Catching up on IG hearing. Graham begins by noting that if you think takeaway of report was something about its predication, it's proof you did not read the report. Says his goal is to educate people about ACTUAL CONTENTS of report and now how it was spun by implicated parties.
Says he'll assume for sake of argument is that investigation started fine. Notes that there are essentially no standards for opening counterintel probe. Discussing the violations of rule of law, systemic failure, people at highest level of government "took law into own hands"
"As if J. Edgar Hoover came back to life. The old FBI that had a chip on its shoulder and wanted to intimidate people." References actions against Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Probe run by people handpicked by McCabe.
Reads texts from probe officials Strzok and Page, showing *extreme* partisan bias against Trump. "God Trump is a loathsome human." "Oh my God, he's an idiot."
Grassley just continuing to read text after text, with these people fantasizing about the removal of Trump as president, discussing investigation as an "insurance policy" in the case he miraculously wins.
Now GRAHAM explaining how FBI blatantly doctored evidence and failed to mention exonerating evidence in order to secure a warrant to spy on an innocent U.S. citizen. GAH. NOT GRASSLEY GRAHAM. Forgive me on all these tweets. GRAHAM.
Notes that manipulation of evidence changed Carter Page's HELP to his country to the opposite. Notes that attorney who doctored that evidence in order to violate Carter Page's civil liberties *also happened have extreme partisan bias* against Trump.
Graham notes that newsrooms in America share this extreme partisan bias, as reflected in the texts from all these key FBI officials. Lawyer who doctored evidence texts his worry that his name is on the documents targeting people affiliated with new administration.
This FBI guy who doctored evidence literally texted "Viva La Resistance," if you are wondering whether he's a part of the Resistance or not.
"If you get out of this report 'lawful investigation with a few irregularities,'" says more about you than Horowitz, Graham says, lambasting the mendacious spin from Democrats/media/NeverTrump about a report that is frankly devastating to the FBI.
Graham notes that IG found dossier was central and essential to securing wiretap on American citizens. Now explaining how that document was funded by Clinton/DNC and that FISA court was not told that. Neither were they told that dossier author was obsessed with defeating Trump.
"Christopher Steele went all over the United States trying to get media outlets to publish this garbage." Graham notes.
!! Graham says McCain gave him the dossier to read. Says he found it stunning and salacious. ("It's a bunch of crap," he adds.)
If you would spend 30 minutes looking at Christopher Steele, you'd see he was biased and had an ax to grind. Take anything he says with a grain of salt, Graham says.
Five people interview Steele's primary subsource, Graham notes. Guy says Steele exaggerated statements, that they were sharing rumor and speculation from a literal bar convo, that he disputed the verification Steele claimed, never expected them to be treated as serious.
Graham: primary subsource tells FBI "I disavow everything in there." After that, they use dossier "they now know to be a bunch of garbage." Describe intvw as subsource being "truthful and cooperative." Leave out his disavowal of claims.
Graham: How would you like this to happen in your life? In January 2017 there is no benefit of the doubt to be given. These 5 people from DOJ/FBI have been told dossier is garbage. The question is how far up did it go? Why they kept going? Maybe b/c they were on mission.
Graham: I don't know what McCabe and Comey knew but I'm dying to find out. Notes that FBI doctored email six months after they knew dossier was garbage.
Graham: If FISA court doesn't take corrective action and do something about being manipulated and lied to, you will lose my support.
Graham: Comey says he's vindicated by your report. True?
Horowitz: "The activities we found don't vindicate anyone who touched this."
Horowitz: "The activities we found don't vindicate anyone who touched this."
Horowitz: Steele's political bias should have been disclosed to court.
Horowitz, on FBI/DOJ failure to disclose Steele's bias to court: "any evidence of bias is supposed to be disclosed to the court."
After Horowitz notes more failures in FISA app, Graham says, 'So are these the best and the brightest?' Horowitz says he hopes others in department follow practices better.
Horowitz detailing precisely how the "Viva The Resistance" guy doctored evidence that would have been "very helpful" to Page in terms of not being spied upon by his government.
Horowitz repeatedly notes the LOW THRESHOLD FBI needed to meet before launching a massive counterintelligence probe on political opponents. So all those headlines of meeting that threshold should probably mention that there basically is no threshold.
I mean, Horowitz's claim is that FBI met threshold to target Trump campaign by receiving hearsay from a foreign source that they never even tried to verify. So I think "low" understates things a bit.
Contrary to media claims, Trump did not receive defensive briefing on Russia interference. In fact, they used briefing to gather and record information for the counterintelligence probe. Horowitz says this is obviously very disconcerting.
"If this doesn't bother you, you hate Trump way too much." -- Graham on the use of a pretext meeting with Trump to gather damaging information on Trump campaign for counterintelligence probe. Person presenting as a briefer was actually gathering information.
Rather than fight Horowitz on his claim that he found no "smoking gun" evidence of bias, Graham's reading of cartoonishly biased texts from the key people who committed all the errors (that just happened to run uniformly in the anti-Trump direction) was pretty tactically smart.
The 400+ page report is about FISA and Confidential Human Source abuses against Trump campaign. Democrat questioning seems to focus on the claim that since there's essentially no threshold that you need to meet before spying on opposing political campaign, that threshold was met.
My Google search just now. google.com/search?q=how+o…
Grassley reminds he sent a criminal referral on Steele in January 2018 regarding media contacts. (man this has been dragging on for years and media and other partisans were defending Steele and his dossier until literally this week.)
Grassley says he has been asking about defensive briefings to Trump campaign since September 2017. Worried that they were using intelligence briefings to investigate campaign. Horowitz again confirms that the one for Trump was for investigative purposes.
One of the takeaways from IG report(s) and this testimony and others is how few policies govern FBI behavior. Really makes it easy to, say, let political allies skate free while ringing up political opponents. *Cough* Midyear Exam *Cough*. *Cough* Crossfire Hurricane *Cough*.
Cornyn notes that agents practiced in preparation for their intelligence gathering during security briefing. They held mock briefings to help them get info on Trump campaign as they were presenting themselves as merely briefing campaign.
Side editorial note: No disrespect to any member of the chambers but ... the level of grandstanding in the Senate is so much more tolerable for this viewer than the level of grandstanding in the House.
Hawley noting that the DOJ/FBI failures were weaponized via leaks to media, who fully coordinated with their sources to perpetuate the completely false Russia narrative.
Horowitz says far more reforms and changes are needed than what FBI Director Wray wrote about in his response letter to the IG report.
Hawley pointing out that the DNC and FBI colluded in this Russia hoax. DNC/Clinton campaign secretly bought and paid for the dossier that DOJ/FBI used, even after it knew that it was complete rubbish.
Blumenthal tries to get Horowitz to say that FBI didn't interfere in 2016 election. Horowitz declines to agree, adding that both this report and the one on Clinton email campaign have information about specific individuals' behavior ...
"FBI didn't put spies INTO the campaign, merely ONTO the Trump campaign," is such a fascinating talking point being offered by the media and other Democrats.
Blumenthal tries to get Horowitz to say that FISA warrants on Page were renewed because they were producing helpful information. Horowitz says that's how it should be, but he would not necessarily say that about the Page warrants.
Horowitz describes FBI/DOJ behavior outlined in his report as "pretty bad."
Adam Schiff was the primary promoter of the completely false Steele dossier -- he even read it into the Congressional record -- and the false Russia collusion narrative. He is a favored media source, despite his consistently dishonest track record. He is now leading impeachment.
Tillis noting how Steele was supposedly fired as a source but that the FBI continued to receive his information -- and do so via a DOJ conduit -- repeatedly. A dozen more times after his firing.
"The stuff that didn't happen on Woods review was basic stuff. You didn't need to be a deeply experienced FBI agent to do it the right way." Horowitz tells Tillis. Tillis noting that bias is sort of the most obvious explanation for the failure, then.
Thom Tillis to Mike Lee, longtime FISA critic: "You can smirk again because you were right."
Tillis noting that Horowitz received many questions that had nothing to do with his actual report. He seems to be critiquing the Democrats here, since they seem to want to avoid talking about the demonstrated abuse of the FISA process in the anti-Trump probe.
Sen. Hirono now up. She's trying to get Horowitz to say that the investigation was not started on the thinnest of suspicions, as critics have said. He declines to do so. Hirono merely reading her staff notes, but she seems a bit underprepared for the moment.
Hirono wants Horowitz to say he's upset at Barr for describing the use of electronic surveillance and confidential human informants as "spying." He declines to do so. She, uh, notes that she does not see him "jumping up and down" in support of the use of that word.
Listening to Hirono reminds me of Sen. Roman Hruska's comment on Supreme Court nominee Carswell. "There are a lot of mediocre judges and people and lawyers. They are entitled to a little representation, aren't they, and a little chance?"
Kennedy says after reading 15% of report, it made him want to heave. After 25%, he felt like he was dropping acid. Couldn't believe how bad it was. Horowitz agrees!
One interesting thing coming out of this hearing is how many of the bad actors are still present in the FBI. We don't have numbers, but Horowitz suggesting it's significant.
Horowitz reiterating that anyone who touched the surveillance of Trump campaign not vindicated by his report, contrary to claims from media and other Democrats.
Horowitz saying that his bias claim was just about Priestap opening, not about all the other issues. Also could explain why Barr/Durham didn't love his comments, since they're privy to so much more information.
On which note, informed parties suggest Horowitz made that note about Priestap precisely because everything else in his report is so utterly devastating to the FBI/DOJ.
Horowitz notes it's reasonable for people to look at, e.g., the 17 errors against Page as merely gross incompetence and not obvious bias.
