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More Reason to Question the Government’s Treatment of Andrew McCabe’s Notes

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In this post, I noted that the three sets of Peter Strzok and Andrew McCabe notes to which FBI added dates (in at least one case, inaccurate dates) had had their Protective Order footers redacted, suggesting someone packaged them up for circulation (probably with two other documents shared that same day, one of which was a frivolous repackaging of Strzok’s texts with Lisa Page).

In this post, I pointed out several other irregularities with McCabe’s notes: that there’s an artifact in the left margin by one of the redactions (multiple people have said this is one or two post-it notes which left a shadow and covered up the margin) and there’s no declassification stamp.

Two more readers of the site have provided further reason to question FBI’s treatment of Andrew McCabe’s notes.

First, a tech expert separated out the objects in the PDF with the altered date, which shows what the original scan of McCabe’s notes looks like. It looks like this:

That is, the redaction that covered up where the footer would say, “SUBJECT TO PROTECTIVE ORDER,” was in the first scan of the document, even though the footer would be applied later (the Bates stamp and the Protective Order footer show up as metadata in the PDF).

Meanwhile, Cannonfire did some more toying with the document in PhotoShop, and shows that the Bates stamp footer and the redaction are of a different quality than everything else on the page.

It makes sense that the Bates stamp footer is–those are added at a later stage to the document along with the Protective Order stamp.

But for this document to have been produced in this way, the Protective Order stamp would have had to have been redacted out at a later date.

Both of those details suggest that the footer was redacted at a later date.

More Irregularities with the Andrew McCabe Notes: Bleg for Graphic Design Analysis

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The Andrew McCabe notes just certified on Monday as a regular FBI document have at least four and, I think, more irregularities. This kind of graphic analysis is not my forté, so I’m going to just post what I think the irregularities are, and invite some people who are better at this to test my hypotheses.

Here’s an annotated version of the McCabe notes (here’s the original). Below, I’ll describe what I think I’m seeing.

A: The left-hand rule of the notebook at the top of the page appears not to line up with the left-hand rule at the bottom of the page. To be sure, I’ve just sketched this up, and it’s the observation I’m the least confident in, so please check my work. [Note: This may arise from copying the notebook.] Update: a reader has convinced me I’m wrong about this — see below.

B: There’s a non-horizontal line drawn to the margin to the left of where the first big redaction begins. Below it, the horizontal page rules don’t appear for about nine lines.

C: As noted here, the footer reading, “SUBJECT TO PROTECTIVE ORDER,” has been redacted. It would be restored in the re-altered version authenticated on Monday.

D: As DOJ has now admitted, someone — and DOJ has not told Judge Emmet Sullivan what government agent it was — added a date. DOJ claimed this was done with a clear sticky with a blue tab, but there’s no sign of the blue tab. Moreover, when the document was re-altered to remove the date, that was accomplished by digitally whiting it out (not the technical term!), leaving a clean white rectangle with no rules.

E: This document has no declassification stamp. The larger redaction here, by topic, must hide notes from a prep session for the World Wide Global Threats hearing that would be held on May 11, 2017. It is, by definition, classified (indeed, that’s presumably the claimed reason for the redaction). And yet there is no declassification stamp for the document. The Peter Strzok notes released in the same batch have declassification stamps dated September 17 and 21.

This document got released after a dispute between McCabe and the FBI about whether he can access his own notes. After the Senate Judiciary Committee promised Andrew McCabe he could review his notes before testifying before the committee in early September, and after McCabe’s lawyer Michael Bromwich engaged in what he believed to be a good faith discussion about obtaining those documents on September 15, on September 16, FBI told the Committee that the request was “unmanageably voluminous;” the Committee passed that determination onto McCabe’s team. On September 18, McCabe’s lawyers worked with FBI’s OGC to narrow the request. One thing FBI lawyers were balking at, categorically, was providing McCabe’s calendars. In addition, they complained that if McCabe reviewed his own notes, he would have access to material beyond Crossfire Hurricane materials (as this page has). On September 23 — the day this document was provided to Flynn’s lawyers by DOJ, according to discovery correspondence — FBI for the first time raised a categorical objection, stating that, the FBI “has a policy of generally not providing documents to former employees and does not see a basis to make an exception to that policy under these circumstances.”

If McCabe had access to his own notes and calendar, he would be able to tell whether this document has been altered beyond the date addition. On the day DOJ sent it out, they decided that McCabe could not be provided access to any of his own notes or calendars so he could provide accurate testimony to Congress.

Update: I have a request for comment from FBI’s press office regarding the lack of a declassification stamp.

Update: FBI referred me to DOJ to ask them why FBI’s EAD certified a declassified document that lacked a declassification stamp.

Update: I have asked the Senate Judiciary Committee (which was supposed to have had McCabe testify earlier this month) for their copy of this set of McCabe notes, to see if we can make sense of the document. I am awaiting a response.

Update: A reader with expertise in the area provides these notes anonymously:

A. yes, the tilt with the line (to the left) at top left, normally would be compensated for with less visible binder rings at bottom right. (to which there is more showing) so its backwards.

B. Yes, agree. The line looks like it was hand drawn. And if you zoom in at 400% in the middle of the red box B) you can see an additional line, very faint. Whited out some way.

C. if you zoom in at 400% at the redaction box, it may have been redacted twice. There are two corners at top left, that are not lined up and same issue at lower right. If they were, it would look like one, clean cornered box.

D. the lines on each side of the date are fainter and in the same distance from each other implying that there was some kind of clear sticker put on top with a handwritten date in the center. When scanning light bounces off the sides of any clear plastic tab, mylar etc. and reflects and fades out whatever is next to it.

E. No opinion.

Other observations:

If you zoom in at 400% in between each of the 3 lines at the lower left (just above the redaction box) there are other faint lines, which make no sense.

At the 3 lines above the handwritten text “possible”, it looks like there was some handwritten text there before, the dot patterns resemble writing that was there once upon a time. Can’t prove it. I don’t have iText redaction software to see if that would show editing (it may be capable or may not), but the scanner would also have to have extra dirt on that area, and doesn’t have the same intensity of dot/dirt scatter as the rest of the white spaces on the rest of the page. Same issue under the 3-6 lines under the text “not the strongest”.

Update: A different reader, who also asks to remain anonymous, sends this screencap of the document pulled into Photoshop and darkened, which (the person explains) can show things that aren’t otherwise readily apparent. The person added a ruler which, I think, shows I’m wrong about the left margin. I’ve crossed out that observation above accordingly.

The Altered Andrew McCabe and Peter Strzok Documents Were Packaged for Circulation

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On September 23, 2020, prosecutor Jocelyn Ballantine sent five documents to Sidney Powell:

  • The altered January 5, 2017 Strzok notes
  • The second set of altered Strzok notes
  • The altered Andrew McCabe notes
  • Texts between FBI analysts
  • A new set of Strzok-Page texts, which included new Privacy Act violations

The letter Ballantine sent accompanying those documents is dated September 23, but it wasn’t loaded to the docket until September 28. Like all her discovery letters, the version of the letter uploaded to the docket informs Powell that, “These materials are covered by the Protective Order entered by the Court on February 21, 2018.”

In her letter providing realtered sets of the notes, the only change Ballantine described to the documents pertained to the removal of the sticky notes — which weren’t actually removed, but instead whited out electronically (and probably weren’t sticky notes in McCabe’s case at all).

But there was another change made to all of them: the “subject to protective order” footnote was restored to the documents.

The altered January 5, 2017 Strzok notes, without the footer:

The realtered January 5, 2017 Strzok notes, with the footer:

The second set of Strzok notes (originally altered to read March 28), without the footer:

The second set of Strzok notes, with the footer.

The altered McCabe notes, with the footer redacted out:

The realtered McCabe notes, with the footer unredacted:

Notably, there’s no declassification stamp on McCabe’s notes.

The Page-Strzok notes don’t have a protective order footer. Nor do the FBI analyst texts.

So all the documents sent to Sidney Powell on September 23 had no protective order stamp, and in the case of McCabe’s notes, they had the protective order stamp covered over.

The altered notes have all since been realtered, and rather than trying to certify the Strzok-Page texts, in today’s declaration, Ballantine just told Judge Emmet Sullivan DOJ wasn’t relying on them — no blood no foul. Presumably, there’s something fishy with the FBI analyst texts, because there’s something fishy with all of these documents.

But given the fact that the protective order footer was redacted in the McCabe notes, it cannot be accidental. These documents — the documents with the “inadvertent” alterations — also were all packaged up such that if Sidney Powell shared them (say, with the President’s campaign lawyer), Powell could claim these were somehow exempt.

Shorter DOJ: We Made Shit Up … Please Free Mike Flynn

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Congratulations to the lawyers who worked all weekend to meet Judge Emmet Sullivan’s deadline to certify all the documents (with just eight explicit caveats and then another slew built in) submitted in the Mike Flynn motion to dismiss proceeding. I doubted you could pull it off time-wise.

In your rush you seem to have provided Judge Sullivan even more evidence that nothing about this proceeding is normal. Indeed, some of this submission almost makes Sidney Powell’s submissions look tidy by comparison.

The slew of caveats

Effectively, the certification (signed by Jocelyn Ballantine, with individual declarations signed by three others, in part because there are things that Ballantine almost certainly knows are inaccurate or include material omissions), says there have been no material alterations to the documents submitted in the proceeding except for:

  1. Redactions done in the name of classification, law enforcement sensitive, or privacy that serve to hide material information pertaining to Brandon Van Grack, Bill Barnett, and the reason a third document was altered by adding a date (at a minimum)
  2. A set of texts where “irrelevant information and excess metadata” was excluded and an error introduced in the process of creating a table showing “corrected date, corrected time,” which raises far more questions about the provenance of the document
  3. The Bill Barnett interview report that DOJ had submitted to Sullivan as “a 302” is instead a “report” that is not being certified in normal fashion, in part, because DOJ is hiding redactions that withhold material information about Brandon Van Grack
  4. An NSL declaration done by Jocelyn Ballantine that may hide the existence of at least one earlier financial NSL served on Mike Flynn that WDMO didn’t ask her to summarize
  5. A new set of text messages between Peter Strzok and Lisa Page that DOJ admits they’re not relying on (but nevertheless committed an additional Privacy Act violation in releasing), which was not redacted to hide personal information
  6. Three documents submitted by Sidney Powell that DOJ won’t certify (two of which, however, are probably more accurate than what DOJ has submitted)
  7. “Unintelligible” markings in transcripts of notes where DOJ was unsuccessful at getting the author or their lawyer to conduct a last minute review over a matter of hours on a Sunday (DOJ does not specify how many of their transcripts this includes); some of these appear significant
  8. Inconsistencies on how redactions and unintelligible text were marked in transcriptions which, in some cases, is affirmatively misleading
  9. Lots of documents where the certification doesn’t list the Bates numbers, with some hilarious results
  10. Inconsistencies on whether DOJ certifies all copies of a particular document that got submitted multiple times, which in one case would raise questions about the production of these documents
  11. An admission that, for some reason, the motion to dismiss didn’t rely on the final 302 of Flynn’s January 24, 2017 interview
  12. A new inaccurate date, ironically describing a Kevin Clinesmith email
  13. A claim that both Strzok and McCabe’s lawyers have confirmed their clients’ notes were not altered, but only Strzok’s lawyer is quoted

For all of the exhibits that accompanied the motion to dismiss, DOJ uses the docket number, not the exhibit number, even though Sullivan is supposed to be ruling on that MTD that uses exhibit numbers. That’ll make it a lot harder for him to use the transcriptions, which otherwise would make it more obvious that DOJ misrepresented what some of these documents say, including their “smoking gun,” the Bill Priestap notes.

In addition, in a lot of the documents with problems (including all undated notes to which dates were added), DOJ doesn’t include Bates numbers in its certification, even though it does elsewhere. There’s good reason for this. In the case of the re-altered altered documents, those new exhibits should have new Bates stamps, but don’t. In other cases, DOJ submitted multiple versions of the same document with different Bates stamps, in others, when they resubmitted exhibits they retained the Bates stamp. That’s … not a legal process reflecting any regularity.

DOJ still pretends to have no fucking clue about documents they relied on in the motion to dismiss

Perhaps the most pathetic (and by that I mean, I would hate to be the lawyer banking my bar membership on this ploy) detail in this package is the way they try to deal with the fact they’ve made false misrepresentations about Strzok’s January 5, 2017 notes. In one place in the table of documents, they describe the date of the notes this way:

In another, they describe it — the very same notes, just repackaged so they could submit them with the wrong date — this way:

Above both transcriptions, DOJ includes the following note.

I understand why DOJ is still claiming to be unsure about the date. It’s an attempt to minimize the damage from previously providing false dates so as to avoid being punished for knowing misrepresentations in their alterations (they’re still at risk though, because they’re incorrect dates kept changing). But this will just make it very easy for Sullivan to point out that the people making this representation are therefore confessing to being completely unfamiliar with documents on which the MTD heavily relies, which means he shouldn’t take the MTD all that seriously.

The shell game behind the actual declarations

As noted, this declaration is a filing signed by Jocelyn Ballantine, submitting declarations from three other people:

  • Executive Assistant Director John Brown, whose job it is to submit declarations like this
  • EDMO AUSA Sayler Fleming, one of the AUSAs conducting this irregular investigation
  • Keith Kohne, one of the FBI Agents conducting the investigation

Brown starts by excluding three documents from his general certification (these are the ones that Fleming and Kohne will be on the hook for):

5. To the best of my knowledge, and based on the information provided to me, the Government Exhibits described in Exhibit A, 9 with the exception of ECF Nos. 198-8 and 249-1, are true and correct copies of documents and records, including copies of select pages of a larger record, maintained by the FBI pursuant to the applicable records retention policy. See ECF Nos. 198-2, 198-3, 198-4, 198-5, 198-6, 198-7, 198-9, 198-10, 198-11, 198-12, 198-13, and 198-14 9 9

6 To the best of my knowledge, and based on the information provided to me, the Discovery Documents described in Exhibit B, with the exception of ECF Nos. 228-3, are true and correct copies of documents and records maintained by the FBI pursuant to the applicable records retention policy. See ECF Nos. 231-1, 237-1. 251-1, 9 257-1. 259-1, 9 259-2, 259-3, and 264-1

Effectively, he is saying these documents are real and that Ballantine’s claims about the reasons for classification are valid.

He then says this about Ballantine’s own summary, which purports to be a summary of all the NSLs used against Mike Flynn, but which may not include one or more financial NSLs obtained in 2016.

One of the Discovery Documents is a summary substitution of classified materials that were provided to DC-USAO by the FBI. See ECF 257-2. This summary substitution was prepared by AUSA Jocelyn Ballantine, and was reviewed, approved, and declassified by the FBI To the best of my knowledge, and based on the information provided to me, the information contained therein truly and correctly summarizes the underlying classified information provided by the FBI and maintained by the FBI pursuant to the applicable records retention policy.

He’s saying that her summary accurately summarizes what she says it does, but he’s not saying that her description of it is accurate (which it wouldn’t be if EDMO told her to leave out 2016 NSLs).

Then it’s Fleming’s turn. After reviewing her role in this shoddy review and asserting that she has no reason to believe that the documents she got from FBI were irregular, she then explains why she did a summary of the texts that Strzok and a bunch of other people sent in early 2017: Just to get rid of unnecessary metadata, she says.

3. Among the documents and records that I reviewed were spreadsheets of electronic messages exchanged between FBI personnel involved in the Michael T. Flynn investigation and prosecution. The spreadsheets produced to EDMO contained messages and metadata that were not relevant to my review.

4. I created Government Exhibit ECF 198-8 and Discovery Document ECF 228-3. These exhibits truly and correctly reflect excerpts from documents and record maintained by the FBI pursuant to the applicable records retention policy that were provided to EDMO/DC-USAO for review.1

Then she admits someone — she doesn’t say who — made an error.

1 There is a single typographical error in these exhibits. A single message (“Will do.”) from DAD Peter Strzok, sent on 4-Jan-17, is incorrectly identified as having been sent at 2:17PM; the message was actually sent at 2:18PM.

What she doesn’t explain, though, is why her table has two headings that show she or someone else had to “correct” the dates and times in the spreadsheet (which may be where the typo got introduced, or retained).

Given that heading, she has no business treating the data she got as reliable, because either she or someone upstream from her had to fix it.

Then Keith Kohne steps in, the guy who conducted an incompetent interview (and possibly one of the guys who altered dates on government exhibits). He doesn’t provide any explanation of why he’s making the declaration — not even the standard boilerplate you’d find in an affidavit. He says only,

 I, Keith Kohne, hereby declare, pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1746, that the document attached as Exhibit 1 to the Government’s Supplemental Filing in Support of Motion to Dismiss … is a true and correct copy of the report of the interview of William J. Barnett conducted on September 17, 2020.

Understand that this declaration lacks the certification afforded by the rules of FBI record-keeping. It lacks Brown’s certification that the data in was redacted properly (this was not). And it doesn’t explain why it wasn’t finalized as a 302 and submitted into FBI record-keeping systems.

Collectively, then, these declarations stop well short of certifying those texts, Ballantine’s summary, or the Barnett’s interview.

We already know that the Barnett interview is withholding material information. I guess we should assume there are problems with the other two documents as well.

Documents and comments

Here are the documents:

Draft closing communication (198-2) [Docket 2, Exhibit 1]

In the certification but not the exhibit referenced, DOJ redacts Bill Barnett’s name, who wrote the document, as well as that of Joe Pientka, who approved it. That serves to make it harder to figure out that the closing EC materially conflicts with unredacted claims Barnett made in his interview, particularly with regards to Barnett’s awareness that the investigation was a counterintelligence investigation considering 18 USC 951 charges.

It’s all the more problematic given that DOJ has submitted two versions of this document with the same Bates numbers; the earlier one does have the names redacted.

Opening Electronic Communication (198-3) [Docket 3, Exhibit 2]

This doesn’t include Bates numbers.

Mary McCord 302 (198-4) [Docket 4, Exhibit 3]

As with other documents, this one was specially declassified for this release. Another copy has been released under BuzzFeed’s FOIA.

Sally Yates 302 (198-5) [Docket 5, Exhibit 4]

Flynn got a summary of this before he allocuted his guilty plea before Sullivan.

170302 Jim Comey Transcript (198-6) [Docket 6, Exhibit 5]

As DOJ notes, HPSCI used a court reporter on this, so they didn’t have to certify it.

170214 Draft Flynn 302 (198-7) [Docket 7, Exhibit 6]

For some reason (I’ll return to this), DOJ submitted a draft version of the 302, rather than the final one (both have previously been submitted in this docket, and a less-redacted version of the 302 was released prior to this in BuzzFeed’s FOIA). Nowhere in the motion to dismiss does Timothy Shea acknowledge that he wasn’t relying on the final 302.

Text massages and electronic messages (198-8) [Docket 8, Exhibit 7]

The certification doesn’t include Bates stamps.

This is the document that has an admittedly minor error in one of the time stamps, saying that Strzok texted “Will do” at 2:18 instead of 2:17. But the error is interesting given that the table’s headings read, “Corrected Date, Corrected Time,” meaning these aren’t just copied, the times (and dates) were “corrected” (which is presumably where the error was introduced), raising questions about what they were corrected from. [My annotation.]

This is one of the documents that FBI EAD John Brown did not certify, which ought to raise questions about how these dates and times got “corrected.” Instead, the authentication reads:

Truly and correctly reflects information contained in documents and records maintained by the FBI, pursuant to the applicable records retention policy that were provided to EDMO.

Without an explanation of how why this data needed to be corrected, I think there are real questions whether this fulfills the requirement here.

Emails about the Logan Act (198-9) [Docket 9, Exhibit 8]

The certification doesn’t include Bates numbers.

170121-22 Emails about providing briefings (198-10) [Docket 10, Exhibit 9]

This certification doesn’t include Bates numbers.

170124 Emails of questions Flynn might ask (198-10) [Docket 10, Exhibit 9]

This certification doesn’t include Bates numbers. This matters both because they’re mixing docket number and exhibit number, but also because there are two copies of the identical document with a different Bates number in the docket.

Emails about 1001 warnings (198-10) [Docket 10, Exhibit 9]

This certification doesn’t include Bates numbers. This matters both because they’re mixing docket number and exhibit number, but also because there are two copies of the identical document with a different Bates number in the docket.

170124 Bill Priestap Notes (198-11) [Docket 11, Exhibit 10]

This certification doesn’t include Bates numbers. This matters both because they’re mixing docket number and exhibit number, but also because there are two copies of the same document with a different Bates number in the docket, yet both have the blue sticky that is hidden in later documents (raising questions about why there are two separate direct scans).

170124 Andrew McCabe write-up (198-12) [Docket 12, Exhibit 11]

This document doesn’t have a Bates stamp on it at all, which is especially problematic given that another less redacted version of the document is in this docket, with a Bates stamp of the same series as other documents submitted with the motion to dismiss.

The May version, with the Bates stamp, makes it clear that McCabe agreed with Flynn that leaks were a problem. [My annotations.]

The motion to dismiss version redacts that.

McCabe’s comment about leaks in no way qualifies under any claimed basis for redaction stated in certification.

It also appears to redact the prior declassification stamp.

One thing DOJ did by submitting this without a Bates stamp is avoided admitting that the document is not at all new, as the Motion to Dismiss suggested.

170124 Strzok and Pientka Notes of Flynn interview (198-13) [Docket 13, Exhibit 12]

These were released as the same exhibit, which given that they don’t use Bates numbers to identify which is which, effectively means they haven’t told Judge Sullivan which Agent’s notes are which, something that Sidney Powell wailed mightily about the last time it happened. They do, however, get it right in the transcript.

In the Pientka notes, however, there are numerous examples of things that are clear, at least from the context, that don’t get transcribed properly.

170822 Strzok 302 (198-14) [Docket 14, Exhibit 13]

This had already been produced in this docket.

200917 “Report” of Bill Barnett’s interview (249-1)

In the Government Supplemental Filing accompanying this interview, they claim that this is, “The FBI 302” of the Barnett interview. Here, they’re correctly noting that it’s not actually a 302, which makes it even more problematic than it already was.

The certification makes it clear that this “report” is maintained differently than normal 302s. Rather than certifying it as,

True and correct copy of a document or record maintained by the FBI pursuant to the applicable records retention policy.

It is instead certified as,

True and correct copy of the report of that interview.

I’m not sure Sullivan is going to be that thrilled that FBI itself is not treating this interview with the regularity of other investigative documents.

This “report” is probably one of the reasons why DOJ included this language in the filing.

There have been no material alterations made to any of the 14 Government Exhibits filed in support of the motion to dismiss and the supplement to the motion to dismiss. Several of the documents contain routine redactions made by the FBI to protect classified information, and/or law enforcement sensitive information, and/or made to comply with the Local Rule to remove Privacy Act information.

As I have laid out, DOJ withheld material information — most notably, all the nice things Barnett said about Brandon Van Grack — by redacting information that would otherwise be unsealed.

This is one of the documents that EAD John Brown did not certify; instead, one of the agents who did the interview did, which suggests it could not be certified properly. It also suggests that Ballantine, who knows it is withholding material information, doesn’t want to be in a position where she can see it (even though she sent an unredacted copy to Flynn).

Text messages (228-3)

The certification notes these are identical to the 198-8 text messages, with the error under heading, “corrected time.” It’s unclear why, in this one case, DOJ admitted to the same exhibit being filed multiple times, since in other cases they don’t note it.

170105 Strzok Notes (231-1)

The transcription of these notes don’t note the redactions. That’s significant because the only difference between this set of notes and the later, altered ones, is that they declassified a bit more information in the latter case.

170125 Gauhar Notes (237-1)

The transcription is inconsistent about whether it treats cross-outs as unintelligible or not, in one place treating a heading “Intro” as intelligible, but not references to “Thanksgiving” and “He said.”

170125 Strzok Notes (237-1)

By labeling these notes as Strzok’s, DOJ makes it more clear that they redacted information that must match other sets of notes from the same meeting.

170130 [Draft] Executive Summary of Flynn investigation (237-1)

The certification doesn’t reveal that this is a draft document, not a finalized one.

170330 Dana Boente Notes (237-1)

Undated McCabe Notes (248-2/259-1)

The transcription doesn’t note that McCabe crossed off his notes on Flynn. Nor does it admit that it redacted what appears to be a continuation of the discussion of Flynn.

The authentication notes that it is,

True and correct copy of a document or record maintained by the FBI pursuant to the applicable records retention policy (ECF 259-1)

That means they’re only certifying that this is something in FBI records (which it shouldn’t be, since it’s a re-altered altered document).

They also leave out Bates numbers, which is problematic because the re-altered document is technically a new document, but it retains the same Bates stamp.

170105 Strzok Notes (248-3/259-2)

The transcription reveals that two of the three new things revealed in the new copy were unintelligible to DOJ, which raises real questions about why they left it unredacted.

The authentication notes that it is,

True and correct copy of a document or record maintained by the FBI pursuant to the applicable records retention policy (ECF 259-2)

That means they’re only certifying that this is something in FBI records (which it shouldn’t be, since it’s a re-altered altered document).

They also leave out Bates numbers, which is problematic because the re-altered document is technically a new document, but it retains the same Bates stamp.

Undated Strzok Notes (248-4/259-3)

As with some others, the transcription doesn’t note all the redactions, which in this case raises questions about why they included notes from the day before.

In addition, they leave out a scribble in front of the word “willfullness” meaning Strzok switched what they were measuring with regards to whether Flynn’s lies about Turkey were deliberate.

The authentication notes that it is,

True and correct copy of a document or record maintained by the FBI pursuant to the applicable records retention policy (ECF 259-3)

That means they’re only certifying that this is something in FBI records (which it shouldn’t be, since it’s a re-altered altered document).

They also leave out Bates numbers, which is problematic because the re-altered document is technically a new document, but it retains the same Bates stamp.

170306 Jim Crowell Notes (251-1)

As expected, DOJ was thoroughly dishonest with this document. They don’t reveal that they’ve redacted something — either a date, or names — where they indicate that they’ve added a date. One way or another, this transcription is false.

Plus, if they’ve redacted the names of non-senior people in the meeting (which is the non-suspect excuse for the redaction), then they need to note that in the transcription. The alternative, of course, is worse, that they knowingly altered the date.

This is one instance where not revealing whether DOJ consulted with the author is especially problematic. But since Crowell is now a DC judge just next door to Sullivan’s courthouse, maybe he can just go ask.

170329 Gauhar Notes (251-1)

180119 Schools Notes (251-1)

161226 Clinesmith NSL Email (257-1)

The certification provides the wrong date for this email, labeling it 12/26/16. [My annotations.]

it was 12/23/16.

Unlike some of the other things here, I think this is just a sloppy error, not an affirmative misrepresentation. But it is ironic that they made the error with Clinesmith.

200924 Ballantine Summary Substitution of NSLs issued in Crossfire Razor (257-2)

In her notice of discovery correspondence accompanying this, Ballantine doesn’t note that she wrote this summary for EDMO to review for them to, in turn, give back to her to give to Flynn. That’s important, because it’s unclear whether the summary shows all NSLs, or only NSLs for the period in question. Both Barnett’s testimony and the Kevin Clinesmith email included suggest the latter.

170125 OGC Notes (264-1)

This doesn’t include Bates numbers, which is interesting because an older 2019 Bates stamp not seen elsewhere is included (possibly indicating that this was previously shared with DOJ IG).

The Government Agent Who Altered Andrew McCabe’s Notes Remains Unnamed

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The frothers have convinced themselves that the sticky notes via which misleading dates were added to Peter Strzok and Andrew McCabe’s handwritten notes do not amount to “altering” those notes. That’s nonsense. Not only did the date added to Strzok’s notes suggest they could have been written on January 4, 2017 when several documents that had already been submitted in the docket (as well as other public documents) made it clear the notes had to have been written on January 5, 2017. But the added date — indicating that whoever wrote it thought the notes could be January 4 or 5 — don’t match the notice DOJ originally gave Sidney Powell about the notes, which suggested the could have been written on January 3.

There are further problems with the alterations, not least that DOJ claims that these documents were “scanned.” A comparison of the original set of notes with the altered one, along with the blue sticky visible on Bill Priestap’s notes with how the same kind of blue sticky appeared on McCabe’s altered notes make it clear these were copied, along with being scanned, a step that made the alterations far less visible.

Worse still, rather than providing unaltered versions of the notes, DOJ instead provided altered versions of the altered notes. That’s easiest to see by comparing the original, altered McCabe notes, where you can see the lined page underneath the added date.

With the altered altered notes.

It’s clear that rather than simply taking the sticky off, DOJ instead simply whited out the date, along with the lines of the page beneath it.

But you can see this by comparing the three versions of the Strzok notes. Unaltered:

First alteration:

Second alteration:

The sticky is still visible in the second alteration, which suggests they’ve done the same thing they did with McCabe’s altered notes, just edit out the alteration, rather than scan the original document. I suspect the reason they doubled down on altering documents is because doing otherwise would make it clear that the McCabe notes, in particular, could not have been “scanned,” because it would have made the blue sticky visible.

So tomorrow they’re going to have to certify that their re-altered notes are “authentic.”

There may be a far more interesting reason why DOJ chose to re-alter the altered documents rather than providing the originals.

In both Jocelyn Ballantine’s notice of discovery correspondence about the Strzok notes:

During the review, agents for EDMO placed a single yellow sticky note on each page of the notes with estimated dates (the notes themselves are undated). Those two sticky notes were inadvertently not removed when the notes were scanned.

I am providing replacement versions of these documents, and ask that you destroy the prior versions provided to you. We have determined, and confirmed with counsel for Peter Strzok, that the content of the notes was not otherwise altered.

And her notice of compliance, falsely claiming to comply with Judge Emmet Sullivan’s order to authenticate all the documents submitted in this case, she blamed WDMO FBI Agents for the alteration to Strzok’s notes.

In response to the Court and counsel’s questions, the government has learned that, during the review of the Strzok notes, FBI agents assigned to the EDMO review placed a single yellow sticky note on each page of the Strzok notes with estimated dates (the notes themselves are undated). Those two sticky notes were inadvertently not removed when the notes were scanned by FBI Headquarters, before they were forwarded to our office for production.

But her notice of discovery correspondence accompanying the newly altered McCabe notes:

At some point during the course of the review of this page of notes, government agents placed a clear sticky notes (with a colored tab) on this page of notes. On the clear portion of this tab was written the date of 5/10/2017. This sticky note was inadvertently not removed when the notes were scanned.

I am providing a replacement version of this document, and ask that you destroy the prior version provided to you. The content of the notes was not otherwise altered.

And her notice of compliance, she didn’t reveal who had altered McCabe’s notes.

Similarly, the government has learned that, at some point during the review of the McCabe notes, someone placed a blue “flag” with clear adhesive to the McCabe notes with an estimated date (the notes themselves are also undated). Again, the flag was inadvertently not removed when the notes were scanned by FBI Headquarters, before they were forwarded to our office for production.

In one case, she blames, “government agents,” in the other case, she blames “someone.” Blaming “someone” is not a very good way to convince a judge you’re not pulling a fast one.

Realtering the altered notes is not either.

Note, too, that while Ballantine says she has reviewed the contents of Strzok’s notes with his lawyer, she only claims that the content of the McCabe notes has not been altered. If the redactions change the meaning of the notes, falsely tying a SSCI briefing to the notes about Flynn, I can see why she might do that.

By realtering the notes, DOJ is hiding that the altered notes were not, in fact, scans (because if they had been scanned the alteration would have been obvious because the stickies in both cases were colored, and FBI’s scans pick up color).

But I suspect they’re also hiding who that “government agent” is who altered McCabe’s notes.

Judge Emmet Sullivan Just Created Four Big Problems for DOJ in the Mike Flynn Case

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Judge Emmet Sullivan just issued an order that may well destroy DOJ’s presumption of regularity (the legal principle that unless the government really fucks up, you have to assume they didn’t fuck up) in the Mike Flynn case.

He noted that on September 29, he had ordered DOJ to certify all documents submitted as exhibits in the motion to dismiss proceeding, but that DOJ had not done so. Instead, it admitted that it had “inadvertently” altered two Peter Strzok and one Andrew McCabe documents, and asked for a mulligan.

So now he’s ordering DOJ to do what he first ordered: to certify all the exhibits submitted to this docket (both those submitted directly by DOJ and those submitted by Flynn’s team) and provide a transcription and the author and date of any handwritten notes.

MINUTE ORDER as to MICHAEL T. FLYNN. During the September 29, 2020 motion hearing, the Court informed the government that it would need government counsel to authenticate documents filed with the Court. See Hr’g Tr., ECF No. 266 at 91:19-92-21; see also Min. Order (Sept. 29, 2020) (ordering the parties to file any supplemental materials by no later than October 7, 2020). On October 7, 2020, the government filed [259] Notice of Compliance in which it stated that: (1) Federal Bureau of Investigation (“FBI”) agents assigned to review Mr. Strzok’s notes had placed sticky notes on the document with estimated dates, and the sticky notes had not been removed prior to scanning the documents for production purposes (see ECF Nos. 248-2, 248-3); and (2) a sticky note with an estimated date had been placed on the notes of Andrew McCabe, and the sticky note had not been removed prior to scanning the document for production purposes (see ECF No. 248-4). The government stated that the notes of Mr. Strzok and Mr. McCabe were otherwise unaltered, and it provided the unaltered versions of Mr. Strzok’s and Mr. McCabe’s notes. See Exs. to Notice of Compliance, ECF Nos. 259-1, 259-2, 259-3. However, the government did not address the Court’s authentication request despite the government’s acknowledgement that altered FBI records have been produced to Mr. Flynn and filed on the record in this case. See Notice of Compliance, ECF No. 259. The government has filed a motion to dismiss pursuant to Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 48(a), has attached 13 Exhibits to that motion, and has cited the Exhibits throughout its motion to support its description of the factual background and its argument in support of dismissal. See generally Mot. Dismiss, ECF No. 198. The government has also filed a supplement to its motion and attached an Exhibit to that supplement. Suppl., ECF No. 249. Although the government relies heavily on these 14 Exhibits, the government has not provided a declaration attesting that the Exhibits are true and correct copies. “The presumption [of regularity] applies to government-produced documents” and “to the extent it is not rebutted–requires a court to treat the government’s record as accurate.” Latif v. Obama, 666 F.3d 746, 748, 750 (D.C. Cir. 2011). Here, however, the government has acknowledged that altered FBI records have been produced by the government and filed on the record in this case. See Notice of Compliance, ECF No. 259. Accordingly, the government is HEREBY ORDERED to file, by no later than October 26, 2020, a declaration pursuant to penalty of perjury under 28 U.S.C. sec. 1746 in support of its motion to dismiss that the Exhibits attached to its motion and supplement are true and correct copies. It is FURTHER ORDERED that the government’s declaration shall identify each exhibit by name, date, and author. It is FURTHER ORDERED that the government shall provide transcriptions of all handwritten notes contained in the Exhibits. The government has also filed on the record in this case numerous notices of filing discovery correspondence and Mr. Flynn has generally filed the discovery produced on the record in this case as Exhibits to his supplementary filings. See ECF Nos. [228], [231], [237], [248], [251], [257], [264]. The government has acknowledged that the discovery provided to Mr. Flynn and thereafter filed on the record contained altered FBI records. See Notice of Compliance, ECF No. 259. Accordingly, the government is HEREBY ORDERED to file, by no later than October 26, 2020, a declaration pursuant to penalty of perjury under 28 U.S.C. sec. 1746 that the discovery documents provided to Mr. Flynn and filed on the record in this case are true and correct copies. It is FURTHER ORDERED that the government’s declaration shall identify each discovery document by name, date, and author. It is FURTHER ORDERED that the government shall provide transcriptions of all handwritten notes contained in the Exhibits.

This is going to create four problems for DOJ.

First, there’s no way they can finish this by Monday. Even if the lawyers on this case were as familiar with these documents as they claimed to be, it would take more than this weekend to transcribe and double check everything. They will likely ask for an extension, one that would extend the order past the election.

Plus, once they do transcribe these documents, it will become crystal clear that parts of the notes — most notably, the Bill Priestap notes they’ve claimed are a smoking gun — in fact confirm that every single witness agreed on the purpose of the January 24, 2017 Mike Flynn interview: to see whether Flynn would lie. By submitting a transcript, then, they will have to admit they’ve misrepresented the substance of the documents.

Then, this order will catch them in their past false claims about the date of (at least) the January 5, 2017 Peter Strzok notes. As I’ve noted, DOJ has submitted several documents in this docket making it clear that Strzok’s notes must have been written on January 5, 2017. Except they falsely claimed not to know. There’s probably no easy way out of this problem.

Finally, there is this exhibit, which also had a date added, but a date added via means that cannot have been accidental.

It’s possible that that redaction doesn’t cover over an existing date (but my annotation, in red, may show the hash marks of a date). But I don’t see how DOJ can authenticate this, and they’re going to have to tell Sullivan who wrote it, making it really easy for journalists to call up the author and get him to confirm or deny the date.

Notably, after Strzok and McCabe’s lawyers gave notice that DOJ had altered their notes, Sidney Powell submitted a demand that Judge Sullivan prevent anyone else from telling him their notes had been altered. So maybe she has exhibits about which she has specific concerns.

The false Strzok claims, by themselves, are going to make a truthful declaration here difficult, if not impossible. But that’s not even the only problem this order will create for DOJ.

Update: There are two sets of documents Sullivan is now asking DOJ to ID the author, provide date, and transcribe: those linked in this post and those in this document cloud project.

675 Days after Mike Flynn Blew Up His Probation Plea Deal, We Learn There Never Was an “Original 302”

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It has been 675 days since Mike Flynn was originally scheduled to be sentenced on December 18, 2018.

In the interim period, he fired his competent attorneys, Covington & Burling, hired firebreathing TV lawyer Sidney Powell, and had her write a letter to Billy Barr and Jeffrey Rosen demanding they appoint an outside lawyer to review the case. Among other things, the letter demanded “the original draft” of the Flynn 302.

The original draft of the Flynn 302 and all subsequent drafts, including the A-1 file that shows everyone who had possession of it. It appears that SCO has never produced the original 302. There were multiple drafts. It stayed in “deliberative/draft” stage for an inordinate time. Who influenced it, how, and why?

Then, in what was crafted to be an effort to insinuate that DOJ had not complied with Judge Emmet Sullivan’s standing Brady order, she asked for the 302 again, on reply even claiming that the claims in the 302 weren’t backed by the notes that Peter Strzok and Joe Pientka wrote during the interview.

Last December, Sullivan wrote an unbelievably meticulous opinion laying out why all the things she was demanding weren’t actually Brady material. In it, Judge Sullivan rejected Flynn’s “speculat[ion]” that an original 302 showing the agents believed Flynn was telling the truth could exist, not least because their notes mapped all versions of the draft and final 302s.

Mr. Flynn speculates that the government is suppressing the “original 302” of the January 24, 2017 interview, Def.’s Reply, ECF No. 133 at 28; he claims that the lead prosecutor “made it sound like there was only one 302,” id. at 29; and he makes a separate request for the FBI to search for the “original 302” in one of the FBI’s databases, id. at 28-30. In Mr. Flynn’s view, the “original 302”—if it exists—may reveal that the interviewing FBI agents wrote in the report “their impressions that [Mr.] Flynn was being truthful.” Id. at 28. Mr. Flynn claims that the FBI destroyed the “original 302” to the extent that it was stored in the FBI’s files. Id. at 30. Comparing draft FD-302s of Mr. Flynn’s January 24, 2017 interview to the final version, Mr. Flynn claims that the FBI manipulated the FD-302 because “substantive changes” were made after reports that Mr. Flynn discussed sanctions with the Russian Ambassador “contrary to what Vice President Pence had said on television previously.” Id. at 14-15. Mr. Flynn points to the Strzok-Page text messages the night of February 10, 2017 and Ms. Page’s edits to certain portions of the draft FD-302 that were “material.” Def.’s SurSurreply, ECF No. 135 at 8-9.

To the extent Mr. Flynn has not already been provided with the requested information and to the extent the information exists, the Court is not persuaded that Mr. Flynn’s arguments demonstrate that he is entitled to the requested information. For starters, the Court agrees with the government that there were no material changes in the interview reports, and that those reports track the interviewing FBI agents’ notes. See, e.g., Gov’t’s Surreply, ECF No. 132 at 4; Def.’s Reply, ECF No. 133 at 20. Mr. Flynn ignores that FBI agents rely on their notes and memory to draft the interview reports after the completion of an interview. See United States v. DeLeon, 323 F. Supp. 3d 1285, 1290 n.4 (D.N.M. 2018) (discussing the drafting process for FD-302s). While handwritten notes may contain verbatim statements, the notes of FBI agents are not verbatim transcripts of the interview. United States v. Forbes, No. CRIM.302CR264AHN, 2007 WL 141952, at *3 (D. Conn. Jan. 17, 2007). And persuasive authority holds that the government’s production of summaries of notes and other documents does not constitute a Brady violation. See, e.g., United States v. Grunewald, 987 F.2d 531, 535 (8th Cir. 1993) (finding no Jencks Act or Brady violations where the government produced summaries of handwritten notes instead of the actual notes); United States v. Van Brandy, 726 F.2d 548, 551 (9th Cir. 1984) (holding that the government fulfilled its Brady obligations by producing summaries of the FBI’s file because Brady “does not extend to an unfettered access to the files”).

As an initial matter, the Court notes that the government has provided Mr. Flynn with the relevant FD-302s and notes rather than summaries of them. See, e.g., Gov’t’s Surreply, ECF No. 132 at 6-7; Gov’t’s Opp’n, ECF No. 122 at 10, 15; Gov’t’s App. A, ECF No. 122-1 at 2; Gov’t’s Notice of Disc. Correspondence, ECF No. 123 at 1-3. And the government states that it will provide Mr. Flynn with the FD-302s of his post-January 24, 2017 interviews. Gov’t’s Opp’n, ECF No. 122 at 4 n.1. Having carefully reviewed the interviewing FBI agents’ notes, the draft interview reports, the final version of the FD302, and the statements contained therein, the Court agrees with the government that those documents are “consistent and clear that [Mr. Flynn] made multiple false statements to the [FBI] agents about his communications with the Russian Ambassador on January 24, 2017.” Gov’t’s Surreply, ECF No. 132 at 4-5. The Court rejects Mr. Flynn’s request for additional information regarding the drafting process for the FD-302s and a search for the “original 302,” see Def.’s Sur-Surreply, ECF No. 135 at 8- 10, because the interviewing FBI agents’ notes, the draft interview reports, the final version of the FD-302, and Mr. Flynn’s own admissions of his false statements make clear that Mr. Flynn made those false statements.

Then, as matters moved towards sentencing and DOJ responded to Flynn’s refusal to cooperate and his conflicting sworn statements, by asking for prison time, Powell got desperate. She filed a bunch of motions to try to get Flynn out of his guilty pleas. And, magically, Billy Barr appointed St. Louis US Attorney Jeffrey Jensen to do what Powell had demanded seven months earlier, to review the case. That “review” used documents already reviewed by Mueller’s team, DOJ IG, John Durham, and — many of them — even Judge Sullivan — to claim DOJ had discovered “new” documents that justified blowing up Flynn’s prosecution.

Before long, Jensen started submitting documents and claims that made it clear his team was either lying or had zero understanding of the documents they used to claim DOJ should withdraw from Flynn’s prosecution. Nevertheless, Jensen kept churning out documents, even — ultimately — releasing an insta-302 showing that a key pro-Trump FBI agent on the case claimed not to understand this was a counterintelligence investigation, professed ignorance of key pieces of evidence, but nevertheless held sway in the Mueller team’s conclusion that they did not have proof that Trump ordered Flynn to blow up sanctions on Russia. They altered evidence in such a way that would support their prior false claims about key dates, and that altered evidence made its way, almost instantaneously and probably via Jenna Ellis, the Trump campaign lawyer with whom Sidney Powell remained in regular touch, into a Trump campaign attack. Ultimately, they admitted to some — but not all — of the evidence that had been altered and asked for a mulligan (but didn’t explain who had altered one of those exhibits).

Along the way, Jensen submitted evidence that made it clear that — not only didn’t Peter Strzok have it in for Mike Flynn — but he pushed the pro-Trump FBI Agent whose view held sway to join the Mueller team. As Sullivan’s amicus has noted, DOJ’s current argument relies on Strzok’s reliability, even while claiming that Strzok cannot be considered a reliable witness.

Jensen also submitted evidence that showed that meetings immediately after Flynn’s interview map perfectly onto Flynn’s existing 302, showing that there are completely credible witnesses who will attest that Strzok described the interview just as the 302 does immediately after the interview happened, including that Flynn lied.

Jensen also provided evidence that made it clear why Flynn’s lies were material — which was ostensibly the reason DOJ blew up his prosecution in the first place. His lies served to hide that Flynn coordinated with Mar-a-Lago on his efforts to blow up sanctions, something that even Billy Barr’s DOJ conceded might be evidence of coordination with Russia.

And then, on Tuesday, perhaps realizing that now that Strzok and Andrew McCabe have gotten discovery in their lawsuits for wrongful termination, DOJ should stop releasing documents that show Trump’s claims about the two of them were false, but also DOJ’s alterations of Strzok and McCabe documents, Jensen stopped.

According to a notice of discovery correspondence released last night, via letter to Sidney Powell sent on Tuesday DOJ told her there are no documents left and, in fact, there never was an “original 302.”

We write to respond to your recent discovery requests. On October 20, 2020, you requested “immediate production of any additional information that has been uncovered by Durham or the FBI or any federal officer or agent and provided to US Attorney Jensen–and not previously provided to the defense.” As we have previously disclosed, beginning in January 2020, the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Missouri has been conducting a review of the Michael T. Flynn investigation. Beginning in April 2020, and continuing through October 2020, we have disclosed on a number of occasions documents identified during that review. We are aware of no other documents or information at this time that meet the standard for disclosure in the Court’s Standing Order (Doc. 20).

You also requested “the original 302 and later drafts . . . , or the data evidencing their destruction.” The Federal Bureau of Investigation has a well-documented record management program and retention plan that provides specific instructions for the collection of information, the maintenance of documents, and the retention or disposal of documents. Those guidelines state that “[w]orking files, such as preliminary drafts, notes, and other similar materials, are to be destroyed when the final documents have been approved by the FBI official with authority to do so.” The policy applies to “all drafts created in any medium.” See Records Management Policy Guide, at p. 31, available at https://vault.fbi.gov/records-management-policy-guide-0769pg-part-01-of01/Records%20Management%20Policy%20Guide%200769PG%20Part%2001%20of%2001/vie w#document/p4.

Here, the FD-302 of your client’s January 24, 2017, interview was created in SENTINEL, which is the FBI’s electronic records management system for all criminal and intelligence gathering activities:

SENTINEL provides FBI employees the ability to create case documents and submit them through an electronic workflow process. Supervisors, reviewers, and others involved in the approval process can review, comment, and approve the insertion of documents into the appropriate FBI electronic case files. Upon approval, the SENTINEL system serializes and uploads the documents into the SENTINEL repositories, where the document becomes part of the official FBI case file. SENTINEL maintains an auditable record of all transactions

See Privacy Impact Assessment for the SENTINEL System, May 28, 2014, at p. 1, available at https://www.fbi.gov/services/information-management/foipa/privacy-impactassessments/sentinel.

In this this case, SSA 1 began drafting the FD-302 on the evening of January 24, 2017. The FD-302 was electronically accessed by SSA 1 and former DAD Peter Strzok in SENTINEL on several occasions. The FD-302 was electronically approved by FBI Assistant Director for Counterintelligence E.W. Priestap on February 15, 2017. Our review of SENTINEL’s audit trail establishes that no other FBI personnel accessed the FD-302 electronically prior to its approval and serialization. Consistent with the FBI’s records retention policy, no prior drafts of the FD-302 were maintained within SENTINEL.

You have previously been provided with three draft versions of the FD-302, dated February 10, 11, and 14, 2017, that were circulated in PDF format by email to FBI personnel for review; these are the only draft versions of the FD-302 that we have located during our diligent searches.

Finally, you requested “all the comms retrieved of McCabe with Comey, Page, Strzok, Baker, Priestap or anyone else about Flynn, Crossfire Razor or any other name for General Flynn or Michael G. Flynn, and any comms of Comey or any FBI member with anyone in the Obama White House about Flynn.” As discussed above, we have reviewed those communications and have disclosed all such communications that we have identified that meet the standard for disclosure in the Court’s Standing Order (Doc. 20). [my emphasis]

This doesn’t mean Barr is done with his shenanigans. After all, in spite of past assertions that no one at DOJ engaged in any abuse in its discovery compliance, this letter suggests (falsely, per Sullivan’s December 2019 opinion and all precedent) that the documents they’ve been dribbling out did meet “the standard for disclosure in the Court’s Standing Order.” Couple that with the fact that DOJ seems to be hiring for a Brandon Van Grack adjacent job, and I wouldn’t be surprised if they’re going after him, even while hiding evidence showing that Bill Barnett liked and trusted Van Grack.

Plus, ultimately Trump will pardon Flynn (indeed, Powell already told Sullivan that she had discussed a pardon with Trump).

But it does mean that, 675 days after Flynn could have started serving a probation sentence, we finally learn that one key premise on which he blew up this prosecution was false. There is no original 302.

In the wake of learning that her witch hunt came up short yesterday, Sidney Powell was complaining about the delay that she herself caused.

The Frothy Right Embraces CIA’s Unmasking the Identities of Political Candidates

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I was going to wait to address the frothy right’s latest attempt to gaslight an election year scandal by recycling Russian intelligence — which might well be disinformation — in an attempt to suggest that Hillary Clinton, in all-powerful fashion, managed to drum up not just the entire Russian investigation into Donald Trump, but also went back in time and planted the evidence dating back months and years that substantiated investigative concerns.

But there’s something so fundamentally stupid about this latest effort I can’t wait to lay out the other reasons this report is actually more damning for Republicans.

At issue is a report from John Ratcliffe, sent on September 29, 2020, explaining that,

In late July 2016, U.S. intelligence agencies obtained insight into Russian intelligence analysis alleging that U.S. Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton had approved a campaign plan to stir up a scandal against U.S. Presidential candidate Donald Trump by tying him to Putin and the Russians’ hacking of the Democratic National Committee. The IC does not know the accuracy of this allegation or the extent to which the Russian intelligence analysis may reflect exaggeration or fabrication.

The following week, presumably in an attempt to dredge up some kind of attack out of an absurd attack, Ratcliffe released the underlying reports that, he claimed in his original report, show the following:

According to his handwritten notes, former Central Intelligence Agency Director Brennan subsequently briefed President Obama and other senior national security officials on the intelligence, including the “alleged approval by Hillary Clinton on July 26, 2016 of a proposal from one of her foreign policy advisors to vilify Donald Trump by stirring up a scandal claiming interference by Russian security services.”

On 07 September 2016, U.S. intelligence officials forward an investigative referral to FBI Director James Comey and Deputy Assistant Director of Counterintelligence Peter Strzok regarding “U.S. Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s approval of a plan concerning U.S. Presidential candidate Donald Trump and Russian hackers hampering U.S. elections as a means of distracting the public from her use of a private mail server.”

By releasing the exhibits, Ratcliffe should raise real questions about his credibility. For example, I’m not at all sure this date, from Brennan’s notes, reads July 26 and not July 28, a critical difference for a ton of reasons.

The FBI report has a slew of boilerplate making it clear how sensitive this report was (for obvious reasons; effectively it shows that the CIA had some kind of visibility into Russian intelligence analysis), which makes it clear how utterly unprecedented this desperate declassification is. Former CIA lawyer Brian Greer discusses that in this Lawfare post.

Plus, Ratcliffe left out an unbelievably important part of the report: the role of Guccifer 2.0 in the Russian report. Intelligence collected in late July 2016 claimed that Hillary was going to work her alleged smear around neither the GRU (which had already been identified as the perpetrator of the DNC hack) nor WikiLeaks (which had released the DNC files, to overt celebration by the Trump campaign), but Guccifer 2.0, who looked to be a minor cut-out in late July 2016 (when this intelligence was collected), but who looked a lot more important once Roger Stone’s overt and covert communications with Guccifer 2.0 became public weeks later.

The report suggests Hillary magically predicted that days after this plot, President Trump’s rat-fucker would start a year’s long campaign running interference for Guccifer 2.0. Not only did Hillary successfully go back and trick George Papadopoulos into drunkenly bragging about Russian dangles in May 2016, then, Hillary also instantaneously tricked Stone into writing propaganda for Guccifer 2.0 days later.

No wonder they consider Hillary so devious.

Mind you, rather than producing evidence that Hillary seeded this story with the FBI (when her public attacks on Trump went right after the Russian intelligence services involved), they appear to be claiming that Hillary used the Steele dossier — which included no reporting on Guccifer 2.0, which was a very early sign of its problems — to plant a story that centered on Guccifer 2.0.

Next up, they’re going to accuse Hillary of going back in time and planting the extensive forensics that prove that the Guccifer 2.0 persona was a GRU operation.

Lucky for them, stupid stories work just fine for gaslighting the weak-minded frothers.

But here’s the craziest aspect of all of this.

The FBI report released here, dated September 7, describes three pieces of intelligence that a CIA fusion cell had collected that might be useful for the Crossfire Hurricane team. a, b, c.

The intelligence on Hillary is paragraph a.

This is CIA intelligence reporting on an American citizen, which means the original report would have necessarily masked the US person, which John Brennan would have had to unmask before reporting it at the White House meeting.

For the set of documents Ratcliffe released to exist, it would mean that John Brennan unmasked candidate the identity of Hillary Clinton, right in the middle of a presidential campaign, and shared raw intelligence incorporating that unmasked identity with others. For the Hillary intelligence to appear as paragraph a would mean she was likely the first American CIA unmasked in reporting that got shared as part of Crossfire Hurricane.

The people chasing this gaslight are some of the same people who continue to wail that — four months later — a bunch of people unmasked a report on Mike Flynn that was not, given what we can see from the closing documents in the case, shared with the Crossfire Hurricane team. For example, Andy McCarthy has written about unmasking over and over and over. Yet here he is, hopping on this latest gaslight, with nary a mention that after all this time, it looks like Hillary was the first person — the Presidential candidate herself!!! — to have her identity unmasked by the nefarious Crossfire Hurricane team.

The Desperation of the Jeffrey Jensen Investigation Already Made Clear that John Durham Won’t Indict

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Yesterday, a sick man called into Maria Bartiromo’s show and wailed that his opponents had not been indicted.

Bartiromo: Mr. President. We now know from these documents that John Ratcliffe unveiled that it was Hilary Clinton’s idea to tie you to Russia in some way. It was successful. The whole country was talking about it for two and a half years. But what comes next, Mr. President? We can have all of these documents, we can see exactly what happened but unless John [Durham] comes out with a report or indictments unless Bill Barr comes out with a — a — some kind of a ruling here, do you think this is resonating on the American people?

Trump: Unless Bill Barr indicts these people for crimes, the greatest political crime in the history of our country, then we’re going to get little satisfaction unless I win and we’ll just have to go, because I won’t forget it. But these people should be indicted, this was the greatest political crime in the history of our country and that includes Obama and it includes Biden. These are people that spied on my campaign and we have everything. Now they say they have much more, OK? And I say, Bill, we’ve got plenty, you don’t need any more. We’ve got so much, Maria, even — just take a look at the Comey report, 78 pages of kill, done by Horowitz, and I have a lot of respect for Horowitz, and he said prosecute. He recommended prosecute and they didn’t prosecute. I was — I couldn’t believe it, but they didn’t do it, because they said we have much bigger fish to fry. Well, that’s OK, they indicted Flynn for lying and he didn’t lie. They destroyed many lives, Roger Stone, over nothing. They destroyed lives. Look at Manafort, they sent in a black book, it was a phony black book, phony, they made up a black book of cash that he got from Ukraine or someplace and he didn’t get any cash.

In the comment, he described speaking directly to Billy Barr about the urgency of prosecuting his political opponents.

In response to this attack, Billy Barr has started telling Republican members of Congress that John Durham isn’t going to indict before the election.

Attorney General Bill Barr has begun telling top Republicans that the Justice Department’s sweeping review into the origins of the Russia investigation will not be released before the election, a senior White House official and a congressional aide briefed on the conversations tell Axios.

Why it matters: Republicans had long hoped the report, led by U.S. Attorney John Durham, would be a bombshell containing revelations about what they allege were serious abuses by the Obama administration and intelligence community probing for connections between President Trump and Russia.

  • “This is the nightmare scenario. Essentially, the year and a half of arguably the number one issue for the Republican base is virtually meaningless if this doesn’t happen before the election,” a GOP congressional aide told Axios.
  • Barr has made clear that they should not expect any further indictments or a comprehensive report before Nov. 3, our sources say.

Barr is excusing the delay by saying that Durham is only going to prosecute stuff he can win.

What we’re hearing: Barr is communicating that Durham is taking his investigation extremely seriously and is focused on winning prosecutions.

  • According to one of the sources briefed on the conversations Barr said Durham is working in a deliberate and calculated fashion, and they need to be patient.
  • The general sense of the talks, the source says, is that Durham is not preoccupied with completing his probe by a certain deadline for political purposes.

This back and forth represents a fundamental misunderstanding of what must be going on.

The Durham investigation should not, at this point, be considered separately from the Jeffrey Jensen investigation attempting to invent a reason to blow up the Flynn prosecution. That’s been true since Barr appointed Jensen because Durham hadn’t yet discovered anything to dig Sidney Powell out of the hole she had dug Flynn. But it’s especially true now that documents that would be central to the Durham inquiry are being leaked left and right — whether it’s the report that the FBI knew that Igor Danchenko had been investigated (like Carter Page and Mike Flynn) as a possible Russian agent, or specific details about when the FBI obtained NSLs on Mike Flynn.

The investigative integrity of the Durham investigation has been shot beyond recovery.

Plus, the sheer desperation of the Jensen investigation raises real questions about whether a credible investigation could ever find anything that could sustain a prosecution, in any case. That’s because:

  • Jensen has repeatedly provided evidence that proves the opposite of what DOJ claims. For example, the Bill Priestap notes that DOJ claimed were a smoking gun actually show contemporaneous proof for the explanation that every single witness has offered for Mike Flynn’s interview — that they needed to see whether Flynn would tell the truth about his calls with Sergey Kisklyak. Plus, now there’s a Priestap 302, one DOJ is hiding, that further corroborates that point. That evidence blows all the claims about the centrality of the Logan Act to interviewing Flynn out of the water, and it’s already public.
  • Jensen’s investigators submitted altered exhibits to sustain easily disprovable claims. DOJ has claimed that this tampering with evidence was inadvertent — they simply forgot to take sticky notes off their files. That doesn’t explain all the added dates, however, undermining their excuse. Moreover, if they didn’t intentionally tamper with evidence, they’re left claiming either that they haven’t read the exhibits they’ve relied on thus far in this litigation, or that they’re so fucking stupid that they don’t realize they’ve already disproven their own assumptions about dates. Add in the way their “errors” got mainlined to the President via a lawyer meeting with Trump’s campaign lawyer, and the whole explanation gets so wobbly no prosecutor would want to proceed toward prosecution with problems that could so easily be discoverable (or already public).
  • Jensen’s investigators got star witness William Barnett to expose himself as a partisan willing to forget details to help Trump. Along with an analyst that was skeptical of the Flynn case (but who was moved off before the most damning evidence came in), Barnett would need to be the star witness in any case alleging impropriety in the investigation. But rather than hiding Barnett’s testimony and protecting his credibility, Jensen made a desperate bid to get his claims on the record and make it public. And what the 302 actually shows — even without a subpoena of Barnett’s personal ties and texts sent on FBI phones — is that in his interview, Barnett claimed not to understand the case (even though documents he filed show that he did, contemporaneously), and either did not remember or deliberately suppressed key evidence (not least that Flynn told Kislyak that Trump had been informed of his calls).  The 302 further showed Barnett presenting as “truth” of bias claims that instead show his willingness to make accusations about people he didn’t work with, even going so far as to repackage his own dickish behavior as an attempt to discredit Jeannie Rhee. Finally, by hiding how many good things Barnett had to say about Brandon Van Grack, DOJ has made it clear that the only thing Barnett can be used for is to admit that he, too, believes Flynn lied, didn’t have a problem with one of the key investigators in the case, and that his views held sway on the final Mueller Report. Had Durham managed this witness, Barnett might have been dynamite. Now, he would be, at best, an easily discredited partisan.

Jensen is working from the same evidence that Durham is. And what the Jensen investigation has shown is that it takes either willful ignorance or deliberate manipulation to spin this stuff as damning. And in the process, Jensen has destroyed the viability of a witness and possibly other pieces of evidence that any credible prosecution would use.

DOJ might make one last bid in giving Trump what he wants, allegations against his adversaries, by using the initial response in the McCabe and Strzok lawsuits as a platform to make unsubstantiated attacks on them (DOJ got an extension in both cases, but one that is still before the election). But those attacks will crumble just like the Jeffrey Jensen case has, and do so in a way that may make it easier for McCabe and Strzok to get expansive discovery at the underlying actions of people like Barnett.

Billy Barr has largely shot his wad in drumming up accusations against Trump’s critics. And along the way, he has proven how flimsy any such claims were in the first place.

Sidney Powell Switches Her FARA Villain Mid-Stream

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In a still pending motion to withdraw Mike Flynn’s guilty plea submitted in January, Sidney Powell told this story about how the baddies in DOJ’s FARA unit — led by David Laufman — entrapped the General in lies.

I’ve linked to the exhibits where Powell claims her arguments are supported, though in places, they show the opposite — for example, Flynn lying to his lawyers claiming that he came up with the idea to write the op-ed himself — and in at least one case, the page Powell cites doesn’t exist.

The next day—Mr. Flynn’s first day out of the White House, with media camped around his house 24/7—Rob Kelner and Brian Smith of Covington, and Kristen Verderame, called Mr. Flynn to give him a status update on the FARA issues. Mr. Flynn accepted their recommendation that it was better to file, and he instructed the lawyers to “be precise.”11

On February 21, 2017, David Laufman, Heather Hunt, Tim Pugh, and multiple others from the FARA Unit telephone-conferenced with Covington. Ex. 8. Laufman directed the content, scope, and duration of the call. In this lengthy conversation, Kelner exacerbated his prior mistake, stating that “Flynn wrote [the op-ed],” and that Mr. Rafiekian, Mr. Flynn’s former business partner, provided “input.” Ex. 8 at 2. Kelner apparently misremembered or misspoke, but the SCO parlayed the description in the FARA form into a felony attributable to Mr. Flynn. Meanwhile, Covington—instead of owning any error and correcting it—began a campaign of obfuscation that deepened the conflicts, created Mr. Flynn’s criminal exposure, and led to repeated instances of ineffective assistance of counsel.12

That evening, Heather Hunt requested a meeting the next day at Covington’s offices to review the draft FARA filing in person. She and several others from the FARA unit, arrived and reviewed the FARA draft and discussed logistics. Mr. Smith made notes of matters to include in the filing, such as the New York meeting with Turkish officials, payments to Inovo, specifics of the Sphere contract, and Sphere’s budget (if established). The team noted that if Turkey was involved, it must be listed on the filing, and they created various reminders. Finally, Ms. Hunt reminded the Covington team to file by email and send a check to cover filing fees by a courier. 13 Ex. 9.

Covington filed the forms on March 7, 2017. Hunt acknowledged receipt at 10:50 p.m., prompting Smith to remark to his colleagues, “They are working late at the FARA Unit.” Ex.12.

Hardly had the FARA registration been uploaded on the FARA website when the onslaught of subpoenas began.14 On May 17, 2017, Special Counsel was appointed, and the much-massaged “final” Flynn 302 was reentered for use by the SCO. Soon thereafter, the SCO issued a search warrant for all Flynn’s electronic devices. Meanwhile, Covington’s August 14, 2017, invoice alone was $726,000, having written off 10% of its actual time. Ex. 13 at 3.

11 Ex. 7: Smith Notes of 2/14/17 call.

12 Covington lawyer Brian Smith’s notes of January 2, 2017, and reconfirmed in his 302 of June 21, 2018, show that Mr. Flynn stated Rafiekian wrote the first draft. ECF No. 151-12 at 17. ECF No. 150-5 at 7. Rafiekian told Covington this also, and the emails confirmed it. Ex. 10.

13 On March 3, 2017, Kelner emailed Hunt to tell her “we are not quite ready to file, but close.” Hunt wanted more detail and demanded to know, “close as in later today, or close as in next week?” Kelner responded, Tuesday, March 7, 2017. Ex. 11.

14 Covington received multiple subpoenas from the DOJ FARA unit, as well as subpoenas from the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, and then Special Counsel Office. In response to these subpoenas, Covington provided many thousands of documents in sixteen productions from April 2017 through October 2017 alone, and Mr. Flynn’s legal fees exceeded two million dollars.

Powell is shading here, covering up the fact that Flynn told Covington & Burling he was writing his Fethullah Gulen op-ed to benefit the Trump campaign rather than entirely for the benefit of clients he knew to be Turkish government ministers. The claim by itself demonstrates how Powell provides evidence that her client lied, even while wailing about unfair prosecution.

But for my purposes, I’m primarily interested in the villains of this story: Flynn’s Covington lawyers who repeated Flynn’s lies, FARA Unit lawyer Heather Hunt who promptly confirmed receipt of a filing, and David Laufman.

Laufman, then Chief of the Counterintelligence and Export Control Section at DOJ, was an early villain in the evolving conspiracies about the investigation into Trump and his flunkies, even while he is the hero of the Trump flunky’s complaints that Jim Comey didn’t let Julian Assange extort the US government with Vault 7 files.

I raise all this because I’m trying to determine whether the other two documents that Jeffrey Jensen’s team decided to date (notes from an ODAG meeting that Jensen purports took place on March 6, 2017 and notes from a meeting involving Bruce Swartz that Jensen purports took place on March 28, 2017) have affirmatively incorrect dates. Here are the notes “inadvertently” dated March 28:

In her filing accompanying the latter, Powell ignores that the notes show that Jeff Sessions asked two Turkish ministers what Flynn had been doing for them in an engagement that — Flynn’s official filing submitted on March 7, 2017 claimed — he wasn’t actually sure whether he had been working for Turkey. Rather than puzzling through why the Turkish foreign ministers would know the answer to that if Flynn was instead working for Ekim Alptekin, Powell instead complains that on March 28, 2017, Swartz “decided” to subpoena Flynn’s company even though (she claims) he had just been told that Flynn had satisfied the registration obligation.

Newly produced notes of Peter Strzok show: Strzok met with Bruce Schwartz, Lisa, and George at DOJ on March 28, 2017, where he noted Flynn Intel Group “satisfied the registration obligation” and “no evidence of any willfulness.” Nonetheless, “Bruce” decided to issue subpoenas to Flynn Intel Group “and more.” Exhibits C, D.

Whereas Laufman had been her villain, now Bruce Swartz is.

The thing is, that claim seems to be inconsistent with what her star witness, pro-Trump FBI Agent Bill Barnett, had to say in his interview with Jensen’s team (though since they’ve redacted Brandon Van Grack’s name it’s hard to tell). He seems to have said the Turkish case “was far stronger than the [Russian] investigation, in that there was specific information that could be investigated. BARNETT was working closely with [Van Grack]. BARNETT had worked with VAN GRACK on other matters.

In any case, the actual subpoena shows that it didn’t happen in March (as the purported date might suggest) but instead on April 5, a week later. And it wasn’t Swartz who filed it, nor even Van Grack, but EDVA AUSA William Sloan.

That doesn’t mean the date that Jensen’s team “inadvertently” applied to Strzok’s notes is wrong. It certainly may have taken a week to put together the subpoena.

But it does show that Powell’s current story doesn’t cohere with her past (still-pending) one.