Trump-Russia collusion did affect an American election — the one in 2018

The Hill ^ | 3/25/2019 | john Solomon

[bitt]

Now that we know for sure that special counsel Robert Mueller, the U.S. intelligence community and Republicans on the House and Senate Intelligence Committees found no evidence that President Trump conspired with Russia to hijack the 2016 election, it is worth stepping back and evaluating the electoral impact of one of the greatest faux scandals in history.

Before doing that, though, let’s summarize what we now know about the origins of the investigation.

Hillary Clinton and the Democratic National Committee asked their law firm, Perkins Coie, to hire the political opposition research firm Fusion GPS to dig up dirt during the 2016 election on Trump and Russia. Fusion, in turn, hired former British intelligence operative Christopher Steele, who turned to a “retired” Russian intelligence officer in the United States to get most of this dirt.

Steele took his information to the FBI and senior Justice Department official Bruce Ohr to interject it into law enforcement circles and make it a criminal matter. According to Ohr, Steele was “desperate” to defeat Trump and viewed his dossier as raw intelligence that was not verified. To augment that research, the Clinton campaign had a Democratic operative working with Ukraine’s embassy in Washington to research Trump's Russia ties, as well as a Ukrainian lawmaker feeding information to Fusion GPS.

In another words, the main evidence used by the FBI to justify a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant to spy on the Trump campaign in its final weeks before the 2016 election, and for much of 2017, came from a political dirty-trick operation paid by Trump’s Democratic rival and run by a foreigner who disliked Trump.

[bitt]

p

[CatOwner]

Yep. 24/7 reporting on how evil Trump was gave too many voters election fatigue even before the mid-terms were in full swing. I suspect they’ll continue with this tactic, even if they can’t remove Trump, to take over both the House and the Senate in 2020.

[bingoplayer]

The 2018 house election was illegitimate. It needs to be vacated. It was based on the lies of the media that Trump colluded with Russia. That was a lie!! it interfered with the election.

[dp0622]

Let’s not forget rampant cheating that took a dozen seats at least.

I SUSPECT that Trump’s approval ratings, combined with 95 PERCENT of those who voted for him saying they are going to vote for him again, will help us take back the house and add to the senate.

see, in 2020 Trump will be on the ticket.

Its called Coattails and he’s gonna have a lot.

[thoughtomator]

The business model of Fusion GPS and organizations like it is criminal. These orgs shouldn’t exist - the ones that do need to be investigated. Same with the dirty tricks Perkins has its hands in - lawyer-client shouldn’t shield that.

[lasereye]

As the “Impeach Trump” machine raged with fuel provided by Democrats and an errant media, a funny thing happened: More than three dozen Republican incumbents in Congress announced they were retiring in 2018, leaving the GOP with a gaping hole in the House that Democrats exploited.

I think that Ryan bought into it. Good riddance.

[MAGAthon]

doubt if Republicans would have lost the House, if it weren’t for the RussiaCollusionHoax.

this is a very important aspect of the attempted coup.

[cableguymn]

Correct.

Ryan and co didn’t help either