A Republic Under Assault

by Tom Fitton

  Shine thanks Flores and asks her to “share with Elliott ASAP.” Flores responds that if Shine is directing her to share with Elliott, “I don’t think I know who that is referring to.” Flores sent that response at 10:09 p.m. on September 20, but Flores waited until 10:00 a.m. the next day to forward the entire exchange to DOJ chief of staff Whitaker, saying: “Should have sent this to you last night.”

  A mostly redacted email exchange on the evening of September 20, 2018, shows the efforts of officials in the Public Affairs and DAG’s office to produce a response to the impending news article. DOJ official Bradley Weinsheimer forwarded to Flores the “DAG response” to the allegations in the article, saying “DAG has cleared this, which is what we just discussed.” He then provides the official DAG response about the allegations over Rosenstein wanting to invoke the Twenty-Fifth Amendment against Trump as being “inaccurate and factually incorrect.” Deputy attorney general’s office official Ed O’Callaghan responds, “Think good.” The rest of his response is redacted under (b)(5)—deliberative process.

  In the final draft of the official DAG response approved by O’Callaghan, the statement is changed from “Based on my dealings with the President, there is no basis to invoke the 25th Amendment” to “Based on my personal dealings with the President, there is no basis to invoke the 25th Amendment.”

  What a difference one word makes! By adding the word “personal” to his careful statement, one can see how Rosenstein leaves open the possibility that others, rightly he believes, would want the president removed!

  Nowhere do these documents, even the material directly from Rosenstein, suggest that the wire and coup discussions did not take place.

  And then we found the extraordinary two-page memo, dated May 16, 2017, by McCabe detailing how Rosenstein proposed wearing a wire into the Oval Office “to collect additional evidence on the president’s true intentions.” McCabe writes that Rosenstein said he thought it was possible because “he was not searched when he entered the White House.”

  The Justice Department turned over the document thanks to a February 2019 FOIA lawsuit for documents about any FBI/DOJ discussions regarding the Twenty-Fifth Amendment and plans to secretly record President Trump in the Oval Office (Judicial Watch v. U.S. Department of Justice [No. 1:19-cv-00388]).17

  The memo, which is redacted in key sections, purports to serve as a “contemporaneous recollection” of a meeting that day (“12:30 pm on 5/16/2017”) in Rosenstein’s office. The meeting included Rosenstein, Deputy Assistant Attorney General for Intelligence Tashina Gauhar, and Principal Associate Deputy Attorney General Jim Crowell in Rosenstein’s Justice Department office. McCabe writes he began the meeting by telling Rosenstein that he “approved the opening of an investigation of President Donald Trump… to investigate allegations of possible collusion between the president and the Russian Government, possible obstruction of justice related to the firing of FBI Director James Comey, and possible conspiracy to obstruct justice.” In justifying his investigation, McCabe refers to the memos Comey secretly wrote on meetings he had with President Trump and an NBC interview with Lester Holt. McCabe writes he “informed DAG [Rosenstein] that as a result of his role in the matter, I thought he would be a witness to the case.” Rosenstein responded by recounting his discussion with President Trump, then attorney general Sessions, and then White House counsel Don McGahn about Comey’s imminent firing and that President Trump wanted him to write a “memo explaining the reason” for Comey’s firing. McCabe writes:

  As our conversation continued the DAG proposed that he could potentially wear a recording device into the Oval Office to collect additional evidence on the President’s true intentions. He said he thought this might be possible because he was not searched when he entered the White House. I told him that I would discuss the opportunity with my investigative team and get back to him.

  We discussed the issue of appointing a Special Counsel to oversee the FBI’s Russia investigation. The DAG said he has two candidates ready, one of whom could start immediately.

  Additionally, McCabe admits that Rosenstein told him that McCabe had a “credibility problem” because a Rosenstein staffer had provided him with photos of McCabe wearing his wife’s campaign T-shirt, in contradiction to McCabe’s “assurance” he had no role in her campaign. McCabe writes he told him the photos were not from campaign events and that he confirmed with “my ethics counsel at FBI” that wearing such a shirt did not “constitute proscribed political activity.”

  This incredible memo details the conflicted and conniving coup effort against President Trump. It is astonishing and shocking that McCabe thought he could have the FBI conduct a “counterintelligence” operation on the president and that Rosenstein thought it would be appropriate to wear a wire to secretly record President Trump in the Oval Office. That the DOJ and FBI sat on this smoking gun for a year shows the need for urgent housecleaning at those agencies.

  The full text of the redacted McCabe memo is printed below:

  Tuesday, May 16, 2017

  At 12:30 pm on 05/16/2017, I met with Deputy Attorney General (DAG) Rod Rosenstein in his office at the Department of Justice. Also present were Tashina Gauhar and Jim Crowell. The following is a contemporaneous recollection of the main topics we discussed.

  I began by telling him that today I approved the opening of an investigation of President Donald Trump. I explained that the purpose of the investigation was to investigate allegations of possible collusion between the president and the Russian Government, possible obstruction of justice related to the firing of FBI Director James Comey, and possible conspiracy to obstruct justice. The DAG questioned what I meant by collusion and I explained that I was referring to the investigation of any potential links between the Trump campaign and the Russian government. I explained that counterintelligence investigations of this sort were meant to uncover any existence of any threat to national security as well as whether or not criminal conduct had occurred. Regarding the obstruction issues, I made clear that our predication was based not only on the president’s comments last week to reporter Lester Holt (that he connected the firing of the director to the FBI’s Russia investigation), but also on the several concurring comments the president made to Director Comey over the last few months. These comments included the President’s requests for assurances of loyalty, statements about the Russia investigation and the investigation of General Michael Flynn. I also informed the DAG that Director Comey preserved his recollection of these interactions in a series of contemporaneously drafted memos. Finally, I informed the DAG that as a result of his role in the matter, I thought he would be a witness in the case.

  The DAG then related his experiences at the White House on Monday, 05/08/2017. He began by stating that he had the feeling that the decision to fire the Director had been made before he arrived. At the White House, he first met with White House Counsel Donald McGahn, who told him that the President had drafted a letter to Director Comey that McGahn did not want the President to send. Shortly thereafter they met with the President and Attorney General Jeff Sessions, and possibly others, in the Oval Office. President Trump told the DAG he had written a letter to Director Comey, asked the DAG if he had seen the letter, and instructed McGahn to provide the DAG with a copy. The DAG described the letter to me as being a long list, possibly several pages, of the President’s complaints with Director Comey. Among those complaints was a discussion about the FBI’s Russia investigation, as well as a paragraph about the FBI Deputy Director. The DAG indicated to me that he retained a copy of the President’s letter. The DAG said he told the President [redacted]. The President then directed the DAG to write a memo explaining the reasoning for Director Comey’s termination and that the DAG should include Russia. The DAG said to the President he did not think this was a good idea and that his memo did not need to include Russia. The President replied that he understood, but that he was asking the DAG to include Russia anyway. As our conversation continued the DAG propo
sed that he could potentially wear a recording device into the Oval Office to collect additional evidence on the President’s true intentions. He said he thought this might be possible because he was not searched when he entered the White House. I told him that I would discuss the opportunity with my investigative team and get back to him.

  We discussed the issue of appointing a Special Counsel to oversee the FBI’s Russia investigation. The DAG said he has two candidates ready one of whom could start immediately. [Redacted] The DAG said that he left a copy of the delegation with Acting Assistant Attorney General for National Security Dana Boente to execute in the DAG’s absence if the DAG were suddenly removed from his position. [Redacted] He anticipated that he may be terminated when he puts the Special Counsel in place, in light of the president’s anger with AG Sessions when the AG recused himself from the Russia investigation. The DAG further stated that he was told that others heard the President tell the AG “you were supposed to protect me.”

  [Redacted]

  The DAG related to me that on Sunday, 05/14/17, the AG asked him to participate in the interview of [redacted] for the position of FBI Director. [Redacted.]

  The DAG told me that he informed the AG that I should remain in my role as Acting Director until the permanent Director was chosen. The DAG opined that my only “problem” was that some people believe that I was involved in my wife’s 2015 campaign for State Senate in Virginia. The DAG said it was a “credibility problem” because after having told him during my May 13 interview that I played no role in her campaign and attended no campaign events, the DAG said a staffer had provided him with a photograph found on the internet of me and my wife wearing Dr. Jill McCabe campaign t-shirts. The DAG suggested that this photograph contradicted my statement that I had not campaigned for my wife. I pointed out to the DAG that the photograph he saw was taken not at a campaign event, but rather at [redacted.] I further informed the DAG that I confirmed with my ethics counsel at FBI that the Hatch Act does not prohibit wearing a campaign button or shirt away from the office, and that attending [redacted] wearing such a shirt does not constitute proscribed political activity.

  Doesn’t this memo read as if Rosenstein and McCabe were two animals in a box fighting it out?

  McCabe isn’t exactly the most trustworthy witness but this contemporaneous record persuasively confirms that there was a plot to get Trump. Ironically, as best we can tell, the part of the coup discussion from those “seven days in May” that was acted upon was the creation of the Mueller special counsel harassment operation against Trump.

  A PENTAGON DEEP STATE OPERATIVE LEAKS TO THE WASHINGTON POST

  As President Trump was rightfully slamming McCabe, the FBI “lovers,” and others, there were still more out to get him.

  Many more.

  Which is entirely the point here.

  The tentacles of this plot extended into every dark and deceitful corner of our government.

  Knowing that to be the case, no one should be surprised that they reached the Pentagon.

  On that very subject, we released 143 pages of new records from the U.S. Department of Defense, showing extensive communications between the Pentagon’s director of the Office of Net Assessment James Baker and Washington Post reporter David Ignatius.18

  Lawyers for Lieutenant General Michael Flynn alleged in a November 1, 2019, court filing that Baker “is believed to be the person who illegally leaked” to Ignatius the transcripts of Flynn’s December 29, 2016, telephone calls with Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak. The Washington Post published Ignatius’s account of the calls on January 12, 2017, setting in motion a chain of events that led to Flynn’s February 13, 2017, firing as national security advisor and subsequent prosecution for making false statements to the FBI about the calls. U.S. Attorney John Durham is reportedly investigating the leak of information targeting Flynn.

  Citing “the government’s bad faith, vindictiveness and breach of the plea agreement,” in January 2020 Flynn’s attorney, Sidney Powell, moved to withdraw Flynn’s 2017 guilty plea during the Mueller investigation. Flynn claims he felt forced to plead guilty “when his son was threatened with prosecution and he exhausted his financial resources.” Recently, prosecutors provided Flynn’s defense team with documentation of this threat, according to additional papers Flynn’s lawyers filed April 24, 2020, in support of the motion to withdraw.

  Judicial Watch obtained the records in a November 2019 Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed after the DOD failed to respond to a September 2019 request (Judicial Watch v. Department of Defense [No. 1:19-cv-03564]). Judicial Watch seeks:

  All calendar entries of Director James Baker of the Office of Net Assessment.

  All records of communications between ONA director James Baker and reporter David Ignatius.

  The time frame for the requested records was May 2015 through September 25, 2019.

  The records include an exchange on February 16, 2016, with the subject line “Ignatius,” in which Baker tells Pentagon colleague Zachary Mears, then deputy chief of staff to Obama secretary of defense Ashton Carter, that he has “a long history with David” and talks with him regularly.

  In an email exchange on October 1, 2018, in a discussion about artificial intelligence, Baker tells Ignatius: “David, please, as always, our discussions are completely off the record. If any of my observations strike you as worthy of mixing or folding into your own thinking, that is as usual fine.” Ignatius replies, “Understood. Thanks for talking with me.”

  Ignatius and Baker’s email exchanges per year are summarized below:

  In 2015, Ignatius and Baker had a total of seven email conversations to set up meetings or calls, two simply to complement one another and one exchange where Ignatius invited Baker to speak at the Aspen Strategy Group conference.

  In 2016, Ignatius and Baker had a total of ten email exchanges to set up meetings or calls and two to complement each other.

  In 2017, Ignatius and Baker had a total of ten email exchanges to set up meetings, one exchange where Ignatius forwarded one of his articles, and one exchange where Ignatius asks Baker for his thoughts on the JCPOA (the Iran nuclear deal), because Baker wasn’t available on the phone.

  In 2018, Ignatius and Baker had a total of nine email exchanges to set up meetings, four where Ignatius forwarded articles and one where Ignatius asks Baker for tips on what to say at a quantum computing conference where he was speaking.

  As I stated with the release of these critically important documents: “These records confirm that Mr. Baker was an anonymous source for Mr. Ignatius. Mr. Baker should be directly questioned about any and all leaks to his friend at the Washington Post.”

  In a related case, in October 2018, Judicial Watch filed a FOIA lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Defense seeking information about the September 2016 contract between the DOD and Stefan Halper, the Cambridge University professor identified as a secret FBI informant used by the Obama administration to spy on Trump’s presidential campaign. Halper also reportedly had high-level ties to both U.S. and British intelligence.

  Government records show that the DOD’s Office of Net Assessment (ONA) paid Halper a total of $1,058,161 for four contracts that lasted from May 30, 2012, to March 29, 2018. More than $400,000 of the payments came between July 2016 and September 2017, after Halper reportedly offered Trump campaign volunteer George Papadopoulos work in London to entice him into disclosing information about alleged collusion between the Russian government and the Trump campaign.

  General Michael Flynn’s attorney told the court that Baker was Halper’s “handler” in the Office of Net Assessment in the Pentagon.

  MUELLER’S SPECIAL COUNSEL—A DEEP STATE SPECIAL

  We must keep this in mind at all times: if dirty and highly compromised operatives from the Deep State can band together to try to take down a legitimately and constitutionally elected president of the United States while also destroying the life and reputation of a man who was not only the head of the Defen
se Intelligence Agency, but a true and lasting American hero, then they can come after any of us, at any time.

  The Mueller special counsel operation was built on corruption. I’ve already described how the special counsel operation flowed out of the coup discussions by senior anti-Trump leaders of the FBI and DOJ. But the corruption behind the appointment runs deeper than that. Mueller was appointed as a result of the illegal leak of the FBI files of President Trump by James Comey, the corrupt Obama holdover whom President Trump had rightly fired.

  How do we know this? Because Comey confessed. First, Comey dishonestly created memos on his private conversations with President Trump, including a February 14, 2017, conversation in which Trump asked him to drop the FBI’s investigation of ousted national security advisor Lieutenant General Michael Flynn, allegedly saying, “I hope you could see your way to letting Flynn go. He’s a good guy. I hope you can let this go.” Comey never considered this obstruction (and it wasn’t, even if Trump did say it) but decided to try to use his memo of this conversation against Trump as part of a vendetta for being fired by him.

  On May 12, 2017, a Judicial Watch lawsuit uncovered how FBI agents went to Comey’s home to inventory and take possession of any FBI property Comey kept there. The agents inventoried and removed all government property from the home except the four “originals” of the memos, including the February 14 Flynn memo, that Comey kept in his personal safe. Comey failed to disclose to the agents that he retained the memos and later admitted that he never requested the FBI’s permission to retain the memos.