We’re still moving far too slowly on FISA abuses and I think people are pinning too much hope on the Horowitz report. But here’s an unsurprising development.
Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz has found evidence that an FBI lawyer manipulated a key investigative document related to the FBI’s secretive surveillance of a former Trump campaign adviser — enough to change the substantive meaning of the document, according to multiple reports.
Nevertheless, Horowitz reportedly found that the FBI employee was involved enough in the FISA process to falsely state that he had “documentation to back up a claim he had made in discussions with the Justice Department about the factual basis” for the FISA warrant application, the Post reported. Then, the FBI employee allegedly “altered an email” to substantiate his inaccurate version of events. The employee has since been forced out of the bureau.
In its initial 2016 FISA warrant application, the FBI flatly called Page “an agent of a foreign power.”
Sources told Fox News last month that U.S. Attorney John Durham’s separate, ongoing probe into potential FBI and Justice Department misconduct in the run-up to the 2016 election through the spring of 2017 has transitioned into a full-fledged criminal investigation — and that Horowitz’s report will shed light on why Durham’s probe has become a criminal inquiry.
Then again we’re talking about a process in which the Steele Report, and news stories that were secretly based on it were considered sufficient grounds. This does seem like blatantly bad faith work, but I just hope it’s not a sloppy fall guy served up as the main course while the larger problems with the process get a pass.
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