Thread by @MZHemingway

Of applications for warrants to spy on US citizen Carter Page, IG says "numerous instances in which factual representations in those applications were inaccurate, incomplete, or unsupported by appropriate documentation."

IG reminds that it did "did not analyze all of the decisions in the Crossfire Hurricane investigation," but had a more limited scope.

In fact, IG specifically says "our role in this review was not to second-guess discretionary judgments by Department personnel about whether to open an investigation" -- something spin from media and their sources on IG's view of opening investigation neglected to mention.

Massive counterintel investigation against political campaign of opposing party was started solely on tip from foreign gov't, nothing else, IG says. W/in days, 4 campaign officials targeted, picked because they'd been to Russia or talked to Russians. Wow does this look flimsy.

IG says this was technically allowed, thanks to " low
threshold" FBI has for counterintelligence investigations.

IG says he's "concerned" about investigation handling given "constitutionally protected activity occurring
during a national presidential campaign." Also "concerned" about "intrusive investigative techniques that could
impact constitutionally protected activity."

IG says officials all agreed that they should launch massive counterintel probe on basis of that one uncorroborated tip and not tell campaign (which included US Sen. and future AG Jeff Sessions and former NJ Gov. Chris Christie, notably) in case they were all in on it.

(It is perhaps worth noting that public reporting from recent years shows that US officials did talk to Russia about the alleged efforts but not the Trump campaign itself.)

IG reminds that previous report showed highly political texts from FBI/DOJ officials that "indicated or created the appearance that investigative decisions were impacted by bias or improper considerations."

IG previously reported (contrary to some claims recently made in media) and states again that texts were "not only indicative of a biased state of mind but, even more seriously, impl[y] a willingness to take official action to impact [Trump's] electoral prospects."

IG notes standards for launching probe of a campaign are extremely low, as happened for sprawling Russia probe. "Given the low threshold for predication...sufficient to predicate the full counterintelligence investigation" (others disagree, obviously.)

IG records Priestap claim that decision to keep probe at HQ instead of the traditional field office was done to prevent unauthorized disclosure to media. (Leaks from intel officials about Russia collusion hoax began in Fall of 2016 and continued through today.)

IG acknowledges that FBI used a confidential human source to interact with and record conversations with Trump affiliates. FBI also used a source to "record a conversation with a high-level Trump campaign official who was not a subject of the Crossfire Hurricane investigation"

Spying "implicated constitutionally protected activity," but IG says wasn't done "solely" to monitor opposition party's campaign so it's fine. IG remarkably nonplussed, though will admit concern activity could have led to "incidental receipt of sensitive campaign information."

In footnote, "recordings done by the CHSs did not generate information tending to support the allegation that Page and Papadopoulos were, wittingly or unwittingly, providing assistance to Russia."

IG notes, mildly, this bombshell: some info FBI had "was inconsistent with, or undercut, the allegations contained in the FISA applications to support probable cause and, in some instances, resulted in inaccurate information being included in the applications."

IG notes that U.S. citizen Carter Page was spied on by his government for more than a year " based on significant omissions and inaccurate information in the initial and renewal FISA applications. "

FBI wanted to get FISA warrant on Papadopoulos, too, but were constrained. "the FBI had no information that Papadopoulos was being directed by the Russians." Also decided against FISAs on Flynn and Manafort.

FBI wanted to get FISA on Page in mid-August. Another intel agency told FBI Page helped agency as "operational contact" from 2008 to 2013, providing detailed information Page had given that agency on Russian intel officers. FBI "did not accurately describe" info it received.

"In August 2016, Page made statements to an FBI CHS that, if
true, were in tension with the reporting the FBI received subsequently from Steele," but Page's statements were kept hidden.

After earlier FISA request was tamped down internally, FBI relaunched wiretap effort on Page, conveniently, the same day it received Steele's claims about him.

IG says Steele dossier "played a central and essential role" in decision to seek wiretap on Page. "FISA application drew heavily, although not entirely, upon the Steele reporting to support the government's position that Page was an agent of a foreign power."

IG confirms Nunes FISA memo, which said dossier formed an "essential" role in securing wiretap. Schiff, by contrast, falsely claimed application “made only narrow use" of Steele dossier (among other false claims about quality of Steele's claims).

IG accepts claim that allegations need not be corroborated before seeking to spy on U.S. citizen. Source merely needs to be vetted. Steele's actual sources were unidentified so they claimed to vet Steele. IG says claims about Steele were "overstated and not approved."

FBI lawyer "expressed frustration" that "FBI had not advised OI of the political origins of Steele's election reporting until late in the drafting process on the first FISA application," and only
after he asked three times for info about Steele's possible political connections.

(Steele had been secretly hired by the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton campaign to develop the Russia dossier for dissemination to media and government officials.)

IG identifies "numerous serious factual errors and omissions" in FISA applications, "a failure across three investigative teams to advise NSD attorneys of significant information that undercut certain allegations in the FISA applications," ...

"lack of satisfactory explanations for these failures" and "continuous failure to reassess the factual assertions supporting probable cause in the FISA applications as the investigation proceeded and information was obtained
raising significant questions about the Steele" dossier

Again, "the factual representations in the initial and renewal FISA applications filed with the FISC contained information that was inaccurate, incomplete, or unsupported by appropriate documentation"

Requirement that "both an agent and a supervisory agent verify, with supporting documentation" every piece of information in FISA application was "not met with regard to any of the four Carter Page FISA applications."

IG goes through a litany of problems with how FBI secured warrant to spy Carter Page. 1) omitted much material info. That includes that "Page had been approved as an operational contact" for (presumably) CIA from 2008-2013, and had provided them with relevant info.

2) falsely claimed Steele's prior reporting had been "corroborated and used in criminal proceedings," which was neither true nor approved by the FBI agent for inclusion. In fact it hadn't been used and mot of his reporting was notably not corroborated.

Let's pause here to note how frequently the media uncritically accepted false claims about Steele's veracity as part of their award-winning participation in perpetuating a false claim of treasonous collusion with Russia to steal the election. Be more skeptical, y'all!

3) Omitted information relevant to the reliability of a Steele source who even Steele himself admitted was a "boaster" and an "egoist" who engages in "embellishment."

4) Laughably asserted that FBI had assessed Steele did not directly provide to the press information in a September 23 Yahoo News article. Steele had been Yahoo News source and FBI knew Steele had blabbed to State Dept., too.

5) Omitted Papadopoulos's statements to FBI informant denying that anyone associated with the Trump campaign was
collaborating with Russia or with outside groups like WikiLeaks in the release of emails.

Omitted Page's statements to FBI informant that he'd "literally never met" or "said one word to" Manafort and that Manafort had not responded to his emails. This contradicted Steele's claims of "conspiracy" with Russia by acting as an intermediary for Manafort on behalf of Trump.

That was 6. 7) Selectively included Page's statements to informant that FBI believed supported its theory that Page was an agent of Russia but omitted other statements Page made, including denying having met with Sechin and Divyekin, or even knowing who Divyekin was.

Steele dossier had falsely claimed Page had met secretly with Sechin and Divyekin about future cooperation with Russia and shared derogatory information about candidate Clinton.

IG says that "corroboration" of Steele dossier was limited to the broad themes checked out (e.g., "Russia's desire to sow discord") and that dossier matched with some "publicly available" information.

IG says interviews with Steele's sources showed "potentially serious problems with Steele's description of information in his election reports," including that sources didn't back up his claims.

FBI did a review of Steele late in the process but didn't mention negative information about "his work-related performance in a prior position" and FBI's own "concerns about the number of contacts that Steele purportedly had with Russian oligarchs"

That reviewing office made "decision to omit its conclusion that Steele's election reporting was uncorroborated." IG says this is problematic, understating wildly. IG also says more should have been done to counter Russian disinformation probability.

Interesting discussion about how FBI wanted to treat Steele as a confidential human source. That would impose obligations on Steele. He preferred to be doing work on behalf of FusionGPS. Both sides elided the conflict to enable the flow of Clinton/DNC oppo to keep coming.

Steele was talking to everyone, obviously.

Every page is just filled with news and information. Even the footnotes. Such as one that says that the FBI disclosed classified information to Steele in an October 2016 meeting. But that FBI has no rules yet on why that's not good. IG recommends agency develop guidance.

IG confirms Bruce Ohr, DOJ official married to Fusion GPS' Nellie Ohr, funneled to FBI information from Steele after his termination as a source. There were 13 meetings after termination. "the general instruction was to let [the FBI]
know ... when I got information from Steele."

It occurs to me that at this point, I've read of many many MANY dozens of "mistakes" by FBI/DOJ officials and every single one of them was in a direction harmful to Trump. What are the odds?

DOJ officials "were unaware of Ohr's meetings with FBI officials, Steele, Simpson, and the State Department until after Congress requested information from the Department
regarding Ohr's activities in late November 2017." (Reminder: DOJ/media/Dems bitterly opposed such requests)

FBI used Trump's "strategic intelligence briefing" to collect info on Flynn. Briefings "rely on expectation of trust and good faith among the participants. FBl's use of such briefings for investigative purposes potentially interferes with this expectation," IG notes.

IG: review "identified significant concerns" with how aspects of Trump investigation "were conducted and supervised, particularly FBI's failure to adhere to its own
standards of accuracy and completeness" when seeking warrants to surveil Carter Page, a Trump campaign affiliate.