Posted on 01/29/2020 5:26:41 AM PST by Oldeconomybuyer
President Donald Trump’s defense team falsely claimed the Justice Department was already investigating him even before the 2016 election and distorted the facts about a dossier of opposition research into Trump’s ties to Russia.
A look at some of the claims Tuesday during Trump’s impeachment trial:
TRUMP LAWYER JAY SEKULOW: “The president of the United States, before he was the president, was under an investigation. It was called Crossfire Hurricane. It was an investigation led by the FBI.”
THE FACTS: Trump was not under investigation before he took office.
In fact, Trump says he was told that directly and repeatedly by then-FBI Director James Comey. Comey has said the same publicly.
The FBI counterintelligence investigation dubbed Crossfire Hurricane was underway when Trump took office, but that was into whether his campaign more generally coordinated with Russia to tip the election. Agents were also looking criminally at several Trump aides, but that’s different from Trump being under investigation.
The situation did change after a matter of months, when Trump fired Comey in May 2017. After that happened, the FBI began looking into whether Trump had criminally obstructed justice. Former FBI acting Director Andrew McCabe has said the FBI also began investigating whether Trump might have been acting on behalf of Russia.
SEKULOW, pointing to the fact that Nellie Ohr was working for the firm that was researching Trump for the Clinton campaign while her husband, Bruce, was an official at the Justice Department: “You’re No. 4 at the Department of Justice ... then the fourth-ranking member at the Department of Justice.”
THE FACTS: Sekulow is vastly overstating Ohr’s position in suggesting systemic bias against Trump at the Justice Department during the 2016 election. Ohr is a career Justice Department official who is not and has never been No. 4 in command.
(Excerpt) Read more at apnews.com ...
Why didn’t you identify this as having been written by the Biden campaign spokesthing?
“THE FACTS: Trump was not under investigation before he took office. “
W T F
Some people are stupid.
“The FBI counterintelligence investigation dubbed Crossfire Hurricane was underway when Trump took office”
Ummm.....
Comey told him he was not under investigation. Oh, Okay. Good enough for me.
If Al Capone owned a news company this is how they would fact check his organization’s criminal behavior.
are their readers that stupid?
Wow!
Fact checkers are wrong about the facts.
The spying on the Trump campaign began long before the election. No one but the AP is disputing this now. Comey clearly lied when he told Trump he wasn’t under investigation. The FISA warrants, especially the one on Carter page a (CIA employee) date back to June 2016.
Second. Nellie Ohr was a go between for Fusion GPS and her husband. The information is clear on that. Fusion GPS was being used by the Clinton team. Further, Fusion GPS had illegal access to the NSA database. Therefore, the political spying was occurring even before Trump ran for office.
The ‘factcheckers’ don’t really want the Truth.
THE FACTS: Trump was not under investigation before he took office.
If the AP said it, then I automatically believe the opposite.
Exactly. If two people disagree, the one liberals don’t like is mistaken or lying, evidently.
ap fact check - LMAO
Amazing what they can print these days without evidence or facts.
Oh yeah. Right. I’ll believe AP about as soon as pigs fly.
“So the “fact checker” says that the Trump campaign was under investigation after saying that Trump was not under investigation. LIARS. “
Juvenile word-parsing sophistry at its finest.
“Trump defense wrong about FBI investigation”
I don’t think so.
This is lying at it’s purest. Trump indicated he knew his campaign was being spied on and it turned out to be too true. Obama administration ordered from the top.
In fact, Trump says he was told that directly and repeatedly by then-FBI Director James Comey. Comey has said the same publicly. "
Ohhhh... Trump was not under investigation because Comey said so...? Too funny...
Associated Press equals fake news. Lies. Fiction. Dishonesty.
Yes! Both of them!
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