Tag: Carter Page

Peter Strzok would like to clear a few things up

Peter Strzok would like to clear a few things up

“I’m sorry to bother you. But it turns out Trump just accused me of treason.”

Peter Strzok, who was still an FBI employee that day in January 2018 and couldn’t respond to the president’s attack, was appealing to his boss: “The bureau can’t let this stand,” he pleaded.

“I’m sorry, Pete,” came the response. “We’re not going to say anything.”

Nearly three years later, Strzok — who led the FBI’s Russia investigation, dubbed Crossfire Hurricane, until he was removed over several anti-Trump texts he’d sent during the election amid an affair with a colleague — is finally able to speak publicly and on his terms for the first time since he joined the FBI more than two decades ago. Continue reading.

Trump supporter is ‘calling for reparations’ — to go to conservatives: ‘People do have to pay for this’

AlterNet logoFormer Donald Trump campaign advisor Carter Page called for reparations on Fox News, but not the kind generally discussed.

There is a movement in America to provide reparations to the descendants of slaves, as their family wealth remains lower due to the theft of their labor.

But Carter Page suggested a different kind of reparations during an interview with Sean Hannity. Continue reading.

DOJ says surveillance of Trump campaign adviser Page lacked evidence

The Hill logoThe Justice Department has concluded that the evidence underlying multiple warrants authorizing the surveillance of former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page failed to show Page was a foreign agent, as the law requires.

The department delivered its conclusion in a December letter to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC), the secretive federal body that approved the department’s four surveillance applications of the Trump aide.

A Justice Department assessment found that in at least two applications “there was insufficient predication to establish probable cause to believe that Page was acting as an agent of a foreign power,” states a court document quoting the department’s review. Continue reading.

Newly released documents prove GOP lied about FBI’s Russia probe

The following article by Emily Crockett was posted on the ShareBlue.com website July 23, 2018:

We now know that Trump and Republicans shamelessly lied to the American people about why the FBI decided to investigate the Trump campaign’s ties to Russia.

The Trump administration released a pile of documents on Saturday that proves what most sensible observers already knew: Trump and Republicans shamelessly lied to the American people about why the FBI decided to investigate the Trump campaign’s ties to Russia.

These documents — the FBI’s original requests for surveillance on Trump campaign aide Carter Page — come to us thanks to a Freedom of Information Act request from multiple news outlets.

The documents were heavily redacted, but they still told us a lot — most importantly that House Republicans lied, and probably knew they were lying, with their “release the memo” debacle earlier this year.

View the complete article here.

Justice Dept releases surveillance applications for former Trump aide

The following article by Olivia Beavers was posted on the Hill website July 21, 2018:

The Department of Justice (DOJ) on Saturday released documents related to the surveillance warrants on former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page as part of the federal investigation into the Trump campaign and Russia.

The documents have been at the heart of a controversy over alleged bias at the FBI.

The heavily redacted application materials — 412 pages, including an initial application and several applications to renew the surveillance — indicate that the FBI “believes Page has been the subject of targeted recruitment by the Russian government … to undermine and influence the outcome of the 2016 U.S. presidential election in violation of U.S. criminal law.”

View the complete post here.

Carter Page, Trump Foreign Policy Adviser, FISA Documents

Moscow, Russia – Dec 12, 2016: Carter Page, a former foreign policy adviser to President-Elect Trump, makes a presentation titled ” Departing from Hypocrisy: Potential Strategies in the Era of Global Economic Stagnation, Security Threats and Fake News”. Credit: Artyom Korotayev, ASS, Getty Images

The Carter Page FISA documents show that serious and significant evidence was used by the FBI to obtain the warrant to monitor Carter Page. Here are the key points to remember

  • The FISA warrant was renewed three times.

    • It was originally approved and then renewed each time by judges who were appointed by Republican presidents.

    • Each of these judges found probable cause that Page had been “collaborating and conspiring with the Russian government.”

  • The FBI did not file the initial FISA application until October 2016, a month after the Trump campaign says he stopped working for them.
  • These documents dismantle the memo put forth by Devin Nunes to discredit the FBI and the DOJ and to undermine the Mueller investigation. Continue reading “Carter Page, Trump Foreign Policy Adviser, FISA Documents”

FBI surveillance of Carter Page might have picked up Bannon

The following article by Kyle Cheney was posted on the Politico website February 8, 2018:

The former Trump campaign adviser says he spoke to Trump aide Steve Bannon about Russia in January 2017, at a time when the FBI had a controversial warrant to monitor Page’s communications.

© Getty Images

The FBI was monitoring Carter Page when the former Trump campaign adviser says he spoke with Trump adviser Steve Bannon about Russia in January 2017, raising the strong possibility that the FBI intercepted a conversation between the two men.

Page told Congress in November about the call. But it has been cast into a new light by last week’s release of a Republican memo revealing that the FBI was monitoring Page’s communications at the time. Continue reading “FBI surveillance of Carter Page might have picked up Bannon”

Why The FBI Investigated Carter Page, ‘Idiot’ Espionage Suspect

The following article by Gene Lyons was posted on the National Memo website February 6, 2018:

Let’s put it this way: if poor, abused Carter Page wasn’t a Russian agent back when Donald Trump plucked him from obscurity to advise his 2016 campaign, he’d definitely done all he could to look like one. Among the many bizarre aspects of Rep. Devin Nunes’ incompetent and dishonest “Top Secret” memo purporting to discredit the Mueller investigation, pushing this odd bird back into the spotlight ranks near the top.

Why did Trump pick Page in the first place? Publicly praising Vladimir Putin as a stronger, more decisive leader than President Obama surely had something to do with it. Trump loves him some Putin. Imprisoning political rivals gives him a thrill. That Putin opponents keep turning up dead in ambiguous circumstances only proves him a manly, decisive leader. Continue reading “Why The FBI Investigated Carter Page, ‘Idiot’ Espionage Suspect”

The sketchy past of the man at the center of the Republicans’ memo obsession

The following article by Judd Legum was posted on the ThinkProgress website February 1, 2018:

Carter Page, an unlikely choice for American hero.

Moscow, Russia – Dec 12, 2016: Page makes a presentation during his visit to Moscow. Credit: Artyom Korotayev,TASS /Getty Images

The infamous Republican House Intelligence Committee memo, which alleges abuses by the FBI in its investigation of the Trump campaign, is expected to be released very soon.

To regular viewers of Hannity, this is the most monumental event since the moon landing. The rest of America, meanwhile, may be wondering what this is all about. It really comes down to one question: Was an obscure Trump adviser named Carter Page a legitimate subject of FBI surveillance, or was he targeted improperly? Continue reading “The sketchy past of the man at the center of the Republicans’ memo obsession”

The Times Asks Court to Unseal Documents on Surveillance of Carter Page

The following article by Charlie Savage and Adam Goldman was posted on the Washington Post website February 5, 2018:

A memo written by Republican congressional aides disclosed that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court approved surveillance targeting Carter Page, a former Trump campaign adviser, in October 2016. Credit Sergei Karpukhin/Reuters

WASHINGTON — The New York Times is asking the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to unseal secret documents related to the wiretapping of Carter Page, the onetime Trump campaign adviser at the center of a disputed memo written by Republican staffers on the House Intelligence Committee.

The motion is unusual. No such wiretapping application materials apparently have become public since Congress first enacted the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act in 1978. That law regulates electronic spying on domestic soil — the interception of phone calls and emails — undertaken in the name of monitoring suspected spies and terrorists, as opposed to wiretapping for investigating ordinary criminal suspects. Continue reading “The Times Asks Court to Unseal Documents on Surveillance of Carter Page”