Top Biden Intel Nominee Calls Warrantless Surveillance Tool Used to Spy on Americans ‘Irreplaceable’

President Joe Biden’s nominee to lead top intelligence agencies described a tool used to surveil Americans without a warrant as vital at his confirmation hearing Wednesday.

U.S. Air Force Lt. Gen. Timothy Haugh characterized Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), a tool that has been abused to spy on Americans, as “extensively used” and “irreplaceable” in his testimony to the Senate Intelligence Committee. Biden nominated Haugh to head both Cyber Command and the National Security Agency (NSA) in May, according to Politico.

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Victor Davis Hanson Commentary: Is There Anything the FBI Won’t Do?

The FBI on Wednesday finally broke its silence and responded to the revelations on Twitter of close ties between the bureau and the social media giant – ties that included efforts to suppress information and censor political speech. 

“The correspondence between the FBI and Twitter show nothing more than examples of our traditional, longstanding and ongoing federal government and private sector engagements, which involve numerous companies over multiple sectors and industries,” the bureau said in a statement. “As evidenced in the correspondence, the FBI provides critical information to the private sector in an effort to allow them to protect themselves and their customers. The men and women of the FBI work every day to protect the American public. It is unfortunate that conspiracy theorists and others are feeding the American public misinformation with the sole purpose of attempting to discredit the agency.” 

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Commentary: Which One of the Spygate Rats Will Flip First?

by CHQ Staff   The news that Attorney General William Barr has tasked Connecticut U.S. attorney John Durham to “examine the origins of the Russia investigation and determine if intelligence collection involving the Trump campaign was ‘lawful and appropriate.’” According to reporting by Dan Bongino’s team, Durham has previously investigated corruption in law enforcement and the destruction of CIA videos. Perhaps Durham’s most notable case was his unraveling of the FBI corruption and cover-up involving mobster Whitey Bulger and the Boston FBI field office while Robert Mueller was FBI Director. As Stephen Z. Nemo reported for Communities Digital News, Bulger, notorious head of Boston’s Winter Hill Gang, was allegedly a confidential informant for the FBI. But it turned out Boston-based Special Agent John Connolly Jr. was the one working for Bulger, not the other way around. He and fellow FBI Special Agent John Morris, we now know, were hit men for Bulger’s gang, and Morris even once served as director of the FBI’s training facility at Quantico, VA. Today, the guy Miami-Dade Circuit Court Judge Stanford Blake said had “crossed over to the dark side,” Connolly sits in a 10’ x 11’ prison cell in a Florida maximum-security facility, convicted…

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As He Investigates Trump’s Aides, Robert Mueller’s Record Shows Surprising Flaws

WASHINGTON — When he was named special counsel in May, Robert S. Mueller III was hailed as the ideal lawman — deeply experienced, strait-laced and nonpartisan — to investigate whether President Donald Trump’s campaign had helped with Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election. The accolades squared with Mueller’s valor as a Marine rifle platoon commander in Vietnam and his integrity as a federal prosecutor, a senior Justice Department official and FBI director from 2001 to 2013, the longest tenure since J. Edgar Hoover. He was praised by former courtroom allies and opponents, and by Democrats and Republicans in Congress. …

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Commentary: Lieberman at FBI? Don’t Do It Donald

  by George Rasley, ConservativeHQ.com Editor President Trump and Attorney General Jeff Sessions have been interviewing candidates to lead the FBI since the President fired Director James Comey last week. Speaking to reporters while meeting with Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos, Trump said he is “very close” to choosing a new FBI director to replace James Comey. And asked if former Senator Joe Lieberman, the Democrat-turned-independent senator from Connecticut was a top candidate, Trump said yes. President Trump has apparently forgotten, if he ever knew, that Lieberman’s best friend in the Senate is none other than Trump’s arch-nemesis Senator John McCain. Indeed, John McCain and Joe Lieberman are so close that in 2008 McCain seriously floated the idea of placing Democrat turned Independent Senator Lieberman on the Republican ticket as his running mate. Lieberman, the Democratic vice-presidential nominee in 2000, endorsed John McCain for president in 2008. And who was the strongest advocate for Lieberman among McCain’s 2008 advisors? Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina, another arch-nemesis of the President’s. McCain, Graham and Lieberman were longtime Senate traveling companions – the trio were known as the “three amigos” – and Graham pushed so hard for Lieberman to be McCain’s…

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Rosenstein Unlikely to Appoint a Special Prosecutor for Russia Investigation, Sources Say

Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein is not likely to turn the probe into Russian efforts to sway the U.S. 2016 presidential election over to a special prosecutor, several sources familiar with Rosenstein’s thinking told CNN Friday. In the wake of President Donald Trump’s sudden firing of FBI Director James Comey on Tuesday evening, Democratic lawmakers renewed…

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