BREAKING NEWS: Senate Releases Final Volume of Trump-Russia Report, This One Focused on Counterintelligence Evidence
UPDATE: As predicted, this Senate report is as damning as Vol. 1 of Mueller's report—quite damning—but most will ignore it. Disinformation agents like "Blazer Legacy" lied in promising the report would "nab" Trump, prove he works directly for Putin, and lead to a new impeachment.
NOTE: I feel enormous sympathy for those who were lied to for *months* by the disinformation entity "Blazer Legacy," which is likely at this moment deleting its prior promises of how earth-shattering this report would be. Again, it is *as damning* as Mueller's report—but no more.
PS/ The report reveals the deleterious effects of a benighted bipartisanship on quality of work product. For instance, Trump's lawyer overheard him acknowledging foreknowledge of the June 2016 Trump-Russia meeting. GOP senators seem to have forced a disregarding of that evidence.
PS2/ Just so, there's ample evidence confirming that among the most verified components of Steele's dossier are those relating to Page's activities in Moscow. The summary of the report's unclassified components is, instead, at *great pains* to take the GOP line on Steele's work.
PS3/ Repeatedly, the report goes right up to the line of alleging serious misconduct, only to, at least in its executive summary conclusions, *refrain* from making any statement that could influence the coming election.
This is what a bipartisan investigation usually looks like.
This is what a bipartisan investigation usually looks like.
PS4/ For months, anonymous disinformation agents of uncertain origin had been selling "hope porn" suggesting that for the first time in modern political history, a bipartisan political report would lead to the collapse of a presidency less than 90 days before a general election.
PS5/ What happened, instead, is what I and many others who've spent years researching Trump long said: once it was revealed that Mueller's scope was not what the media had reported—but far narrower—we were going to have to wait for a new Attorney General for a real investigation.
PS6/ For instance both Mueller's report and the Senate counterintelligence report establish facts consistent with a bribery prosecution of Trump—but Mueller didn't feel authorized to investigate it and the Senate report is a counterintelligence rather than criminal investigation.
PS7/ But I do want to repeat a point I was making throughout 2019: under a Democratic Congress, the evidence in Vol. 1 of the Mueller Report and in this Senate counterintelligence report would have been sufficient to impeach and remove Donald Trump on *national security grounds*.
PS8/ While neither report makes *anything* like the case "Blazer Legacy" promised—that Trump "works for" Putin—just like Mueller's report, this Senate report confirms Trump was establishing his foreign policy toward Russia while compromised by promises of future deals from Putin.
PS9/ Ironically, the Senate considers Cohen credible when he's describing the 2015 business deal with Putin that Trump sought to negotiate, but suddenly ignores his sworn testimony when he's revealing Trump had *foreknowledge* of the June 2016 Trump-Russia meeting at Trump Tower.
PS10/ Above all, here's the problem we'll have with today's Senate report: the overwhelming majority of what's in it was also in Mueller's report, but since no one read that report, both media and disinformation agents will be in a position to claim this report holds major news.
PS11/ The sad truth is that we already knew much of what is in this Senate report by the time I published Proof of Collusion in 2018, and nearly all of it by the time I published Proof of Conspiracy in 2019. Even the damning information about Stone we have had for many months.
PS12/ The chief indictment in the Senate report is an implicit one: an indictment of *America* for not caring about this incredibly damning criminal and counterintelligence information when we first received it not just in the Mueller Report but at least a year before the report.
PS13/ That Trump and the Trump campaign earnestly believed Stone had access to Kremlin cutout WikiLeaks, and that Stone first promised the campaign WikiLeaks would help it *months before the DNC hack*, should be *national news* from now until the election. But it won't be, sadly.
PS14/ That Trump *ordered his political team* to access the fruits of federal crimes and international espionage for political purposes—and that his team believed it was Russia that held those fruits—should be national news between now and the election, but likewise, it won't be.
PS15/ That Trump told Cohen his political campaign was an infomercial for his business—then established a Russia policy he had Cohen use in pitching what would have been the largest deal in Trump's career to Putin—is bribery, and should be national news, but once again, won't be.
PS16/ That Trump knew by mid-2016 that Russia was attacking America—and withheld everything he knew about that from the US intelligence community alongside Flynn—should be national news, but instead this Senate report falsely alleges he didn't have that information until October.
PS17/ The criminal standard for aiding and abetting is having knowledge with "a high likelihood" that a crime is occurring—but it seems that under pressure from GOP senators, the Senate has changed the standard to "known for a certainty." That falsely exculpates Trump of a crime.
PS18/ Per the Senate, The counterintelligence briefing Trump received in August 2016—which was *more* than enough to confirm what had already been reported by media in June 2016 about Russian attacks—meant nothing. Only the formal ODNI statement in October meant anything at all.
PS19/ Today, unfortunately, Americans will have to watch out for disinformation from both Republicans and anonymous disinformation agents. For instance, many are screen-shotting this *minority* report from Democrats as though it's the conclusion of the report itself. It is *not*. 
PS20/ What we find in the Democrats' minority report is exactly what folks like me have been saying since 2018. In other words, my view is the view that a reasonable investigator would have—and would register—if s/he didn't have to negotiate with GOP senators acting in bad faith.
PS21/ But one thing I would *never* do to readers here is pretend that my view—which is consistent with Democratic senators' view, which will be consistent with an ethical Attorney General's view sometime in the future—is *currently* the bipartisan view in the Senate. It *isn't*.
PS22/ If Marco Rubio were a patriot—and his peers in the GOP were patriots—the minority view presented by the Democrats in today's report *would've* been the consensus view, and it *would've* necessitated what frankly was *already* necessitated: a "national security" impeachment.
PS23/ But I want to state this as clearly as I can: what you've gotten on this feed for five years now is *exactly* the mainstream view of Democratic investigators, which is *exactly* what the view of non-political criminal and counterintelligence investigators would be and *is*.
PS24/ One thing today's report *does* underscore is the cowardice of a supposedly "liberal" media in framing mainstream views of what Trump did as "conspiracy theories." While there were wackos and disinformation agents like "Blazer Legacy" out there, most of us were responsible.
PS25/ I agree—based on thousands of hours of research into the Trump-Russia case as a former criminal investigator and longtime criminal defense attorney, and as someone who has now published 3 epic-length books on this subject—with Heinrich, Feinstein, Wyden, Harris, and Bennet:
PS/ Caught having spread disinformation for months, the "Blazer Legacy" account has now issued a statement (and if past is precedent, will shortly nuke itself and scurry away until it's time for a new disinformation op).
The statement—incredibly—echoes Trump: "It is what it is."
The statement—incredibly—echoes Trump: "It is what it is."
NOTE/ It's 90 days before the biggest election of our lifetimes. Trump is indeed disloyal to America—and a counterintelligence threat. Do *not* endorse or share critical election information from anonymous accounts. It's time for those of us on the left to *stop messing around*.
NOTE2/ I've no problem *generally* with anonymous feeds. But some of us are out here taking death threats, harassment, libel, and far worse *under our real names* because we believe in this fight. Don't signal-boost cowards who pass on supposedly key information from the shadows.
NOTE3/ Today is a day for me to say how proud I am (and how much I stand by) every single piece of fully-sourced major-media information in Proof of Collusion, Proof of Conspiracy, and Proof of Corruption—not *one* of which has been disputed by Mueller, the Senate or anyone else.
