On Saturday, Democratic members of the House Intelligence Committee released their rebuttal to the Nunes memo. The counter-memo claims “FBI and DOJ officials did not ‘abuse’ the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) process, omit material information, or subvert this vital tool to spy on the Trump campaign.” Following its release, President Trump slammed the Democrats’ counter-memo, branding it a “total political and legal BUST.”
The Democrat memo response on government surveillance abuses is a total political and legal BUST. Just confirms all of the terrible things that were done. SO ILLEGAL!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 24, 2018
“Dem Memo: FBI did not disclose who the clients were – the Clinton Campaign and the DNC. Wow!” Trump added.
Dem Memo: FBI did not disclose who the clients were – the Clinton Campaign and the DNC. Wow!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 24, 2018
The counter-memo claims “FBI and DOJ officials did not ‘abuse’ the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) process, omit material information, or subvert this vital tool to spy on the Trump campaign.”
Below are the memo’s key findings. (CLICK HERE TO READ MEMO PDF)
Via Zerohedge:
- The Steele Dossier was not the catalyst for launching the Trump-Russia probe
- The rationale for surveilling Carter Page was carefully weighed.
- The Nunes memo used classified information selectively and included distortions and misrepresentations
- Papadopoulos’ role as the original catalyst for the Trump-Russia investigation outlined.
- DOJ’s FISA application was carefully vetted and wasn’t used to spy on Trump or his campaign
- Steele’s information about Page’s contacts with Kremlin insiders like Sechin was consistent with Papadopoulos information
- DOJ was transparent with the court about Steele’s role and why he had reliable information
- Nunes memo’s references to Ohr are misleading and the Strzok/Page texts are irrelevant
Some more details: as part of “correcting the record”, the HPSCI democrats claim that:
- Christopher Steele’s raw intelligence reporting did not inform the FBI’s decision to initiate its counterintelligence investigation in late July 2016. In fact, the FBI’s closely-held investigative team only received Steele’s reporting in mid-September – more than seven weeks later. The FBI – and, subsequently, the Special Counsel’s – investigation into links between the Russian government and Trump campaign associates has been based on troubling law enforcement and intelligence information unrelated to the “dossier.”
- DOJ’s October 21, 2016 FISA application and three subsequent renewals carefully outlined for the Court a multi-pronged rationale for surveilling Page, who, at the time of the first application, was no longer with the Trump campaign. DOJ detailed Page’s past relationships with Russian spies and interaction with Russian officials during the 2016 campaign [REDACTED]. DOJ cited multiple sources to support the case for surveilling Page — but made only narrow use of information from Steele’s sources about Page’s specific activities in 2016, chiefly his suspected July 2016 meetings in Moscow with Russian officials.[REDACTED] In fact, the FBI interviewed Page in March 2016 about his contact with Russian intelligence, the very month candidate Donald Trump named him a foreign policy advisor.
House Intel Committee Chairman Nunes responded to the Dem spin memo on Saturday in an official statement (screenshot below):
Nunes also refuted the Dem memo point by point with a 5 page response via the House Intelligence site. (screenshot below):
Lights out Adam Schiff!