Posted on 02/04/2018 7:27:43 AM PST by markomalley
Representative Adam Schiff (D-CA) appears to be openly disclosing classified information to the news media–after weeks of complaining about Republican plans to disclose such information.
Per a report by CNN on Saturday, Schiff, the ranking member on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (“HPSCI”) told multiple reporters on Friday that the central claim of the Nunes surveillance memo was “unfounded.”
The Nunes surveillance memo relies upon the following thesis: that FBI and DOJ officials within the Obama administration made substantial and material omissions–rising to the level of perhaps unlawful misrepresentations–in front of a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (“FISA Court”) in order to obtain a surveillance warrant on Donald Trump‘s former campaign volunteer, Carter Page. The memo itself spells out those alleged omissions and reads, in part:
Neither the initial [FISA] application in October 2016, nor any of the renewals, disclose or reference the role of the DNC, Clinton campaign, or any party/campaign in funding Steele’s efforts, even though the political origins of the Steele dossier were then known to senior and FBI officials.
But after the controversial memo was released on Friday, Schiff took multiple reporters by the hand and offered his insight into those allegations against high-level officials within the Department of Justice (“DOJ”) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (“FBI”) by dismissing them in whole.
Those insights cut to the heart of the Nunes memo’s claims. Namely, Schiff noted, via both a press release and comments to reporters, that the memo’s claims regarding Christopher Steele‘s political motivations were “not accurate.” Schiff’s press release reads, in part:
The Majority suggests that the FBI failed to alert the court as to Mr. Steele’s potential political motivations or the political motivations of those who hired him, but this is not accurate.
In comments to reporters, Schiff later said that Steele’s “likely political motivation” was made aware to the FISA Court–again, a direct contradiction of the Nunes surveillance memo’s allegations.
But in the performance of Schiff’s schtick–protecting the nation’s largely unaccountable intelligence agencies from any sort of oversight–Schiff may have released classified information himself.
Now, the initial press release, on its own, likely isn’t enough to rise to the level of releasing classified information. Schiff’s lengthy rebuttal more or less just says that Devin Nunes’ memo is wrong and is light on details. But his later comments to reporters–where he told reporters that Steele’s “likely political motivation” was revealed to the FISA Court–do appear to reveal distinct information, potentially classified information.
Recall: the Nunes memo was only released after President Donald Trump declassified the much-ballyhooed document. What Trump did not do, however, was de-classify the underlying FISA warrant application. It would appear that Schiff has revealed information from that underlying application by attempting to discredit the Nunes memo.
As with any controversy involving America’s secret court system–FISA–and classified information, generally, it’s hard to nail this down completely. Attorney Mark Zaid, who has handled multiple cases involving such information said, in comments to the Washington Examiner:
At first blush I would have some concerns about the details in this statement as to whether it crosses a classification line, but it is possible Rep. Schiff, having had access to the underlying classified information, knows these points are in unclassified paragraphs. So much of these back-and-forths about the memo are in a gray area on classification.
Grey is certainly the color of the day. Both for its uncertainty and the overwhelming sense of meh.
Recall again: The Nunes surveillance memo was widely trumpeted before its release by the #MAGA set and many congressional Republicans as damning evidence viz. alleged FISA abuses. Conversely, the FBI, as well as the DOJ and other members of the intelligence community warned the memo’s release would endanger national security. The Democratic Party fully embraced and echoed the concerns of the intelligence community, savaging the memo’s release as “dangerous,” and a violation of House rules–in addition to their Chicken Little-like cries about endangering national security.
In reality, none of the above claims were true. Republicans mislead about the memo’s significance–most of the information is public knowledge. While Democrats, the FBI, DOJ, and others in the intelligence community all-but outright lied as to the alleged dangerousness of the memo’s contents–no one has yet to offer any plausible reason America’s national security was endangered by it.
Democrats are quite loudly preparing their own counter-memo to the Nunes surveillance memo in order to dispute the claims contained in the original, but the tactics employed by some Democrats in attempting to bat down the Nunes memo’s significance are ironically looking like nothing more than a messier, aped version of exactly what Democrats have been accusing the memo’s boosters of doing for so long now: releasing (over) classified information.
It's been 20+ years since I had access to classified documents, but the ones that I used had an (s) or (ts) marking for each paragraph that was secret or top secret in addition to the markings on the top and bottom of the page. Also, they were always numbered "1 of 268", "2 of 268"..."268 of 268". This memo has only the TOP SECRET marking at the top and bottom (which was crossed out via declassification) and no paragraph markings and no page counts.
I don't see any reason why this thing should ever have been Top Secret except to protect the guilty maybe.
Also, remember that Mrs. Bill Clinton always made sure to say that she didn't pass along emails marked "Classified". That's true, because documents are marked "Secret" or "Top Secret" (like this memo), and NOT marked "Classified".
I think it is because they never figured Trump would win. And when that happened, they then cobbled together anything and everything to create the Russian collusion narrative to get Trump impeached. It was the only avenue available that would allow the Deep State to continue its corrupt, anti-American citizen activities.
For example, if you use your I-phone to take a picture in a museum of a mockup of a nuclear submarine’s interior, and then claim that you were really inside one when you took the picture, is that a crime?
= = =
Probably could get charged. Something like Counter-espionage on the Fed level. It would depend on the politics of the situation, not any real leakage of information. The outcome of the trial would be political.
PS Don’t point a fake gun at a cop.
“This theory of Adam Schiff is only possibly viable if you believe using the Dossier in a FISA court was legit in the first place.”
Yes it is an attempt by Schiff to deflect by saying if this then the whole memo is wrong. If true it doesn’t change the fact that the spying was done. It would only indicate that the judge had poor judgment or was in on it.
“...or Shift is LYING again.”
Given his history that would be infinitely more likely.
They would had to be in on it, it doesn’t pass the rules of evidence.
Needs to have his security clearances pulled. Stat.
I’m not so sure. He’s dirty, somehow, we just haven’t got proof and when it comes out I think his own party will be leading the charge to get rid of this dirty little shiff. Just like with Franken.
Will be interesting how long it takes for his sexcapades to surface more widely and in more detail.
This youtube has some interesting details on DEM corruption and free speech trashing etc.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UayL0c2Stfc
We have an admin (OBummer) reverse engineering a "crime" to protect themselves.
You misspelled "today", typing "yet" instead.
LOL.
He is a democrat and thus protected from the laws concerning classified information.
And now we have the echo chamber dem media claiming it has been reported that memo is false. Based solely on Shiffhead saying it is so.
There should be no protection for these rats and their conspiracy to abuse and usurp power from WTP.
“The Majority suggests that the FBI failed to alert the court as to Mr. Steele’s potential political motivations or the political motivations of those who hired him, but this is not accurate.”
The FBI may have told the court later and sometime after getting the FISA warrant, but FBI knew the Steele dossier was BS at the time they submitted the evidence to get permission to spy on Page and the Trump campaign.
Schiff just admitted that Russian dossier was BS. He can’t deny Steele’s political motivations.
Let’s also not forget that Comey never notified congressional Intel oversight committee on the investigation until some time in Feb 2017, but he was in frequent contact with WH all along during investigation. Obvious procedural violation. I wonder if Comey was talking to Schiff w/o Nunes being made aware.
I don’t think they’ve written their memo yet.
The court certainly wasn’t aware of the political motivations. The warrant application cites that the source of the dossier was from a “private citizen”. No where does that cite that the citizen paid by the DNC for the work.
"The initial FISA application notes Steele was working for a named U.S. person, but does not name Fusion GPS and principal Glenn Simpson, who was paid by a U.S. law from (Perkins Coie) representing the DNC (even though it was known by DOJ at the time that political actor~ were involved with the Steele dossier). The application does not mention Steele was ultimately working on behalf of-and paid by-the DNC and Clinton campaign, or that the FBI had separately authorized payment to Steele for the same information."
Just who is this "named US person"? Nobody in the media seems terribly interested in this highly relevant fact, and this despite Schiff's blather highlighting the issue.
Here's a guess: His name is either Harry Reid or John McCain, or both.
Exposing the evil Schiff’s blatant lies, hyperbole, and hypocrisy (first he accused Nunes of releasing classified, then he himself released similar) is good. But to accuse him because of what he accuses, it assumes you agree that Nunes was in violation too.
Neither one was in violation of releasing sources or methods. The article even says they likely pulled from unclass portion-marked paragraphs.
In theory, someone could claim Steele was a classified source, but that seems laughable.
Schiff is a (probably compromised) rube and mouthpiece. But he’s not the legal target (yet).
Carter Page had not been under continuous investigation since 2013. At that time, Mr. Page became aware that he was being recruited by Russian agents. He did not hide the fact, but rather he went to the FBI and cooperated in a sting operation that resulted in the exposure of the agents.
The relevant thing about Page is that he was a KNOWN entity to the FBI, and thus he made a convenient stooge for the FBI conspirators, since they knew from his dealings with them that they use these facts to lend credence to their false narrative. They knew they could use Page to get to Trump and other senior campaign members. The object of the Page surveillance was not Page, but Trump.
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