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Stephen McIntyre

@ClimateAudit

Sep 16, 2021 • 46 tweets • 15 min read • Read on X

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Sussmann of Perkins Coie indicted for lying to FBI.
Indictment contains fascinating details on (long-denied) role of Clinton campaign and Democrats in perpetrating this fraud.context-cdn.washingtonpost.com/notes/prod/def…

2/ Sussmann's work in pushing and disseminating the fraudulent "Alfa" logs was billed to Clinton campaign, contradicting prior claims that he represented some anonymous public-spirited client.

3/ Durham's characterization of July 29, 2016 meeting leaves out one of most important facts: in addition to Fusion personnel (US Investigative Firm) attending this meeting, Christopher Steele of Orbis was in attendance. Why omit this?

4/ Sussmann, Elias and Fusion were coordinating in August 2016, with time charged to Clinton campaign

5/ Tech-Executive 1 (Max, who, prior to indictment, was plausibly identified by @Fool_Nelson as Rodney Joffe of Neustar) also communicated directly with Fusion GPS. Questoin: are these communications disclosed in Communications Log provided to Alfa?

I'm a bit slow with this thread as I'm digesting it in real time. Each page has fresh surprises and hard to do justice to it. I encourage everyone to read it.

6/ I'm going to walk through chronology of events, adding commentary. Durham observes that Tea Leaves/Originator 1 had "assembled purported DNS data" by "in or around late July 2016" spanning time period from May 4, 2016 to July 29, 2016.

7/ the July 29 date matches, by coincidence or not, the date of a meeting between Sussmann, Elias, Fusion GPS and Christopher Steele at Perkins Coie office. This was in the immediate wake of Wikileaks publishing DNC emails. Also date that Crossfire Hurricane opened.

8/ the latest timestamp in Tea Leaves' purported DNS log was July 19, 2016 11:33 AM (EDT). So it was finalized only minutes before the Perkins Coie meeting.

9/ by coincidence (or not), the earliest timestamp in the purported DNS logs was on May 4, 2016 6:48 AM (EDT), the very day that Crowdstrike's engagement began and, within minutes, purported to identify Russian state hackers.

9/ Durham says that Originator-1 (Tea Leaves) was "a business associate of Tech Executive 1 [Joffe]". WeaponizedAutism convincingly identified Tea Leaves some time ago as April Lorenzen. Detail in Indictment consistent with this identification.

10/ at almost exactly the same time, Steele and Danchenko published Report 95 (undated but within a day or two of July 27, 2016), which broke the most detailed and damning fabrications of Trump-Russia collusion, claiming that Wikileaks hack and drop a product of this collusion

11/ the fraudulent Steele Report 95 would almost certainly have been on the agenda of Fusion, Steele, Elias and Sussmann at their July 29 summit meeting - in addition to the incipient fraud related to "Alfa Bank" communications

12/ the Indictment itemizes contacts between Sussmann, [Joffe] and Elias in August, all billed to Clinton campaign.

13/ the next section of Indictment describes efforts by Tech Executive 1 to "use his access at multiple organizations" to dig up dirt on Trump and Russia with the "goal of creating a 'narrative'" regarding Trump-Russia. If nothing else, this sounds like FARA in-kind contribution.

14/ Tech Executive 1 used his authority at two companies to direct employees to search "public and non-public" data for "derogatory" information on Trump. Some of this data appears to have been held by companies in supposed confidence, but such duties ignored.

15/ employees appear to have told FBI that they were "uncomfortable" with such an assignment, but Tech Executive 1 was a "powerful figure"

15/ on orders from Tech Executive 1, employees carried out a monumental search of "non-public Internet data" held in confidence for contacts of Trump associates. (Keep in mind that the Tea Leaves "data" was already in hand and has nothing to do with this August research.)

16/ employees of Internet Company 3 appear to have drafted a "written paper" for Tech Executive 1 containing "some of the same technical observations". I presume that these were comments on the Tea Leaves data, as hard to understand otherwise.

16/ concurrently, Tech Exec 1 commissioned Tea Leaves [Lorenzen] and two researchers at University-1 (plausibly identified as Georgia Tech) to research Trump ties to Russia to "please certain 'VIPS'". Another in kind contribution not declared to FEC.

17/ Durham observed that University-1 and Agency-1 were then finalizing a major contract. Walkafyre has convincingly identified this as the DoD-Georgia Tech contract announced on Nov 29, 2016. PI was Manos Antonakkis. Michael Farrell was Chief Scientist news.gatech.edu/news/2016/11/2…

18/ Durham says that TeaLeaves/Originator 1 was "founder of a company that [Georgia Tech] researchers were considering as a potential data provider". Slight support for identification of Lorenzen as putative Tea Leaves, as she was founder of Dissect Cyber.

19/ TechExec1 and InternetCompany1 provided [Georgia Tech] with confidential data, including DNS data of an Executive Branch office which [Neustar] held confidentially as a "sub-contractor in a sensitive relationship between USG and another company". By what authority I wonder?

20/ the ostensible purpose of Company 1 supplying confidential data to [Georgia Tech] was for research "to protect US from cyberattacks". However, TeaLeaves and the GT researchers "exploited" data to research alleged Trump-Russia ties

21/ but while the researchers were carrying out oppo research on all sorts of confidential data that they had for other purpose, this research not only doesn't appear to have turned up any derogatory information, but to have raised questions about Tea Leaves' original file

21/ Researcher 1 queried the DNS datafiles on domain (the domain in later controversy) and was unable to locate any communications linked to Russia, reporting that list "does not make much sense with the storyline you have". mail1.trump-email.com

21/ Originator 1 sent an email to [Joffe] and the other researchers on Aug 20, 2016, pointing out that it would be easy to fill out sales forms on two websites with a fake email address, and thereby cause them "to appear to communicate in DNS".

22/ [Joffe] then sent an email to [Lorenzen] and the researchers saying that "VIPs would be happy" with "evidence of *anything* that shows an attempt [by Trump] to behave badly". Very clear that [Joffe] complying with requests from Perkins Coie and Democrats.

23/ on August 21, 2016, [Joffe] concurred with researchers that DNS traffic "was not a secret communications channel" with Alfa Bank, noting that host was "legitimate cusomter relationship company" and that they could "ignore it", but urged researchers to press on in search.

24/ on August 22, Researcher 1 totally backed off allegations, saying that they could not credibly defend against criticism that traffic was "spoofed", that they would need to use "every trick" to make "even weak association" and claims could not "fly public scrutiny"

25/ so, at this point in Indictment, the tech specialists, including Tech Executive 1 (Max) have concluded that DNS logs did not provide defensible evidence of backchannel communications via Alfa Bank. Yet Sussmann and Perkins Coie proceeded anyway. On to balance of Indictment

26/ on September 5, Sussmann "began billing work for drafting" white paper summarizing the Alfa allegations, allegedly working on this with [Joffe], [Lorenzen] and the [Georgia Tech] researchers. One presumes that a lawyer acting as a lawyer would be obliged to include negatives

27/ on Sept 6, Sussmann (billing Clinton campaign) met with Fusion representatives, media, "consultant" (Tech Exec 1?) and Elias. Probably Eric Lichtblau of NYT was being pitched.

28/ on Sept 7, Sussmann (billing Clinton campaign) continued work on White Paper (which thus appears to be primarily work of Sussmann and Perkins Coie, as opposed to Max, Tea Leaves, Fusion or the Georgia Tech researchers)

29/ next paragraph interesting. Om Sept 14, Sussmann "continued work" on White Paper and met with [Joffe]. This time he billed time to both Clinton campaign and Internet Company 1 [Neustar?]. Did InternetCo1 file this contribution with FEC? How much was it?

30/ also on Sept 14, [Joffe] sought comments from [Lorenzen] and the [Georgia Tech] researchers on whether Sussmann's White Paper would be "plausible" to "security experts" (not as "dns experts"), at least enough to throw mud.

30/ the cynicism of the conspirators is breathtaking. Researcher 1 commended White Paper for avoiding the caveats and thought that it would fool "non-DNS" security professionals. "Nice!"

31/ On Sept 15, Tea Leaves also agreed that Sussmann's White Paper managed to be "plausible" within the "narrow scope". (By concealing and evading the caveats and question-marks which they were all aware of.)

32/ on Sept 16, Researcher-2 was also on board and suggested that Sussmann's White Paper was ready to "be shared with government officials". This is three days prior to Sussmann's meeting with FBI.

32/ this next paragraph suggest's that what I've been calling Sussmann's White Paper was more properly a joint product of Sussmann and TechExec1 [Joffe]. [Lorenzen] said that [TechExec1] had "carefully crafted message that could work to accomplish goals". Seems like a conspiracy

32/ concurrently, Sussmann was personally acting as agent for Clinton campaign with media. On Sept 1, he met with Franklin Foer (Reporter 1) who had previously authored article on Trump as Putin's bitch and would later break fraudulent Alfa communications story.

33/ on Sept 12, Sussmann and Elias talked to one another about Sussmann's efforts to place story with [New York Times]. Both Elias and Sussmann billed Clinton campaign for call.

34/ on Sept 15, Elias corresponded with 3 Clinton campaign officials about "Alfa" allegations that were subject of Sussmann-[Joffe] White Paper: campaign manager Robbie Mook, communications director Jen Palmieri and foreign policy advisor Jake Sullivan (now Biden Nat Sec Advisor)

35/ for readers new to this story, several of the key names in this narrative (Rodney Joffe, April Lorenzen, Georgia Tech researcher David Dagon) are listed in Alfa Bank subpoenas (located by Walkafyre at Search 2020ca006304). My collation below. appsgp.mypalmbeachclerk.com/eCaseView/land…

typo here. This should be July 29, 2016. Arggh.

36/ by coincidence, Rodney Joffe visited White House on Mar 23, 2016, 4 days after Podesta hack. Accompanied by Ilona Johnson of Neustar linkedin.com/in/ilana-johns… and Martin Lindner, soon to join SecureWorks, which endorsed Crowdstrike's ID of Fancy Bear linkedin.com/in/martin-lind…

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Stephen McIntyre

@ClimateAudit

Feb 13

Climate United Fund, into which Biden EPA appears to have parked $6.97 billion, is a coalition of three 501(c)(3): Calvert Impact Capital, Community Preservation Corporation and Self-Help Credit Union.

The grant was originally announced by Kamala Harris youtube.com/watch?v=-NZqTJ…

Their EPA work plan here:
epa.gov/system/files/d…. Their work plan says that they have managed more than $30 billion in private and institutional capital.

I looked very quickly at the financial statements for each of the three participants.

Calvert Impact assets.ctfassets.net/4oaw9man1yeu/6… shows a 2023 balance sheet with $520 million in portfolio investments and $154 million in cash.

Calvert Impact streams money into a large number of smaller (mostly) non-profits, including for example Artspace boutique homes illustrated below.

Community Preservation Corporation 2023 balance sheet shows $847 million invested in mortgage loans; cash and restricted cash of $342 million, $370 million invested in hedge funds, $101 million in unconsolidated subsidiaries for overall assets of $1.8 billion.

Self-Help Corporation has loans of $3.42 billion, with total assets of $4.49 billion.

All three participants are substantial 501(c)(3) corporations, all three are in the lending business. But their total is nowhere near the $30 billion mentioned in their application. I wonder where the $30 billion comes from.

The business to date of the three participants has been loans. Someone is going to benefit from the infusion of $6.97 billion into these three companies. How will that work? Maybe Kamala Harris can explain.

One-quarter of the Climate United Fund will be spent on "electric transportation" - a topic on which the leader of DOGE is well informed.

They propose "Electric and/or plug-in
hybrid electric passenger vehicles replacing existing ICE cars" - 25,000 – 35,000 passenger vehicles electrified. They also propose "Electric medium duty vans
and trucks replacing existing
ICE fleets" - 500-750 vehicles.

What isn't explained is why three Democrat 501(c)(3)'s have any useful role to play in the acquisition of electric vehicles by ICE? Surely that's something that ICA can administer themselves.

Similarly they propose "Electric heavy-duty trucks replacing diesel trucks" and "Electric school buses replacing diesel buses". Whatever the merits of the scheme, how do the 501(c)(3)'s add value?

Read 7 tweets

Stephen McIntyre

@ClimateAudit

Dec 2, 2024

Victoria Nuland was appointed to Board of Directors of National Endowment of Democracy, the primary US funding agency for overseas NGOs involved in Georgia, Ukraine and Syria.
One can scarcely help wondering what Nuland's input has been in connection with recent NGO activity in Georgia and Syria.

for people unfamiliar with Victoria Nuland, she has been mentioned dozens of times in previous threads here.
x.com/search?q=nulan…

reupping a link to Nuland's notorious conversation with US ambassador to Ukraine Geoffrey Pyatt in early February 2014, while Maidan insurrection reaching crescendo in Ukraine (precisely as Putin and Russia preoccupied with Sochi Olympics). On February 22, 2014, Yats (Yatsenyuk) Nuland's choice was installed as Prime Minister; Oleh Tiahnybok, leader of the neo-Nazi party, was given a key role in post-coup government, while Klitschko remained mayor of Kyiv, a position that he retained. Precisely as Nuland and Pyatt agreed. Nuland said that Biden would be running point on the operation, which he did, becoming the de facto US regent in Ukraine from 2014-Jan 2017. Worth listening to again. 📷youtube.com/watch?v=WV9J6s…… Earlier CA link here x.com/ClimateAudit/s…

Read 4 tweets

Stephen McIntyre

@ClimateAudit

Oct 24, 2024

Some readers have probably noticed that Microsoft has recently become one of the leading retailers of lurid allegations about "Russian influence operations targeting U.S. elections".

What is being overlooked is the lead author of the Microsoft articles is none other than Clint Watts, the founder (fpri.org/news/2017/08/f…) of the infamous Hamilton 68 dashboard, which was exposed by @mtaibbi in #TwitterFiles 15 (x.com/mtaibbi/status…) as the "next great media fraud".

Taibbi comprehensively exposed the total sham of the Hamilton 68 dashboard. Nonetheless, Clint Watts, the main proponent of the sham Hamilton 68 dashboard, has risen to a more lucrative and more prominent platform at Microsoft, where he continues to propagate the same warmonging claims as he has for more than a decade.

less well known is that Watts also had a curious role in the original Russiagate hoax. Christopher Steele had met Kathleen Kavalec, a senior State Department official on October 11, 2016, where he spun an even more lurid fantasy than the "dossier" itself, adding in Sussmann's false Alfa Bank hoax and naming Millian as a supposed source (notwithstanding his supposed reluctance to identify sources because of "danger".) Kavalec later met with Bruce Ohr, who became Steele's conduit to FBI after November 1, 2016.
Kavalec read Watts' lurid November 6, 2016 article entitled "Trolling for Trump" and, after meeting with Ohr et al on Nov 21, 2016, called Watts in for a meeting on December 7, 2016. warontherocks.com/2016/11/trolli…
Kavalec was so impressed with Watts that she sent a copy of "Trolling for Trump" to Victoria Nuland and other high-level State Department officials including Daniel Fried, John Heffern, Athena Katsoulos, Naz Durakoglu, Jonathan Cohen, Bridget Brink, Eric Green, Christopher Robinson, Conrad Tribble. Earlier in 2016, Brink and Nuland had been involved in the Biden/State Department putsch to remove Shokin as Ukrainian Prosecutor General.

Clint Watts' "Trolling for Trump" article warontherocks.com/2016/11/trolli…, which had so enthralled senior State Department official Kavalec and her associates, said that their interest in "trolls" had arisen as follows: "When experts published content criticizing the Russian-supported Bashar al Assad regime, organized hordes of trolls would appear to attack the authors on Twitter and Facebook."

So who were the "experts" whose feelings had been hurt by online criticism? It turned out to be January 2014 article foreignaffairs.com/articles/syria… co-authored by Watts himself entitled "The Good and Bad of Ahrar al-Sham: An al Qaeda–Linked Group Worth Befriending."

At the time of Watts' article, ISIS was still very new. It was written in the same month as Obama had called ISIS the "jayvee". At the time, U.S. (through separate CIA and DoD operations) and Gulf States allies were funneling cash and weapons to jihadis of every persuasion as the Obama administration attempted to implement its regime change coup in Syria.

But despite Beltway support for arming Al Qaeda and its allies (including Ahrar al-Sham as advocated by Clint Watts), the larger public has never entirely understood the higher purpose supposedly served by arming Al Qaeda and its allies to carry out regime change in Syria. Mostly, they find it hard to believe that U.S. would carry out such an iniquitous policy. So Watts ought to have expected some blowback to his advocacy of arming AlQaeda allies, but instead, Watts blamed "Russia" for online criticism, ultimately falsely accusing simple opponents of US allying with AlQaeda allies as Russian agents or dupes.

Read 5 tweets

Stephen McIntyre

@ClimateAudit

Oct 2, 2024

actually, the lesson from Helene is the opposite from that being promoted.

In 1933, the Tennessee Valley Authority was given the mandate for flood control in the valley of the Tennessee River and its tributaries. Over the next 40 years, they built 49 dams, which, for the most part, accomplished their goal. Whereas floods in the Tennessee were once catastrophic, younger people are mostly unaware of them.

The French Broad River (Asheville) is an upstream tributary where flood control dams weren't constructed due to local opposition.

Rather than the devastation of Hurricane Helene on Asheville illustrating the effect of climate change, the success of the flood control dams in other sectors of the Tennessee Valley illustrates the success of the TVA flood control program where it is implemented.

Hurricane Helene did not show the effect of climate change, but what happens to settlements in Tennessee Valley tributaries under "natural" flooding (i.e. where flood control dams have been rejected.)

I should add that, in its first 40 years, the TVA built 49 flood control dams, of which 29 were power-generating. In the subsequent 50 years, TVA built 0 flood control dams,
However, in the 1980s, they established the Carbon Dioxide Information Centre (CDIAC) under their nuclear division, which sponsored much influential climate research, including the CRU temperature data (Phil Jones) and Michael Mann's fellowship from which Mann et al 1998 derived.
In 1990, the parents of Crowdstrike's Dmitri Alperovich moved from Russia to Chattanooga, Tennessee, where his father was a TVA nuclear engineer. Dmitri moved to Tennessee a few years later.
One can't help but wonder whether TVA's original mandate for flood control got lost in the executive offices, attracted by more glamorous issues, such as climate change research.
If so, one could reasonably say that a factor in the seeming abandonment of TVA efforts to complete its original flood control mandate (e.g. to French Broad River which inundated Asheville) was partly attributable to diversion of TVA interest to climate change research, as opposed to its mandate of flood control.

another thought. As soon as the point is made, it is obvious that flood control dams have reduced flooding. Not just in Appalachia. I've looked at long data for water levels in Great Lakes and the amount of fluctuation (flooding) after dams installed is much reduced.
And yet my recollection of public reporting of climate is that weather extremes, including flooding, is getting worse. But in areas with flood control dams, it obviously //isn't// getting worse than before. It's better. Note to self: check IPCC reports for their specific findings on flooding.

Read 5 tweets

Stephen McIntyre

@ClimateAudit

Aug 7, 2024

as readers are aware, @walkafyre has a long-term project of decoding the Mueller investigation through the laborious project of identifying the interviewees underneath the redactions. Some of the identifications are so ingenious that it's fun. Yesterday was an interesting example, which I'll narrate since it's interesting. (There are many other equally interesting examples.) It is the identification of the interviewee of Bates number B2997, interviewed on Aug 15, 2018 (302 filed on Dec 17, 2018). The 302 was published in volume 11 (page 92) - online at walkafyre's website here:

The 302 has 6 pages. The last 4 pages are totally redacted of information. All identifying information has been redacted from the first two pages except for the presence of Mueller attorney Aaron Zelinsky. Take a look.

And yet from this meagre information, walkafyre has made a firm identification of the interviewee.

It doesn't seem possible, does it. But I've reviewed the backup and it works. I'll explain.themyefiles.knack.com/mueller-files#…

first step. The 302s are in non-proportional font (Courier) and characters can be counted. Last name has 8 characters and praenomen has 9-10 characters.

second step. B2995 previously identified as Ali, Hesham and B3005 previously identified as Bartholomew, Vanessa. 302s are //locally// in alpha order, thus pinning surname to alpha range Ali to Bar.

third step. the interviewee (LN8) interacts with a LN9 frequently.

fourth. the interview was in summer 2018 with Zelinsky in attendance. This indicates that interview was connected to Roger Stone.

fifth, LN9 has given money to "the ___". Probably "the PAC". Public data on Roger Stone's PAC shows that the largest contributor (by far) was John Powers Middleton (9-character last name.)

So the interviewee is a LN8 in alpha range Ali-Bar with some sort of regular connection to Middleton. Walkafyre had this figured out a long time ago, but was stuck.fec.gov/data/receipts/…

a few days ago, @walkafyre took a look at documents related to a sordid lawsuit between Middleton and Roy Lee, an estranged associate. Case number shown below. One of the motions demanded deposition of "Alex Anderson", a Middleton employee. Alexander Anderson had previously made a deposition in support of Middleton.
As a coup de grace, one of the production requests in the pleadings was for "all communications related to Middleton's relationship with Roger Stone".
The redacted interviewee the August 15, 2018 grand jury notice was convincingly Middleton's employee Alexander Anderson.

Read 15 tweets

Stephen McIntyre

@ClimateAudit

Jul 25, 2024

@WashAuthor
in your interesting March 2023 article entitled "The Trump Campaign's Collusion with Israel", you observed that the profile of the Israeli agent whose emails were the subject of a May 5, 2018 warrant in the Roger Stone investigation (courtlistener.com/recap/gov.usco…) was "strikingly similar to that of Isaac Molho".

However, the specific identification to Molho is precluded by several details in the supporting affidavit.

First, on multiple occasions, slightly incomplete redaction revealed that the first letter of the agent's surname was A, as shown in paragraph 43 below (there are several other examples).

Second, the length of the surname is approximately 9 letters. The affidavit is in Times New Roman 11.5 with either default or close to default margins and tabs. While a precise character count is not possible, it is possible to say that the length is approximately 9 letters - much too long for "MOLHO".

Third, from paragraph 63, it appears that the first letter of the first name is also A. The redaction in paragraph 63 is a quote from a text from the Israeli agent to Roger Stone and is too long for the standalone surname, but is consistent with a first name-surname combination.

At first glance, these details seem insufficient to permit a positive attribution, but, remarkably, an Israeli agent with first name beginning with A and a nine-letter surname beginning with A was exposed in January 2019 by @jsrailton and @razhael: Aharon Almog Assouline. See apnews.com/article/9f31fa… and nytimes.com/2019/01/28/wor….

@RonanFarrow subsequently wrote about Assouline's connection to Black Cube, the Israeli private intelligence firm that had worked on behalf of Harvey Weinstein: newyorker.com/news/annals-of…

Below shows an attempted replication of paragraphs 42 and 43 of the May 5, 2018 Stone Warrant in Times New Roman 11.5 with "ASSOULINE" (showing the slightly unredacted A in yellow). If the surname isn't "ASSOULINE", it's a surname of almost identical length in Times New Roman 11.5 that begins with A.

Also shown is an attempted replication of paragraph 63 showing a full name (with AARON rather than AHARON).

While these details (length of surname, A as first letter of surname) do not //prove// that Assouline was the Israeli agent, they severely limit the field of potential candidates and eliminate Molho.

Meier's book ial connection of Assoulin to the Stone warrant was first thought of (needless to say) by @walkafyre.

The January 2019 incident in which Railton and Satter exposed Assoulin was discussed in @BarryMeier's book Spooked (amazon.ca/Spooked-Trump-…) which discussed Black Cube but did not consider its possible connection to the Mueller warrant for emails of the Israeli agent.

Meier's book did point out an interesting attribute of a Black Cube operation identified by Citizen Lab: it sent out fake security alerts (ostensibly from Google) in which a public hyperlink-shortening service shortened and encoded a hyperlink containing the target email address of the phishing target. Citizen Lab figured out the sequencing of the shortened hyperlinks and identified thousands of targets of the phishing campaign carried out by Black Cube.

By coincidence (or not), the Podesta hack is also attributed to a fake security alert (ostensibly from Google) that used a public hyperlink-shortening service (bitly) that encoded Podesta's email address (in base64) in the hyperlink as part of a phishing campaign in which thousands of shortened addresses were generated.

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