Comey told the OIG that he never saw any actions by Lynch to interfere with the investigation, stating, “I’ll say this again, I saw no reality of Loretta Lynch interfering in this investigation.” Rather, Comey said he was concerned that leaks of this non-credible information about Lynch would undermine her credibility. The FBI did not inform Lynch about the allegation in the highly classified information until August 2016, more than a month after Comey’s announcement, and then(according to Lynch) did so in a way that highlighted the FBI’s assessment that the information lacked credibility.156 At no time did Comey alert Lynch or Yates that the information raised concerns about Lynch’s ability to participate credibly in the Midyear investigation or in any declination announcement. At no time did Comey consult with Lynch or Yates about how to deal with this false information to protect the credibility of the declination decision.
Because of the threat that classified rumors might be leaked about Lynch, Comey distanced himself — which is ultimately why he didn’t seek the approval of Lynch or Yates when he announced the results of the Midyear investigation including the fairly harsh criticism Clinton. Many of his behaviors were either in reaction, or anticipation of the actions of the Trumplandian cabal.
This thinking also affected the release of the Weiner Letter to Congress.
We asked the FBI personnel involved in these discussions if a fear of leaks impacted the decision to notify Congress. Comey told us that he “didn’t make thisdecision because [he] thought it would leak otherwise.” Comey stated that he thought “that would be a cowardly way to make a decision.” Nevertheless, Comey told us, “I kind of consoled myself, this was a hard call and you’re going to get the crap beat out of you for it, but it would have come out anyway.” He reiterated,however, “I [don’t] want to leave you with the impression that I sent the letter to Congress because I thought it was going to leak otherwise.”
Others, however, had a different recollection. Rybicki told us that, while not remembering the context, he recalled the issue of leaks being raised during these discussions. Strzok stated that the fear of leaks played a role in the ultimate decision. Strzok explained that the decision to seek a search warrant for the Weiner laptop was known to many people beyond the Midyear team and this raised a concern that the information could leak. Draft talking points that were circulated to FBI senior management on October 31 regarding the decision to send the letter to Congress, which incorporated comments by Strzok, the Lead Analyst, and Page, included the following bullet point: “It’s important to note the [sic] I notified Congress before moving forward with additional investigative steps in this investigation, because of my commitment to transparency and because I wanted Conrgess [sic] to hear it from me first.” (Emphasis in original). Page told us that her “personal belief” was that there was “a substantial and legitimate fear that when we went to seek the warrant in order to get access to the Weiner laptop, that the fact of that would leak.” Page said that this concern related to the suspicion that NYO personnel had been leaking negative Clinton Foundation stories. Bowdich,Anderson, and FBI Attorney 1 told us that they did not recall a discussion of leaks during the debates about notifying Congress.
Baker told us that a concern about leaks played a role in the decision to send the letter to Congress. Baker stated:
We were quite confident that...somebody is going to leak this fact.That we have all these emails. That, if we don’t put out a letter,somebody is going to leak it. That definitely was discussed.... [If] we don’t do a letter. It’s either going to be leaked before or after the election, and we either find something or we don’t. And either way,there’s going to be claims that we tried to play games with the election, and we tried to steer it in a certain way to help Hillary Clinton and hurt Donald Trump. We’re not about that. We don’t, we’re not making decisions on the basis of which candidate we like or don’t like.We’re not going to do that. And so we are just going to have to ignor all that and do what, again, what we think is right, consistent with our obligations to Congress.
Baker told us that “the discussion was somebody in New York will leak this.” Baker continued, “[W]hat we discussed was the possibility that if we go forward with the search warrant and take that step, that’s a step being taken in the Hillary Clinton investigation. And that’s what will leak.” Baker explained, “[T]he sense was that that this significant of a step is not going to go unnoticed. And if we don’t put something out, somebody will leak it. That’s just what we talked about.”
...
[Lynch] said the Director had expressed that he needed to send the letter because he was very concerned about leaks, that it was going to leak out anyway that they had found these emails in relation to the Weiner investigation. She may have told me something else, but I don’t remember. I remember that being the big thing that he had focused on.
This was clearly a major part of why the Weiner letter was ultimately sent to Congress before a warrant was sought, and after the incessant attacks generated by the Russia stolen emails and voter micro-targeting campaign from the troll farm in St. Petersberg it's exactly what finally pushed Hillary Clinton’s campaign off the edge of the cliff. The irony is, as I mention above the flip, the existence of the Weiner Laptop emails had already been leaked to Giuliani and Nunes. It was technically, already too late even if their concerns were exactly on target.
In the end, the OIG remained very concerned with the leaking process.
Among the issues we reviewed were allegations that Department and FBI employees improperly disclosed non-public information. We found that Department and FBI officials raised considerable concerns about alleged leaks of information,particularly in October 2016, regarding the Midyear investigation and the Clinton Foundation investigation.
As we describe in Chapter Eleven of this report, Lynch and Comey discussed their concerns about leaks on October 31, 2016. Additionally, on October 26, 2016,Lynch raised her concerns about leaks with McCabe and the head of the FBI New York Field Office (NYO), with specific focus on leaks regarding the FBI’s high-profile investigation into the death of Eric Garner, as we detailed in our February 2018misconduct report concerning McCabe. McCabe told us that he “never heard[Lynch] use more forceful language.” The head of FBI NYO confirmed that the participants got “ripped by the AG on leaks.” These widespread concerns about leaks led Comey, following the 2016 election, to instruct the FBI’s Inspection Division (INSD) to investigate whether confidential information was being improperly disclosed by any FBI employees.
Concerns about the impact of possible leaks on the Midyear investigation, particularly in the October 2016 time period, are described in Chapters Ten and Eleven. Several FBI officials told us that their concerns about potential leaks were a factor that influenced them in the discussions about the possibility of sending a notification letter to Congress on October 28, 2016, regarding the FBI’s discovery of Clinton-related emails on the Weiner laptop. As then FBI General Counsel Baker starkly characterized that decision to us, “[I]f we don't put out a letter, somebody is going to leak it.”
Against this backdrop, and as noted at the time the OIG announced this review, we examined allegations that Department and FBI employees improperly disclosed non-public information. We focused, in particular, on the April/May and October 2016 time periods. We have profound concerns about the volume and extent of unauthorized media contacts by FBI personnel that we have uncovered during our review.
…
In addition to the significant number of communications between FBI employees and journalists, we identified social interactions between FBI employees and journalists that were, at a minimum, inconsistent with FBI policy and Department ethics rules. For example, we identified instances where FBI employees received tickets to sporting events from journalists, went on golfing outings with media representatives, were treated to drinks and meals after work by reporters, and were the guests of journalists at nonpublic social events. We will separately report on those investigations as they are concluded, consistent with the Inspector General (IG) Act, other applicable federal statutes, and OIG policy.
This week both Inspector General Horowitz and FBI Director Wray refused to tell Congress whether there was an ongoing investigation into these leaks by the Anti-Clinton Cabal — but Comey has said that he’d specifically asked for an investigation, and this final note above says they “will separately report on those investigations as they are concluded.”
So stay tuned on that front.
Although It may not take that long since it was revealed today that Giuliani was interviewed by the FBI about his involvement in the Weiner email leak.
WASHINGTON ― Rudy Giuliani says FBI agents interviewed him in his room at the Trump International Hotel earlier this year regarding his 2016 remarks predicting a “surprise” in the closing days of the presidential race that would benefit then-Republican nominee Donald Trump.
“That’s all they asked about. What was I talking about in terms of ‘surprise’?” Giuliani told HuffPost Tuesday. “What was I talking about when.”
Apparently what he was talking about was the fact that he had been tipped off about the Weiner Emails by Former TOP NYC FBI Agent James Kallstrom, but now he denies it.
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), a member of the Trump transition team, recently admitted that FBI officials gave him inside information about the Clinton investigation in September, 2016. And FBI and Justice Department officials have long suspected that disgruntled anti-Clinton forces in the FBI’s New York field office were feeding Giuliani and James Kallstrom, the pro-Trump former head of that office, information that hurt the Clinton campaign.
Giuliani told HuffPost that he spoke with Kallstrom as well as one other former FBI official he would not identify.
But Giuliani said he told the FBI agents who interviewed him that he had neither inside knowledge of the Clinton probe’s status nor advance warning of Comey’s Oct. 28 announcement. He was merely speculating that FBI agents were so upset by Comey’s earlier decision not to charge the Democratic nominee with any crimes that they would “revolt,” either by leaking damaging information about her or by resigning en masse.
Yeah, right.
Meanwhile Roger Stone has apparently gotten himself into a pickle because he may have lied to Congress when he claimed he hadn't talked to "any Russians” [Besides GRU Agent Guccifer 2.0] in the months leading up to the election since it turns out that he had a meeting in Florida on May 2, 2016 with a Russian calling himself Henry Greenberg who had offered him campaign dirt on the Clinton Foundation in exchange for $2 Million from Donald Trump. Stone had apparently told him Trump doesn’t pay “$2 Million for anything” and turns the offer down and then claims he forget until the Mueller investigation showed text messages about the meeting to his associate Michael Caputo, who also hadn’t told Congress about it. Stone is now trying to claim that this was an “FBI Setup” since Greenberg had previously been an informant, however the Crossfire Hurricane investigation didn’t begin until June 2016, and this meeting was more than a month previously — so who in the FBI was trying to sting Trump people with Russian dirt on Hillary, before they even knew about that? Christopher Steele didn’t even go to DOJ official Bruce Ohr until July. The argument that "Mueller tried to frame him” is flatly ridiculous since the meeting took place a year before Mueller was Special Counsel — but that’s your average Trumptarian for you.
Regarding the main Mueller investigation Paul Manafort is now being held in jail without bail because of his attempts to tamper with witnesses in his case and Michael Cohen has fired his old attorneys and seems to be looking to make a plea deal - so there’s likely to be much more news if either, or both, of these guys, finally flip. Reports are that an arrest warrant for Cohen is being drawn up, so he’s about to crack like a raw egg.
On the immigration separation issue which I’ve already discussed in detail here, here, here and here I do have an additional set of thoughts. First off, the Trumptarians are again lying when they state that Asylum seeks have to surrender themselves at a border point of entry because that literally isn’t the law.
- Affirmative Asylum: A person who is not in removal proceedings may affirmatively apply for asylum through U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), a division of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). If the USCIS asylum officer does not grant the asylum application and the applicant does not have a lawful immigration status, he or she is referred to the immigration court for removal proceedings, where he or she may renew the request for asylum through the defensive process and appear before an immigration judge.
- Defensive Asylum: A person who is in removal proceedings may apply for asylum defensively by filing the application with an immigration judge at the Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR) in the Department of Justice. In other words, asylum is applied for “as a defense against removal from the U.S.” Unlike the criminal court system, EOIR does not provide appointed counsel for individuals in immigration court, even if they are unable to retain an attorney on their own.
…
What Happens to Asylum Seekers Arriving at a U.S. Border?
Noncitizens who are encountered by, or present themselves to, a U.S. official at a port of entry or near the border are subject to expedited removal, an accelerated process which authorizes DHS to perform rapid deportations of certain individuals.
To ensure that the United States does not violate international and domestic laws by returning individuals to countries where their life or liberty may be at risk, the credible fear and reasonable fear screening processes are available to asylum seekers in expedited removal processes.
Individuals who are placed in expedited removal proceedings and who tell a Customs and Border Protection (CBP) official that they fear persecution, torture, or returning to their country or that they wish to apply for asylum should be referred for a credible fear screening interview conducted by an asylum officer.
If the asylum officer determines that the asylum seeker has a credible fear of persecution or torture, it means that the person has proven that he or she has a “significant possibility” of establishing eligibility for asylum or other protection under the Convention Against Torture. The individual will then be referred to immigration court to proceed with the defensive asylum application process.
- In Fiscal Year (FY) 2017, USCIS found 60,566 individuals to have credible fear. These individuals, many of whom were detained during this screening process, will be afforded an opportunity to apply for asylum defensively and establish that they meet the refugee definition.
- The number of credible fear cases has skyrocketed since the procedure was implemented—in FY 2009, USCIS completed 5,523 cases. Case completions reached an all-time high in FY 2016 at 92,071 and decreased to 79,977 in FY 2017.
From what I can tell whether you surrender at the border point of entry or simply near the border makes no difference, in fact, you actually have one year after you’ve entered the country — with or without a visa — to surrender yourself for asylum processing. What they've done is shut down asylum processing at points of entry forcing people to erect camps on their doorstep, or else try and cross between the border to avoid being targeted by cartels and then get caught and separated by CBP.
It’s a trap, it’s all a trap.
Changing the rules for “credible fear” to exclude domestic and gang violence is also another part of the overall plan to block more people from being able to legitimately enter via asylum all the while the number of people entering since this policy has existed has gone up 5% which shows that it's even failing as a deterrence.
The documents, which refer to the effort as the "Prosecution Initiative," demonstrate that in early April, days after President Donald Trump announced he would send the National Guard to the border and after Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced his offices would prosecute all illegal crossings referred to the Justice Department, Homeland Security staff predicted that the deterrent effects of the policies would be visible quickly.
"The full impact of policy initiatives are not fully realized for 2-3 weeks following public messaging -- however, some migrants already underway may temporarily halt to determine the effects of the new policy," the document states.
Instead, publicly released data showed a roughly 5% uptick in the number of people caught crossing the border illegally when compared to figures from April, including a big jump in unaccompanied children.
Oddly I think there may be a credible case to place blame on Barack Obama for this, not that Republicans will ever admit the specifics that lead me to this possibility since it’s because he protected the border “too well.” The facts are these.
Further Trump’s actual deportation are really down dramatically when you compared with the early portion of Obama’s administration.
This chart doesn't break down which of those deported were “criminals” but the accompanying documentation states that for FY2015 91% of interior removals had a criminal record. You can see here that compared to Trump’s internal deportation totals of 81,603 for FY2017 which is more than 65,332 for FY2016 and 69,478 for FY2015 which is mostly associated to their increased deportation of Non-criminals the real numbers for were 102,224 for FY2014, 133,551 for FY2013, 180,970 for FY2012, 223,755 for FY2011 and at least 234,000 from FY2008 - FY2010. This means that Obama's internal deportation peak rates were nearly four times higher than Trump's are.
So far as much as the Trump administration likes to brag about how they’re “protecting the border” they’ve reached a fraction of the border interdiction and internal removal numbers that Obama achieved.
In 2012 the Obama Administration deported 409,000 people the majority of whom were reportedly criminals taken from the interior of the nation. Where exactly did those people go? If many of them were violent criminals and gang-bangers — like MS-13 which actually originated in Los Angeles, not in El Salvador — we may have been exporting our problem to them.
MS-13 is a gang that was created in Los Angeles in the late 1980s by a group of Salvadoran refugees, The New York Times reports. The gang now has a presence across the country, with about 10,000 members.
MS-13 is no longer a group of only Salvadorans, Fox News reports. It also includes members who are Honduran, Guatemalan, Mexican and from other areas of Central and South America.
The gang operates internationally as well, CNN reports.
By 2012, MS-13 was the only gang in the U.S. to be classified by the FBI as “transnational criminal organization,” CNN reports. The U.S. Attorney’s Office in Massachusetts estimates that gang has as many as 30,000 members beyond U.S. borders.
So if we’ve been sending tens of thousands of these people back to El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala — wouldn't that be a natural catalyst for the unaccompanied minors we began seeing pouring toward our borders in 2014? Well, it seems that exactly what
Thinkprogress said back in 2015.
Many Salvadorans in the United States wound up in prison for gang-related activities. And, in 1996, Congress passed a law that allowed prisoners to be deported if they had a sentence of just one year. Before, only those with violent felonies who had been sentenced to five or more years in prison would be deported. But this effort in the United States meant that thousands of Salvadorans with gang affiliations wound up back in El Salvador — a country that was largely helpless to combat them.
“As you can imagine, coming out of long civil wars, there was no strong institutionality in this country,” Carlos Dada, an investigative reporter in El Salvador, said. “There were a lot of weapons, a lot of people military trained, and very few means to make a living. And there was a lot — a lot of broken families. So when these gang members, mainly from Los Angeles but also from the D.C. area, started to come back … they were very attractive models for these kids on the street and gang members started to develop their own clique in El Salvador.”
Authorities in El Salvador were largely left in the dark about the specific criminal records and allegiances of those the United States deported. Gangs became a sort of necessary force in the country, and even came to take hold of political networks in the country
So sweeping a problem you created under someone else’s rug, really doesn't work. Now it’s come back to haunt us in thousands of refugees trying to escape the criminals that we sent them.
So far all four currently living 1st ladies have condemned this policy. It’s been called a violation of international torture laws by Amnesty International and Child Abuse by Fox's Judge Anthony Napolitano, the UN Human Rights Council, and Dr. Collen Kraft head of the American Academy of Pediatrics who has said it could cause permanent developmental damage.
“I can’t describe to you the room I was in with the toddlers,” Kraft said of the detention facility. “Normally toddlers are rambunctious and running around. We had one child just screaming and crying, and the others were really silent. And this is not normal activity or brain development with these children.”
Pediatrician Dr. Julie Linton put it in even more stark terms last night on Anderson Cooper where she said these separations can cause long-term damage to leading to depression and long-term health problems among children, particularly the fact that they can’t be touched by the staff, meaning they can't be physically comforted when emotrrirs at onally traumatized. This can cause irreparable harm to these children. (Linton Appears at 17:30)