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Real Clear Investigations' Lee Smith tells FOX News host Laura Ingraham said there was a press campaign by Obama administration intelligence officials to dirty Donald Trump's bid for the presidency. From the Friday edition of FNC's Ingraham Angle: LAURA INGRAHAM: Well John Solomon discovered that the FBI violated its own rules by using informants before the investigation was ever launched. So why were FBI informants contacting Trump figures about Russia long before the Russia probe was opened? Something else that doesn't add up, whether a key player was an FBI informant or somewhere closer to a Russian spy. Reporter Lee...

In the shifting narratives of the Trump-Russia probe, a Maltese academic named Joseph Mifsud has remained a linchpin regarding claims of collusion. He is the professor who allegedly told Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos that the Russians had emails related to the Clinton campaign. The FBI says it opened its investigation in late July 2016 after Papadopoulos relayed that information to Australian diplomat Alexander Downer, and the Australians tipped off U.S. authorities. While some news accounts describe Mifsud as an accomplice to Russian clandestine operations or a “cut-out” (intermediary), others contend he is a full-fledged Russian spy. In an official...

Mr. Mifsud is said to have given to the aide [Papadopolous] “dirty information” on Mrs. Clinton collected by the Russian. “This is nonsense”, Mifsud comments, “friendship is friendship but Papadopoulos doesn’t tell the truth. The only thing I did was to facilitate contacts... “I am a member of the European Council on Foreign relations”, he adds, “and you know which is the only foundation I am member of? The Clinton Foundation. Between you and me, my thinking is left-leaning... Ok. But what about the emails stolen from Mrs. Clinton? “The dirty job” offered to Papadopoulos? “I don’t know. I strongly...

Sen. Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, said Thursday a meeting between a bipartisan group of House and Senate leaders and intelligence and law enforcement officials is a “farce” because the disclosure of classified information should be limited to the so-called “Gang of Eight” — a collection of Senate and House leaders who traditionally receive the briefings on sensitive intelligence matters. Two intelligence briefings are scheduled for Thursday afternoon to discuss the FBI’s investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 election. It is said to include details about an FBI informant who contacted members of the...

Part 1: George Papadopoulos and Josef Mifsud Inaction. It's been rattling around my head for a long time. Why was there no action? Why didn't obama do something? barack obama was warned about Russian meddling in 2014. The Obama administration received multiple warnings from national security officials between 2014 and 2016 that the Kremlin was ramping up its intelligence operations and building disinformation networks it could use to disrupt the U.S. political system, according to more than half a dozen current and former officials. As early as 2014, the administration received a report that quoted a well-connected Russian source as...

Halper, 73, reached out to Clovis and Papadopoulos within days of each other in August and September 2016. He reached out to Clovis first, offering to provide the campaign with foreign policy advice... ...Halper contacted Papadopoulos through email on Sept. 2, 2016, offering to fly him to London.... Papadopoulos made the trip and had dinner multiple times with Halper and a Turkish woman described as his assistant. Sources familiar with Papadopoulos’s version of their meetings said Halper randomly asked Papadopoulos whether he knew about Democratic National Committee emails that had been hacked and leaked by Russians. Papadopoulos strongly denied the...

A Cambridge professor with deep ties to American and British intelligence has been outed as an agent who snooped on the Trump presidential campaign for the FBI. Multiple media outlets have named Stefan Halper, 73, as the secret informant who met with Trump campaign advisers Carter Page and George Papadopoulos starting in the summer of 2016. The American-born academic previously served in the Nixon, Ford and Reagan administrations. The revelation, stemming from recent reports in which FBI sources admitted sending an agent to snoop on the Trump camp, heightens suspicions that the FBI was seeking to entrap Trump campaign aides....

George Papadopoulos appears to have been targeted by three individuals with ties to British and/or U.S. Intelligence. Joseph Mifsud Alexander Downer Stefan Halper George Papadopoulos and Joseph Mifsud reportedly both worked at the London Centre of International Law Practice. Joseph Mifsud appears to have joined LCILP around November 2015. Papadopoulos appears to have joined LCILP sometime in late February or early March 2016 after leaving Ben Carson’s campaign. Per reports, Papadopoulos and Mifsud first met on March 14, 2016. The London Centre of International Law and Practice Limited (LCILP) is an odd institution. From their website: LCILP training emphasises the...

An email sent by George Papadopoulos last year provides the first hard evidence that the former Trump campaign adviser was friends with Sergei Millian, an alleged source for some of the most salacious claims in the infamous Steele dossier. The Washington Post reported Tuesday night that Papadopoulos sent an email to Trump aide Boris Epshteyn last September seeking to set up a meeting with Millian, who he reportedly described as a friend. Epshteyn told The Post that the meeting did not occur. Papadopoulos, a 30-year-old energy consultant, is in the news this week because it was revealed that he pled...

[SNIP] Joseph Mifsud, a former Maltese official who co-directs the London Academy of Diplomacy at the University of Stirling, was identified in media reports after details in the documents pointed to his attendance at a conference in Russia last year. He told the Daily Telegraph Tuesday that he is the professor in the documents, but said that the acquaintance in Moscow with government connections who he introduced Papadopoulos to was only an academic. Mifsud also told the paper that he did not know anything about Russian “dirt” on Clinton, and said that he was upset by the “incredible” claims. He...