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“Ticking Off the FISA Boxes

The July 19 Steele memo alleging that Page had a “secret meeting” with Sechin checked off an important box for the FISA application process.

“It’s to find out about the target’s clandestine activities on behalf of foreign powers. It doesn’t make sense if it’s a public meeting in Red Square,” said Wauck. “Next you’d want to show that the people he met with clandestinely were part of the criminal activity.”

The memo ties Page’s potentially criminal actions to Trump himself.

However, there is no crime alleged in the July 19 memo. The substance of Page’s supposed meeting is not criminal. Removing sanctions on Russia in exchange for bilateral energy cooperation would be a matter of policy.

The criminal predicate for the FISA warrant is introduced subsequently, in a memo dated almost exactly three months later, October 18. Report 134 is essentially a revision of the July 19 memo. It discusses the same meeting in early July and appears to be described by the same intimate of Sechin’s who reported the meeting to Steele’s intermediary in July. This time, however, Sechin’s “close associate” gives a significantly different account to Steele’s source—he “elaborated on the reported secret [July] meeting.”

According to the October 18 report, instead of offering bilateral energy cooperation in exchange for convincing Trump to relieve sanctions, Sechin tells Page that he will profit personally. According to the memo, Page was offered “the brokerage of up to a 19% (privatised) stake in Rosneft in return.”

That’s bribery. The scheme would have benefited both men, likely removing sanctions on Sechin and making Page a wealthy man. The brokerage fee would have amounted to at least tens of millions of dollars on a percentage worth more than $10 billion.

The Trump adviser, the report continues, “expressed interest and confirmed that were Trump elected US president, then sanctions on Russia would be lifted.” The memo ties Page’s potentially criminal actions to Trump himself. According to Steele’s source, Page was “speaking with the Republican candidate’s authority.””

"The Importance of 19 Percent Newly incoming House Intelligence Committee Chair Adam Schiff contended back in March 2017 that the fact Rosneft did eventually sell off a 19 percent stake, to Qatar, proves the veracity of the dossier. However, the number would have been easy to find on the internet. By spring 2016 it was widely reported that Russia, hurting from both sanctions and a drop in energy prices, intended to sell off between 19 and 19.5 percent of Rosneft. ‘It suggests that the scenario may have been directed by the FBI.’ Nevertheless, the 19 percent figure may have won the warrant. “Imagine you’re before a judge,” said Wauck, “and you’re making a case that your suspect was involved in a bribery scheme. If you give a real figure, that’s a lot more persuasive than saying he was handed a suitcase full of cash.” While the allegations from the July 19 memo regarding the Page-Sechin meeting are included in all four FISA applications, the dossier’s allegations of Page’s crime are apparent in neither the original nor the three renewals. Either the warrants failed for some reason to include sensational allegations of a potential crime in connection with the clandestine intelligence activities of a FISA target, or the allegations are redacted. Perhaps that was to conceal evidence that Steele’s October 18 memo secured the FISA three days later. The rapid turnaround is not typical, says Judicial Watch’s Farrell. “An act of espionage may not be reportable for years. By its nature, you’re talking about clandestine activity, so you may not find out about it until long after it’s happened. Here the operational activity is identified almost immediately. And then it’s followed by a warrant. It suggests that the scenario may have been directed by the FBI.”\"