Posted on 10/07/2019 7:57:38 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Deep State has been after President Trump from the before his presidency, and its latest trick has been in orchestrating a rules change to ensure that any deep-stater can come forward with secondhand information, as a "whistleblower.
It's supposedly to ensure that wrongdoing bruited about at the spy agency water coolers gets into the hands of authorities. Problem one: Spy agencies don't do water cooler talk.
But politics is always a topic, so now we have one or two leakers from the ranks of the still-embittered Deep State, taking the cover of 'whistleblower' as a result of that rules change, with a string of unsubstantiated secondhand information.
Sean Davis at the Federalist has been doing a yeoman's job of ferreting out this leaks-as-whistles con job, with the first report that the rules allowing secondhand stories to go into whistleblower filings were mysteriously changed just in time for the first whistleblower to come forward, supposedly in August.
Now he reports that it gets worse. Davis reports that it turns out the rules weren't changed in August, they were changed in September, and the watchdog agency, the Intelligence Community Inspector General (IGIC) backdated that rules change.
In tense testimony before the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI) on Friday, the inspector general for federal spy agencies refused to disclose why his office backdated secret changes to key whistleblower forms and rules in the wake of an anti-Trump whistleblower complaint filed in August, sources told The Federalist.
As The Federalist reported and the Intelligence Community Inspector General (ICIG) confirmed, the spy watchdog secretly changed its whistleblower forms and internal rules in September to eliminate a requirement that whistleblowers provide first-hand evidence to support any allegations of wrongdoing.
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
The swamp was NEVER drained. It is killing the USA.
All irrelevant. Under the Adiminstrative Procedures Act, for a rule change there must have been notice in the Federal Register, public comment period, adjudication of the public comments and then a final rule-making. None of that was apparently done.
You don't want to open the bomb bay doors until you're directly over target.
Although the form requests information about whether the Complainant possesses first-hand knowledge about the matter about which he or she is lodging the complaint, there is no such requirement set forth in the statute. In fact, by law the Complainant – or any individual in the Intelligence Community who wants to report information with respect to an urgent concern to the congressional intelligence committees – need not possess first-hand information in order to file a complaint or information with respect to an urgent concern.
Thus, the IC IG decided post-submission, that firsthand knowledge was not required in the statute, therefore it shouldn't be required on the form.
As Col. Sherman T. Potter would say: "Horse Hockey!"
RE: Finally, the WB did claim to have direct knowledge and the IG agreed.
So, you’re telling us that the WB had DIRECT KNOWLEDGE of the so called quid pro quo and it was not from second hand sources?
How does this direct knowledge square with the transcripts released ?
Also, see here:
(EXCERPT)
Devin Nunes just sent a letter to the Intel Community Inspector General demanding answers about how secondhand information was used to kick up this whole ordeal.
FROM HIS INTERVIEW WITH LAUEA INGRAHAM:
REP. DEVIN NUNES (R-CA): Well, I’m glad that we finally have a response from the IG. Remember, this leaked out last Friday. The DNI refused to respond to it. So finally, because of the pressure we’ve put on this morning, we’re getting an answer from the Inspector General.
But I would say this, Laura. I haven’t seen any evidence of that. So if he has firsthand knowledge, he or she has firsthand knowledge, what is that - where is that evidence? Just because the IG said so, they haven’t provided us that evidence.
And furthermore, he didn’t answer anything in that three-page press release, the questions that we asked in our letter today. So he has until Thursday to provide us the facts, the evidence, the emails. Why did they - because they admit that they changed this regulation. OK? This guideline, they changed it because of this whistleblower. He admits it in his own press release. So the mainstream media is trying to cover this up.
BACK TO YOU. So, you’re saying that Devin Nunes is blowing smoke and IG, Michael Atkinson was right all along? WHAT IS THIS NONSENSE ABOUT REQUIRING FIRST HAND KNOWLEDGE TO BE CONSIDERED A WHISTLE BLOWER WHEN ( as you claim ) THERE IS NO SUCH REQUIREMENT?
Are these Republican legislators ignorant about the rules?
RB - rumorblower
RE: Thus, the IC IG decided post-submission, that firsthand knowledge was not required in the statute
See the post #19 above.
It is poster, semimojo’s contention that firsthand knowledge PRE-SUBMISSION was never required, and second hand knowledge has always been acceptable.
I want to get to the bottom of this.
Which is it?
Was first hand knowledge a requirement before? Or was it only added later as not a necessary requirement?
The IG, Michael Atkinson said second hand knowledge had always been acceptable to be considered a Whistleblower.
Reporters like Sean Davis and the Republicans congressmen insist that ONLY first hand knowledge was a requirement to be a whistleblower.
Who is right?
if it was always allowed why make the sneaky change? check bank accounts payoffs...
First hand knowledge was a requirement on the form. The current IC IG decided that it was improperly included on the form because the underlying statute didn't require first hand knowledge.
The IG, Michael Atkinson said second hand knowledge had always been acceptable to be considered a Whistleblower.
We have always been at war with Eurasia.
Great but said more rude was Alan Harper with, “BIOYA!”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9EcZW17Qgcw
First-hand knowledge is required for an “urgent concern”, which is a complaint that can be forwarded directly to congress. Second-hand knowledge can be used within the ICIG’s own system, but is not eligible for submission to congress until confirmed, I think.
I am curious as to why the ICIG decided that POTUS is within his jurisdiction, which is an explicit requirement from the statute.
See Post #31 as it relates to impeaching the President.
I correct myself (sorry ).
See Post #33 as it relates to impeaching the President.
RE: First hand knowledge was a requirement on the form. The current IC IG decided that it was improperly included on the form because the underlying statute didn’t require first hand knowledge.
So, you are saying that there was NO MALICE on the part of the IC IG, that what he did was a simple matter of correction in order to make the form compatible with a pre-existing statute?
If this was simply a clerical error, then all the IC IG should say is this — “It was an oversight in the form, what I did was not a malicious attempt at backdating it, but to correct the form’s mistake”.
No, I'm telling you that the IG claims to have determined that the WB had direct knowledge of some of the acts.
I don't know beyond that because that's all the ICIG said in his statement.
So, you’re saying that Devin Nunes is blowing smoke and IG, Michael Atkinson was right all along?
Yeah, pretty much.
Again, if you look at what Nunes says he doesn't claim the form was changed for the whistleblower (although that's what he wants you to believe), he's saying it was changed because of the WB. I don't think Atkinson would even agree with that but it doesn't matter because the WB didn't use the new form and wasn't subject to new rules.
I think that's right and I know the IG determined that the WB had direct knowledge of some of the claimed acts.
It's all in the ICIG's statement I linked to up thread. I'm mobile now and can't cut and paste from a PDF or I'd post the text.
Look at the ICIG's statement and the US Code he references in it. First hand knowledge isn't required for a whistleblower report under the law.
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