For decades, Halper has been close to Sir Richard Billing Dearlove, a British intelligence fixture who served as director of MI6 for five years, through 2004. Sir Richard is a mentor and adviser to none other than Christopher Steele. Halper and Dearlove were among a small group of eminences who ran the Cambridge Intelligence Seminars—until they jointly and messily stepped down in December 2016, with Halper claiming the enterprise was coming under “unacceptable Russian influence.” Odd, given that Halper is an old friend of Vyacheslav Trubnikov—the former Kremlin spy-chief … and claimed key source of Chris Steele. (Again, such a small world.) Anyway, before that contretemps, in the late spring and quite out of the blue, Carter Page was invited to attend one of the Halper/Dearlove seminars. Having recently been named as a Trump foreign policy adviser, Page eagerly accepted. The seminar, called “2016’s Race to Change the World,” was scheduled for the second week in July—what a coincidence: right after Page’s trip to Russia. Though he was not asked to speak, Halper’s group paid Page’s airfare. He traveled to Cambridge directly from his speech at the New Economic School in Moscow. Halper was a gracious, gregarious host. The only discussion of Trump’s candidacy was Halper’s passing mention that he knew Paul Manafort—which put him one up on Page, who had never met the then-manager of Trump’s campaign. But Halper enticed Page into a cordial relationship—they spoke frequently over the next 14 months (during most of which Page was under FISA surveillance), with Page sometimes visiting Halper’s Virginia farm.32
It was shortly after Page’s trip to Cambridge, via Moscow, that Steele wrote his explosive July 19 dossier report, claiming that while in Russia, Page had met with (a) Putin crony and Rosneft CEO Igor Sechin, to discuss a corrupt quid pro quo exchange of future energy cooperation for anti-Russia sanctions relief (which Steele eventually refined into a staggering multi-million dollar bribe offer to Trump); and (b) Putin’s presidential administration official Igor Divyekin, to discuss kompromat files—the one on Hillary Clinton that the Kremlin might be willing to share with the Trump campaign, and the one on Donald Trump that the Kremlin was warning his campaign to bear in mind. This was information Steele was most keen to impart to Bruce on July 30, and which Ohr promptly passed along the FBI Deputy Director McCabe and his counselor Lisa Page.
Palpably, the FBI’s insistence (echoed by House Democrats) that its investigative team at headquarters did not have access to Steele’s reporting until mid-September is an effort to disconnect the farcical, unverified dossier allegations from the Bureau’s formal opening of the “Crossfire Hurricane” investigation on July 31. This position cannot be squared with the facts that (a) Gaeta, the agent who obtained Steele’s information on July 5, needed prior approval from headquarters to meet Steele, and reportedly found the information so startling he blurted out that headquarters would need to be notified right away; (b) Halper, the FBI informant, met with Page at the Cambridge Seminar, three weeks before the investigation was formally opened; (c) Nuland, the State Department official who approved Gaeta’s trip, was given a synopsis of Steele’s information in mid-July (we’re to believe the State Department’s front office had the information from the FBI informant who had been interviewed by the FBI agent, but that the FBI’s own front office didn’t?); (d) Nuland says she instantly directed that the FBI be notified (presumably, if it had not already been alerted by its own agent); and (e) Ohr, upon being briefed by Steele himself in Washington on July 30, promptly notified McCabe and, within no more than a few days, met with McCabe and Lisa Page.
Here, a commonsense observation bears making. In the FBI and the Justice Department, it is a far more consequential matter to seek a wiretap warrant from a federal court, under oath and with top-level approvals, than to take the ministerial step of opening a case file—which does not obligate investigators to do anything. It is simply not credible to suggest that the Steele information, which was coming into the Bureau from several channels starting in early July, would not have been considered in merely opening a case, yet would soon afterwards be relied on in a sworn FISA warrant application. And note: when the Bureau and the Obama Justice Department took the critical step of seeking a FISA warrant, the chosen target was Carter Page—in reliance on the Steele dossier—not Papadopoulos, Mifsud, or some other target.
That is not to say the Steele dossier was the only game in town in these frenetic early summer days. Recall that this is when GCHQ chief Robert Hannigan transmitted intelligence thought to be so sensitive that he was impelled to fly to Washington and deliver it to CIA Director John Brennan, face-to-face (as we noted in Chapter 8).
And then there was Alexander Downer—who just happens to be another acquaintance of Stef Halper and Sir Richard Dearlove. As we’ve detailed (Chapter 7), when news of the hacked DNC emails went global on July 22, the Australian diplomat suddenly decided that this must have been what George Papadopoulos had been talking about when they met in the London bar two months earlier. Downer deduced this from Papadopoulos’s passing mention that Russia might have damaging information on Mrs. Clinton, notwithstanding that Papadopoulos had not said anything about emails; he had no reason to know about DNC emails; he had no information about what Russia might be planning to do with any damaging information it might have; Mrs. Clinton was not damaged by the DNC emails; and Russia’s responsibility for the hacking, though suspected, had not been established.33 (But other than that …) On July 26, Downer moseyed over to the American embassy in London, where Chargée d’Affaires Elizabeth Dibble took his “suggestion” about what Papadopoulos must have meant and transmitted it through government channels to the FBI.
It was this notification that is said to have triggered the formal opening of the FBI’s Trump–Russia investigation. Clearly, the most benefit of the doubt we can give that claim is this: Downer’s exaggeration of Papadopoulos’s remarks may have been the proximate cause for Crossfire Hurricane, but it was very far from being the only cause.
CHAPTER TWELVE
I Spy
In the wee hours of Thursday morning, July 28, from their separate homes among their separate families, Lisa Page and Peter Strzok texted each other while watching the Democratic National Convention. Unable to coo over each other, the lovers cooed over Vice President Joe Biden (“he’s just a really sincere guy”) before grousing over those “stupid *ss Bernie supporters” who were making life difficult for Hillary Clinton. A more telling window into their thinking was what they were jointly reading off the left-leaning website Talking Points Memo. The Josh Marshall post was entitled “Trump & Putin. Yes, It’s Really a Thing.”1
It’s an interesting article, like a roadmap an anti-Trump journalist can only dream two of the country’s top FBI officials might pore over—especially officials working counterintelligence, where the probative value of evidence often seems secondary to its potential for intrigue. Marshall observed that Donald Trump was deeply dependent on Russian financing. In just the last year, his debt load had increased by $280 million (to a staggering $630 million). Trump had trouble finding financing because of prior bankruptcies, so he’d relied heavily on Russian capital to rebuild his business. “Russians make up a pretty disproportionate cross-section of a lot of our assets,” Trump’s son Don Jr. had told a real-estate conference in 2008.
Marshall stressed that shady Russian oligarchs were involved in Trump development ventures. He speculated that Trump’s tax returns might reveal the depth of financial ties to Moscow, but noted Trump’s reneging on the promise to disclose them. He observed that Trump had brought into his campaign both Paul Manafort, who had worked for years for a Kremlin-backed Ukrainian party, and Carter Page, a Putin apologist with financial ties to Gazprom, the Kremlin-controlled energy behemoth. He explained that Putin had “aligned all Russian state controlled media behind Trump.” And Marshall maintained that the Trump campaign, though otherwise indifferent to the party platform during the Republican convention, had intervened to water down an amendment on providing assistance to Ukraine against Rus
sian aggression.2
After reading Marshall’s post, Strzok said it highlighted something he and Page had been discussing, and that he hoped his boss, Bill Priestap, had taken up with “the 7th floor”—where the FBI’s top officials have their offices. Underscoring how reflective the Page–Strzok running dialogue was of the mood at headquarters, Strzok said he would send the Marshall post to Priestap.
There was more discussion, but the Justice Department and FBI excised it from the copy of the texts disclosed to the public. Just a hunch, but I’m betting the redacted portions do not agitate over Russian money lining the Clintons’ pockets while the Uranium One transaction was pending Obama administration approval, or over Secretary Clinton’s role in promoting the development of Russia’s tech sector—to the delight of some Clinton Foundation donors, and the dismay of the Defense Department, and at least some sentient officials at the FBI.
‘The White House Is Running This’
By late Friday afternoon, Strzok and Page were buzzing about the “new case.” Strzok was hoping to get thinking on it from Deputy Director “Andy” McCabe before making strategic plans with Priestap. Page was busy finishing up the “lhm”—the “letterhead memo” the FBI prepares when investigative information is to be shared outside the Bureau. It was already clear that the Crossfire Hurricane loop would include Justice Department lawyers and State Department officials. Strzok was getting set for his Sunday night flight to London.
He had been talking with a State Department counterpart there, who was keeping “Main State” (Foggy Bottom) informed. That was critical because Strzok’s trip was extraordinarily sensitive. Breaking with diplomatic protocol after tense negotiations, the American and Australian governments had agreed that Strzok and another agent would be permitted to interview High Commissioner Alexander Downer, Canberra’s top emissary to London. Naturally, the British government, too, was involved. Downer had informed the American embassy that he believed Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos had tipped him off to a Russian scheme to swing the presidential election to Trump—mainly by hacking and releasing information that could damage Clinton, such as the tens of thousands of Democratic party emails now in circulation.3
Soon after bursting at the seams over how “momentous” it was to be working finally on a case that “MATTERS,” Strzok was crossing the Atlantic, arriving in London on Monday morning, August 1. The ensuing texts show that events in Britain were nerve-wracking. McCabe was hands-on and wanted to be briefed immediately after Strzok interviewed Downer—which was apt to irritate Strzok’s direct boss, Priestap. Sliding into her role as McCabe’s counselor, Page instructed Strzok to be careful of what he signed so the FBI could “lawfully protect” the information—meaning, conceal it. As she put it, “Just thinking about Congress, foia [the Freedom of Information Act], etc.” A much tighter circle of government lawyers than usual was in the loop—a group that included Trisha Anderson, who had served in the Justice Department’s prestigious Office of Legal Counsel (and is married to Charles Newman, a lawyer on Obama’s National Security Council). Anderson was acting in the stead of James Baker, the Bureau’s general counsel, who was out. Strzok was agitating that hold-up by the lawyers could derail his shot at interviewing Downer.
Ultimately, Strzok cryptically reported that the session with the diplomat was a success. As he headed back home on August 3, he agreed with Page: keep a tight ship. For that, the Bureau had to prioritize “control” over the “information flow.”
But the Bureau was not in control, not ultimately.
Strzok was back in Washington by the next evening, heading straight to the office from the airport to prepare to brief the bosses. On the afternoon of August 5, he and Page had a tense conversation about an imminent meeting involving “agency people”—apparently, the CIA. Later, there was an interagency meeting of some kind. Afterwards, Strzok told Page the meeting had been the “best we could have expected” … other than when one official—whose name has been redacted—told him, “The White House is running this.”
For that, he could thank John Brennan.
Brennan’s Steele Trap
He’s so “relieved”!
That’s what the former CIA director had to say for himself after the Mueller report’s findings became public in late March 2019. “I am relieved that it’s been determined there was not a criminal conspiracy with Russia over our election,” said the man who had tweeted the last two years away, telling the nation that its president was a traitor. “I think that’s good news for the country.”4
Sure is. But, gee, Mr. Director, why did you say all those awful things?
“I don’t know if I received bad information,” Brennan spluttered from his comfy new MSNBC digs. “I think I suspected there was more than there actually was?”
Ya think?
What Brennan “suspected there was” was the disinformation in the Steele dossier. He has been trying to distance himself from it for months—telling anyone who would listen that he made sure not to use any unverified information that was not an official U.S. intelligence product in his post-election assessment of Russia’s election meddling.5 But that is not the tune he was singing during the 2016 election season.
The Washington Post is Collusion Central, and Brennan is the hero lionized in its epic report, “Obama’s secret struggle to punish Russia for Putin’s election assault.”6 Other officials were paralyzed by misgivings, unsure of what was happening, and why, after the hacked DNC emails were released. “I feel like we sort of choked,” a “former senior Obama administration official involved in White House deliberations on Russia,” told the paper. But not Brennan. Nope. He was ripe dead certain when others were skeptical: Putin was backing Trump to the hilt; he had Trump compromised and he was trying to get him into the Oval Office to govern America in alignment with the Kremlin’s wishes. That was the explanation.
But how did he know?
He knew, the Post tells us, because he possessed “an intelligence bombshell.” It was “a report drawn from sourcing deep inside the Russian government that detailed Russian President Vladimir Putin’s direct involvement in a cyber campaign to disrupt and discredit the U.S. presidential race.” Obtaining such deep cover intel, the Post marvels, was an astonishing feat of spycraft. How did ol’ John do it? How did he manage to flip Putin’s top guys and—
Uh … wait a second.
Didn’t Brennan testify that he made sure the FBI knew everything that he knew from outside sources—you know, because he would never want the CIA accused of illegally spying on Americans? Brennan just wanted to be a facilitator, right? He was going to leave all the big investigative decisions up the Bureau. His only role, he tells us, was to make sure the FBI had all the information he could give them.
FBI officials told Congress, however, that—try as they might—they just weren’t able to verify Steele’s information. How is that possible if Brennan was showing them what he had, and what he had was “sourcing deep inside the Russian government” that implicated Putin himself in the hacking scheme?
That’s exactly the information that Steele claimed to have. So, if Brennan had the same information, doesn’t that mean Brennan’s information must have corroborated Steele’s information?
No. It means Brennan’s information must have been Steele’s information.
We now know that Steele bragged to the State Department that his sources included two of Putin’s top guys, Vyacheslav Trubnikov and Vladislav Surkov. It is confirmed beyond question that Steele shared that information with State Department official Kathleen Kavalec, and it has been reported that Steele identified at least some of his sources for the FBI. There is thus no reason to believe the head of the CIA would not have known this. Brennan was dealing regularly with his British counterparts. Steele, an FBI informant, remained deeply wired into British intelligence and into the U.S. State Department—which has an intimate global working relationship with the CIA. It is inconceivable that Brennan did not know Steele�
��s sources.
But we don’t really have to speculate.
John Brennan’s CIA and Jim Comey’s FBI took very different approaches to their congressional disclosure obligations. Comey is a shrewd political actor (and he has become overtly partisan in his post-Bureau life—which no one should begrudge him as long as he’s honest about it). But in his high-minded top-cop incarnation, Comey was ostentatiously disdainful of politics—the personification of progressive theory that the Justice Department and FBI should be so insulated from their political superiors in the executive branch, and their political oversight in Congress, that they effectively become an independent, unaccountable fourth branch of government.
Brennan, in stark contrast, is a political animal. He did not swim against the tide of his political masters. He went with the flow. He made sure his subordinates followed suit. He gave the White House and its congressional allies the narratives they demanded. Politicized intelligence.
Observe how this contrast played out in Russia-gate.
The FBI defied the Constitution’s grant to the people’s representatives of the power to monitor the activities—particularly, activities under the guise of national security—of agencies such as the FBI, which Congress created, regulates by law, and funds with taxpayer dollars.
To resolve the obvious tension between the needs for investigative secrecy and political accountability, Congress created the so-called “Gang of Eight.” It is comprised of the bipartisan leaders of the Senate and House, as well as the chairperson and ranking member of each chamber’s intelligence committee.7 This way, the FBI and CIA are able to disclose their most sensitive operations to Congress confident that these matters will not leak.
Ball of Collusion Page 27
