‘This information was redacted until now for one single reason—to hide the fact that false allegations from the Steele dossier were included in Mueller’s scoping memo…’
(Ben Sellers, Liberty Headlines) Once a strong advocate for appointing special counsel Robert Mueller to investigate claims of Russian collusion involving President Donald Trump, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-SC, said that the newly unredacted release of a scope memo showed the “legal foundation for Mueller’s appointment is crumbling.”
The Justice Department released the document Wednesday at Graham’s request.
In it, former Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who was overseeing the Russia probe following then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions‘s recusal, outlined the specific authority that Mueller’s office had to investigate five individuals connected with the Trump campaign.
“So now we know that the scope of the investigation was to look at Carter Page, Flynn, Papadopoulos and Manafort as to whether or not they were working with the Russians. Now, this is in August of 2017,” Graham said during an appearance on Sean Hannity‘s Fox News show, according to Breitbart.
The fifth, still-redacted individual is presumed to be Trump, himself, given the focus of the Mueller Report, which was released a year ago following nearly two years of investigating, on top of the FBI’s prior “Crossfire Hurricane” operation.
In hindsight, Graham said, Mueller’s costly and politically divisive probe was entirely unwarranted based on what the FBI and Justice Department already knew at the time.
Many conservative journalists who have helped to untangle the web of lies and cover-ups agreed with Graham that the developing picture showed it was a sham.
Previously declassified files have since revealed that the FBI already should have ruled out some of the charges, which were based on false pretenses and misinformation, while the remaining considerations failed to justify a massive criminal probe.
This was a joke from day 1. When Rosenstein wrote this memo Mueller already knew none of these people “Colluded”
— Undercover Huber (@JohnWHuber) May 6, 2020
A Flimsy Foundation
As with much of the FBI case, which was used to justify eavesdropping on Trump staffers using the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, the subsequent Mueller probe leaned heavily on the unverified—and largely debunked—information contained in the Democrat-funded Steele Dossier.
Recent documents revealed that the dossier itself was based in a Russian disinformation campaign—a fact which corrupt FBI agents chose to ignore and conceal.
“In January 2017, the sub-source disavowed the dossier,” Graham said. “And without the dossier, there is no warrant. So they knew that the Carter Page thing was a fraud.”
More recently, a new investigation into Flynn’s charges show that FBI agents conspired to frame him, using as its basis the questionable claims that Flynn violated the antiquated Logan Act.
This is its own bloody outrage as the #FBI‘s own files showed he was not a foreign agent, they knew he was working with #DIA on all foreign contacts, @FBI agents briefed all he was honest.#FBI #SCO #DOJ lies@realDonaldTrump @GenFlynn@BarbaraRedgate #ExonerateFlynnNow #Flynn pic.twitter.com/uOMKtjW3C5
— Sidney Powell ??⭐⭐⭐ (@SidneyPowell1) May 6, 2020
The law, dating from 1799 and never successfully used in prosecution, bars civilians from engaging in foreign policy and diplomacy on behalf of the U.S.
Flynn was accused on the basis of his communications with a Russian diplomat in December 2016, a month before Trump took office.
Then-President Barack Obama had expelled the Russian emissaries and threatened sanctions over the claims that they interfered in the 2016 election.
However, since the Russians were involved in crafting the conspiracy theories promoted by the Steele Dossier, it was the Obama FBI that was, effectively, colluding with them covertly to smear the new president.
Ironically, the same Logan Act charges levied against Flynn have since been raised in relation to former Secretary of State John Kerry for interfering in Iranian diplomacy.
But Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton was among those who confirmed it provided a flimsy foundation for what followed with the Mueller probe.
Obama’s “Logan Act” predicate for the @GenFlynn investigation is a knowing fraud and an attack on the constitutional powers of @RealDonaldTrump to conduct foreign policy. A pardon is mandated in these circumstances to protect the Constitution and the presidency. https://t.co/zA7BZKzCwS
— Tom Fitton (@TomFitton) May 6, 2020
Although the FBI aimed to close the Flynn case following a highly irregular White House interview in January 2017, corrupt counterintelligence agent Peter Strzok insisted on keeping it open, with his justification being that people on the “7th floor”—aka FBI leadership—were involved, Fox News reported.
The Other Targets
Prior to the recent breaks in Flynn’s case, former Trump adviser George Papadopoulos has disclosed in February that the FBI also attempted to set him up.
In his recently published exposé, titled Deep State Target, Papadopoulos noted that the U.S. intelligence apparatus used foreign assets like Maltese professor Joseph Mifsud to plant misinformation linked to Russia, which it then hoped Papadopoulos would spread virally throughout the Trump campaign.
As with Flynn’s case, the prosecutors stand accused of leaving out exculpatory information in his case.
“We’ve got Papadopoulos on record denying working with the Russians, saying to do so would be treason,” said Graham during his Hannity appearance. “So the foundation for the Mueller investigation is crumbling.”
Papadopoulos, who served a two-week sentence for allegedly lying to the FBI, is now running for Congress to fill the seat of disgraced “throuple” Rep. Katie Hill, D-Calif.
As part of an effort to get him to flip on the president, Manafort—who served briefly as Trump’s campaign chief—ultimately was indicted by the Mueller probe for entirely unrelated process crimes liked to tax evasion. He is currently serving a seven-year sentence.
Page—the primary target of FBI spying—was eventually cleared by the Mueller probe, which found no evidence that he colluded with Russia.
Preparing for Fallout
The fallout has left many of the co-conspirators scurrying as Justice Department special prosecutor John Durham presses forward with a criminal probe.
Top FBI brass of the Obama era are implicated—among them former Director James Comey, Deputy Director Andrew McCabe and counterespionage chief Bill Priestap.
In addition, the disclosures confirm long-held assumptions that current House Intelligence Committee Chair Adam Schiff, D-Calif., knowingly lied to the public on multiple occasions by claiming “direct evidence” of collusion.
Top Trump administration officials are now preparing to release transcripts from a GOP-led House Intelligence probe, despite Schiff’s efforts to block them.
“Schiff is in panic mode,” a senior administration official reportedly told Fox News.
The disclosures may also raise further questions about Rosenstein—and about Mueller. With new assertions that they violated DOJ regulations outlining the appointment of a special prosecutor, some speculate that the underlying motive of the former FBI director’s involvement was to conduct his own counterintelligence investigation.
Schiff’s Intelligence Committee counterpart, ranking minority member Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., said that many of those now facing charges are starting to jump ship as the plot unravels.
It is believed that former FBI Counsel James Baker is among the key witnesses now cooperating with Durham’s probe.
Nunes put the entire scheme into simple context as an elaborate—and expensive—anti-Trump smear campaign, conceived, funded and orchestrated by the president’s political rivals.
“This information was redacted until now for one single reason—to hide the fact that false allegations from the Steele dossier were included in Mueller’s scoping memo,” Nunes told Just the News.
“In other words, a bunch of lies paid for by the Democrats were used to engineer the appointment of a Special Counsel to drag the Trump administration through the mud for years,” he said. “The Russia collusion hoax was a disgrace, and we can’t let anything like it ever be repeated.”