ET-
In a little-noticed exchange during his Senate hearing Wednesday, Attorney General William Barr made a surprising disclosure that could allow the public and press to obtain sensitive details about the origins of the Trump-Russia probe.
During a back-and-forth with Democratic Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin, Barr identified Alexander Downer, a former Australian diplomat, as the FBI’s source for the information that sparked the bureau’s counterintelligence investigation into George Papadopoulos and other Trump campaign associates.
The federal government had not officially identified Downer as the source until Wednesday. His role in the investigation was publicly known, but only through press reports and his own statements to the media.
Federal agencies could deny requests for information about Downer and his role in the opening of “Crossfire Hurricane,” the FBI’s name for the counterintelligence investigation, without official confirmation from U.S. government officials.
That all changed on Wednesday, according to Bradley Moss, the deputy executive director of the James Madison Project, a transparency group that handles national security-related lawsuits. more here
What a downer. (I was first so I got to say it.)
Going to Walmart for some popcorn. Y’all need anything?
The fan is spinning, the excrement is ready for launch. Now it’s Trumps turn.
https://www.rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2019/05/03/obama-spied-on-trump-and-now-everyone-knows-it/
Trump’s counsel just set the stage in a letter to Congress, an interesting response the the special council report. You can read it at the website.
Yeah, pick-up a case of Trump Whup-Ass 2020 for me, MJA.
I’d like to read (Limp)Dick Durbin’s question to Barr. Barr’s answer is ambiguous because of lack of context, and Barr has in the past displayed keen sensitivity to the exact wording of things.
Anybody got a link to a searchable transcript?
I’m thinking that a lot of people are going to get “woke” about Trump when their dull minds can’t help but review how insane the attacks have been by the Swamp critters.
Uncle Al — Here is the cspan link to the hearing. As you can see, you can filter it according to the speaker you wish to hear/review, and there is accompanying transcript of what is being said. Hope this is helpful.
(I was astonished to see there were 54K views of this on cspan’s site.)
This would not have happened if the Democrat geniuses in Congress had not demanded that Barr explain himself. They are lucky he chose to ignore them on day two. Lord knows what shivs he would have put between their ribs.
@AA – Thank you. I’ll look at it after I take care of a higher priority agenda item…my nap (-:
I’m guessing: 1) A.G. Barr, being a most savvy guy, did that on purpose; 2) none of the msm will pursue the opening until some other source(s) make it VERY clear that the information cannot be further ignored; and, 3) any revelations regrading swamp or oscuma corruption will be spun by the msm to minimize the impact.
From AA: “(I was astonished to see there were 54K views of this on cspan’s site.)”
Girl, 53,950 of those were democratic lawyers trying to stay ahead of damaging information about their clients.
Is this it?
“.. Durbin outlined the evidence that was already known to the FBI in July 2016 when it opened a counterintelligence investigation into possible coordination between Trump’s campaign and Russia. That Russia had hacked the Democratic National Committee. That a Trump aide named George Papadopoulos had been informed in April that Russia had incriminating emails on Clinton. That the aide in May told an Australian diplomat named Alexander Downer. And that, in late July, material stolen from the DNC was dumped by WikiLeaks. (It was this dump that prompted Australia to inform the FBI about Papadopoulos’s earlier comments.)
“Do you believe that it was an appropriate predicate,” Durbin asked, “for opening a counterintelligence investigation to determine whether Russia had targeted people on the Trump campaign to offer hacked information that might impact the presidential election?”
Barr said: “I’d have to see exactly what the report was from Downer, the Australian, Downer, and exactly what he quoted Papadopoulos as saying.
But from what you just read, I’m not sure what the correlation was between the Russians having dirt and jumping to the conclusion that that suggested foreknowledge of the hacking.” ..”
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/barrs-conclusions-are-undercut-by-his-lack-of-familiarity-with-details-of-muellers-probe/ar-AAAMqR3?li=BBnbcA1&parent-title=florida-senate-bill-wont-let-teachers-carry-guns-but-librarians-could&parent-ns=ar&parent-content-id=BBJUtu1&index=30 .
if I were a smart Democrat (which is oxymoronic, I know), I would do everything I could to accelerate the investigation process so that by the time 2020 came around, hopefully America would forget about it and we could claim that all this is old news.
The Democrats won’t do this. They will delay as much as they can, and the investigation will end up reaching its peak during the general election.
@Blink – Yes, that helps a lot. Thank you.
What I’m trying in my own way to determine is whether Barr’s testimony does or does not support sundance’s analysis¹ that the legal predicate for opening the investigation came from information given by Papadopolous not to Amb. Downer but rather to his aide Erika Thompson. The difference is that because of Thompson’s role as an intelligence operative she would not have been a legitimate conduit for “Five Eyes” information. The Weissmann/Mueller report carefully avoids stating explicitly that Downer (and not Thompson) was the source, and then mentions the date of the investigation kickoff which precedes Downer’s meeting with Papadopolous (Thompson had met with Papadopolous several days earlier, before the kickoff).
This raises the serious question about the legality of the investigation, and if the investigation was not legally founded, it is a poisoned tree and everything that came out of it is legally inadmissible.
When Durbin asked Barr if Barr believed “it was an adequate predicate, Barr said,
That could be consistent with Barr knowing that the whole setup was bogus and he was finessing the question from Durbin.
I still don’t know.
1. sundance has multiple article making the same observations and conclusions. A recent one is here.
It would have been even more helpful if I’d actually inserted the link: https://www.c-span.org/search/?searchtype=All&query=+barr+house+judiciary
….sorry ’bout that.
Lowell — haha, I’m sure you are quite right about that!
TN Tuxedo — And if we know our president, he will make doubly sure of the unfolding of events coinciding with the GE. What a great year this has been so far! Winning!
Uncle Al — ICYMI (which I’m doubting), did you read the article about how Barr — while still in private practice — sent a 19 page legal argument to Rosenstein regarding Mueller’s flawed obstruction (legal) theories and their application? I don’t think I bookmarked it and I can’t remember where I read it, but it was within the past week or so. Fascinating read. Barr had already put together (and the analyst suspected he used his firm’s resources) an iron clad argument against Mueller. And I didn’t know this, but, as it turns out, Barr was the only person recruited by the WH to take over at the DoJ. If you find the article, would you post it here, please?
@AbigailAdams – When I got up I found @Blink’s comment which answered my specific question, but I’ll bookmark the CSPAN link for handy reference.
No, I had not bumped into the article about Barr’s 19-page Mueller refutation but it sounds like Very Important Reading. When/if I find out more, I’ll post here.
@AbigailAdams – here it is. I haven’t read it yet but will do so shortly.
I found it at Liberty Unyielding in an article published yesterday.
Uncle Al — Yup, that’s the one! Thanks.
The corollary to Barr’s legal refutation of “obstruction” — as used by Meuller — are the comments made about how Mueller’s legal arguments supporting his musings about obstruction read like a high-schooler’s stab at a legal argument.
The problem with the Left’s disjointed nonsense is they actually start believing their own vapid B.S.
“Downer” from down under – fake name?