Monday, September 30, 2019

IG Horowitz Refused to Dig Into Clinton-Lynch Tarmac Meeting – Failed to Interview Lynch, Clinton Protective Detail



DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz refused to really dig into the infamous June 2016 meeting between Bill Clinton and then-Attorney General Loretta Lynch which took place on the tarmac of Phoenix International Airport.


Just days after Bill Clinton met with Loretta Lynch on the Phoenix tarmac, then-FBI Director James Comey usurped the DOJ and held a press conference where he announced charges will not be brought against Hillary Clinton for her use of a private server.
DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz never interviewed Loretta Lynch’s and Clinton’s protective detail despite the fact that Clinton and Lynch maintained they ‘spontaneously’ ran into each other at the Phoenix tarmac and only chatted about ‘grandchildren and golf.’

Both Clinton’s and Lynch’s security detail would have known about the planned meeting between the two in order to prepare flights accordingly and scour the grounds to make sure the locations were safe and secure — there is no way the security teams were left in the dark about this meeting, but Horowitz refused to interview FBI security team and Clinton’s Secret Service.
Via Paul Sperry at Real Clear Investigations:
Lynch had an FBI security detail, and Clinton had a Secret Service detail. Typically, both insist on doing what’s called “advance work,” where they evaluate the security of locations in advance of such meetings, looking for threats, escape routes, critical entry points, weaknesses in security, as well as fire risks and other dangers. But to hear Lynch and Clinton recount the episode, neither of their security teams had advance knowledge of the meeting or were able to prepare for it. It was, they maintained, 100% spontaneous.
Despite the dubious chance-encounter story, Horowitz never checked it out with either security team. Were they really left in the dark? Or was the meeting, in fact, prearranged?
“The OIG considered but decided not to interview the head of Lynch’s FBI security detail,” Horowitz wrote in his report. He also neglected to quiz Clinton’s protective detail. Why? Because requiring them to testify “could impair the protective relationship.”
The two protective details were potentially valuable witnesses for another reason: They may have overheard the conversation on the plane. But Horowitz never bothered to ask them about that.
“We believed it was unlikely that the head of the security detail would have been in a position to be able to overhear the conversation between Lynch and former President Clinton,” Horowitz wrote.
Recall, Judicial Watch obtained emails through a FOIA lawsuit showing the FBI scrambling to cover up the Clinton-Lynch tarmac meeting.
The emails showed that the FBI was more concerned about who leaked the Clinton-Lynch meeting to a local reporter.
Horowitz is expected to release his report on FISA abuse within the next couple of weeks but without indictments, the reports are just hot air.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2019/09/ig-horowitz-refused-to-dig-into-clinton-lynch-tarmac-meeting-failed-to-interview-lynch-clinton-protective-detail/

Britanistan : UK: ‘Anti-racism’ conference banned white people from speaking


The Edinburgh University has been accused of supporting ‘blatant racism’ for having hosted a supposed ‘anti-racism’ conference which banned white people from speaking.

The conference, called ‘Resisting Whiteness 2019’, took place over the weekend and was organized by a group which purports to oppose racism and describes itself as a QTPOC (queer and trans people of color) organization. 

The event’s organizers allege that it seeks to ‘amplify the voices of people of color’ and to give ‘people of color a platform to talk’, the Telegraph reports.

According to the event’s blurb, organizers will ‘not be giving the microphone to white people during the Q&As’. Similarly, one of the two ‘safe spaces’ is reserved ‘only for people of color’, while the other is open to people who are feeling ‘overwhelmed/overstimulated or uncomfortable’.

“If you are a white person with a question, please share it with a member of the committee or our speakers after the panel discussion,” the blurb reads.

However, 42-year-old Jane McColl, an anti-racism campaigner from Glasgow, described the event as ‘blatantly racist’, adding: “It sets back the battle to achieve equality and fairness by decades, all because of the actions of a tiny group of extremists, whose perverse sense of logic has led them to belittle white people, not by who they are as individuals, by merely because of their skin color.

“Imagine if this event was called ‘Resisting Blackness’ and non-white people were told they could not ask questions, nor access a room because they were the ‘wrong’ color,” McColl added.

A spokesperson for the university has stated that the tackling racism was of great importance for the institution while adding that it placed ‘great value on issues around equality and voice’.

Clear victory for Sebastian Kurz’s Austrian People’s Party


Exit polls released following Austria’s parliamentary elections have shown a clear victory for Sebastian Kurz’s Austrian People’s Party (ÖVP), strong gains for the Greens, and significant losses for the right-wing populist Freedom Party. 

According to Sunday’s exit polls, the ÖVP garnered 37.2 percent of the vote, marking an increase of 5.7 percentage points compared to elections in 2017. The Social Democrat Party of Austria saw sizable losses, receiving 22.0 of the vote, marking a decrease of 4.9 percentage from 2017. This is the worst the SPÖ has ever fared in a National Council Election. The Austrian Freedom Party (FPÖ) hemorrhaged the most support of any party, sliding down to 16.0 percent from 26.0 in the previous election. 
 
The Green Party saw the largest gains with the exit polls showing a 14.3 percent result, marking a 10.5 percent increase from the last national election

https://twitter.com/EuropeElects/status/1178326548350459904

“The result is unbelievable,” Kurz said in response to the results. “I’m overwhelmed and almost speechless.”

The disastrous result for the FPÖ is more than likely due to the effects of the Ibiza scandal that shook the party to its core, leading Heinz-Christian Strache, the party’s former leader, to step down as Vice-Chancellor and as the leader of the party just before the European Elections.

The Ibiza scandal initiated a series of events that ended in the collapse of the OVP-FPÖ coalition government. After the news of the scandal broke, FPÖ Interior Minister Herbert Kickl was forced to resign. This then resulted in the resignation of all of the FPÖ’s ministers, which sparked a confidence vote, which ultimately ended Kurz’s premiership.

In response to the exit poll numbers, FPÖ General-Secretary Harald Vilimsky stated that he was unhappy with the result, “we have to make a fresh start.”
 
If exit poll results remain relatively unchanged, Kurz will have several options to form a ruling coalition. His party will be able to either form a coalition with the Greens or it could choose to renew its coalition deal with the populist Freedom Party.


 

Sea Watch captain Carola Rackete brought murderers, rapists and torturers to Italy


Carola Rackete, the infamous captain of the NGO migrant transport vessel Sea-Watch 3, brought three men who ran a migrant detention center in Libya where migrants were raped, tortured, and murdered.


According to a report by Il Giornale, three of the 40 migrants who were picked up by Rackete’s boat are men who’ve been accused of raping, torturing, and murdering people in Libya. The suspects are said to have been arrested in the reception center in Messina, Italy. 

Police had originally concealed the arrests which reportedly occurred on the same day that the migrants disembarked from the ship.

“The Captain transported three immigrants accused of torture on the Sea Watch,” Franco Grilli of Il Giornale writes. 

“We cannot rule it out, but we have no precise information,” Sea Watch spokesman Ruben Neugebauer told German news agency DPA about the report.

The three men have been formally accused of ‘a criminal association dedicated to the management of an illegal prison center’, complete with torture, rape, kidnapping and even murder.

In response to the news, Italy’s most trusted politician and leader of the national populist Lega party, Matteo Salvini, wrote: “Not only did she violate the laws and rammed a Guardia di Finanza patrol boat; on June 29th Carola Rackete of the Sea Watch 3 would have unloaded three immigrants accused of violence, rape, kidnapping, murder in Italy. Democratic Party (PD) parliamentarians had demanded the landing of all immigrants, including those who are now suspected of being ferocious criminals.”

According to Chiara Giannini, who cites ‘reliable sources’, the new interior minister Luciana Lamorgese had asked for the embarrassing news not to be published. But instead, members of the real press made the arrests public, along with the names of the three suspects – Mohammed Condè, 27, Hameda Ahmed, 26 and Mahmoud Ashuia, 24.


Condé is from Guinea, whereas Ahmed and Ashuia Egyptian.

Swedenistan : Young Swedish pupils forced to join climate strike in school


Political pressure from left-wing activists goes on in Swedish schools. Now, one school in Umeå in the Northern region of Sweden, forces its pupils aged 6-11 to participant in the joint Friday climate strike – despite the Swedish constitution forbids mandatory participation in political movements. No teacher seems to have protested against the take. 

School management and teachers at Västangård School in Umeå decided that all children would gather up for the joint climate demonstration on Friday. The children’s parents were informed via mail about the decision and were also invited to join.

The pupils were forced to join the strike, according to information to the newspaper Nyheter i Västerbotten.

“What’s going to come next?”

Anders Ågren, conservative politician in the city, is upset. “It is a scandal beyond belief! For a start, it is wrong to go on strike during school hours. But the more serious part of this is that teachers and school management obviously forces the students to go in strike. It shows a complete lack of judgement by the adults. What’s going to come next? Will all pupils be forced to join the 1 May demonstrations, just because school management considers it to be a good idea, Ågren tells the paper.

Against the law

According to Swedish constitution, Regeringsformen, 2 chapter §2, it is illegal to forcing the children to participate in the strike.

“Nobody must by the public be forced to present their views in political, religious, cultural or in other respect. Neither must anybody by the public be forced to participate in venues for opinion-making or in demonstration, or other political union, religious community or other venue for opinions which are stated in the first sentence”, the constitution says.

RNC Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel has tough 2020 message for Dems

Republican National Committee chairwoman Ronna McDaniel had some blunt words for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Monday, saying that Republicans were "coming" for seats held by vulnerable Democrats on the heels of President Trump's impeachment inquiry.

"What I'm going to say to Nancy Pelosi is we're coming for these Democrats in districts where President Trump won," McDaniel said on "The Story with Martha MacCallum."

The RNC announced Monday launched a national counter-impeachment campaign called “Stop the Madness," targeting House Democrats and vowing to cause "chaos" in response to the formal impeachment inquiry against Trump.



Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said Monday that he would have “no choice” but to take up articles of impeachment against Trump should the House of Representatives approve them following their formal impeachment inquiry.

"We're starting an ad campaign," McDaniel said. "We're gonna put pressure on these Democrats because we're going to take back the House, keep the Senate, reelect the president.

McDaniel also dismissed any notion that Democrats could turn Texas blue, saying the party was "comfortable" with its standing in the state.




Ukraine Mystery: Schiff Staffer Made August Visit for Think Tank Backed by Hunter Biden’s Old Employer





A staffer for Rep. Adam Schiff’s House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence took a trip to Ukraine last month sponsored and organized by the Atlantic Council think tank.

The Atlantic Council is funded by and routinely works in partnership with Burisma, the natural gas company at the center of allegations regarding Joe Biden and his son, Hunter Biden.

The Schiff staffer, Thomas Eager, is also currently one of 19 fellows at the Atlantic Council’s Eurasia Congressional Fellowship, a bipartisan program that says it “educates congressional staff on current events in the Eurasia region.”

Eager’s trip to Ukraine last month was part of the fellowship program and included nine other House employees. The bi-partisan visit, from August 24 to August 31, was billed as a “Ukraine Study Trip,” and culminated in a meeting with former Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko.

The dates of the pre-planned trip are instructive. Eager’s visit to Ukraine sponsored by the Burisma-funded Atlantic Council began 12 days after the so-called whistleblower officially filed his August 12 complaint about President Donald Trump’s phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Schiff’s House Intelligence Committee reportedly reached a tentative agreement in recent days for the so-called whistleblower to testify.

The complaint surrounds Trump’s request for Ukrainian assistance in investigating possible corruption related to the Burisma company and Joe and Hunter Biden.

Also mentioned by Trump during the phone call with Zelensky are questions about CrowdStrike, the outside firm utilized to conclude that Russia hacked the Democratic National Committee’s servers since the DNC would not allow the U.S. government to inspect the servers.

CrowdStrike founder Dmitri Alperovitch is a nonresident senior fellow of the Cyber Statecraft Initiative at the Atlantic Council.

Eager did not immediately return Breitbart phone and email requests for comment.

The email request inquired whether Eager, during his trip sponsored by the Atlantic Council, personally held any meetings in Ukraine related to the whistle blower complaint filed about two weeks before the visit.

Besides funding from Burisma, the Atlantic Council is also financed by Google Capital, billionaire activist George Soros’s Open Society Foundations as well as the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, Inc. and the U.S. State Department.

As Breitbart News reported last week, Google, Soros’s Open Society Foundations, the Rockefeller Fund and an agency of the State Department each also finance a self-described investigative journalism organization repeatedly referenced as a source of information in the so-called whistleblower’s complaint alleging Trump was “using the power of his office to solicit interference from a foreign country” in the 2020 presidential race.

Schiff signed form

Schiff’s signature appears on the required post-travel disclosure form filed with the House Committee on Ethics documenting the visit to Ukraine. The form signed by Schiff says that Eager’s trip to Ukraine was paid for by the “Atlantic Council’s Eurasia Center.”







The form bearing Schiff’s signature (above) describes the visit thusly:

Series of meetings and visits with gov’t officials, party officials, civil society and private sector reps in Ukraine to learn about ongoing political and military issues, including conflict in the East.

The costs for Eager’s visit listed on the form are $2202.91 for transportation, $985.50 for lodging, and $630.15 for meal expenses.

Geysha Gonzalez is the Atlantic Council officer listed on the form. She is deputy director of the Atlantic Council’s Eurasia Center.

Speaking to Breitbart News, Gonzalez confirmed that Eager started his one year fellowship with the organization in January and that Eager is still a fellow.

Gonzalez said the pre-planned trip was part of the fellowship program, which also includes a full year of round tables and other educational events. She said it was not within her portfolio to comment on issues of funding from Burisma or other donors.

The itinerary of the trip shows a meeting with Poroshenko as well as discussions with local activists, politicians and residents.

Besides Eager, nine other Congressional staffers were listed as participating in the visit. Republicans were represented by Laura Detter, legislative assistant to Rep. Scott Perry (R-PA), Zachery Laven, legislative assistant to Rep. David Schweikert (R-AZ), Michael McCabe, legislative assistant to Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-PA) and Sarah Miller, legislative assistant to Rep. Brian Mast (R-FL).

McCain adviser and dossier

The Atlantic Council’s Gonzalez is also one of eleven members of the rapid response team for the Ukrainian Election Task Force, which says it is working to expose “foreign interference in Ukraine’s democracy.”

Another member of the team is David J. Kramer, a long-time adviser to late Senator John McCain who served at the McCain Institute for International Leadership as senior director for human rights and democracy.

Kramer revealed in testimony that he held a meeting about the anti-Trump dossier with a reporter from BuzzFeed News who he says snapped photos of the controversial document without Kramer’s permission when he left the room to go to the bathroom. That meeting was held at the McCain Institute office in Washington, Kramer stated.

BuzzFeed infamously published the Christopher Steele dossier on January 10, 2017 setting off a firestorm of news media coverage about the document.

The Washington Post reported last February that Kramer received the dossier directly from Fusion GPS after McCain expressed interest in it.

In a deposition taken on Dec. 13, 2017 and posted online earlier this year, Kramer revealed that he met with two Obama administration officials to inquire about whether the anti-Trump dossier was being taken seriously.

In one case, Kramer said that he personally provided a copy of the dossier to Obama National Security Council official Celeste Wallander.

In the deposition, Kramer said that McCain specifically asked him in early December 2016 to meet about the dossier with Wallander and Victoria Nuland, a senior official in John Kerry’s State Department.

Burisma and Atlantic Council

Besides funding the Atlantic Council, Burisma also routinely partners with the think tank.

Only four months ago, the company co-hosted the Council’s second Annual Kharkiv Security Conference.

Burisma further co-hosted a U.S.-Ukraine Business Council event with the Council last year in Washington, DC. David Kramer of the dossier episode is a senior adviser to the Business Council.

Busirma and the Atlantic Council also signed a cooperative agreement to develop transatlantic programs with Burisma’s financial support reportedly to focus “on European and international energy security.

Burisma advertises that it committed itself to “15 key principles of rule of law and economic policy in Ukraine developed by the Atlantic Council.”

Common Funding Themes

There are common threads that run through an organization repeatedly relied upon in the so-called whistleblower’s complaint about Trump and CrowdStrike.

One of several themes is financing tied to Google, whose Google Capital led a $100 million funding drive that financed Crowdstrike. Google Capital, which now goes by the name of CapitalG, is an arm of Alphabet Inc., Google’s parent company. Eric Schmidt, the chairman of Alphabet, has been a staunch and active supporter of Hillary Clinton and is a longtime donor to the Democratic Party.

CrowdStrike was mentioned by Trump in his call with Zelensky. Perkins Coie, the law firm that represented the DNC and Hillary Clinton’s campaign, reportedly helped draft CrowdStrike to aid with the DNC’s allegedly hacked server.

On behalf of the DNC and Clinton’s campaign, Perkins Coie also paid the controversial Fusion GPS firm to produce the infamous, largely-discredited anti-Trump dossier compiled by former British spy Christopher Steele.

CrowdStrike founder Alperovitch is a nonresident senior fellow of the Cyber Statecraft Initiative at the Atlantic Council, which takes a hawkish approach toward Russia. The Council in turn is financed by Google Inc. and Burisma.

Besides Google and Burisma funding, the Council is also financed by billionaire activist George Soros’s Open Society Foundations as well as the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, Inc. and the U.S. State Department.

Google, Soros’s Open Society Foundations, the Rockefeller Fund and an agency of the State Department each also finance a self-described investigative journalism organization repeatedly referenced as a source of information in the so-called whistleblower’s complaint alleging Trump was “using the power of his office to solicit interference from a foreign country” in the 2020 presidential race.

The charges in the July 22 report referenced in the whistleblower’s document and released by the Google and Soros-funded organization, the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP), seem to be the public precursors for a lot of the so-called whistleblower’s own claims, as Breitbart News documented.

One key section of the so-called whistleblower’s document claims that “multiple U.S. officials told me that Mr. Giuliani had reportedly privately reached out to a variety of other Zelensky advisers, including Chief of Staff Andriy Bohdan and Acting Chairman of the Security Service of Ukraine Ivan Bakanov.”

This was allegedly to follow up on Trump’s call with Zelensky in order to discuss the “cases” mentioned in that call, according to the so-called whistleblower’s narrative. The complainer was clearly referencing Trump’s request for Ukraine to investigate the Biden corruption allegations.

Even though the statement was written in first person – “multiple U.S. officials told me” – it contains a footnote referencing a report by the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP).

That footnote reads:

In a report published by the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) on 22 July, two associates of Mr. Giuliani reportedly traveled to Kyiv in May 2019 and met with Mr. Bakanov and another close Zelensky adviser, Mr. Serhiy Shefir.

The so-called whistleblower’s account goes on to rely upon that same OCCRP report on three more occasions. It does so to:

Write that Ukraine’s Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko “also stated that he wished to communicate directly with Attorney General Barr on these matters.”
Document that Trump adviser Rudi Giuliani “had spoken in late 2018 to former Prosecutor General Shokin, in a Skype call arranged by two associates of Mr. Giuliani.”
Bolster the charge that, “I also learned from a U.S. official that ‘associates’ of Mr. Giuliani were trying to make contact with the incoming Zelenskyy team.” The so-called whistleblower then relates in another footnote, “I do not know whether these associates of Mr. Giuliani were the same individuals named in the 22 July report by OCCRP, referenced above.”

The OCCRP report repeatedly referenced is actually a “joint investigation by the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) and BuzzFeed News, based on interviews and court and business records in the United States and Ukraine.”

BuzzFeed infamously also first published the full anti-Trump dossier alleging unsubstantiated collusion between Trump’s presidential campaign and Russia. The dossier was paid for by Hillary Clinton’s campaign and the Democratic National Committee and was produced by the Fusion GPS opposition dirt outfit.

The OCCRP and BuzzFeed “joint investigation” resulted in both OCCRP and BuzzFeed publishing similar lengthy pieces on July 22 claiming that Giuliani was attempting to use connections to have Ukraine investigate Trump’s political rivals.

The so-called whistleblower’s document, however, only mentions the largely unknown OCCRP and does not reference BuzzFeed, which has faced scrutiny over its reporting on the Russia collusion claims.

Another listed OCCRP funder is the Omidyar Network, which is the nonprofit for liberal billionaire eBay founder Pierre Omidyar.

Together with Soros’s Open Society, Omidyar also funds the Poynter Institute for Media Studies, which hosts the International Fact-Checking Network that partnered with Facebook to help determine whether news stories are “disputed.”

Like OCCRP, the Poynter Institute’s so-called news fact-checking project is openly funded by not only Soros’ Open Society Foundations but also Google and the National Endowment for Democracy.

CrowdStrike and DNC servers

CrowdStrike, meanwhile, was brought up by Trump in his phone call with Zelensky.

According to the transcript, Trump told Zelensky, “I would like you to find out what happened with this whole situation with Ukraine, they say CrowdStrike … I guess you have one of your wealthy people…The server, they say Ukraine has it.”

In his extensive report, Special Counsel Robert S. Mueller notes that his investigative team did not “obtain or examine” the servers of the DNC in determining whether those servers were hacked by Russia.

The DNC famously refused to allow the FBI to access its servers to verify the allegation that Russia carried out a hack during the 2016 presidential campaign. Instead, the DNC reached an arrangement with the FBI in which CrowdStrike conducted forensics on the server and shared details with the FBI.

In testimony before the Senate Intelligence Committee in January 2017, then-FBI Director James Comey confirmed that the FBI registered “multiple requests at different levels,” to review the DNC’s hacked servers. Ultimately, the DNC and FBI came to an agreement in which a “highly respected private company”—a reference to CrowdStrike—would carry out forensics on the servers and share any information that it discovered with the FBI, Comey testified.

A senior law enforcement official stressed the importance of the FBI gaining direct access to the servers, a request that was denied by the DNC.

“The FBI repeatedly stressed to DNC officials the necessity of obtaining direct access to servers and data, only to be rebuffed until well after the initial compromise had been mitigated,” the official was quoted by the news media as saying.

“This left the FBI no choice but to rely upon a third party for information. These actions caused significant delays and inhibited the FBI from addressing the intrusion earlier,” the official continued.

Biden, Ukraine and Burisma

Ukraine in 2016 removed a key prosecutor probing alleged corruption involving Burisma, the same firm paying Hunter Biden. Joe Biden two years later admitted to personally threatening to withhold loan guarantees from Ukraine unless the prosecutor in question, Viktor Shokin, was removed.

Biden publically boasted about his role in the removal of Shokin during a panel discussion sponsored by the Council on Foreign Relations in 2018.

“I remember going over (to Ukraine), convincing our team … that we should be providing for loan guarantees. … And I was supposed to announce that there was another billion-dollar loan guarantee. And I had gotten a commitment from (then Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko) and from (then-Prime Minister Arseniy) Yatsenyuk that they would take action against the state prosecutor (Shokin). And they didn’t…” Biden said.

“They were walking out to a press conference. I said, nah, … we’re not going to give you the billion dollars. They said, ‘You have no authority. You’re not the president.’ … I said, call him. I said, I’m telling you, you’re not getting the billion dollars. I said, you’re not getting the billion. … I looked at them and said, ‘I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money.’ Well, son of a bitch. He got fired. And they put in place someone who was solid at the time.”

After it was revealed that Hunter Biden joined the board of Burisma Holdings in 2014, ethics experts were quoted by the news media as raising questions about potential conflicts of interest.

https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2019/09/30/ukraine-mystery-schiff-staffer-made-august-visit-for-think-tank-backed-by-hunter-bidens-old-employer/#




Mukasey Op-ed Should Strike Fear in Democrats



John H. Durham, U.S. Attorney for the District of Connecticut (Public Domain)

If I were a Democrat, I would be afraid, I would be very afraid, after reading former Attorney General Michael Mukasey's Monday WSJ oped: "John Durham's Ukrainian Leads." The subtitle is "What the prosecutor has found may be quite different from what the Democrats are looking for."
Mukasey begins:
Americans often boast that we are a nation of laws, but for the moment laws appear to play a decidedly secondary role in the drama we are living in and—hopefully—through.
True enough, but the nub of the article, which returns us to the rule of law, comes further on:
True, much media and political effort has gone into sometimes close and often willful parsing of President Trump’s July 25 conversation with President Volodymyr Zelensky —ironic when you consider Mr. Trump’s well-known linguistic promiscuity—not to mention the celebrated whistleblower complaint, which contains no firsthand information. Little notice has been given, however, to another document lying in plain sight: a Justice Department press release issued the day the conversation transcript became public.
That Justice Department statement makes explicit that the president never spoke with Attorney General William Barr “about having Ukraine investigate anything relating to former Vice President Biden or his son” or asked him to contact Ukraine “on this or any other matter,” and that the attorney general has not communicated at all with Ukraine.

It also contains the following morsel: “A Department of Justice team led by U.S. Attorney John Durham is separately exploring the extent to which a number of countries, including Ukraine, played a role in the counterintelligence investigation directed at the Trump campaign during the 2016 election. While the Attorney General has yet to contact Ukraine in connection with this investigation, certain Ukrainians who are not members of the government have volunteered information to Mr. Durham, which he is evaluating.” [Bold mine]
The number of countries includes the U.K. and Italy, the latter of which was just visited by one William Barr. So what's going on? More from Mukasey:
The definitive answer to the obvious question—what’s that about?—is known only to Mr. Durham and his colleagues. But publicly available reports, including by Andrew McCarthy in his new book, “Ball of Collusion,” suggest that during the 2016 campaign the Federal Bureau of Investigation tried to get evidence from Ukrainian government officials against Mr. Trump’s campaign manager, Paul Manafort, to pressure him into cooperating against Mr. Trump. When you grope through the miasma of Slavic names and follow the daisy chain of related people and entities, it appears that Ukrainian officials who backed the Clinton campaign provided information that generated the investigation of Mr. Manafort—acts that one Ukrainian court has said violated Ukrainian law and “led to interference in the electoral processes of the United States in 2016 and harmed the interests of Ukraine as a state.”
Sorry to quote so extensively, but the WSJ is behind a paywall and I thought everyone should see as much of Mukasey's writing as possible.  Reading not so far between the lines here, it's clear that the biggest story of 2019 or maybe 2020 is yet to come — and it won't be impeachment. The Russia Probe is being turned on its head.



Former senator Al Franken is accused of sexual harassment for the NINTH time as woman says he groped her buttocks as they posed for photos at an event in 2006


  • The new accuser aired her allegations in New York magazine on Monday
  • She said the assault occurred when she was working as an aide to Washington Sen. Patty Murray at an event where Al Franken was a guest speaker in 2006
  • The woman said she was taking a photo with Franken when he 'put his hand on my a**'
  • She didn't tell anyone about the incident for years out of embarrassment and concern for the career repercussions she could face
  • Franken resigned as Minnesota senator in 2017 after eight other woman accused him of sexual misconduct, three of them claiming he groped their behinds 
  • Responding to the new claim, Franken said: 'Two years ago, I would have sworn that I'd never done anything to make anyone feel uncomfortable, but it's clear that I must have been doing something'
  • 'As I've said before, I feel terrible that anyone came away from an interaction with me feeling bad,' he added
Former senator Al Franken has been accused of sexual harassment for the ninth time by a woman who claims he groped her buttocks while they posed for photos at event in 2006. 
The new accuser told New York magazine the assault took place when she was working as an aide to Sen Patty Murray (D-Washington) at the lawmaker's annual Golden Tennis Shoes Awards event, where Franken, who was exploring a senate run in Minnesota at the time, was a guest speaker. 
The woman, identified only as a military veteran and a senior staffer at a major progressive organization, said she was working the photo line at the event.  
When it was her turn to take a photo with the politician, she said he 'put his hand on my a**'.
'He's telling the photographer: "Take another one. I think I blinked. Take another one." And I'm just frozen. It's so violating,' she said.
'And then he gives me a little squeeze on my buttock, and I am bright red. I don't say anything at the time, but I felt deeply, deeply uncomfortable.' 
The ninth accuser said she burst into tears when she first learned of the allegations against Franken. 
She said she considered coming forward at the time, but chose not to. She explained that years after the Franken incident she had reported unwelcome attention from her boss at work and ended up leaving the job because she felt ostracized for speaking up. 
Responding to the latest claim, he told New York Magazine: 'Two years ago, I would have sworn that I'd never done anything to make anyone feel uncomfortable, but it's clear that I must have been doing something. 
'As I've said before, I feel terrible that anyone came away from an interaction with me feeling bad.'
Franken resigned as Minnesota senator in 2017 after eight other woman accused him of sexual misconduct. The allegations emerged after Leeann Tweeden, a Los Angeles radio anchor, accused him of forcibly kissing her during a 2006 USO tour in Afghanistan. Tweeden produced a photo that showed Franken groping her breasts while she slept on a military plane (above)
Franken resigned as Minnesota senator in 2017 after eight other woman accused him of sexual misconduct. The allegations emerged after Leeann Tweeden, a Los Angeles radio anchor, accused him of forcibly kissing her during a 2006 USO tour in Afghanistan. Tweeden produced a photo that showed Franken groping her breasts while she slept on a military plane (above)
 Thirteen years after the alleged incident, the new accuser said she wants to become a Cabinet secretary in a future Democratic administration but knows her speaking out against Franken will be a red flag in the vetting process. 
She is haunted by 'the idea that I would not get a job and would always wonder: "Was it the article where I was the one who was raising my hand against a powerful man?"'
Franken recently announced that he will be hosting a weekly program on SiriusXM radio called: 'The Al Franken Show'. 
'Listeners can expect a mix of guests from my comedian friends like Chris Rock, to my political pals like former Senate majority leader Harry Reid, to policy experts on the issues in play in 2020,' Franken said in a statement on the show. 
'When I'm interviewing Harry or former Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz, I'll be the funny one. When I interview Rock or Patton Oswalt, I'll be the one who served eight and a half years in the Senate.'
SiriusXM has not commented on whether the latest allegation will impact the launch of Franken's new program.  
Responding to the new claim, Franken said: 'Two years ago, I would have sworn that I'd never done anything to make anyone feel uncomfortable, but it's clear that I must have been doing something. As I've said before, I feel terrible that anyone came away from an interaction with me feeling bad. Franken is seen leaving the Capitol with his wife after he resigned in 2017
Responding to the new claim, Franken said: 'Two years ago, I would have sworn that I'd never done anything to make anyone feel uncomfortable, but it's clear that I must have been doing something. As I've said before, I feel terrible that anyone came away from an interaction with me feeling bad. Franken is seen leaving the Capitol with his wife after he resigned in 2017
The allegations against Franken began when Leeann Tweeden, a Los Angeles radio anchor, accused him of forcibly kissing her during a 2006 USO tour in Afghanistan.
Tweeden produced a photo that showed Franken groping her breasts while she slept aboard a military plan on their way back from a USO tour performance. 
Other allegations followed, including a woman who says Franken put his hand on her buttocks as they posed for a photo at the Minnesota State Fair in 2010.
Two more women told the Huffington Post that Franken squeezed their rear ends at political events during his first campaign for the Senate in 2008.
A fourth, an Army veteran, alleged Franken cupped her breast during a photo on a USO tour in 2003.
Another accuser, a former Democratic congressional aide, said he tried to forcibly kiss her after a taping of his radio show in 2006. 
Franken apologized for his behavior but has also disputed some of the allegations. 
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7521507/Ex-senator-Al-Franken-faces-sexual-misconduct-claims-ninth-woman-says-groped-2006.html?ito=social-twitter_dailymailus



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