaken and just don't realize it.

You really do. If you're facing crimes related to presidential election interference and the rest of your life behind bars....you might agree to say whatever they want you to if that gets your charges busted down to lying to the FBI. It's not like the FBI has to give you your lawyer. They can dig up some old number of his that no longer works, call up, tell you he was busy, and offer you a dumb public defender more willing to help the FBI than his client.

That why you really want to read those transcripts....like Durham did.

When you say Papadopoulos might agree to say whatever they want, it's based on a premise that the FBI doesn't care what is true. You are therefore projecting a bias against the FBI and are not thinking objectively.

Obviously. I haven't read his book though....nor do I think he's going to throw criminal accusations at the FBI he cannot prove.

Papadopoulos expressed that he felt was being worked, he also indicated he doesn't know by who and he claims he doesn't understand why. I draw that inference from the interviews I've seen with him and cross referenced with congressional testimony he has given.

I don't. Unfortunately, some of these small intel analysts are former CIA and some are current CIA cutouts. If I can look at their entire career from college to today, I'd probably trust them if they don't have any unexplained periods of time they didn't work.

I can trust Crowd Strikes forensics as much as I can trust whoever prepares the hamburger I eat.

I probably would have said the same. Unfortunately, a guy who wrote a letter throwing dirt on a particular laptop that later turned out to be completely legit has his own small business that he hires a lot of former associates who also signed that letter....for the expressed purpose of helping the Biden campaign.

I'll give you one guess on what that letter writer's name is, what his business does, and where he used to work (hint, despite writing articles and contributing to the WaPo, that's not the employer I'm talking about).

Once you figure out, you'll probably understand why I have a little less confidence than yourself.

Like I said, I'm convinced by the factual order of events that preceded and followed the meeting at Trump Tower.

1. That's exactly why the FBI should have done this by the books and held multiple independent unbiased reviews of the intel.
2. Since they didn't do #1 and in fact, violated policy and procedures in likely multiple instances, they probably should be gutted and rebuilt.

Consider that if the FBI goes to Facebook, Twitter, or tries to circulate a letter to any news organization with any integrity, and claim Russian disinformation....who would be dumb enough to believe them? I'd tell the agent to provide the full extent of evidence and I don't care if it's confidential. Then he's going to present it to me....and I'm recording the whole meeting. If he's not prepared to lose his job and do hard time....he won't be showing up again.

1. You're mistaken here for two reasons. The first is that the FBI went by the book in opening the investigation, which required "an articulable factual basis for the investigation that reasonably indicates that ... [a]n activity constituting a federal crime or a threat to the national security ... is or may be occurring ... and the investigation may obtain information relating to the activity.''

The second is that the "significant review" Durham is speaking about is a review of all U.S. intelligence databases on the subject of Trump being involved with Russian leadership officials...

Durham than goes on to say that had they performed this "significant review of databases" they would have found the Intelligence databases contained no information about Trump being involved with Russian leadership officials, acknowledging that such a review would have been a complete waste of time.

See the first part of this reply and it's relation to your above statement.

The FISA warrant....based on intel that wasn't corroborated and in fact, was extremely doubtful since they knew it came from HRC, represents a crime. Or to put it another way....because he was biased, Strzok acted like an idiot and kicked off a full investigation that broke a lot of policies and was a comedy of errors. I don't know if Strzok was also the brainless moron who had applied for the FISA warrant but if he was....his biased eventually led to a crime. You can't lie on those applications. If he didn't get it approved on basically nothing....then he lied. If he included the fact that all the intel was highly suspicious and extremely unreliable, and still got the warrant, then there's a problem in the application process.

Either way, I don't think we need to wonder about the possibility of the FBI being entirely corrupted. They're out there stalling IRS investigators while hiding evidence for Biden....who they know is corrupt. They're holding the evidence for that.

Strzok didn't kick off the investigation, he was told to do so by department senior, and all others in FBI leadership positions were unanimous in their approval.

The altering of a document was wrong, but all I can glean is that for some reason Clinesmith or others didn't want it known that Carter Page was a source. There also was information in the Steele dossier about Page that was true, and I don't know if Page was working for the CIA.

As pertains to the claims that the FBI are withholding evidence, or stalling IRS investigators, I don't know how much of that is true. Some people are saying that it's the same Guiliani report from pro-Russian oligarchs in Ukrainian..

I don't have the warrant. I can't imagine a judge comfortable with signing one on basically nothing. It is evidence of misconduct....but whether it violates only policy (because no laws are passed regarding these warrants) or whether it violates the law, idk. I'd assume it violates some law, even without a law.

Going through someone's entire digital footprint....and monitoring their digital activity, definitely violates this little thing called the 4th amendment if they have no reason to suspect a crime. They had no reason to suspect a crime. So I'm going to guess there's a fourth amendment violation there. That's less of an example of "putting their finger on the scale" and more of a reason to gut the agency of basically everyone who has over 5 years. They're incompetent with the power they have....and entirely corrupt.

The indictment of Clinesmith is accessible to the public. You can always look at that.

Huh? They got the warrant or one of the warrant extensions based on uncorraborated intel handed to them by Hillary's lawyer first, who lied about working for Hillary, and then by Hillary who dragged Steele in front of them second...who was being paid for the "intel".

They started the investigation because they're either too biased or too dumb to be trusted. They continued the investigation because of the hoax perpetrated by Hillary. She may not realize it was a hoax (if you're incredibly ignorant) but the dossier was paid for and passed to the FBI by her....so she perpetrated it.

It's still possible that Carter Page was an informant.

His investigation was into the investigation and whether it was handled properly. That's what he was there to prove. It's not about if Trump was exonerated or whether Hillary was guilty. It's about the FBI and their behavior. Durham did exactly as he should have and that's why it's hard to throw dirt on the report.

There's nothing in Durham's report that was not already dealt with in the IG investigation. Durham brought two cases to trial and both were about connecting Hillary to deceiving the FBI. Both cases failed in a court of law.

The bias is your own.

Now that you understand my post which you've replied to here....do I need to bother with the other two? Comey is an idiot....but at least he was honest. He should have found a lead investigator who was uninterested in the election or had a record of handling sensitive investigations without bias....if any are left. Once you find this agent, you make it abundantly clear he handles everything by the book without any goal...and engages in periodically offering up whatever he has for review.

The FBI is a garbage pile at this point.

No, you don't need to bother answering my other posts, nor this one if you prefer not to, but I do want to thank you for your robust discourse. Just please consider that it can't be said that the meeting at Trump Tower had anything to do with my bias because it's a factual event.

 

[childeye 2]

He also did not say it was a national security threat. No matter how they try to justify their actions. It was well outside of standards and practices

And now they got caught.

It doesn't matter what Durham did not say in his report. The FBI's actions were justified just by exposing the truth that Russia did interfere to help Trump and hurt Hillary, and such actions do qualify as a National security threat to our Nation's democratic process in how we choose our government's leadership.

 

[childeye 2]

What does appearing to not have any evidence mean?

It means he doesn't know for sure, or "as far as I can tell", and he's alluding specifically to collusion.

 

[stevil]

It means he doesn't know for sure, or "as far as I can tell", and he's alluding specifically to collusion.

It's funny that Durham makes any comments at all regarding collusion, because in the hearing, he made out that he never investigated such things, tried to make out he didn't even know about some pretty basic stuff, I'd be super embarrassed if I were Durham.
And if I were people that were handing over the funds to Durham's investigation, I'd be following up on what he was doing over the 4 years and billing for.

 

[KCfromNC]

None of those convictions ha


Which of those people were convicted of colluding with Russia to interfer with the election?

If the convictions were actually illegitmate as the post is implying, there wouldn't be a need for hyper-specific leading questions such as these.

 

[childeye 2]

It's funny that Durham makes any comments at all regarding collusion, because in the hearing, he made out that he never investigated such things, tried to make out he didn't even know about some pretty basic stuff, I'd be super embarrassed if I were Durham.
And if I were people that were handing over the funds to Durham's investigation, I'd be following up on what he was doing over the 4 years and billing for.

Durham doesn't seem to know much about the actual collusion that we all witnessed. It's hard to believe he didn't know Trump was reading the WikiLeaks releases at his rallies, while telling supporters Russian interference is a hoax invented by the wicked Democrats and the fake news media. Nor did Durham seem to want to recognize Schiff's showing the connection between what paragraph 5 was forecasting and the factual events that followed.

I would point out that there is no allegation of collusion in paragraph 5 against the Trump team, because it specifically states it was, "...unclear how Mr. Trump's team reacted to the offer", which is referring to the suggestion from Russia that they could help Trump to hurt Hillary.

The only allegation that is being made in paragraph 5 is against Russia, who wants to interfere to help Trump and hurt Hillary.

So, why does Durham believe that searching all the intelligence databases for information about "Trump being involved with Russian leadership officials" would somehow verify, or corroborate, or even evaluate the raw information from the Australians, when they presented no such allegations?

The semantics show that Durham portrays the raw information as unverified based on his own personal bias that opening a full investigation was indicative of the FBI being politically motivated.

 

[rjs330]

If the convictions were actually illegitmate as the post is implying, there wouldn't be a need for hyper-specific leading questions such as these.

Which of the convictions were for colluding. Just cause they charg d someone with some stuff doesn't make the initial investigation legitimate. If I I vestigat d you for murder and I had no legitimate reason for doing so, but in the process arrested your neighbor for a garbage violation while interviewing him doesn't mean my initial investigation was legit.

 

[rjs330]

This is so laughable. No charges were ever filed. Nothing was ever found and Durham found nothing and said it shouldn't have happened. Mueller never claimed it happened. Your hatred and bias is clouding your judgement. The only one THAT collided with Russia was Clinton and we actually have proof of that thought the dossier.

 

[childeye 2]

Which of the convictions were for colluding. Just cause they charg d someone with some stuff doesn't make the initial investigation legitimate. If I I vestigat d you for murder and I had no legitimate reason for doing so, but in the process arrested your neighbor for a garbage violation while interviewing him doesn't mean my initial investigation was legit.

Here's the problem with what you're asking. Mueller specifically writes: “Collusion is not a specific offense or theory of liability found in the United States Code, nor is it a term of art in federal criminal law.”

Nor were the FBI investigating collusion. The investigation was to determine (1) if the Trump campaign was witting/aware of Russian activities to interfere in the election, and/or (2) if associates of the campaign were coordinating with Russian activities.

From the Durham report:
"to determine whether individual(s) associated with the Trump campaign [were] witting of and/or coordinating activities with the Government of Russia. "

As pertains to finding evidence of coordinating, Roger Stone would not reveal who his contact with WikiLeaks was, and he eventually was charged with obstruction, and witness tampering. And there was also Manafort, who was sending campaign internal polling data to his contact Kilimnik, but that trail of evidence ended because Kilimnik would not leave Russia to cooperate with Mueller's investigation. I think Kilimnik was charged with obstruction, but I could be wrong. Hence Mueller said he was unable to establish that the campaign coordinated with Russia. Manafort was charged with obstruction, conspiracy to launder money, tax fraud, and failing to register to represent foreign interests.

 

[stevil]

This is so laughable. No charges were ever filed. Nothing was ever found and Durham found nothing and said it shouldn't have happened. Mueller never claimed it happened. Your hatred and bias is clouding your judgement. The only one THAT collided with Russia was Clinton and we actually have proof of that thought the dossier.

How do you explain Paul Manafort sharing polling data with the Russians?
How do you explain the Trump tower meeting with the Russians?

 

[childeye 2]

This is so laughable. No charges were ever filed. Nothing was ever found and Durham found nothing and said it shouldn't have happened. Mueller never claimed it happened. Your hatred and bias is clouding your judgement. The only one THAT collided with Russia was Clinton and we actually have proof of that thought the dossier.

Everything you said above is inaccurate.
Durham didn't ever investigate if there was collusion or coordination.
Durham never said it shouldn't have happened as you claim above.
Durham indicates in his report that he felt the FBI should have first had a preliminary investigation.
Durham never said that Hillary compiled the Steele dossier or colluded with Russia.
Mueller produced 34 indictments.

Mueller report:
“Although the investigation established that the Russian government perceived it would benefit from a Trump presidency and worked to secure that outcome, and that the [Trump] Campaign expected it would benefit electorally from information stolen and released through Russian efforts, the investigation did not establish that members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities.”

“we understood coordination to require an agreement—tacit or express—between the Trump Campaign and the Russian government on election interference. That requires more than the two parties taking actions that were informed by or responsive to the other’s actions or interests.”

“While the investigation identified numerous links between individuals with ties to the Russian government and individuals associated with the Trump Campaign, the evidence was not sufficient to support criminal charges. Among other things, the evidence was not sufficient to charge any Campaign official as an unregistered foreign agent of the Russian government or other Russian principal. And our evidence about the June 9, 2016 meeting and Wikileaks’s releases of hacked materials was not sufficient to charge that any member of the Trump Campaign conspired with representatives of the Russian government to interfere in the 2016 election.”

Further, the Office learned that some of the individuals we interviewed or whose conduct we investigated — including some associated with the Trump Campaign — deleted relevant communications or communicated during the relevant period using applications that feature encryption or that do not provide for long-term retention of data or communications records. In such cases, the Office was not able to corroborate witness statements through comparison to contemporaneous communications or fully question witnesses about statements that appeared inconsistent with other known facts.

Accordingly, while this report embodies factual and legal determinations that the Office believes to be accurate and complete to the greatest extent possible, given these identified gaps, the Office cannot rule out the possibility that the unavailable information would shed additional light on (or cast in a new light) the events described in the report.