Emails In Ukraine Scandal Point Directly To Trump

It has been several weeks since President Trump was impeached, but the evidence for abuse of power continues to roll in. Earlier this week, the defense website, Just Security, obtained unredacted emails that point directly to President Trump’s involvement in delaying aid to Ukraine and show that Administration officials questioned the legality of the move.

The emails were originally released in redacted form in December in response to a Freedom of Information Act request by the Center for Public Integrity. A federal court mandated that the government release 300 pages of emails, which were made public in two batches on Dec. 12 an Dec. 20. The emails obtained by Just Security can be compared with the redacted releases to confirm their accuracy as well as determine what the Trump Administration considered worthy of censorship.

Among the revelations from the redacted emails was the news that the Ukrainian aid was delayed immediately after the president’s July 25 phone call with Ukrainian President Zelensky. CNN reported last month that the redacted emails showed that efforts to freeze the aid began about 90 minutes after the phone call concluded.

Although the president’s interest in the aid predated the phone call, Michael Duffey, associate director of national security programs at the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), emailed Pentagon officials within hours of the call, instructing them to “please hold off on any additional DOD obligations of these funds….”

“Given the sensitive nature of the request,” Duffey added, “I appreciate your keeping that information closely held to those who need to know to execute the direction.”

Duffey was among the White House officials subpoenaed by House Democrats during the impeachment hearings last year. He did not comply with the subpoena and failed to show up at the hearing.

The emails show that Pentagon officials were concerned that the freeze violated the Impoundment Control Act. The law requires certain steps if the executive branch does not spend money appropriated by Congress. These steps, including congressional notification, were never taken by the Trump Administration. The Administration also never provided a rationale that explained either the initial freeze or its subsequent release.

Deputy Under Secretary of Defense Elaine McCusker followed up with an email to Mark Sandy at the OMB asking if the pause had been approved by legal counsel. The question was redacted in the original email release.

Sandy formalized the freeze on July 25 with a footnote in a budget document that held the money until Aug. 5. Initially, the hold was not deemed to affect the expenditure of the money by the end of the fiscal year.

The next day, July 26, Under Secretary of Defense for Policy John Rood emailed Secretary of Defense Mark Esper expressed unanimous agreement among the “Ukraine Deputies Small Group” that the aid should be released. The same email notes that the freeze was at “the President’s direction via the Chief of Staff [Mick Mulvaney].”

On Aug. 6, Duffey notified McCusker that the freeze was being extended. On Aug. 9, McCusker notified Duffey and Sandy at OMB that time was running out to spend the money before the end of the fiscal year. Subsequent emails continued to extend the freeze through the end of August, raising red flags at the Pentagon. Contractors became aware of the hold by Aug. 27 and Politico revealed the freeze publicly in an Aug. 28 story.

The emails point toward the Oval Office as the source of the freeze. In one example cited in the article, Duffey wrote on Aug. 30, that there was “clear direction from POTUS to continue to hold.”

Officials expressed hope that the money would be released after Vice President Pence met with Zelensky on Sept. 1, but the freeze continued after the meeting with the hold extended again on Sept. 5.

When McCusker emailed Duffey on Sept. 9 saying that the DOD would not be “able to ‘fully’ obligate by the end of FY,” Duffey responded by shifting the blame to the Pentagon, despite McCusker’s repeated warnings that time to spend the money was running out.

“OMB developed a footnote authorizing DoD to proceed with all processes necessary to obligate funds,” Duffey wrote in a formal email that copied in OMB and Pentagon lawyers. “If you have not taken these steps, that is contrary to OMB’s direction and was your decision not to proceed. If you are unable to obligate the funds, it will have been DoD’s decision that cause any impoundment of funds.”

McCusker’s incredulous response was, “You can’t be serious. I am speechless.”

Two days later, on Sept. 11, Duffey emailed McCusker that the freeze had been lifted. When she asked why, he responded, “Not exactly clear but president made the decision to go. Will fill you in when I get details.”

Just Security notes that, in the end, $35.2 million of the aid could not be spent before the fiscal year ended and it expired. The money had to be reappropriated by Congress.

As I discussed back in November, the aid was released two days after the inspector general notified members of the House Intelligence Committee about the whistleblower report. The whistleblower may have actually spurred the president to release the aid in time to avoid a larger violation of the law.

The email chains undercut Republican claims that the aid was held up due to a policy review. There is no evidence in the exchanges that any policy review was being conducted. Instead, officials bided their time while trying to convince the president and the OMB that the freeze was a bad idea. At the same time, many sought legal advice because they were concerned that they could become scapegoats if the money was not released in time for the money to be spent, which would have been a definite violation of the law.

The emails point directly at the president as the source of the freeze. The timing of the freeze points back toward President Trump’s request for the “favor” of a Ukrainian investigation into Crowdstrike and the Bidens as a motive for delaying the aid. The incriminating email exchanges between White House and Pentagon officials also explains why the Trump Administration refused to allow its staffers to testify and ignored congressional subpoenas for documentation about the freeze.

Further, comparing the redactions with the full emails shows that the Justice Department attempted to conceal Pentagon concerns about the freeze. Many of the emails that were redacted contain questions about the legality of the delay and warnings that the money might not be spent in time to comply with the Impoundment Act.

The release also shows that the Democratic decision to rush impeachment was an error. While this error has been somewhat mitigated by Speaker Pelosi’s decision to delay referring the articles of impeachment to the Senate and deny Donald Trump the ability to conduct a pro forma trial while information is still coming out, the House could have done a much better job of investigating the incident. If a third party organization could obtain this information quickly through the Freedom of Information Act, there is no reason that the House could not have asked courts to enforce its subpoenas and compelled Duffey and others to testify.

With the new information, the House can still rectify its mistake. House Democrats should reopen the impeachment investigation and keep digging. The officials mentioned in the email chains have firsthand information linking the freeze to the president. Congress – and the American public – needs to hear from them.

Originally published on The Resurgent

Trump to continue love-hate relationship with FBI's Comey

Donald Trump has had a love-hate relationship with FBI Director James Comey. The new president alternately criticized and praised the chief of the FBI during the campaign and post-election Russian hacking scandal, but now it seems that all is forgiven. Numerous sources are reporting that President Trump plans to keep Director Comey on the job in the new administration.

Back in July, after the FBI declined to recommend an indictment for Hillary Clinton, Trump accused Director Comey of corruption on Twitter, “FBI director said Crooked Hillary compromised our national security. No charges. Wow! #RiggedSystem.” He also tweeted, “The system is rigged. General Petraeus got in trouble for far less. Very very [sic] unfair! As usual, bad judgment.”

In October, when Comey sent a letter to Congress advising them of newly discovered emails in the Clinton case, Trump praised the director. “I have to give the FBI credit,” Trump said in Politico, “It took guts for Director Comey to make the move that he made in light of the kind of opposition he had where they’re trying to protect her from criminal prosecution. You know that. It took a lot of guts.”

A few days later, Trump reversed course again when Comey excused Clinton a second time. Trump accused Comey of lying to cover Clinton, telling The Sun, “You can't review 650,000 emails in eight days. You can’t do it, folks.” Trump added, “Right now she’s being protected by a rigged system. It’s a totally rigged system. I’ve been saying it for a long time.” Trump even explicitly accused the FBI of covering for Hillary saying, “Hillary Clinton is guilty, she knows it, the FBI knows it….”

After the election, Trump also had sharp words for the FBI over the agency’s conclusion that Russia purposefully worked to help Trump win the election. “I think it’s ridiculous,” Trump said in an interview with Fox News. “I think it’s just another excuse. I don’t believe it... No, I don’t believe it at all.”

Now, four days into the Trump Administration, President Trump is apparently past all his concerns about Director Comey’s competence and integrity. Although the Trump Administration has not publicly confirmed that Comey will continue his 10-year term which began in 2013, the New York Times reports that Comey told top agents at the FBI that he had been asked to stay in his position. If true, there may be future chapters in the love-hate saga between President Trump and his FBI head.

Originally published on The Resurgent

Russian hacking scandal grows

The scandal over Russian interference with the presidential election is growing. Over the weekend, the CIA released its assessment that Russia acted to intentionally aid Donald Trump’s campaign. Mr. Trump responded to the claim with an attack on the CIA.

The New York Times reported on Friday that American intelligence agencies had “high confidence” that Russia acted to harm Hillary Clinton’s campaign. This assessment was based on the finding that the Russians had hacked the Republican National Committee as well as the Democrats, but did not release stolen Republican documents to Wikileaks or other websites.

The report confirms earlier reports from August and September that the Republican Party had been hacked. The Hill reported in August that a number of leaked Republican emails had appeared on DC Leaks, a website connected to the Russian hacking of the Democratic Party. The Republican email trove did not appear to be complete. For example, some of the posted emails were responses to messages that did not appear elsewhere on the site.

President-elect Trump responded by calling the CIA assessment “ridiculous” according to the Wall Street Journal. The Trump camp had previously said, “These are the same people that said Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction,” implying that the CIA assessment should not be trusted.

Intelligence officials fired back in a statement saying, “It’s concerning that intelligence on Russian actions related to the U.S. election is being dismissed out of hand as false or politically partisan. The inclination to ignore such intelligence and impugn the integrity of U.S. intelligence officials is contrary to all that is sacred to national-security professionals who work day and night to protect this country.”

Trump has continually denied a Russian connection to the hacked Democratic emails both during the campaign and after. This in spite of the fact that Trump publically called on Russia to find and publish Hillary’s deleted emails in July. However, when Vice President-elect Mike Pence was briefed on the alleged Russian involvement in October, Pence said on CNN, “I think there's no question that the evidence continues to point in that direction. There should be severe consequences to Russia or any sovereign nation that is compromising the privacy or the security of the United States of America.”

The evidence that Russia was behind the hacking is not new. The new assessment deals largely with the apparent motives. The CIA and the FBI have not come to the same conclusion that the hacking was done to hurt the Clinton campaign according to CNN. However, both agencies suspected Russian involvement in the hacking as early as July.

Officials who were briefed by both agencies last week said that the FBI responses were “vague” and “ambiguous.” The difference may be partly differences in organizational culture. The CIA takes available evidence and gives an estimate while the FBI has to gather enough evidence to prove a case beyond a reasonable doubt. The dated nature of the Republican documents that are known to have been stolen is also a factor in the FBI’s failure to totally agree with the CIA assessment that the leaks were intended to help Trump.

Concern about the hacking is bipartisan. Republican senators John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) joined Democrats Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Jack Reed (D-R.I.) to call for a congressional investigation into the hacking. “It's pretty clear to me that WikiLeaks was designed to hurt Clinton and it could be us tomorrow, to my Republican friends,” Graham said to CNN. “What if the Iranians hack into Trump's emails, because they don't like him being tough? As a nation, this is not a partisan issue.”

Fox News noted that Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), Senator Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and Senator James Lankford (R-Okla.) appear to be backing a congressional investigation as well.

Speaker Paul Ryan stopped short of calling for an investigation, but expressed concern. “Speaker Ryan has said for months that foreign intervention in our elections is unacceptable,” Ryan’s spokeswoman, AshLee Strong, said in a statement to Politico. “The speaker cannot comment on or characterize the content of classified briefings but he rejects any politicization of intelligence matters.”

Many Republicans appear unconcerned about the hacking and view it as an excuse for the Clinton loss or an attempt to delegitimize the Trump Administration. John Bolton, who is reportedly Trump’s pick to be the second-in-command of the State Department, questioned Russia’s involvement on Fox News. Russian propaganda site, RT, framed Bolton’s doubts as an argument that the hacking was a “false flag” by President Obama although Bolton never made that claim.

Although there has so far been no evidence that the Trump campaign was complicit in the DNC hacking, there is concern about Mr. Trump’s cozy relationship with the Kremlin. Trump has appointed numerous Russia-friendly cabinet members and advisors, including Rex Tillerson, who is reportedly Trump’s pick to be Secretary of State, and the administration’s affinity for Putin may affect its policy.

Even before the election, the Trump campaign was instrumental in a pro-Russia change to the Republican platform. Since the Russian invasion of Crimea, the party had called for lethal aid to the Ukrainian army in its fight against Russian-backed militants. That provision was stripped at the request of the Trump campaign. Trump has even considered dropping the sanctions on Russia and recognizing Crimea as Russian territory.

Max Boot points out in USA Today that “Republicans would be sputtering in outrage, and with good reason” if the Russians had released GOP emails to help Hillary Clinton because they saw her as a friendly alternative. That fact is a clue about the right way to handle the intervention that benefitted Trump. Regardless of whether Republicans benefitted, investigators need to pursue the truth about the tampering with America’s election.

Originally published on The Resurgent

Hillary Clinton is being hammered in the final days before the election. The news of renewed interest in the FBI probe of her handling of classified information shook the campaign last week. Now comes a new report that FBI agents investigating the Clinton Foundation thought that they had enough information to warrant more aggressive measures, but were allegedly told to “stand down” by the Justice Department.

The Wall St. Journal reports that the investigation into the Clinton Foundation began as a result of the book, “Clinton Cash: The Untold Story of How and Why Foreign Governments and Businesses Helped Make Bill and Hillary Rich” by Peter Schweizer. The investigation began in the summer of 2015 and is ongoing.

Citing multiple sources from several different agencies, the Journal reports that there was a conflict between the FBI and the Department of Justice over the strength of the case.  The investigation into whether Clinton Foundation donors received favorable treatment from then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was perceived as weak by the upper levels of the FBI and DOJ, but investigators believed that there were promising leads that they were not allowed to follow.

The discovery of a trove of emails on a computer belonging to Anthony Wiener, the husband of Huma Abedin, a top aide to Hillary Clinton, may have revealed some of the limits placed on FBI investigators. Politico reported that the agents had never asked Clinton staffers for their personal email devices and may have even lacked subpoena power.

Much of the debate stemmed from secret recordings of a suspect in a public corruption case. In a recorded conversation, the suspect, whose identity was not disclosed, discussed alleged deals made by the Clintons. The investigators could not corroborate the details of the deals, but wanted to investigate further. Prosecutors disagreed. The Justice Department felt that the information was hearsay and too weak to warrant a more aggressive investigation.

The FBI agents and the DOJ became more frustrated with each other as the investigators continued to try to pursue the case. The FBI pushed for more leeway while DOJ officials were irritated by the failure of the FBI to act discreetly and follow instructions. In February, the DOJ allegedly told FBI investigators to “stand down” according to the Journal sources.

The Journal reports that Robert Capers, the US Attorney for Brooklyn, was at the center of the brouhaha. Sources say that Capers told both sides what they wanted to hear, which exacerbated tensions. At one point, Capers allegedly told DOJ officials that the FBI “won’t let it go,” prompting a call to FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe on Aug. 12. In the call, an unnamed senior DOJ official complained that the FBI was not following instructions on the case. McCabe allegedly asked, “Are you telling me that I need to shut down a validly predicated investigation?” The DOJ official answered, “Of course not.”

Regardless of whether the case was truly too weak to pursue or the Justice Department was actively running interference to protect the Clintons, the result is the same. Both the DOJ and the FBI have egg on their face and the reputation of their agencies have been tarnished. Rather than having the problems of the Clinton Foundation aired a year before the election, Mrs. Clinton’s once-assured victory may be fading with yet another October surprise.

Originally published on The Resurgent

FBI never asked for email devices from Hillary staffers

The FBI’s on-again-off-again investigation of Hillary Clinton’s handling of classified information has shaken the presidential race. Now new revelations are coming out about the way that the investigation was handled last spring that shed light on how the normally efficient FBI could have missed 650,000 emails on a computer belonging to the husband of Secretary Clinton’s closest aide.

According to a report in Politico, the FBI never asked for devices used by staffers when Clinton was Secretary of State. The report, based on an anonymous source, said that while agents did try to obtain the computers that were part of Clinton’s private server as well as laptops where Clinton received and reviewed emails, they never made an effort to gather the smartphones and computers that were used by staffers in her State Department office.

“No one was asked for devices by the FBI,” Politico quoted the source, who is familiar with the investigation.

There had been speculation as to why the Huma Abedin, Clinton’s top aide, never turned the computer containing the emails over to the FBI. There had been speculation that Abedin had withheld the computer. Politico reported earlier that Abedin claimed to be unaware of how the emails came to be on her husband’s computer and now it seems that the FBI may have never asked to examine the computer. The email trove was found in a separate investigation of former congressman Anthony Weiner who was allegedly sexting a 15-year-old girl.

Republicans are asking how the FBI could have made such an obvious error. “The more we learn about the FBI’s initial investigation into Secretary Clinton’s unauthorized use of a private email server, the more questions we have about the thoroughness of the investigation and the administration’s conclusion to not prosecute her for mishandling classified information,” Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.), chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, told Politico.

One possible answer is that there was interference in the investigation. The Wall St. Journal reported last week that a PAC associated with Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D-Va.) gave more than $600,000 in donations and support to the Senate campaign of Dr. Jill McCabe. Jill McCabe is the wife of Andrew McCabe, then an associate deputy director of the FBI. After the McCabe campaign ended in defeat, Andrew McCabe was promoted to deputy director where he an oversight role in the Clinton investigation.

The Wall St. Journal also reported that the FBI had found the new emails in early October and that agents had notified Mr. McCabe, who instructed agents on the two investigations to get together to determine whether the emails were relevant to the Clinton investigation. A decision was made to let the Weiner investigators proceed with their examination of the laptop’s metadata. McCabe apparently did not inform Director Comey at the time.

According to the Journal report, the Department of Justice refused to authorize aggressive investigation techniques such as subpoenas, formal witness interviews or a grand jury. Opinions differ on whether the resistance from the Justice Department was due to lack of compelling evidence presented by the FBI or whether it was present from the beginning of the investigation.

McCabe seems to have been caught in the middle. The Journal article reports a call on Aug. 12 from a “senior Justice Department official” who was unhappy that agents were still pursuing the investigation of the Clinton Foundation in the middle of the campaign. McCabe’s defenders say he asked, “Are you telling me that I need to shut down a validly predicated investigation?” and was answered, “Of course not.”

Opinions differ on whether the call was simply trying to make sure that the FBI remained neutral in the election as longstanding policy dictated, was based on the prosecutor’s opinion that there wasn’t enough evidence to convict or was a move to protect Clinton. Some sources told the Journal that McCabe ordered the investigators to continue with the nonaggressive investigation. Others said that field agents were told to “stand down” based on orders from McCabe.

Whatever the reason, the FBI’s failure to mount a full investigation last year led directly to the Director Comey’s October surprise for the Clinton campaign last week. If Clinton used influence within the Department of Justice to stymie investigators, the sudden reappearance of the FBI investigation may be poetic justice.

Originally published on The Resurgent

Hillary's email scandal will affect the election, but probably not as much as you think

Last Friday, FBI Director James Comey dropped a bomb in the middle of the presidential election. Comey’s revelation that the FBI had found additional emails that might be pertinent to investigation of Hillary Clinton’s handling of classified information turned the campaign on its ear. The big question is how the Comey bombshell will affect the outcome of the election.

Donald Trump was quick to capitalize on Comey’s letter to Congress, calling it the “biggest political scandal since Watergate” according to USA Today. For her part, the Clinton campaign says the emails are nothing new and that voters have already made up their minds about her use of a private server while Secretary of State. The truth is that the revived scandal will almost certainly benefit Donald Trump, but probably by less than you think.

The bottom line is that Hillary Clinton’s image is unlikely to go much lower. Both candidates are historically unpopular. Even though Hillary Clinton’s unfavorable rating has been deep in negative territory for the entire campaign, Donald Trump’s has consistently been worse. People know them both and dislike them both.

Trump has alienated large swaths of the electorate over the past year. Those voters are unlikely to rally to his banner in the wake of renewed questions about Hillary’s emails. After campaigning for a wall on the Mexican border and deportation of illegal immigrants, a recent NBC News/Wall St. Journal poll found Trump 50 points behind Hillary with Hispanic voters, who make up a large share of voters in many swing states. After weeks of accusations of sexual misconduct, Clinton led Trump by 10 points among women according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll released last week. Trump led by only two points among Republican women. Other recent polling found Trump with only four percent support among black voters and 21 percent among millennials. Perhaps with the exception of Republican women, few of these voters are likely to switch to Trump.

In the same way that many Trump supporters refused to believe the allegations against Donald Trump, many hardcore Clinton supporters and Democrats will simply refuse to accept the revelation of an additional trove of emails or rationalize it away. As Trump supporters argued against the credibility of Trump’s accusers, Clinton supporters will argue that the email scandal is almost two years old and has already been considered by voters after Director Comey’s July announcement that Clinton’s private server was careless, but not criminal.

Essentially, most people have made up their minds that the other candidate is worse than whatever problems their own candidate might have. According to Real Clear Politics, about 85 to 90 percent of the electorate has consistently supported either Trump or Hillary regardless of scandals or bad news of the day. Third party candidates account for another five to 10 percent. That leaves only about five percent of voters who are undecided and perhaps another five percent whose support for their candidate is soft enough to change. This means that the impact of the email scandal will be felt among a tiny sliver of the electorate.

A new Washington Post/ABC News poll found that two-thirds of likely voters said that the investigation makes no difference in their support for Clinton. One-third said that it made them less likely to support Clinton, but nearly 70 percent of these voters already leaned Republican. This leaves about 10 percent of voters who are less likely to support Clinton and who weren’t already unlikely to vote for her.

The timing of the scandal also works against Donald Trump. For maximum effectiveness in the campaign, the Comey letter would have come several weeks earlier. In some states, early voting had already been going on for weeks. Reports on early voting show that Democrats were overrepresented in early voting in battleground states. These votes were locked in before Comey’s announcement. The fact that these voters cannot now change their vote or stay home works in Hillary’s favor.

Aside from swinging a few voters, there are possible additional benefits for Trump from the scandal. First, it could dampen enthusiasm among Democrats and cause some to stay home. Even with a high unfavorable rating, FiveThirtyEight noted last week that a majority of Clinton voters are voting for Hillary rather than against Trump. Even if new questions about her competence as commander-in-chief don’t push voters to Trump or third party candidates such as Gary Johnson or Jill Stein, some might find themselves busy with other activities on Election Day.

The reminder of Clinton’s failings as Secretary of State is also likely to help motivate the Republican base. An ABC News poll released on Oct. 31 shows a surge in Republican support for Donald Trump. The poll, which was taken during the period in which Comey notified Congress, shows Trump at 89 percent support among Republicans, up from a low of 82 percent. The upswing of support from undecided Republicans accounts for much of the tightening in the polls.

The final caveat is that national polls are misleading at this stage of the election. There are 51 separate elections rather than a single national vote. While many swing states are close and the email scandal may tip some of them to Donald Trump, the Electoral College still heavily favors Hillary Clinton. Clinton would have to lose virtually every contested state (Arizona, Florida, Iowa, Nevada, North Carolina and Ohio plus a blue state such as Pennsylvania or Wisconsin to lose the Electoral College. At this point, such a sweep by Donald Trump seems unlikely.

Barring another October surprise, it seems likely that Director Comey’s shocking announcement will have only a marginal effect on the election. It may help to shore up states like Arizona, Georgia, Missouri and Texas by energizing Republican support and could possibly push Florida, North Carolina and Ohio into the Trump column. The final result of the Electoral College is unlikely to change, however.

Originally published on The Resurgent

What goes around comes around: Hackers steal Russian emails

Zachary Taylor

In what might seem to some like poetic justice after Russia was implicated in the hack of Democratic National Committee emails, a group of Ukrainian cyber-warriors has released a trove of emails hacked from the account of a top aide to Russian president, Vladimir Putin. The hack appears to be much more serious than the penetration of the DNC because it reaches directly into Putin’s Kremlin offices.

A group calling itself “Cyber Hunta” has so far released more than a gigabyte of emails from Vladislav Surkov. According to “Foreign Policy,” Surkov has been a senior official in the Russian government since 1999 when Putin assumed the presidency after the resignation of Boris Yeltsin. Called the “gray cardinal” of the Kremlin, Surkov has served many key roles for Putin and is believed to been instrumental in Russia’s 2014 annexation of the Crimea.

“This is a serious hack," said Maks Czuperski, head of the Digital Forensic Research Lab of the Atlantic Council (DFRL) on NBC News. “We have seen so much happen to the United States, other countries at the hands of Russia. Not so much to Russia. It was only a question of time that some of the anonymous guys like Cyber Hunta would come to strike them back.”

The emails provide a “smoking gun” that confirms that Russia was actually controlling the Ukrainian separatist movement in the forgotten war that has killed 10,000 people. NBC News cites an unnamed U.S. official who said that the emails confirm what U.S. intelligence has long believed, that the Kremlin was “running the separatists at the micro-level.”

One email contains a list of candidates for a local election, some with asterisks indicating they were “checked by us” and “especially recommended.” These candidates were “elected” a few days later. Other emails contain casualty lists, expense reports and a proposal for a propaganda office in the heavily contested city of Donetsk.

Vladislav Surkov was among the Russian officials singled out by the United States and the European Union for individual sanctions for their roles in invasion and annexation of Crimea. At the time Surkov told The Independent that Obama’s action would not affect him since “The only things that interest me in the US are Tupac Shakur, Allen Ginsberg, and Jackson Pollock. I don’t need a visa to access their work. I lose nothing.”

Earlier this month, the Obama Administration said in Politico that it would deliver a “proportional” response against Russia for its alleged role in cyber-attacks against the United States. The U.S. has denied any involvement in the hack of the Surkov emails.

Originally published on The Resurgent

President Obama knew about Hillary's private server

New revelations from Wikileaks seem to prove that the White House knew about Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s private email server. President Obama previously denied that he had any prior knowledge of Clinton’s “homebrew” server, but Wikileaks documents suggest that the president used a pseudonym to correspond directly with Clinton’s private email address and then lied about it.

Back in March 2015, as the email scandal was breaking, President Obama said, in essence, that he did not have textual relations with Hillary’s private server. Obama told CBS News that he learned of the server at “the same time everybody else learned it through news reports.”

Obama’s denial seems to have triggered a crisis in the Clinton campaign. Andrew McCarthy at National Review points out that the same day that Obama made his comments, Josh Scherwin, the Clinton campaign secretary, emailed an alert to several Clinton staffers including Jennifer Palmieri: “Jen, you probably have more on this but it looks like POTUS just said he found out HRC was using her personal email when he saw it in the news.”

McCarthy then traced the email from one of the original recipients, Nick Merrill, to Clinton attorney and aide, Cheryl Mills. Mills then emailed John Podesta, chairman of Hillary’s campaign. Mills told Podesta, “We need to clean this up — he has emails from her — they do not say state.gov.”

The Mills email is damning evidence that President Obama received emails from Hillary’s private email account. It would have been impossible for the White House to not be aware that Clinton was using a private server if she had used the private email account to conduct state business with the president.

Eventually, 18 emails between Clinton and Obama were identified. On January 29, 2016 at the daily press briefing, Josh Kirby announced that the emails were “being withheld to remain confidential, to protect the President’s ability to receive unvarnished advice and counsel. And they ultimately will be released in accordance with the Presidential Records Act.” Kirby didn’t cite executive privilege, but it amounted to the same thing.

The 18 emails not only prove that Obama lied about his ignorance of Hillary’s private server, they also provide a motive for his administration to interfere with the FBI investigation of Hillary’s handling of classified information. If Hillary was guilty of mishandling classified information and had engaged in email exchanges with the president, then the president would be guilty as well.

McCarthy noted that executive privilege could not shield the president if Hillary was indicted or was the target of a grand jury investigation. “In its famous Watergate ruling, United States v. Nixon,” McCarthy wrote, “the Supreme Court held that an invocation of executive privilege to secure the confidentiality of presidential communications will not shield those communications from disclosure if they are relevant evidence in a grand-jury investigation or a criminal trial.

With President Obama linked to the private server and complicit in the cover up, Rep. Trey Gowdy’s (R-S.C.) grilling of FBI Director James Comey comes to mind. On CNBC, Gowdy said, “In your old job you would prove intent as you referenced by showing the jury evidence of a complex scheme that was designed for the very purpose of concealing the public record and you would be arguing in addition to concealment the destruction that you and i just talked about or certainly the failure to preserve.”

Now there is evidence that the president was involved in the same scheme to conceal Clinton’s purposeful mishandling of classified information. That means that President Obama is as guilty as Hillary Clinton. Not indicting Hillary was not for the benefit of the Clintons. It was to protect Barack Obama.

Originally published on The Resurgent

Hillary Clinton promoted Donald Trump as way to damage GOP

Among the documents in the leaked John Podesta emails recently posted by Wikileaks was a strategy memo that suggested that the Clinton campaign may have colluded with the Democratic National Committee and the media to promote certain Republican primary candidates that the Democrats considered extreme. If genuine, the memo indicates that the Clinton campaign interfered with the Republican primary with the help of the media.

The memo was an attachment to an email with the Wikileaks ID number 1120. It was sent to numerous staff members on April 23, 2015 with the subject line “[AGENDA & MEMO] Friday Strategy at 8:00 AM ET.” The email was sent by “MASTOR,” probably a reference to Marissa Astor, who is listed as a surrogate on the Hillary for America organizational chart. The attachment file name is “150407 Strategy on GOP.”

The memo is addressed to “The Democratic National Committee” and is dated April 7, 2015. The introduction says that its purpose is to “outline the strategy and goals that a potential Hillary Clinton presidential campaign would have regarding the 2016 Republican presidential field.” The introduction notes that, even though Hillary Clinton was not yet the Democratic nominee, “most of what is contained in this memo is work the DNC is already doing.”

The memo lays out three strategies to “make whomever the Republicans nominate unpalatable to the majority of the electorate.” First, the Clinton campaign planned to “force all [emphasis theirs] Republican candidates to lock themselves into extreme conservative positions that will hurt them in a general election.” Second, they wanted to “undermine any credibility/trust Republican presidential candidates have” among independent voters. Finally, they planned to “muddy the waters on any potential attack launched against HRC.”

In “operationalizing the strategy,” the memo described a plan to “use the [Republican] field to inflict damage on itself.” The Clinton campaign wanted to use “more extreme candidates” as “’Pied Piper’ candidates” who would seem to “represent the mainstream of the Republican Party.”

The memo identified three “Pied Piper” candidates by name. They were Ted Cruz, Donald Trump and Ben Carson. At the time the memo was written, Donald Trump was still two months away from declaring his candidacy. It is not clear if the Clintons directly influenced Trump to enter the race.

“We need to be elevating the Pied Piper candidates so that they are leaders of the pack and tell the press to them [sic] seriously,” the memo says. This indicates coordination between the Clinton campaign, the DNC and members of the media.

The memo goes on to identify several “more established” candidates who needed special attention to
“undermine their credibility among our coalition (communities of color, millennials, women) and independent voters.” The candidates identified as bigger threats to the Clinton campaign were Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio, Scott Walker, Rand Paul, Bobby Jindal and Chris Christie.

To “muddy the waters,” the memo suggested building a dossier on each Republican candidate in the areas of “transparency & disclosure, donors & associations, and management & business dealings.” In a statement that presaged this week’s attacks on Donald Trump, the memo says, “any information on scandals or ethical lapses on the GOP candidates would serve well. We won’t be picky.”

 While the email does not contain a “smoking gun” that indicates that Clinton enticed Donald Trump to enter the Republican primary, it is apparent that Trump was considered a weak and extreme candidate who could hurt the rest of the Republican field. The reference to the press may help explain the large amounts of friendly press coverage that Trump received during the primary. There is also no indication that the Clinton campaign thought that Donald Trump could actually win the Republican primary and become the party’s nominee.

In the end, Hillary Clinton’s plan to sabotage the Republican primary must have exceeded her wildest expectations.  One of her “Pied Pipers” actually won the nomination and became the Republican candidate for the presidency. Hillary was ready when he did.

Read the full story on The Resurgent

Did the Russians just throw the election to Trump?

 

(Kremlin.ru)

The hack of the Democratic National Committee emails two days before the opening of the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia has rocked the political world. The emails contain damaging exchanges that show that Democrat staffers, supposedly neutral in the primary, actively undermined the Bernie Sanders campaign. The bigger story, however, is that the Democratic email hack may have been intended to throw the U.S. presidential election to Donald Trump.

CNN reports that several cyber security firms have verified that the two groups of hackers that targeted the DNC were of Russian origin. One group monitored DNC communications for about a year and another specifically targeted Democratic opposition research on Donald Trump.

Defense One quotes the cyber security report that notes that the hackers “appeared to cease operations on Russian holidays, and their work hours seem to align with the UTC +3 time zone, which contains cities such as Moscow and St. Petersburg.” The report continues, “It’s the same group that hit the State Department, the White House, and the civilian email of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.”  

Adding to the evidence is the fact that Wikileaks is not a hacker group like Anonymous. Wikileaks gets the documents that it publishes from other sources. Two of the most famous Wikileaks sources were Edward Snowden and Bradley Manning. Manning was convicted of espionage and Snowden fled to Russia to escape prosecution. He remains there today.

While the news of Russian involvement doesn’t absolve the Democrats of the duplicity revealed in their emails, the fact that Vladimir Putin’s Russia would interfere with internal American politics is a serious problem. A future document dump could come just before the election when a candidate would not have time to respond. If Russia could hack and post sensitive emails, they could just as easily manufacture incriminating emails to dump at the right time.

Russia and the U.S. have recently been at odds over Syria policy, but Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump have long been chummy. Last year, the two men were so complimentary of each other that their relationship was referred to as a “bromance.” This is in contrast to Mitt Romney who called Russia America’s “number one geopolitical foe” in a 2012 presidential debate. Nevertheless, it seems doubtful that their mutual admiration would be enough of a reason for Putin to risk an international incident by interfering with internal U.S. politics.

As it turns out, Trump’s affinity for Russia goes beyond Putin to the 1980s. The Washington Post reported that Trump has had business relationships in Russia for decades and has sold many properties to Russian investors. The Hill reports on Trump’s extensive links to Russia including  

“Russians make up a pretty disproportionate cross-section of a lot of our assets,” Donald Trump Jr., said in 2008. “We see a lot of money pouring in from Russia.”

One of the highest level connections is through Trump’s campaign manager, Paul Manafort, who spent years as a consultant for the pro-Putin dictator of Ukraine, Viktor Yanukovych. Yanukovych was ousted in 2014 prior to Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. According to Politifact, Manafort spent about 10 years in Ukraine working for Yanukovych’s Party of Regions and only left after the Ukrainian revolution.

There is are other reasons for Russia and Putin to try to make sure that Donald Trump wins the election. Trump’s foreign policy would be even better for Vladimir Putin than that of Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton, who tried to reset Russian-American diplomacy in 2009. The Obama Administration and the European Union imposed sanctions on Russia in response to the invasion of Ukraine. If a pro-Russia candidate like Trump became president, it is likely that those sanctions would be removed.

Trump has shocked allies in recent days by stating that his administration might not honor American treaty commitments to defend NATO allies. Trump also floated the idea of withdrawing U.S. troops from foreign countries such as Japan and South Korea.

A chief beneficiary of Trump’s isolationist foreign policy would be Vladimir Putin. Putin’s Russia is already invading Europe through its proxy army of Ukrainian separatists and has its eye on restoring the former Soviet sphere of influence. Russia has also expanded its presence in the Middle East for the first time since the fall of the Soviet Union.

In fact, Trump has already given his approval to a more aggressive Russian foreign policy. Last year, Trump applauded Russian intervention in Syria on behalf of dictator Bashar Assad. “Let Russia fight ISIS, if they want to fight ‘em … in Syria,” Mr. Trump said at the time.

At about the same time that Wikileaks dumped its trove of documents online, Russia was bombing a base in Syria used by the U.S. and Britain. Trump did not comment on the attack.

It appears likely that the email scandal will continue to dog Ms. Clinton for the remainder of the campaign. Wikileaks founder Julian Assange has boasted that the group will post more documents in the future. Assange claims on ITV that there will be enough evidence to indict Clinton. It seems likely at this point that Ms. Clinton’s “homebrew” email server was compromised by the Russians as well.

The hacked emails showcase the corruption of the DNC, but they may show even more about Donald Trump. If the hackers were really acting on behalf of the Russian government, it raises serious questions about Trump’s foreign policy proposals as well as his connections to Vladimir Putin. 

Read it on Conservative Firing Line

Is Hillary electable?

Hillary Clinton has finally announced her candidacy for president. Her candidacy was begun with a tweet and a two-and-a-half minute You Tube video, of which only about 40 seconds is Hillary giving her announcement and rationale for seeking office.

In contrast to the Republican hopefuls, who kicked off their presidential campaigns to adoring crowds, Hillary’s campaign began with a soundbite on social media followed by a trip in her “Scooby” van to Iowa with no organized campaign stops along the way. Hillary’s presidential announcement was almost secretive in comparison to the Republicans, with no rallies, no crowds of supporters and no questions from the media.

Hillary’s trip to Iowa is more akin to a fugitive sneaking across the state line than a triumphant politician arriving to assume her mandate. When Clinton’s “Scooby” van stopped at an Ohio Chipotle restaurant, the presumptive Democratic nominee was incognito, hiding behind a large pair of sunglasses. She not only did no campaigning, but she was only recognized when the manager examined the store’s surveillance videos after being tipped by a New York Times reporter than Hillary had visited the restaurant. Neither employees nor other customers had recognized the former First Lady.

Dick Morris, a longtime confidante of the Clintons, explains that the subterfuge is part of Hillary’s nature. Unlike her extroverted, fun-loving husband, Hillary is “hidden, paranoid, secret, controlled, and scripted” according to Morris. Where Bill was a natural campaigner, Morris calls Hillary a “born bureaucrat” who sticks “to a script, blundering when she make the slightest departure.”

The current crop of scandals that are already dogging the Clinton campaign can only serve to heighten Hillary’s sense of secrecy and paranoia. She has hidden from the media for the past several months as the scandal of her personal email server and deleted emails developed. Questions about the legality of sending classified documents via unsecure personal email and an unsecure server mean that Hillary has to consider that any questions that she answers might come back to haunt her in a criminal proceeding.

Keeping Hillary away from the media and real voters also minimizes the chance of an embarrassing gaffe. Ms. Clinton is known for a number of misstatements, such as when she asked congressional Benghazi investigators, “What difference, at this point does it make?” or when she claimed that the Clintons were “dead broke” upon leaving the White House in 2001.

One embarrassing error has already occurred. Hillary’s long-awaited announcement also came with a serious typo according to Bloomberg. A press release heralding her announcement claimed that she had “fought children and families all her career,” omitting the word “for.” Although the wording was quickly corrected, it is shocking that such a high profile announcement on a multibillion dollar campaign could have seen the light of day.

Similarly, Hillary’s campaign logo, a blue “H” with a red arrow, quickly became the target of widespread ridicule. Many claimed it resembled a road sign that pointed toward a hospital or the FedEx logo. Julian Assange claimed that it was based on the WikiLeaks logo.

Hillary has long been assumed to be inevitable by many on both the left and right. Now with her lack of campaign skills, scandals, and a slipshod campaign becoming evident, the question is whether she is electable at all.

Hillary’s biggest advantage over any Republican is that she is well known. Many Republican candidates are new to the national stage and not familiar outside the GOP. According to Gallup, 90 percent of Americans are already familiar with Hillary. No Republican even comes close.

The downside for Hillary is that, while she is well known, she is also a polarizing figure. Even the Huffington Post puts her approval rating almost equal with her disapproval at 47 – 46 percent. Further, polls that use likely voters rather than adults give her a much high negative rating. Republican candidates are not as well known, but have much lower negatives.

While Hillary’s name recognition gave her an early lead in polling, there are signs that her lead may already be fading. Karl Rove pointed out in the Wall St. Journal that recent polling in 15 battleground states showed Ms. Clinton trailing a generic Republican. Recent polling available on Real Clear Politics also shows several races around the country where Republicans Scott Walker, Mike Huckabee and Rick Perry hold slight leads over Ms. Clinton.

Nevertheless, Hillary’s failings may be more than offset by several factors. First, whoever the eventual Democratic nominee is will win at least 40-45 percent of the popular vote. The worst Democratic wipeout in recent history, Richard Nixon’s 1972 trouncing of George McGovern, still saw McGovern win 37 percent of the vote even as he lost 49 states. Ms. Clinton would undoubtedly do much better than McGovern. With normally reliable Democratic states such as those carried by John Kerry in 2004, any Democratic candidate can be expected to win at least 200 of the 270 electoral votes needed just by appearing on the ballot as a Democrat.

Second, Ms. Clinton now heads the Clinton money machine. Hillary is backed by many on Wall Street including friends at Goldman Sachs. The Clintons also have a well-established network of foreign contributors. Republican candidates will be struggling to establish support networks for the first time, which will put them at a disadvantage. Additionally, it seems unlikely that Hillary will face a serious primary threat, which will enable her to get a head start on general election campaigning and fundraising.

Finally, Hillary will benefit by default if the Republicans nominate someone who seems more extreme and unlikable than she is. Hillary’s negatives will only take Republicans so far. The Republican nominee must be able to close the deal with moderate and independent voters. This will require the ability to present a positive vision to voters and not simply focus on negatives like Ms. Clinton’s poor record or promising to repeal Obamacare. The Republican candidate must convince voters that he cares about them more than Ms. Clinton does.

Despite her problems, Ms. Clinton’s money and network alone make her a formidable candidate, but not an inevitable one. Conservatives would do well to remember that she has only run in three elections, twice for the Senate and once for president. Of these, only one, the 2008 Democratic primary, was a tough race. Hillary lost.

 

Read the full article on Examiner.com