Making my way through the Carter Page FISA application. First thing that jumps out: They went straight for “knowingly engages in clandestine intelligence activities”; I’d thought they might have leaned on the “aids or abets” definition of a foreign agent.
“The FBI believes that the Russian Government’s efforts are being coordinated with Page and perhaps other individuals associated with Candidate #1’s campaign.”
Significant amount of redacted information pertaining to Page’s pre-2016 ties to Russia & Russian intelligence. Implies they think he was recruited years ago, but impossible to assess the evidence for that.
There’s a full page of discussion of Steele being hired to conduct political oppo research, and why the FBI regards his reporting as reliable anyway. Makes the Nunes claim that they tried to hoodwink the FISC about this look even more ridiculous.
It’s absolutely insane Nunes tried to claim FBI hid this information from the FISC. All this immediately follows the first mention of Steele (aka “Source 1”). 
Several fully redacted pages in the section containing Steele dossier information. Suggests he may have provided info beyond what has been published, or that the FBI had independent sourcing supporting some of his claims.
Also quite clear that, contrary to Nunes’ claims, the FBI was NOT using Michael Isikoff’s Yahoo News article as independent confirmation of Steele’s reporting, but as a source for Page’s denials he was working for Russia.
Possible Steele misled FBI about whether he’d talked to press, but it looks like FBI understood the Isikoff article was based on Steele’s reporting and made this clear to the FISC, ever if they didn’t think Steele had provided it directly.
Somewhat surprisingly, they redact the section where they appear to lay out what criminal statutes they think Page’s conduct would or “may” violate
Main takeaway: It’s still impossible to assess the overall strength of FBI’s evidence. Long sections related to Page’s preexisting relationship with Russian intelligence, and many pages following reference to Steele’s reporting, are redacted in full.
The fact that the material remains redacted implies they had *something* apart from the Steele reporting that’s currently public, but no way to know what it is or how solid it is.
What this does make clear beyond any serious doubt is the brazen dishonesty of the Nunes memo. It is impossible to imagine a reasonable person reading this document and then making the claims in that memo in good faith.
Assorted odds and ends: There are some pretty puzzling redactions, including what looks like a citation to the statutory definition of “minimization procedures”. Open to theories as to why that would be blacked out.
Just eyeballing it, but the renewal application seems to have a substantially longer redacted section implying additional supporting evidence gained from either collection on Page or from other sources.
One part of the application quotes KellyAnne Conway’s claim that if Page was involved in discussions with Russian officials, he was not doing so with the “permission or knowledge of the campaign.” A redacted passage follows. Possibly evidence for thinking this claim was untrue?
Of potential interest: The renewal applications cite Page’s public denials and, specifically, his claims that he was targeted purely based on bogus information produced at the behest of the Clinton campaign. Long redacted passages follow.
Two full Roman-numeral demarcated sections of the initial FISA application are redacted in full. In the renewal applications, there are three such sections, and by the final one (approved by Rosenstein) these final sections have gotten much, much longer.
Whatever these sections contain, it seems safe to assume they are independent of the Steele reporting.
