Free Republic

The Justice Department's internal watchdog has concluded that James Comey defied authority at times during his tenure as FBI director, according to sources familiar with a draft report on the matter. One source told ABC News that the draft report explicitly used the word "insubordinate" to describe Comey's behavior. Another source agreed with that characterization but could not confirm the use of the term. In the draft report, Inspector General Michael Horowitz also rebuked former Attorney General Loretta Lynch for her handling of the federal investigation into Hillary Clinton's personal email server, the sources said. On Tuesday morning, President Donald...

$16.7 million. That’s the bill for the Mueller investigation. The last spending phase, from October to March, included $2.7 million in salaries with another $532,340 in travel expenses. And there’s no sign that this hideously expensive circus is ever going to end. The latest high-wire act in the circus is yet another accusation aimed at Paul Manafort. This time, Mueller’s favorite target is being accused of witness tampering. Like most of Mueller’s favorite charges, such as making false statements, this isn’t a crime being uncovered, but arises from the investigation. The accusation is also obviously a means to an end....

One of the challenges of Spygate is that it's such a sprawling, complicated tale, filled with competing narratives and motives open to interpretation. We understand that this is a serious situation – possibly the biggest scandal in U.S. history. But how can one get the message across to the average American without his eyes glazing over? To cut through the complexity, it helps to focus on specific actions by individuals that we all can agree are suspect. This brings us to Samantha Power. Of all the political stories from 2017, surely the most curious is this: why is everyone ignoring...

Once again, it appears the FBI redacted documents to Congress in order to hide illicit behavior. The FBI hid that they were using sources to “lure” US citizens (Trump officials?) in the UK.

It might be time for the Federal Bureau of Investigation to revise its Russia-Trump collusion origin story again. First, they said the whole thing started with the Christopher Steele dossier. When that fell apart, the beginning became a random conversation between a Trump campaign staffer and a foreign diplomat. But an examination of the George Papadopolous explanation—that the FBI kicked into gear once it was told a Trump affiliate was trawling for hacked emails—shows that the public evidence doesn’t fit the bureau’s story. The FBI has long maintained that it launched its investigation into the Trump campaign on July 31,...

The Trump transition team may demand an investigation after tens of thousands of emails were handed to the Mueller probe without consent or warrants Late last year, news broke that a federal agency turned over tens of thousands of private emails of Trump transition team officials to the special counsel’s team—without a warrant, and without getting the officials’ permission. Now, according to communications reviewed by The Daily Beast, the transition team is fighting back. They are threatening to call for an inspector general’s investigation of the General Services Administration (GSA), which gave the emails to Mueller, and to potentially try...

In the wake of the revelation that an FBI informant lured George Papadopoulos to London during the 2016 campaign, the former Trump campaign adviser has grown skeptical of many of his contacts during and after the election, his wife says. Papadopoulos’ contacts with the FBI informant — a former University of Cambridge professor named Stefan Halper — have been widely reported over the past several weeks. The 30-year-old Chicago native’s interactions with Joseph Mifsud and Alexander Downer, two diplomats who are key to special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian meddling in the election, are also well known. Simona Mangiante,...

Chris Farrell, Judicial Watch. “They were running an operation to undermine a candidate for President of the U.S. These are all violations of law. This is intelligence tradecraft to steer an election. There’s nothing more grave when it comes to abuse of our intelligence system... ...This is a level of criminality beyond the pale. This is such a grave abuse of power and authority, it’s like nothing else we’ve seen in our history. This makes the Nixon Watergate burglary look like keystone cop stuff ....The greatest Witch Hunt in political history!https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1004171953404628998

Reports of the FBI seizing computer hard drives form the home of the congressional IT director and aide of Florida Democratic Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz are accurate, according to FBI sources: with the exception of one major detail. The computer hard drives were not damaged when they were confiscated, FBI sources said. The FBI, who is working in some capacity to assist with the Capitol Police on the Awan investigation, confirm the hard drives and other computer equipment have been damaged but are pointing the finger at the Capitol Police’s chain of custody with the evidence. The FBI, they said,...

Former House Speaker and Trump ally Newt Gingrich warned President Trump against pardoning himself should special counsel Robert Mueller pursue charges in the ongoing Russia investigation, telling "CBS This Morning" on Tuesday that it would be an "arrogant statement of power" if he did so. "I don't think he can pardon himself, that would lead to a reaction in the Congress that would be devastating," Gingrich said. Gingrich's comments come after Mr. Trump declared Monday that he has the "absolute right" to pardon himself, but added he had done nothing wrong. The president asserted his presidential power as the White...

President Trump took another dig at Attorney General Jeff Sessions on Tuesday for not telling him about the recusal from the Russian investigation, saying he would have picked someone else to head the Justice Department. Mr. Trump has repeatedly expressed frustration with his attorney general for not overseeing the probe into possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia. Mr. Sessions, citing ethics rules, recused himself shortly after becoming attorney general since he had been part of the Trump campaign during the 2016 election. “The Russian Witch Hunt Hoax continues, all because Jeff Sessions didn’t tell me he was going...

On Friday, just days before the election, reports are emerging that the FBI has re-opened the Hillary Clinton email investigation. “The FBI has learned of the existence of emails that appear to be pertinent to the investigation,” a letter from FBI Director James Comey reads. And while Comey didn’t indicate how long the investigation could take, it’s pretty safe to bet investigators won’t come to any kind of decision before November 8th. It may even take months for the FBI to wrap up round two of this. So what happens if Clinton is elected, takes office, and then finds her...

Senate Judiciary Chairman Sen. Chuck Grassley announced the date for a hearing on the DOJ Inspector General report about FBI officials’ conduct ahead of the 2016 presidential election, including the Hillary Clinton email scandal.....Originally scheduled for Tuesday, the hearing will now take place at 2 p.m. on June 11 and is "open to the public." Media outlets, including Fox and the Hill, report House lawmakers also will hold a hearing to question Bill Priestap, assistant director of the FBI’s counterintelligence division, Michael Steinbach, former head of the agency’s national security division, and John Giacalone, Steinbach’s predecessor. Priestap oversaw both the...

The US Senate today released over 500 pages of information related to the Spygate scandal. Hidden in the information are unredacted Strzok – Page texts that show the FBI initiated actions to insert multiple spies in the Trump campaign in December 2015. Once again Internet sleuths unearthed damning evidence that the FBI was engaged in Spygate long before they let on. As we reported previously, according to far left Politico, Comey stated in March of 2017 under oath that the FBI investigation into the Trump – Russia scandal started in July 2016: FBI Director James Comey told lawmakers Monday that...

Is it just me, or was bringing Rudy Giuliani onto his legal team a monumentally bad decision on the part of the Trump administration?

President Donald Trump's former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, who has been indicted by U.S. Special Counsel Robert Mueller, attempted to tamper with potential witnesses, Mueller said in a court filing on Monday. Mueller, who is investigating possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia, asked the judge overseeing the case in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia to revoke or revise an order releasing Manafort ahead of his trial. Manafort was released to home confinement after his arraignment in October. Mueller has indicted Manafort in federal courts in Virginia and Washington, D.C., with an array of allegations from...

George Papadopoulos’ wife, Simona Mangiante, said her husband was not involved in collusion between the Trump campaign and the Russian government and that he pleaded guilty in the special counsel’s investigation to avoid facing charges that he was an agent of the Israeli government. In an exclusive interview with The Daily Caller News Foundation, Mangiante also claimed that it was former Trump campaign aide Papadopoulos who, during an interview with the FBI on Jan. 27, 2017, brought up Joseph Mifsud, the mysterious Maltese professor who mentioned Hillary Clinton’s emails to him during a meeting in London in April 2016. Papadopoulos’...

Every Dem has his day. Hillary had her tour. Bernie had his. A number of Dem staffers and media people have done theirs. Now it's Ben Rhodes' turn to play Miss Obama. His documentary clips are everywhere. He's got a new gig with NBC. And he's churning out a stream of articles, editorials and excuses. As the Obama Whisperer, the manager of the echo chamber, he's back doing what he loves. Spinning. This time it's Obama on Syria. In an Atlantic piece, Obama's vizier blames the international community and Republicans. Obama had famously blamed the Euros. Rhodes goes easier on...

“'John Brennan, no single figure in American history has done more to discredit the intelligence community than this liar. Not only is he a liar, he’s a liar about being a liar," the president tweeted (Dan Bongino) $17 million spent, it’s a scam Investigation. Americans are being worked. We now know there was Russian collusion, with Russians and the Democrats. The Mueller team is stacked with anti-Trumpers, who actually represented Clinton people (& gave $’s to Crooked H).” Dan Bongino

Is the former campaign adviser accused of misrepresenting his subjective state of mind, not objective reality? Congress should be taking a very hard look at the prosecution of George Papadopoulos. To these eyes, the harder one looks, the more the Papadopoulos case appears to be much ado about nothing. That is no small thing: The “much ado” here is a purported Trump–Russia conspiracy to subvert a presidential election. There has always been something fishy about the charge filed by Special Counsel Robert Mueller against Papadopoulos, who was a green-as-grass 28-year-old when he made the big primary-season move from Ben Carson–campaign...