The Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee had their rebuttal memo released today after it was redacted to remove the portions that the FBI felt disclosed intelligence sources and methods. You can read the memo itself, but it has turned out to be a big dud. Here's the key points:
1. The main subject of both the original Republican memo and the Democrat memo is the application made by the FBI and DOJ to the FISA court for a warrant to surveil Carter Page. The Republican memo says that the application for the warrant relied heavily on the Trump Dossier, a collection of phony claims put together by Christopher Steele from Russian sources. Steele was paid for this work by Fusion GPS which in turn was ultimately hired by the DNC and the Clinton campaign. The Democrats don't try to contest that the Trump Dossier was the product of work funded by the Democrats and the Clinton campaign. The Republican memo says that Andrew McCabe, the deputy director of the FBI at the time testified that no application for the FISA warrant would have been submitted but for the Trump Dossier. The Democrat memo doesn't contest this either.
2. The Republican memo says that in the FISA application, the court was never told that the Democrats and Clinton campaign had funded the Trump Dossier which was being used to support the application. The Democrats contest this by saying that the court was told of a "possible political motivation" in connection with the compiling of the Trump Dossier. That's ridiculous. It's one thing to tell the FISA court that Hillary and her party paid to compile this pile of BS in the Trump Dossier. That would clue in the court that this was a wholly unreliable document. It's quite another thing to put in a note that the document might possibly have a political motivation. The FISA court was entitled to know that this was a political hatchet job, particularly since the FBI and DOJ personnel knew this to be the case.
3. The Democrats also try to deflect attention from the points made by the Republican memo by arguing about what gave rise to the investigation in the first place. They say that the investigation predated the Trump Dossier and actually was the result of something that George Papadopoulos allegedly said in a bar one evening in London. Of course, this is a red herring. The issue raised by the Republicans was misuse of the FISA process, not what gave rise to the investigation in the first place. The FISA application submitted the Trump Dossier to the court in support of obtaining a warrant to spy on an American citizen and his contacts with the Trump campaign. It's not enough to say that there was an investigation prior to the creation of that bogus document, especially since the FBI and DOJ didn't tell the FISA court that they knew this was a bogus, political hatchet job.
4. The Democrats also try to make the point that surveillance of Carter Page was necessary and would have happened even without the Trump Dossier. Because of redactions, there's no way of knowing what other purported evidence there was of Page's supposed involvement with the Russians. The Democrats do make mention of the attempts by Russians to lure Page into helping them a few years earlier. That was told to the FISA court. The FBI and DOJ, however, did not tell the FISA court that Page himself reported these approaches by the Russians and that he cooperated with the FBI in attempts to catch the Russians involved in that approach. In other words, contrary to the point in the Democrat memo, the prior attempts by the Russians to coopt Page actually mitigated against the need to surveil him. The FISA court should have been told that.
There's more stuff in the Democrat memo, but in totality, it is not even worthy of discussion. After telling America that their memo would show that the Republican memo was wrong, incomplete and misleading, the Democrats should have produced something more. They haven't.
1. The main subject of both the original Republican memo and the Democrat memo is the application made by the FBI and DOJ to the FISA court for a warrant to surveil Carter Page. The Republican memo says that the application for the warrant relied heavily on the Trump Dossier, a collection of phony claims put together by Christopher Steele from Russian sources. Steele was paid for this work by Fusion GPS which in turn was ultimately hired by the DNC and the Clinton campaign. The Democrats don't try to contest that the Trump Dossier was the product of work funded by the Democrats and the Clinton campaign. The Republican memo says that Andrew McCabe, the deputy director of the FBI at the time testified that no application for the FISA warrant would have been submitted but for the Trump Dossier. The Democrat memo doesn't contest this either.
2. The Republican memo says that in the FISA application, the court was never told that the Democrats and Clinton campaign had funded the Trump Dossier which was being used to support the application. The Democrats contest this by saying that the court was told of a "possible political motivation" in connection with the compiling of the Trump Dossier. That's ridiculous. It's one thing to tell the FISA court that Hillary and her party paid to compile this pile of BS in the Trump Dossier. That would clue in the court that this was a wholly unreliable document. It's quite another thing to put in a note that the document might possibly have a political motivation. The FISA court was entitled to know that this was a political hatchet job, particularly since the FBI and DOJ personnel knew this to be the case.
3. The Democrats also try to deflect attention from the points made by the Republican memo by arguing about what gave rise to the investigation in the first place. They say that the investigation predated the Trump Dossier and actually was the result of something that George Papadopoulos allegedly said in a bar one evening in London. Of course, this is a red herring. The issue raised by the Republicans was misuse of the FISA process, not what gave rise to the investigation in the first place. The FISA application submitted the Trump Dossier to the court in support of obtaining a warrant to spy on an American citizen and his contacts with the Trump campaign. It's not enough to say that there was an investigation prior to the creation of that bogus document, especially since the FBI and DOJ didn't tell the FISA court that they knew this was a bogus, political hatchet job.
4. The Democrats also try to make the point that surveillance of Carter Page was necessary and would have happened even without the Trump Dossier. Because of redactions, there's no way of knowing what other purported evidence there was of Page's supposed involvement with the Russians. The Democrats do make mention of the attempts by Russians to lure Page into helping them a few years earlier. That was told to the FISA court. The FBI and DOJ, however, did not tell the FISA court that Page himself reported these approaches by the Russians and that he cooperated with the FBI in attempts to catch the Russians involved in that approach. In other words, contrary to the point in the Democrat memo, the prior attempts by the Russians to coopt Page actually mitigated against the need to surveil him. The FISA court should have been told that.
There's more stuff in the Democrat memo, but in totality, it is not even worthy of discussion. After telling America that their memo would show that the Republican memo was wrong, incomplete and misleading, the Democrats should have produced something more. They haven't.
No comments:
Post a Comment