What it wasn’t a witch hunt
 

OMG it wasn’t a witch hunt, too bad Trump couldn’t fire everyone in time to prevent that damn IG report. Of course that won’t stop him from using witch hunt, it will just be moved up to the impeachment investigation.

There was an investigation, they said there was no political bias, Im glad for that and can accept it. I did not want evidence of politically motivated DOJ investigations, that scared the heck out of me.
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Bill Barr is trying to Bill Barr the Horowitz report like he did the Mueller report, let’s not play this game again.

“The Inspector General’s report now makes clear that the FBI launched an intrusive investigation of a U.S. presidential campaign on the thinnest of suspicions that, in my view, were insufficient to justify the steps taken.”

Barr is a joke!
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wow....someone is jumping the gun

Wait, I just saw Trump claiming the report completely exonerates him and proves it's all a witch hunt???

Trump on the IG report: "It is incredible. Far worse than I ever would've thought possible. It's an embarrassment to our country, it's dishonest. It's everything that a lot of people thought it would be, except far worse."

Justice Department Watchdog Crushes Trumpworld’s Deep State Dreams
Rick Wilson on the IG report
We were told Russia was a hoax, the president was persecuted by Obama, and the real traitors would be locked up. So much for all that.

For months, President Trump and his allies have been salivating over a report from the Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz, outlining what they expected would be a tale worthy of a John Le Carre novel. Taking a cue from Trump, Fox News and a constellation of right-wing media have promised us the report would reveal the smoking guns in the Deep State’s plot to destroy the president. The report, a product of Trump’s insistence that his servile Department of Justice investigate the origins of the Trump-Russia probe, would unleash the hounds of hell on the Democrats, the Obama administration, and the intelligence community.
Well, the report’s finally been released and the results are underwhelming, to put it mildly. Burn this phrase, lifted directly from the report, into your mind: “No evidence political bias influenced the decision to open the Russia probe.” As has happened time and again, Trump’s ludicrously overwrought promise — that this was to be a tentpole of his ongoing (and entirely imaginary) war against the Deep State — was followed by an utterly underwhelming outcome.
The vast enterprise of formerly conservative media outlets now dedicated to trafficking in baroque QAnon-adjacent conspiracy theories in defense of Trump will try their best to polish this turd into a diamond, but the chances are slim they’ll be able to convince even their own audience of credulous Trump rubes and conspiracy nuts this report means all that much.

https://gen.medium.com/justice-depar...s-7595d731b85f

And the report, if you have a lot of time to read, but you ought to at least look at it. Remember we paid for it.
https://www.justice.gov/storage/120919-examination.pdf

And Wray's response to the report
https://www.fbi.gov/news/pressrel/pr...general-report

hang in there pete only 5 more years :hihi:

Sooooo let's get this right?

Carter Page was not a Russian Asset but was someone working with a paricular US 3 letter agency. The email was edited to state that Page didn't previosuly work for that agency when the email stated he HAD worked for that agency.

That particular 3 letter agency told the FBI not to believe the Steele Dossier.

The Steele Dossier was less reliable without those edits and obfuscations and the above not mentioned three letter agency stated to not trust the Steele Dossier.

That FBI lawyers knowingly omitted information that would weaken the Steele Dossier and illegally edited the documents used in the FISA application several times to keep the investigation going, knowing the information they had was insufficient to ask for the 302 or even worse, ran counter to what they were using on the application.

That on the 302 Page had met with particular Russians that it turns out he didn't meet with. (Side note, Carter Page still seems like a dumbass).

That the Steele Dossier / Fusion GPS was funded by the DNC.

There are others but these are the key items (well, these and outright fraud) that allowed the 302 Application to go through FISA and get us here we we are today.

So good, no Politically Motivated Deep State Witch Hunt Conspiracy, just some career SES people cooking the books to make it look like the other guy was cooking the books.

Ya know in those movies where it shows the Good Cops fudging the info to get the Judge to sign off on a Warrant because they just know the other guy is guilty and they want leverage or a chance to "uncover" other items?

Well this is what happens when they eff up.



I generally like Rick Wilson and have followed him since before the primaries but he is a Snake Oil Merchant and his current income is directly anti-Trump. He has trotted along the Trump Conspiracy for years and goes deep into the Russia Did It and Putin Owns Trump for a while. He is not Louise Mensch level crazy.

That was the third application mind you. And the IG still found no political bias.
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there was all kinds of reason not to use the Steele dossier. none of the news outlets believed it. i’m glad there was no evidence of political bias, but what other reason was there for the significant errors.
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there was all kinds of reason not to use the Steele dossier. none of the news outlets believed it. i’m glad there was no evidence of political bias, but what other reason was there for the significant errors. they
used the flimsy evidence to monitor a rival political campaign.
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Seems like the IG found more rigor should have been used considering the context of a presidential campaign, but these rules didn’t exist. The team followed existing rules. They did they’re job.
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They butchered their job
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Really Jeff?
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IG said everything was justified. You’ve got you binkie right?
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I was talking about your spelling,dotard.
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Pathetic
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i think i more rigor should
have been used considering the context that Page is an american citizen. they did not follow existing rules, come on, the report says “serious mistakes.”.
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The NO BIAS! conclusion is amusing.


I think we will be amused watching Horowitz squirm, dissemble and wither on Wednesday trying to defend that NO BIAS! conclusion when pressed about so many deviations of procedure, Woods violations, purposeful omissions and outright deceptions -- all to obtain the Page FISA warrant by any means*.

The Demedia are celebrating the conclusion of NO BIAS! but they are setting themselves up again for exposure of their own bias, by simply not telling the entire story.

Their reporting and commentary is choreographed to instill a belief that the IG did a deep dive into everything, that Horowitz uncovered everything that could be discovered and the book can now be closed.

In actuality, Horowitz was very limited. This was an administrative inspection examining process and procedure. Horowitz was limited to questioning only personnel in the employ of the DOJ -- not being able to look outside the DOJ and with all the FBI and DOJ employees that have been fired or quit or retired, his investigative reach was rigidly constrained.

Horowitz had no grand jury powers, he had no subpoena powers to compel testimony, only of documents and no ability to indict anyone or even threaten charges. All he could do is suggest civil or administrative actions within the DOJ, or refer a person to the AG for prosecution after the report is published . . . Given his investigation is subordinate to the concurrent Durham investigation and Horowitz being required to turn over any evidence of criminal action, criminal referral is of no effect or benefit for Horowitz. All this means Horowitz had no leverage, no hammer to make people come clean.

Understand, if Horowitz uncovered actual criminal activity he could not put that in his report!

Anything considered criminal information had to be passed on to Durham. If he suspected a person committed a crime and/or knew they were under grand jury subpoena or if he knew the particulars of incriminating documents that he turned over, he could not put that in his report! -- perhaps that explains the very conspicuous absence of the infamous Strzok/Page "insurance policy" text?

For that reason, Horowitz's testimony on Wednesday will be interesting . . . The questions he won't be able to answer could be as informative as the ones he does answer.

The legal effect of these circumstances is what Barr's and Durham's statements are trying to warn the Demedia and the liberals about . . . problem is, they are too boisterous celebrating to hear, and too occupied denouncing Barr and Durham as being political to understand.



*The Carter Page FISA warrant was desperately needed because with the 18 month look-back and the two hop rule, it (and renewals) would allow the cover-up of thousands of illegal §702(16)(17) abuses of the NSA database in the summer / fall of 2016, into the election, transition and flowing right into the Mueller investigation.

:smash:

Funny typical response when the report fails to support yours and others fantasies..you responded just like bengiza, biden, emails..
With suggestion. Of cover up or the IG himself is bias..

Where is the smoking gun ,, maybe the IG used the standard the Republicans are using to defend Trump. He cant find. Anyone who spoke directly to anyone who directed or ask can you do us a favor conduct surveillance on Trumps campaign for political reasons
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but it did.....

If Trump suggests the world is flat, Barr will find a way to spin that to be true and the GOP will adopt the newest and greatest conspiracy theory. The high stepping right in the senate will never accept the truth, Trump speaks the only truth in their minds.
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Thank you for sharing your valuable opinion today. Enjoy your freedoms.
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Soon to come
Acting FBI Director Janine Pirro
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Thanks for sharing
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Don’t joke about such things.
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I see a lot of smoke coming out of Floridaman and the Trumplicans, seems to be the scream louder and you win theory, because to his base truth doesn't matter, Floridaman does

If you read the report you'll find that it blows the Trumplican conspiracy theories out of the water.

The Crossfire investigation was for political purposes............

“We did not find documentary or testimonial evidence that political bias or improper motivation influenced the decisions to open the four individual investigations..."

They planted spies in the campaign...........

“We found no evidence that the FBI attempted to place any CHSs within the Trump campaign, recruit members of the Trump campaign as CHSs, or task CHSs to report on the Trump campaign.”

The investigation was based on the Steele report paid for by the Dems......

“These officials, though, did not become aware of Steele’s election reporting until weeks later, and we therefore determined that Steele’s reports played no role in the Crossfire Hurricane opening..."

I think you are correct as you scream loudly here on a daily basis. I also think it will ultimately discourage you as Trump is a certainty to win in 2020. But keep screaming as you fall deeper into the abyss of misfits.
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Keep believing that

OK
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A day after U.S. Attorney General William Barr disputed a watchdog’s finding that the FBI was legally justified in opening the Russia investigation, a group of lawyers who served in Republican administrations on Tuesday accused him of mischaracterizing the conclusions and more broadly injecting politics into the Justice Department to benefit President Donald Trump.

Barr disavowed certain findings of the Justice Department’s inspector general, Michael Horowitz, who documented missteps in the FBI’s inquiry into Russian interference in the 2016 election but otherwise determined the investigation was lawfully opened. Taking aim at that latter finding, Barr said the inspector general’s report “now makes clear that the FBI launched an intrusive investigation of a U.S. presidential campaign on the thinnest of suspicions that, in my view, were insufficient to justify the steps taken.”
“It is also clear that, from its inception, the evidence produced by the investigation was consistently exculpatory,” he said, in a prepared statement that went out within a half-hour of the inspector general report’s release.

His commentary added fuel to criticism that he’s serving more as a “spokesman” for Trump —as James Comey called him in a Washington Post op-ed—than as the independent head of the U.S. Justice Department. Barr’s critics have accused him of politicizing the Justice Department, using his leadership to advance defense-lawyer arguments benefitting Trump personally and not more widely the office of the presidency. Barr is set to speak later this afternoon in Washington at an event hosted by the Wall Street Journal.
On Tuesday, a group of former Justice Department and White House lawyers, all of whom served in Republican administrations, criticized Barr over his latest dip into a partisan battle. The former leaders are all affiliated with Checks & Balances, a group of conservative lawyers who have bristled at Trump’s presidency. The group has lashed out at Barr previously, challenging his attempt to implement an “autocratic vision of executive power.”

Jonathan Rose, who served under the Reagan administration as the assistant attorney general in charge of the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Policy, said the inspector general’s report “rebuts in detail the AG’s charge that the FBI’s investigation of the 2016 Trump campaign was unjustified, overly intrusive, or systematically suppressed exculpatory evidence.”

“This is the first attorney general in the history of presidential impeachment proceedings to enlist as a partisan warrior on behalf of a President. It is a sad day for those of us who revere the historic commitment of the FBI and the Department of Justice to even-handed law enforcement based on truth and verifiable facts,” said Rose, who had previously served under the Nixon administration as the deputy associate attorney general.
Donald Ayer, who served as deputy attorney general under the George H.W. Bush administration, said Barr’s reaction to the inspector general’s report was reminiscent of his handling of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report on the Russia investigation. Ahead of the Mueller report’s release, Barr came under criticism for mischaracterizing the report’s findings.

Ayer, a former Jones Day partner who now teaches at Georgetown Law, said the inspector general’s exhaustive investigation showed that the Russia investigation was “properly initiated based on a sound factual basis, and that the allegations of ‘witch hunt’ and bias on the part of those overseeing it are without foundation.”

“Rather than focus on those critical findings which should reassure all Americans, Barr dwells entirely on the report’s further findings that some agents (who he describes as a ‘small group of now-former’ FBI employees) were guilty of misconduct in the manner in which they put forward evidence in some submissions to the [Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act] court,” Ayer said, referring to the secretive court tasked with weighing warrant applications filed under the surveillance law.

Indeed, the inspector general’s report stated repeatedly that the review of the Russia investigation had not uncovered evidence that “political bias or improper motivation” influenced the FBI’s action, an assertion that flew in the face of Trump’s refrain that the probe amounted to a partisan “witch hunt.”

Christopher Wray testifies before the Senate Judiciary Committee during his confirmation hearing in 2017. Credit: Diego M.
FBI Director Christopher Wray has accepted the findings of the inspector general’s report, saying it revealed “unacceptable” problems and missteps. Wray, a former partner at King & Spalding, has vowed to make changes to how the bureau handles confidential informants and applies for warrants through the FISA courts.

On Tuesday, Trump targeted Wray over his reaction to the report, writing in a tweet: “I don’t know what report current Director of the FBI Christopher Wray was reading, but it sure wasn’t the one given to me. With that kind of attitude, he will never be able to fix the FBI, which is badly broken despite having some of the greatest men & women working there!”

Carrie Cordero, a co-founder of Checks and Balances and former counsel to the head of the Justice Department’s national security division under the George W. Bush administration, said Trump’s tweet on Tuesday “betrays his own bias: one in favor of personal loyalty and blind partisanship instead of dedication to mission and country.”

“We should not accept as normal or acceptable a political leader who routinely seeks to damage the credibility of the leadership and institutions dedicated to keeping Americans safe,” she said.

the report highlighted many errors, some it labeled as “serious”. the DOJ ignored a lot of exculpatory information when applying for FISA warrants on an american citizen.

i’m not sure what the motive was to commit a large number of serious errors, if not political, in this case. Maybe the FBI is just that unprofessional all around.

Durham stuck his neck out to say he disagrees with parts of the reports. Let’s see what he says. But if I’m ok with the mueller report not finding Trump colluded with russia, than i should
be equally satisfied with the IG report finding no political bias.
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Here's a link to IG reports, all of them. https://oig.justice.gov/reports/all.htm
What the IGs do is find errors in procedure, that is the job they are to perform.
Read any executive summary, you will find that the issues are listed and they always are found and acted upon.
All jobs performed by humans have errors, misjudgements and miscalculations.
In my experience few people conspire to do their jobs incorrectly, perhaps it is common in your industry.

FBI bad for conducting legal surveillance... :realmad:

Trump asking ukraine for a favor against Biden :faga::lm:

not every task performed by humans, is found to have serious errors. Is that really news to you?
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FBI bad for making serious errors when deciding to suspend the inalienable rights of an american citizen. One who presumably by sheer coincidence, worked for the presidential campaign which the agent leading the investigation, said he’d “stop” from becoming president.

You’re bending over backwards to whitewash this, because it helps your political agenda.

Carter Page is going to be suing as many people as that Sandman kid. I can’t imagine any insurance company willing to write slander/libel insurance for CNN or MSNBC. I used to work
for a company which sold
such insurance.
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Barr stated, “The Inspector General’s report now makes clear that the FBI launched an intrusive investigation of a U.S. presidential campaign on the thinnest of suspicions that, in my view, were insufficient to justify the steps taken.”

Note what Barr did not say. He did not say that launching the investigation was illegal. Nor did he say the FBI violated any internal policy. Instead, he relied on his own opinion that the evidence was insufficient to justify the investigation. His hindsight does not make the investigation illegal or improper.

He stated that “the evidence produced by the investigation was consistently exculpatory.” This statement overlooks facts contained in Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report documenting contacts between the Trump campaign and Russia. He neglected to mention Trump’s negotiations for a Trump Tower in Moscow, the June 2016 meeting with Russians at Trump Tower in New York to obtain dirt on Hillary Clinton, and Manafort’s meeting with Konstantin Kilimnik in August 2016 to share polling data on battleground states. Barr’s omissions tend to make him sound more like a defense attorney for Trump than the Attorney General of the United States.

Just keep defending Putin's Puppet and his lackeys.