Posted on 05/20/2019 4:38:33 PM PDT by billorites
U.S. Attorney John H. Durham, who is examining the origins and propriety of the FBI’s Russia inquiry, has been working in Washington for months, looking into a related matter and quietly building a team of investigators, people familiar with the matters said.
The Courant and other news organizations reported Monday that Attorney General William Barr assigned Durham to examine the circumstances under which the FBI opened a disputed counterintelligence investigation into possible ties between President Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign and efforts directed from Russia to interfere with the U.S. election.
The Barr assignment comes months after Durham began investigating whether laws were broken by politically-motivated leaks of evidence and the identities of grand jury witnesses and targets.
The leak investigation became generally known in January, through letters made public in Congress accusing senior FBI officials of political bias. [Related] Columbine and addiction survivor Austin Eubanks made his last speech at a Connecticut opioid conference. He was found dead in Colorado last weekend. »
Durham is said by associates to have been at work as early as early last summer and was recruiting investigators months before Barr became Attorney General in January. In this Oct. 25, 2005 file photo, Assistant U.S. Attorney Nora Dannehy speaks to reporters outside U.S. District Court in New Haven, Conn. In this Oct. 25, 2005 file photo, Assistant U.S. Attorney Nora Dannehy speaks to reporters outside U.S. District Court in New Haven, Conn.
Former federal prosecutor Nora R. Dannehy agreed to join Durham two months ago, associates of both said. Before leaving the justice department for United Technologies Corp., Dannehy prosecuted complex political corruption, including cases resulting in the convictions of former Connecticut Gov. John G. Rowland and former state Treasurer Paul Silvester. In 2008, she was assigned to Washington to investigate whether prosecutors in the President George W. Bush justice department had been fired for political reasons.
One official said Durham’s leak investigation did not grow into the probe of the legal underpinning of the FBI’s Russia investigation. Rather, the official said Durham was chosen for because of his knowledge of the Russia inquiry gained through the leak investigation and his previous experience investigating the Central Intelligence Agency.
In 2008 and 2009, Durham was assigned by the justice departments under Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama to investigate the CIA’s use of torture after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and its destruction of certain videotapes showing the torture of suspected terrorists.
Barr acknowledged in testimony to Congress a month ago that he had reservations about the FBI’s Russia investigation, in particular whether there was legal justification for the resulting surveillance of associates of President Donald Trump. [Related] ‘Game of Thrones’ star Kit Harington visits Connecticut bookstore while on vacation »
“I think spying did occur,” Barr told Congress. “The question is whether it was adequately predicated. And I’m not suggesting that it wasn’t adequately predicated. But I need to explore that.”
Barr said he planned to examine the "genesis and the conduct" of the FBI's investigation into possible ties between the Trump campaign and Russia.
Trump has railed for months against what he calls his unfair treatment by the FBI and the counter intelligence investigation that resulted in the inquiry by Special Counsel Robert S. Mueller III. Mueller’s report said the evidence did not support charging Trump or his associates for colluding with Russians, but said the FBI was justified in opening the counterintelligence probe.
Trump’s political allies have been demanding yet another investigation to investigate the investigators – at the FBI and within Mueller’s team.
Trump and Congress Republicans claim the FBI targeted his campaign political reasons. As evidence, they point to text in which top FBI officials express contempt for Trump and FBI’s decision to treat as credible information provided by a former British spy who had been paid, indirectly, by Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign.
Ed Mahony can be reached at emahony@courant.com.
Gosh. What AG could possibly have put Durham to work early last summer?
Awesome. Mueller had perjury traps, indictments and guilty pleas in a few months. How years should I plan on waiting for Durham’s “work” to bear fruit? Where there is a will, there is a way. The Trump hating GOP has not the will to criminally indict Democrats to the benefit of Donald J. Trump. Sorry.
Heard Barr use the word “review”.
Didn’t hear ‘investigate possible crimes’.
So, not holding my breath.
Watch this interview with Larry Klayman and weep. He knows the DC game and his take on what Barr, Durham, Huber, etc., are up to is not good:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nRFNuqzfOjw
*Waves fistful of dollar bills*
Because they know the swamp will rally around them AND they themselves and their accomplices who are still faithful to them and despise trump have already destroyed vital incriminating evidence ...HAS BEEN DESTROYED!! WHAT THE HELL do you think they were doing for 3 freakin years in case their coup turned sour????!!! Holy crap folks, TRUMP is screwed..he’ll NEVER clean the swamp, or destroyed Hitlery on the contrary they’ll continue to seek his hide for months before 2020! The mediaVOMITS, the RINOS and even Fox News will see to it! The bitch from hell should have been behind bars, instead trump’s presidential term has been a living hell, while the bitch enjoys freedom and laughing all the way to the bank!!
Rosenstein, not Sessions. Rosenstein knew what Meuller knew, no conspiracy/collusion from day one of the investigtion. He anticipated the release of the report and pending uproar and decided to betray his co-conspirators whom he helped initiate the coup. This is how he walks away clean after offering to wear a wire and conducting a straw poll amongst the cabinet on the feasibility of using the 25th amendment to remove the President. By appointing Durham he puts himself back on the winning team. Rosenstein is as greasy as he looks. If Barr is worth his salt, he’ll figure out a way to make Rosenstein pay too.
When you figure out how the GOP controls the DOJ I’ll be curious to see how that works.
Trump could have fired that one any day he wished. Why did he wait two years?
I don’t think he needed flipping. Some who had been aware of what had been going on were just biding their time, waiting for a new sheriff to arrive. Barr wasn’t faking his speech at RR’s retirement party.
When you figure out how the GOP controls the DOJ I’ll be curious to see how that works.
When you show me some solid evidence of DOJ action that shows Trump controls the DOJ I’ll be happy to say I was wrong. Let us review the fact that the “Trump DOJ” sent more FBI agents to get Roger Stone than the Navy sent sailors to get Bin Laden. Does that sound like something POTUS controlled?
Until we see some action from the Trump DOJ the proof is in the pudding. Three years after their treasonous crimes the criminal Democrats are guilty as sin, free as birds. Sadly, there is no solid evidence that will be changing any time soon. Victory laps around yet another DOJ “investigation” just show how hollow the “trust” sunshine pumping has is.
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