Thread by @emptywheel

For some reason people are responding to this claiming that Hillary wasn't hacked herself.

IN RESPONSE to Trump's request, her office server was targeted, but her campaign was ALSO successfully hacked. Also John Podesta, other individuals, the DNC, and DCCC.

https://twitter.com/emptywheel/status/1658434504288002048

Reminder: Mueller spoke to at least one witness who said there was basis for the Sechin allegation.

Durham repeats a fairly astonishing mistake he made in the Sussmann investigation, assuming that when Sussmann met with Elias about a server it had to be the Alfa Bank allegations and not the HACKED SERVER of their mutual client.

Here, Durham presents the fact that Hillary tried to figure out a real anomaly as proof of some devious plan.

Durham says that Carter Page FISA was not productive even though he introduced exhibits at trial saying the opposite.

pacer-documents.s3.amazonaws.com/36/235637/0451…

Somehow Durham neglects to mention that Page said he was going to get $$ from RU to start a pro-RU think tank.

Among other things (including that Page was running around Moscow in December 2016 claiming to speak for Trump).

Durham presents as proof that the investigation shouldn't have been opened the fact that BEFORE FBI used NSLs FBI didn't have the kind of evidence that one gets from NSLs.

Durham here presents proof that the IC should have been FAR MORE skeptical of Konstantin Kilimnik, but he doesn't say that (or mention Kilimnik at all).

BREAKING: A genuinely interesting, newsy detail: USG believes RU learned of Steele's subsources via USG (IMO, this is possibly that RU compromised FBI's informant lists, which is why ALL the outreach to Trump was done via former FBI informants).

Durham is troubled that the pee tape wasn't immediately disseminated.

Remember, there were three different VERIFIED versions of trump compromise stories.

Durham doesn't mention in his report that Trump's personal lawyer called Dmitry Peskov and asked for his help to arrange a Trump Tower deal brokered by a former GRU officer and paid for using sanctioned banks, then lied about it.

Seems like it would be relevant!

There's evidence from the Danchenko case that conflicts with this. The purpose was to FIGURE OUT what the dossier was--including that it might be disinformation. (FBI pointedly encouraged conflict between Danchenko and Steele to try to figure out how it came about.)

Durham makes this claim even though the judge in the Danchenko case debunked it.

Durham's entire discussion of the pee tape neglects to mention that Danchenko attributed the allegation itself to other Russians who did meet with Danchenko that trip.

Durham's pee tape theory is based on what "seems apparent" to him, but actually could be explained 5 different ways.

There are SO MANY holes in Johnny D's so-called "analysis."

Johnny D never really considered the significance of Danchenko raising a project with Dolan in August (which is that he hadn't earlier).

Durham confirms that Deripaska was Steele's initial client for dirt on Manafort, and that this email was part of it. What's corrupt is that he DIDN'T ID Deripaska as Oligarch-1, they guy behind any disinformation.

Johnny D will take Galkina's word for things -- even though this could easily involve Peskov directly.

Note how Durham doesn't describe WHERE this purported narrative formed?

This is how denialists always make the Steele dossier out to be more than it is.

Durham goes beyond the stupid of the charge tied to Danchenko that Judge Trenga dismissed to provide YET MORE evidence that Danchenko provided info on Dolan but had concerns about his ties to RU.

Remember that Durham hid a report that used Danchenko's reporting RE Dolan.

Now Johnny D just speculates wildly about Mueller's mandate (this was the period when Rosenstein started limiting what Mueller could investigate, eg, Michael Cohen's corruption).

This is what Durham claims was proof that Danchenko was explicitly asked for emails to Millian.

This is a lie. Durham presented evidence that Millian wouldn't shut up bragging about Trump in this period, including to George Papadopoulos.

Durham repeats the nonsense that led to acquittal at trial. He would have to introduce LinkedIn, and get both phones.

It is literally the absence of evidence.

John Durham is so stupid he thinks this helps his case, when it actually proves he needed to access the devices.

Note that Durham STILL feels no need to explain why Millian returned earlier than he had said he would from Asia.

I genuinely love this part, bc Durham doesn't realize how fucking stupid it makes him look, trying to disprove comms that would have been by messenger app by looking at telephony records.

Durham doesn't mention that his "interview" with Millian was not in person.

Also note it was 3 months after the indictment, in which Durham relied on MILLIAN'S TWITTER FEED!

Durham here makes no mention that Nellie had been doing this research for Paul Singer for months.

Durham suggests that Fusion people were the only people in DC that noticed Sergei Millian's ties to Trump, which is hilarious.

You will be unsurprised to know that Johnny D doesn't disclose:
1) Millian's contacts with George Papadopoulos, which EVEN HE described as creepy
2) Millian's meeting with Oleg Deripaska
3) That Millian refused to show up for Danchenko's trial

Durham claims that Mueller investigated Millian for 2 years (INCLUDING his phone calls to Papadopoulos), but never got his call records.

Help me out with this one.

Durham REALLY doesn't understand that Danchenko is not the one who wrote the dossier.

Durham also didn't mention this.

documentcloud.org/documents/2139…

Durham complains that the FBI didn't access Page's emails to Manafort in the same breath where he complains about a FISA warrant to access Page's emails.

Durham doesn't appear to understand that Carter Page saying that the October Surprise would be Hillary emails is not exculpatory.

Kind of weird that Durham doesn't admit that FBI included these denials in the application.

documentcloud.org/documents/6842…

Reminder: Before the next FISA app, Carter Page would (per Kilimnik) wander around Moscow claiming to speak for Trump AND called Bannon.

Johnny D is as impressed as everyone else that Pap denied being involved in what he called "treason."

Wow. I wonder why Pap would deny it if he 1) believed it WAS treason and 2) believed Halper might be reporting back to CIA?

Durham seems to forget that WHEN HE WAS INTERVIEWED, Pap lied, and then checked his records and lied again, and then asked why he was setting up a back channel meeting with RU, he claimed he couldn't read his own handwriting.

USG specifically denied that Pap was very useful to interviewers -- again note the claim not to be able to read his own handwriting.

But Johnny D knows better, apparently.

Johnny D finds it VERY impressive that Pap denied the RU ties he had after he had already lied to the FBI about them. This statement is nothing but inculpatory.

I believe this is factually inaccurate.

Page got to the higher standard on probable cause because he said he had no problem sharing non-public information with people he knew to be spies.

Johnny D keeps ignoring the significance of the existing investigation.

The reason why Clinesmith, rightly or wrongly, didn't consider Page a "source" was because HE WASN'T TASKED. He was a reporting contact, NOT an informant.

Johnny D would know this if he paid attention to the sentencing of Clinesmith.

"Speculate" should not appear in a report on charging decisions. But sure enough, it appears here!

Which is nutty, bc "SPECULATION" isn't even permitted in an assessment.

Note when Durham describes the literally true claim and the four alleged false statements for which he charged Danchenko, he doesn't refer to them as "alleged," not even after getting his ass handed to him.

If I'm Danchenko I sue DOJ for that.

Funny way of spelling "acquittal."

Again, if I'm Danchenko, I sue.

My favorite part is where Durham invents excuses for himself but DOESN'T admit that he took this indictment based on Millian's Twitter claims, couldn't get Millian to repeat his claims under oath, and Dancheko proved that Millian was saying similar things as he reported.

John Durham would have you believe he had provably false statements against Danchenko he didn't charge.

🤣

4 years, he pursued this white whale.

Durham continues to not be at all bothered that the FBI was proven correct on the Pap disclaimer. He was lying.

Reminder: The Sussmann trial affirmatively proved that Sussmann helped to kill the Alfa Bank NYT story, a motivation that Durham indicted before learning bc he was too inept to ask Jim Baker for his iCloud account.

Pretty much this entire paragraph is made up. And the word "work" is doing a great deal of work.

We're several pages into Durham's Alfa Bank allegations and he has not yet admitted the he learned over the course of his investigation that the allegations were real (tho the explanation was not proven).

Johnny D doesn't realize that these are not necessarily conflicting stories.

Durham neglecting to mention that, bc the Spectrum IP in question had been hacked, there was too a Cyber component. They were, literally, wrong.

Curiously, this claim is not footnoted.

A stunning tell from Johnny D, given that Andrew DeFilippis threatened a witness with criminal investigation unless he made this claim.

emptywheel.net/2022/05/24/the…

Durham STILL does't see the problem with asking the people who've been hired to say there were no logs in response to this inquiry.

(Which the FBI didn't figure out for months.)

Somehow, Durham forgot to quote his lead prosecutor saying of the FBI Alfa investigation, "the FBI didn’t necessarily do everything right here. They missed opportunities. They made mistakes."

emptywheel.net/2022/06/08/som…

To substantiate this claim implying months of contact with the media, Durham points EXCLUSIVELY to contacts in September, before Sussmann helped the FBI kill the story.

Durham misleadingly suggests the articles in question came right after Sussmann's contact with Lichtblau, rather than months later.

267 pages in, this is just the 4th reference to Trump's Russia if you're listening comment.

Durham seems to be supporting this allegation with a citation to a redacted part of an exhibit.

documentcloud.org/documents/2202…

Durham admits he has no evidence that Sussmann WAS representing a client when he presented the YotaPhone allegations. But he did reveal that Sussmann's retention letter for Joffe was in the names of Skipper and Mary Ann, but that Sussmann or Joffe got the references wrong.

Now we're working on inferences that a jury already ruled unpersuasive.

Durham is straight up misrepresenting the evidence. There was the meeting, which HE ALREADY SAID Hillary did not approve of, and there's the other work.

This was a ref to the meeting.

Things that make you go hmmm.

Section after section, Durham describes looking at totally legal activity and checking whether could make a crime out of it.

This entire report is an example of what Durham complains Crossfire Hurricane was, an investigation without a crime (only CH DID find crimes).

Cendyn claims to have no idea what client it was sending marketing mail for via the IP in question--which demolishes about 12 of the prior explanations for it, most notably Alfa Bank's.

This is based on an April 22, 2022 Technical Analysis -- which explains why Durham is NOT making the claims he did up to the trial.

documentcloud.org/documents/2381…

The Georgia Tech researchers referred to the data as April Lorenzen's data, it seems, which undermines a great many of the claims Durham has made publicly.

The statement about the Tor claim (which researchers knew was wrong, but ended up in the FBI report) may provide some hints at what everyone was really looking at.

Remember: The IP address HAD been hacked before.

Durham claims that FBI techs did a report but didn't date it bc FBI totally forgets to date stuff.

Durham still insisting that he knows better than the jury.

Durham doesn't mention that even after immunizing one of the key players, he STILL didn't find evidence of a conspiracy.

Notice how this report became one about all of Crossfire Hurricane, tho Durham has presented not a lick of evidence about misconduct relating to Flynn or Manafort, and his evidence on Pap is wildly misleading.

Here's why I think Durham doesn't believe that RU really hacked Hillary or did much of anything in 2016.

@danielsgoldman

One thing that's weird is Durham is furious that the pee tape didn't immediately get treated as credible.

Durham's proof that the FBI didn't exercise analytic independence (in an investigation that led to FIVE Trump insiders lying to cover up their real Russian ties, plus Don and his son refusing to be interviewed about the same, is that the FBI believed the Hanssen mole was at CIA.

The biggest failure of analysis was that FBI didn't open an investigation into Roger Stone right away.

[Note, in Danchenko case, defense attorneys reviewed that ALL initial subjects BUT Page were charged.]

I'm increasingly convinced that Durham is so pissy abt the preliminary v full bc he wants to invent a way it wouldn't last until Mike Flynn started undermining sanctions.

After arguing elsewhere that Andy McCabe was too closely involved in this investigation, Durham decides that it didn't have enough oversight.

Reminder that Durham has made ZERO mention of the FBI informant working Clinton Foundation run by biased FBI Agents.

This is an obstinately stupid comment, not least bc Pap was telling informants he was looking for a way to monetize his tie to Trump.

One thing that Durham pretends not to understand--as does everyone else who tries to make excuses for Trump--is that 99% of people would be alarmed by suspicion that they had an asset on their campaign (as Trump unquestionably did w/Flynn, for Turkiye). Trump took it personally.

Note Durham's "some have argued" comment. What his report showed is that Hillary didn't get a defensive briefing for 10 months -- Trump DID get a briefing w/in 10 months (wrt Flynn).

Much of the first year of the Durham investigation--stuff not explained in this report--was spent chasing manufactured claims that House Oversight provided.

Note, Durham doesn't confess what Billy Barr already did--there was no substance to those claims. Sheer boondoggles.

I keep reading Durham deigning to give recommendations, after a 4-year investigation that broke virtually every singe one of his recommendations.

This bit is particularly hilarious.

First, Durham has spent 4 years chasing confirmation bias, and he STILL insists the jury (and judge, in Danchenko case) is wrong and he is right.

But also bc Strzok CONSISTENTLY proved to disbelieve there was there there to CH.

Durham keeps pointing to the fact that the IC didn't know about Manafort and Stone's suspect ties to RU assets, or that Flynn was on Turkiye's payroll, and concludes that's proof the investigation shouldn't have started, RATHER THAN that the IC failed.

Again, Durham claims that Hillary's accurate statement that RU's hack of the DNC was partly an attempt to get Trump elected is proof she had some nefarious plot.

HOW FUCKING DARE a DOJ prosecutor accuse a victim of being criminally suspect because she publicly spoke, accurately, about being a victim.

And fin.