by Chuck Ross FBI agents in 2015 sought authorization to surveil foreign government operatives who sought to influence Hillary Clinton, but ultimately settled for a defensive briefing given to lawyers for the Democratic presidential candidate, according to documents released on Sunday. One FBI agent involved in the investigation asked then-FBI Director James Comey in an April 2015 email for a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant, according to the documents, published by Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham. A FISA order was not granted in the investigation. Instead, an FBI special agent provided a defensive briefing to Clinton’s personal lawyers in October 2015. Graham, a Republican, said that the documents are evidence of a double standard in how the FBI conducted investigations of foreign meddling regarding the Clinton and Trump campaigns. The FBI obtained FISA orders against former Trump campaign aide Carter Page in October 2016 as part of its investigation into Russia’s meddling in the election. The FISA Court has been highly critical of the FBI over its surveillance of Page, citing numerous errors and omissions found in applications for the spy warrants. The FBI provided defensive briefings to Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton regarding general foreign threats in August 2016.…
Read the full storyTag: Hillary Clinton
Hillary Clinton Won’t Rule Out Serving in Biden Administration
Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton won’t rule out serving in presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden’s administration if he wins the November election, Clinton revealed in an article published Thursday.
Clinton, the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee, said that she will fundraise for the Biden-Harris campaign while advocating for organizations she thinks could enhance voter turnout and infrastructure, The 19th, a nonprofit news outlet, reported Thursday.
Read the full storyTop-Level Democrat Party Member Says Marsha Blackburn Is ‘Inbred Racist Trash’
One of the Democratic Party’s top grassroots organizers, who once worked for Hillary Clinton, this week took to Twitter and described U.S. Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) as “inbred racist trash.”
That man, Adam Parkhomenko, of McLean, VA. then told Blackburn to “f*** off.”
Read the full storyExclusive: GOP Influencer Alexander Ali Warns Rookies Blowing Trump’s Relection
Ali Alexander is something of veteran in the Republican digital game and he sees warning signs for the reelection of President Donald Trump–and he cannot keep quiet about. When Alexander was growing up he learned politics when his lawyer mother took him with her to phone-bank for local judges, but he said he did not start helping Republicans with websites and digital communications after the party lost the House and Senate in 2006, so 2008 was his first cycle. “I penned a piece criticizing the John McCain campaign during the primaries and they invited me onto the campaign,” he said. Back then, he said there were about 25 people working GOP digital communications and he was at the right place at the right time. Now, he is the old-timer, looking at a Trump campaign led by a first-time campaign manager, Brad Pascale, with a first-time leader of the Republican National Committee, Ronna McDaniel, he said. https://twitter.com/ali/status/1280586946352422914?s=20 Trump’s campaign advantages are not leveraged In the 2016 campaign, Pascale ran the Trump campaign’s digital communications and outreach from his offices in San Antonio, Texas, as the rest of the campaign was run out of Trump Tower. Before the Trump presidential campaign,…
Read the full storySen Ron Johnson Considers Subpoenas for Clinton Cronies Who Peddled a Second Trump Dossier
Sen. Ron Johnson, the Republican chairman of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, is weighing subpoenas for two longtime Hillary Clinton associates who peddled a dossier of allegations about Donald Trump that mirrored those in the infamous report compiled by Christopher Steele.
Johnson seeks documents and testimony from Sidney Blumenthal and Cody Shearer, the two Clinton cronies, and 33 other witnesses as part of a sprawling probe of the FBI, State Department and other agencies.
Read the full storyBill Hagerty: Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden Are Cut from the Same Cloth
U.S. Senate candidate Bill Hagerty has weighed in on Hillary Clinton endorsing Joe Biden for president.
Read the full storyCrom Carmichael Gives His Opinion on the Latest Developments in Joe Biden’s Alleged Sexual Assault Accusations
On Tuesday’s Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy and all-star panelist Crom Carmichael discussed the latest on Joe Biden’s alleged sexual assault accusations.
Read the full storyHillary Clinton Endorses Joe Biden for President
WASHINGTON – Former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton endorsed former Vice President Joe Biden on Tuesday in his bid against President Donald Trump in the November national election.
Read the full storyCommentary: A Deep Dive into the Monstrous Lie Behind CrowdStrike and the ‘Russian Hack’
Robert Mueller’s investigation into the 2016 presidential election was predicated largely on the claim Russian intelligence had hacked the Democratic National Committee’s servers ahead of the November election. Russia’s guilt is such an article of faith among our political class that a Republican-controlled Congress imposed sanctions on Russia and President Trump signed on, substantially worsening relations with an important and potentially dangerous nation.
Since those sanctions were imposed, Mueller’s team confirmed the Russian espionage they were meant to punish. Since its publication last year, the Washington establishment has treated the Mueller report almost as a sacred document.
Read the full storyJudge Orders Hillary Clinton to Appear for Deposition as Part of Judicial Watch Lawsuit
A federal judge on Monday ordered Hillary Clinton to appear for a deposition as part of a lawsuit filed by the watchdog group Judicial Watch, saying in a ruling that the former secretary of state’s written responses so far in the case have “left many more questions than answers” about her decision to use a private email system while in office.
Judge Royce Lamberth also granted Judicial Watch permission to depose Cheryl Mills, a top aide to Clinton at the State Department.
Read the full storyCommentary: New Impeachment Rules Would Snare Obama
Barack Obama’s eight-year tenure was detrimental to the United States, but like most of his nonbelievers, I harbor no animosity for his person.
Few critics that I know advocated that Obama be impeached, much less removed from office, before his reelection bid – even amid his worst scandals and dangerous policies. But we are now in a new age, whose protocols might have made it impossible for the Obama Administration to have finished two terms.
Read the full storyCommentary: The Once and Future Scandal
Who in the federal government then continued Clinton’s efforts after the 2016 election to disrupt and indeed attempt to destroy the Trump transition and presidency?
Read the full storyCommentary: Our Two-Party System Is One Thing Obama DID Fundamentally Transform
The outcome of 2020 is not yet settled, obviously, but these two presidential election contests taken together already tell an amazing story.
The Democrat-Republican establishment had 2016 all planned out. According to the plan, 2016 would be another Clinton-Bush election, this time Jeb(!) versus Hillary. Hillary would win of course, and politics would return to normal. The majority party Democrats would keep pushing for bigger and more unaffordable government, the minority party Republicans would continue their project of steadily losing the fight, and the establishmentarians on both sides would continue feathering their nests.
Read the full storyRashida Tlaib Apologizes for Encouraging Bernie Crowd to Boo Hillary
Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI-13) issued an apology after encouraging a crowd at a campaign event for Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) to boo Hillary Clinton Friday night.
Read the full storyFormer Hillary Clinton Running Mate Tim Kaine Says President Obama Referred to Donald Trump as ‘a Fascist’
Former President Barack Obama reportedly called President Donald Trump a “fascist” during a 2016 phone call.
Read the full storyTulsi Gabbard Sues Hillary Clinton Over Russia Smears
Democratic Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard is suing Hillary Clinton for defamation over the former Secretary of State’s remarks on a podcast characterizing the Democratic presidential candidate as “a favorite of the Russians” last year.
Read the full storyDNC Announces ‘Multi-Million Dollar’ Investment in Battleground States, Including Michigan and Wisconsin
The Democratic National Committee announced Wednesday a multi-million dollar investment in six key battleground states, including Michigan and Wisconsin.
Read the full storyCommentary: The Rise of America’s ‘Putin-ized’ Intelligence Community
“Oppressors,” James Madison once wrote, “can tyrannize only when they achieve a standing army, an enslaved press, and a disarmed populace.” Our forefathers feared a large but idle military interfering with domestic politics or even taking power. Within our own hemisphere, a Latin American government is more likely to be toppled by its own army than by a foreign invader.
Read the full storyTulsi Gabbard Isn’t Letting Go of Hillary Clinton’s Russian Asset Accusations
Democratic Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard continued to rip into Hillary Clinton on Tuesday for insinuating that the congresswoman could be a Russian asset.
Read the full storyClinton Foundation Continues to Hemorrhage Money Following Hillary’s Loss
The Clinton Foundation’s revenue dropped to a 16-year low in 2018 and reported a third-straight year of losses, a trend that began in 2016 when Hillary Clinton was defeated by President Donald Trump.
Read the full storyHillary Says She’s ‘Under Enormous Pressure’ to Run for President, But Doesn’t Say From Who
Hillary Clinton refused to rule out a 2020 presidential run Monday, and said she is “under enormous pressure” to do so.
Read the full storyMichael Patrick Leahy Interviews Donna Brazile on The Tennessee Star Report from Politicon in Nashville
In a special edition of The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast live on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC Saturday afternoon from Politicon at the Music City Convention Center, host Michael Patrick Leahy was joined by former Democratic National Committee Chairwoman Donna Brazile to talk about election integrity, Hillary Clinton, and the current positions of the 2020 Democratic candidates running for President.
Read the full storyThe Tennessee Star Report: Leahy, Carmichael, and Swain Wonder, Will Hillary Get in the Race?
On Thursday morning’s Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 am to 8:00 am – host Michael Patrick Leahy was joined by all-star panelist’s Crom Carmichael and Carol Swain to discuss whether or not Hillary Clinton will jump back in the 2020 Democratic presidential race.
Read the full storyState Department Concludes Clinton Email Review, Says It Found Nearly 600 Security Violations
State Department investigators probing Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server as secretary of state discovered nearly 600 security incidents that violated agency policy, according to a report the Daily Caller News Foundation obtained.
Read the full story‘Of Course He’s Obsessed With Me’: Hillary Clinton Doesn’t ‘Accept’ Four More Years of Trump
Former First Lady Hillary Clinton went after President Donald Trump Sunday on CBS, where she expressed support for the impeachment inquiry and said she simply won’t accept four more years with Trump in office.
Read the full storyNashville to Welcome Conservative Activist Scott Presler, Who Planned Baltimore Cleanup
Scott Presler, the conservative activist who organized the recent Baltimore cleanup is headed to Nashville, according to a new listing on Eventbrite.com
Read the full storyVIDEO: Washington Post Spikes Interview with Dayton Resident Who Opposes Gun Control
Bryan St. John lives near and frequents the Oregon District, a quaint neighborhood in Dayton where the shooting took place. A journalist from The Washington Post asked St. John for his opinion on the various sides of the gun debate.
“Well, when people say you should ban guns, to me it goes back to 1991 and the Killeen Luby shooting there where the lady was under the table and had to watch her parents get shot and followed the law and left her gun in the car,” St. John replied to one question.
Read the full storyCommentary: It Is Joe Biden’s Race to Lose as He Leads Every Poll, but Do His Opponents Smell Blood?
by Robert Romano As the national race for the Democratic nomination for President in 2020 kicks into high gear with debates on June 26 and June 27, the race is Joe Biden’s to lose as he has led every single poll against his Democratic opponents both nationally and in statewide races compiled by Real Clear Politics since the end of April. Biden’s advantage comes as having served as Barack Obama’s vice president from 2009 to 2016, with the highest name identification. At this point in the 2016 cycle, Hillary Clinton was leading all of the polls on the Democratic side, and Jeb Bush was temporarily leading a few polls for the GOP nomination in June 2015 but soon trailed to then-candidate Donald Trump who dominated the field starting in July 2015. Biden is being viewed as the “safe” candidate to take on now President Trump, even as some his utterances and votes on trade issues might make him ill-suited to take on Trump, particularly in the Rust Belt states that gave Trump a majority in the 2016 Electoral College in Pennsylvania, Ohio and Michigan. Biden voted for NAFTA and granting China permanent normal trade status, and the Obama White…
Read the full storyCommentary: Why Wasn’t Everyone Looking for Hillary’s Missing Emails?
by Julie Kelly Just like in 2016, President Trump appears ready to make Hillary Clinton’s deleted emails an election issue in 2020. “Just compare how they came after us for three years, with everything they have, versus the free pass they gave to Hillary and her aides after they set up an illegal server, destroyed evidence, deleted and acid-washed 33,000 emails, exposed classified information,” Trump told a raucous crowd in Orlando on Tuesday night. “Thirty-three thousand emails! But let’s see what happens.” Even if the media and Democrats are poised to dismiss the missing cache as old news, Trump sure isn’t. Perhaps his renewed attention to the scandal will jigger long-dormant curiosity for why Clinton continues to escape any responsibility for erasing thousands of emails that the public, federal officials, and investigators have never seen. The Media’s Dumb Play One of the weirdest attacks against President Trump, going back to 2016, asserts that he asked the Russians to help find the thousands of emails Hillary Clinton deleted from her personal server the month before she announced her candidacy for president. “Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing,” Trump said during…
Read the full storyCommentary: Attorney General Barr’s Intelligence Review Should Include the DNC Servers
by Robert Romano The Hill’s John Solomon made big news on June 6 when he reported that Ukrainian businessman Konstantin Kilimnik, said in Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report to be a Russian agent, was an intelligence source for the U.S. State Department. “In a key finding of the Mueller report, Ukrainian businessman Konstantin Kilimnik, who worked for Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort, is tied to Russian intelligence… What it doesn’t state is that Kilimnik was a ‘sensitive’ intelligence source for State going back to at least 2013 while he was still working for Manafort, according to FBI and State Department memos I reviewed.” This is as startling revelation as any that has been discovered, since it calls into question whether somebody purported to be a Russian intelligence officer by the Justice Department really was. It also calls into question other contacts Trump campaign officials were said to have had with supposed Russian agents, and other actions said to have been perpetrated by supposed Russian agents. Kilimnik was practically the entre basis for saying that Paul Manafort had at least been in touch with somebody connected with Russian intelligence. The Mueller report stated, “[O]n August 2, 2016, Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort met…
Read the full storyMexican Official Leading Tariff Negotiations Compared Trump to Hitler, Called Him Mexico’s ‘Enemy’
by Peter Hasson The top Mexican official leading negotiations with the U.S. over President Donald Trump’s newly announced tariffs previously compared Trump to Hitler and described him as an “enemy” of Mexico. Mexican Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard arrived at the Mexican embassy on Saturday and is scheduled to meet with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Wednesday, Ebrard announced on Twitter. Ebrard, a former Mexico City mayor who has served as foreign secretary since December 2018, has been open in his disdain for Trump in the past. “He, like Hitler, is a good communicator,” Ebrard told The New Yorker in 2016, referring to Trump. The New Yorker’s article profiled Ebrard’s get-out-the-vote efforts for then-Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton. “It was after hearing Donald Trump speak that I decided to get much more involved, beyond just giving opinions,” Ebrard told the magazine. “The risk represented by el Señor Trump, the things that he says, in particular about Mexico, but in general, too, are like nothing else I’ve encountered.” Roughly a week before the 2016 election, Ebrard called Trump the greatest “enemy” that Mexico has faced in “many years.” Cada voto cuenta, apoyemos a Hillary Clinton. Derrotemos la xenofobia anti mexicana de Trump pic.twitter.com/Qpb314m3Qq — Marcelo Ebrard…
Read the full storyCommentary: The Colluders, Obstructionists, and Leakers Project Onto ‘Trump World’ What They, Themselves Do
by Victor Davis Hanson Before the defeat of Hillary Clinton, the idea that the Russians or anyone else could warp or tamper with our elections in any serious manner was laughed off by President Obama. “There is no serious person out there who would suggest that you could even rig America’s elections,” Obama said in the weeks leading up to the 2016 election. Obama was anxious that the sure-to-be-sore-loser Trump would not blame his defeat on voting impropriety in a fashion that might call into question Clinton’s victory. After Clinton’s stunning defeat, Russian “collusion” – thanks initially to efforts by Obama holdover Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates to go after Michael Flynn and the successful attempts of the CIA and FBI to seed the bogus Steele dossier among the government elite – became a club to destroy the incoming Trump Administration. Colluders, Inc. How ironic that Russian “collusion” was used as a preemptive charge from those who actually had colluded with Russians for all sorts for financial and careerist advantages. The entire so-called Uranium One caper had hinged on ex-President Bill Clinton, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and their Clinton Foundation uniting with Russian or Russian-affiliated oligarchs to ease…
Read the full storyObama White House Tracked FOIA Request for Hillary Emails that Was Improperly Denied
by Chuck Ross The Obama White House kept tabs on a Freedom of Information Act request for information on former Sec. of State Hillary Clinton’s email accounts that the State Department improperly denied, according to newly released emails. The emails, which were provided to Judicial Watch, show for the first time that the Obama White House was aware of the Clinton-related FOIA request, which the liberal watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) submitted to the State Department in December 2012. The State Department denied the request in May 2013, claiming that no responsive records existed. That despite officials at the State Department, the White House, and even President Obama himself knowing that Clinton used a personal email account for government business. The State Department’s inspector general determined in a report released on Jan. 7, 2016 that the State Department’s denial of the CREW request was “inaccurate and incomplete.” It is not clear from the emails why the White House was interested in the request. But Judicial Watch president Tom Fitton has a theory. “These documents suggest the Obama White House knew about the Clinton email lies being told to the public at least as early…
Read the full storyCommentary: The Fright of James Comey
by Victor Davis Hanson In a recent op-ed, fired FBI Director James Comey was back again preaching to the nation about the dangers of Donald Trump and his capacity to corrupt any top-ranking federal official of lower character than Comey’s own. Comey seems to have become utterly unhinged by Donald Trump, especially when the president, in his thick Queens accent, scoffs in the vernacular—quite accurately, given the transgressions of the FBI hierarchy—about “crooked cops.” What an affront to Comey’s complexity, his subtlety, his sophistication, his feigned Hamlet-like self-doubt—at least as now expressed in his latest incarnation as Twitter’s Kahlil Gibran. One can say a number of things about the timing of Comey’s latest sermon and his characteristic projection of his own sins on to others. First, Comey’s unprofessionalism was home-grown and certainly did not need any help from President Trump. His schizophrenic behavior both as a prosecutor and investigator in the Hillary Clinton email matter was marked by exempting Clinton aides Cheryl Mills and Huma Abedin from indictment, despite their lying to his own federal officials about their knowledge of a private Clinton email server. Comey wrote his summation of the Clinton email investigation before he had even interviewed the former…
Read the full storyCommentary: ‘ObamaGate’ Is All High Crimes and No Misdemeanors
by Dr. Sebastian Gorka Do you sometimes feel like you are living in a Tim Burton movie? Or an episode of “Monty Python’s Flying Circus”? All the more so after a private Twitter user, who posted a video of the teary-eyed Rachel Maddow, was suspended by the social media platform. Why? Because she posted the close-up that clearly demonstrated that Maddow was overwrought. Suspended for posting the truth. Or look instead at Anderson Cooper, CNN’s putative doyen, who can’t even garner 0.3 percent of the population as viewers for his “flagship” program, and who recently accused Jared Kushner of “gaslighting” the nation over Russia; in other words of making statements aimed at convincing the listeners that they are insane. This from the network that has so stoked the flames of Russia conspiracy-mongering every day for two years, that they publish outlandish pieces on Robert Mueller’s sealing indictments against the president, and as Cooper’s fellow show host Chris Cuomo qualifies the president’s public statements as those made by a convict already wearing an “orange jumpsuit,” statements that are less gaslighting than full on tinfoil-hattery. And why was Kushner so calumniated? What craziness was he trying to sell to America as fact? His “gaslighting” sin was to state early last week that…
Read the full storyWatchdog Says Bank of America Has Hosted Consecutive Fundraising Galas For Planned Parenthood
Archived webpages show Bank of America sponsored consecutive annual fundraising galas for Planned Parenthood of New York City, according to a press release by 2ndVote. The archives are available here. Conservative watchdog organization 2ndVote published an online announcement for Planned Parenthood of New York City’s May 2, 2017, centennial gala. That form listed Bank of America as a “corporate sponsor.” The event was billed as a “once-in-a-lifetime gala to benefit Planned Parenthood Federation of America and Planned Parenthood of New York City.” Former presidential candidate Hillary Clinton was presented with the Champion of the Century Award at the gala. One year later, a similar announcement for Planned Parenthood of New York City’s “Spring Into Action Gala” on May 1, 2018, listed Bank of America as a “bronze sponsor.” 2ndVote also posted IRS Form 990 filings by Bank of America Charitable Foundation that show donations to multiple Planned Parenthood affiliates. In 2017, the foundation distributed over $50,000 to these organizations. The Form 990 filings are available here. In addition, 2ndVote released a copy of a letter from Bank of America Charitable Foundation President Kerry Sullivan from Feb. 5, 2019. The letter reads, “Bank of America does not make any direct…
Read the full storyCommentary: Pursue Those Indictments!
by Roger Kimball Last month, Chris Buskirk wrote a column for the Spectator USA describing Representative Devin Nunes as “a hero of the Republic.” It was well-deserved praise. Nunes, a Republican Congressman from a rural district in California was, until January, chairman of the House Permanent Special Committee on Intelligence (he is now the ranking member). Nunes has worked tirelessly for more than two years to expose what our masters in deep-state Washington would bury from the glare of public scrutiny: the evidence that the entire Trump-Russian collusion narrative was a partisan effort, first, to undermine the Trump presidential campaign and, when that failed, to cover up the effort while still working assiduously to destroy the Trump presidency. As Buskirk points out, without Nunes’s terrier-like efforts—conducted, it has to be pointed out, against the background of scurrilous and unremitting calumnies from the Democrats and their bought-and-paid-for megaphones in the media—the public would likely be totally in the dark about what really happened over the course of 2016 as the Obama Administration and the Hillary Clinton presidential campaign endeavored to “dirty up” Trump and his colleagues, calmly at first, and then with growing hysteria as Trump, against all the odds, emerged as a serious…
Read the full storyPresident Trump Planning Tax Day Event in Minnesota
President Donald Trump plans to visit Minnesota Monday for an event celebrating the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act on the April 15 tax filing deadline. Details of the event are still unclear, but White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders confirmed that the trip will happen while speaking with reporters aboard Air Force One on Wednesday. The Star Tribune reports that the event will be held in the Twin Cities area, and points out that the Federal Aviation Administration has posted a “VIP Movement Notification” for Minneapolis on April 15. Trump visited Duluth and Rochester in 2018 for rallies to bolster Republican candidates, and claimed during both events that he would flip Minnesota red in 2020. Both districts Trump visited (Minnesota’s First Congressional District and Eighth Congressional District) ended up going to Republicans in the 2018 midterms. Trump narrowly lost to Democrat Hillary Clinton in Minnesota in 2016 by just 1.5 percent, or 44,593 votes. DFL Party Chairman Ken Martin said in a statement that “if Donald Trump expects a warm welcome in Minnesota, he’ll be sorely disappointed.” “He’s here to sell a record of broken promises, lies, and attacks of families across our great state. It won’t work,” Martin…
Read the full storyCommentary: The Tables Turn in Russian Collusion Hunt
by Victor Davis Hanson The irony of the entire Russian collusion hoax is that accusers who cried the loudest about leaking, collusion, lying, and obstruction are themselves soon very likely to be accused of just those crimes. Now that Robert Mueller’s 674-day, $30 million investigation is over and has failed to find the original goal of its mandate—evidence of a criminal conspiracy between the Trump presidential campaign and the Russian government to sway the 2016 election—and now that thousands of once-sealed government documents will likely be released in unredacted form, those who eagerly assumed the role of the hunters may become the hunted, due to their own zealous violation of the nation’s trust and its laws. Take Lying Former FBI Director James Comey’s testimonies cannot be reconciled with those of his own deputy director Andrew McCabe. He falsely testified that the Steele dossier was not the main basis for obtaining FISA court warrants. On at least 245 occasions, Comey swore under oath that he either did not know, or could not remember, when asked direct questions about his conduct at the FBI. He likely lied when he testified that he did not conclude his assessment of the Clinton illegal…
Read the full storyNew Details Emerge of the Path the Steele Dossier Took through Media and the Government
by Chuck Ross Court documents released last week in a lawsuit involving the Steele dossier revealed new details about the campaign to disseminate the infamous anti-Trump report to the press and within the U.S. government. Much was already known about Fusion GPS and dossier author Christopher Steele’s efforts to seed the dossier with reporters and government officials. Fusion GPS founder Glenn Simpson orchestrated several meetings between Steele and Washington, D.C.-based journalists prior to the 2016 election. It has also been widely reported that Steele and Simpson met with government officials in an attempt to ensure that Steele’s unverified findings landed on the government’s radar. A deposition given by David Kramer, a longtime associate of former Sen. John McCain, shed light on even more contacts with reporters and government officials. Kramer’s Dec. 13, 2017 deposition was released on March 14 along with a batch of other documents from a dossier-related lawsuit against BuzzFeed News. By giving the dossier to government officials, Fusion GPS and Steele were able to create news hooks for journalists to write stories airing the dossier’s unverified allegations. That was the case with Yahoo! News, Mother Jones, CNN and BuzzFeed News, all of which published stories not about…
Read the full storyCommentary: A Tight and Tangled ‘Collusion’ Web
by Roger Kimball Most people reading this will know Sir Walter Scott’s famous couplet (from the narrative poem Marmion): Oh, what a tangled web we weave When first we practise to deceive! Less well known, but undeservedly so, is the excellent completing couplet by J. R. Pope, published under the sly title “A Word of Encouragement”: But when we’ve practiced for a while, How vastly we improve our style! Indeed. You really have to give it to the suits in Barack Obama’s intelligence services and Department of Justice (many of whom, of course, are still strutting about in Donald Trump’s administration). It was quite a web they wove, and tangled with complexity. Yet their prodigious practice also made it nearly impenetrable to anyone not inside their charmed circle. That adamantine carapace of impenetrability is a sign of their high style, their assiduity, the reason that a “word of encouragement” did not come amiss. Put your hand on your heart. Can you really tell me what happened and who all the major players are in the Get Trump farce that has been occupying the nation for more than two years now? There have been various worthy efforts to unpack the drama—I’ve made a…
Read the full storyAndrew McCabe Defends FBI’s Use Of Steele Dossier, Confidential Informant In Trump-Russia Probe
by Chuck Ross Former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe is defending the FBI’s reliance on the Steele dossier as well as the bureau’s use of a confidential informant to make contact with the Trump campaign as part of an investigation into possible collusion with Russia. In an interview as part of a recent book tour, McCabe disputed Republicans’ claims that the FBI misled the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) Court about aspects of the dossier in applications warrants to spy on former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page. And in his book, The Threat: How the FBI Protects America in the Age of Terror and Trump, McCabe defended the use of an informant who appears to be Stefan Halper, a longtime FBI and CIA informant who cozied up to Page and two other Trump advisers, Sam Clovis and George Papadopoulos, during the 2016 campaign. “I do believe that we adequately notified the FISA Court of the information we were using, and what we thought of the information,” McCabe told New York Times reporter Adam Goldman in an interview that aired on C-SPAN on Saturday. McCabe, who was fired from the FBI on March 16, 2018, said that the bureau’s applications for FISA warrants…
Read the full storyPresident Donald Trump Wows Conservatives at 2019 CPAC
President Donald Trump delivered a raucous, rally-style speech during his appearance at the 2019 Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) Saturday where he let capacity crowd know how he felt about everything from the Robert Mueller Investigation and Hillary Clinton’s emails to the booming US economy and North Korea. During one of the president’s longest speech to date, Trump was not shy about telling the crowd how he honestly felt about the Mueller Investigation. “Unfortunately you put the wrong people in a couple of positions, and they leave people for a long time that should not be there and all of a sudden they’re trying to take you out with bullsh*t,” Trump said to the crowd. The president criticized Jeff Sessions’ lack of a role in the investigation. “Now Robert Mueller never received a vote, and neither did the person that appointed him,” Trump said in a southern accent. “As you know the attorney general says, ‘I’m going to recuse myself.’ And I said, ‘Why the hell didn’t he tell me that before I put him in?’” The Mueller Investigation was not the only thing that Trump critiqued. The president called asking Russia to get Hillary Clinton’s emails a “joke.” “If…
Read the full storyAmy Klobuchar Took a Swipe at Hillary, Then Called to Apologize
by Jason Hopkins Minnesota Democratic Sen. Amy Klobuchar quickly apologized to Hillary Clinton after making a not-so-subtle dig at her 2016 campaign strategy. Presidential hopeful Klobuchar revealed during her 2020 announcement on Feb. 10 where her first campaign stop would be: Wisconsin. “Because, as you remember, there wasn’t a lot of campaigning in Wisconsin in 2016,” she stated to reporters at the time. “With me, that changes.” The reference to the state — which Clinton notably ignored during the 2016 election — was meant as evidence that the moderate senator from the Midwest would run her campaign differently. However, the line drew ire from Clinton’s inner circle and prompted Klobuchar, who had just visited with her three days prior, to reach out to the twice-failed presidential candidate and apologize. Upon making the offensive remark, Klobuchar conducted damage control by hastily sending Clinton an email and then followed up with an apology over the phone. The senior senator from Minnesota claimed her remark had been misinterpreted and was not meant to be offensive, The New York Times reported Tuesday. News of the behind-the-scenes apology comes as Klobuchar has faced other uncomfortable headlines since launching her presidential campaign. Numerous former Klobuchar…
Read the full storyThe Tennessee Star Report: Neil McCabe on the Death of Legendary Pollster Patrick Cadell
On Tuesday’s Tennessee Star Report with Steve Gill and Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 am to 8:00 am – Gill and Leahy talked to One America News Networks Neil McCabe about the recent and unexpected death of good friend and legendary pollster Pat Cadell. Cadell passed away from a stroke at the age of sixty eight in Charleston, South Carolina. He was known as the man who helped Jimmy Carter to win the Presidency and is survived by his daughter, Heidi Caddell Eichelberger, brother, Daniel, sister, Patricia Roberts, and three grandchildren. Gill: You know The Tennessee Star lost a friend that has been a close relation with Michael Patrick Leahy and the show. Came on the show a couple of times. Pat Cadell one of the ultimate pollsters. A guy who got Trump before most people got Trump. And Neil McCabe from One America News is on with us today to talk a little about Pat Cadell today. Neil McCabe with us in this segment today to talk a little about our friend Pat Cadell. Hey Neil good morning. McCabe: Hey good morning guys. Good to be with you…
Read the full storyStonewalling on Clinton Emails Continues Under Trump, Watchdog Says
by Kevin Mooney Federal bureaucrats, defying President Donald Trump, are resisting requests for information about Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email account while secretary of state and how that may have compromised national security, the head of a legal watchdog group told The Daily Signal in an interview. Tom Fitton, president of Judicial Watch, said Obama administration officials originally declined to assess the extent to which Clinton’s email practices damaged national security. But later, Fitton said, “President Trump’s appointees got in the way of us doing it.” U.S. District Judge Royce C. Lamberth ruled Jan. 17 that Judicial Watch could begin the process of discovery in the Clinton email case. That means former Obama administration officials and Clinton aides must respond to questions from the organization under oath and in writing. “Obviously, Mrs. Clinton’s conduct is an issue here, but we are also talking about the conduct of the Justice Department and the State Department,” Fitton said in the Jan. 31 phone interview with The Daily Signal, adding: The email scandal is not just a Hillary Clinton scandal. It’s a State Department scandal and it’s a Justice Department scandal. There’s a lot of powerful agencies and deep state…
Read the full storyCommentary: Can Democrats #Resist Their Own Ruling Class in 2020?
by Jeffrey A. Rendall Hill-a-reeee! Hill-a-reeee! Hill-a-reeee! Upon hearing this you might assume you’re comatose and slowly waking to the sounds of a nightmarish 2016 Hillary Clinton “With Her!” rally, but it’s definitely not three years ago and rumors are flying – once again – that the Democrat maven is seriously pondering a third (and hopefully final!) try at the presidency next year…all because of Special Counsel Robert Mueller and his stupid witch hunt investigation. Diana Stancy Correll reported on the fantasy sequence at The Washington Examiner over the weekend, “Although no campaign is underway yet, CNN senior White House correspondent Jeff Zeleny said on CNN’s ‘Inside Politics’ Sunday that Clinton has started to discuss a third potential presidential bid. “’So Hillary Clinton is telling people that she’s not closing the doors to the idea of running in 2020,’ Zeleny said. ‘Let’s just let that sink in.’ “Zeleny said that three people told him that as recently as this week, Clinton was telling people that she hadn’t definitively decided against running in 2020, especially given recent indictments of those close to President Trump, including his longtime adviser Roger Stone… [and] Clinton would likely capitalize on the fact that she…
Read the full storyHalf Of America Doesn’t Have Confidence Mueller’s Report Will Be Fair
by Hanna Bogorowski The majority of Americans support congressional Democrats’ calls to investigate President Donald Trump’s past communication and financial ties with Russia, but half of them lack confidence that special counsel Robert Mueller’s report will be fair and even-handed. A Washington Post-ABC News poll released Sunday showed that 50 percent of Americans surveyed don’t believe Mueller’s probe, which is currently investigating Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election, will result in an unbiased, fair report. A random sample of 1,001 U.S. adults were asked between Jan. 21-24 how much confidence they have that Mueller’s report will be even-handed, to which 28 percent responded “Just some” and another 22 percent responded “None at all.” Just 24 percent said they have “A great deal” of confidence in the report, which stands in contrast to the large public support for such investigations. The poll, which had a margin of error of 3.5 percentage points, showed that 57 percent of respondents support a Democratic investigation into potential collusion between Trump’s campaign and Russia, 61 percent support investigations of suspected financial ties between Trump and foreign governments, and 59 percent support investigations into Trump’s relationship and communication with Russian President Vladimir Putin. At the same time, a plurality…
Read the full storyCommentary: An Epidemic of Erasures, Redactions, Omissions, and Perjuries
by Victor Davis Hanson Imagine the following: The IRS sends you, John Q. Citizen, a letter alleging you have not complied with U.S. tax law. In the next paragraph, the tax agency then informs you that it needs a series of personal and business documents. Indeed, it will be sending agents out to discuss your dilemma and collect the necessary records. But when the IRS agents arrive, you explain to them that you cannot find about 50 percent of the documents requested, and have no idea whether they even exist. You sigh that both hard copies of pertinent information have unfortunately disappeared and hard drives were mysteriously lost. You nonchalantly add that you smashed your phone, tablet, and computer with a hammer. You volunteer that, of those documents you do have, you had to cut out, blacken or render unreadable about 30 percent of the contents. After all, you have judged that the redacted material either pertains to superfluous and personal matters such as weddings and yoga, or is of such a sensitive nature that its release would endanger your company or business or perhaps even the country at large. You also keep silent that you have a number…
Read the full storyIowans Prepare for Surge in Visits from Democratic Party Presidential Hopefuls
The race to challenge President Donald Trump in November 2020 kicked off in earnest Saturday, when the first major Democratic Party hopeful to announce her candidacy visited with voters across Iowa. A larger-than-usual deluge of candidates — possibly up to two dozen — are expected to hit the state within the coming year, including an unprecedented number of women and minorities. Top contenders include Senators Cory Booker, Kamala Harris — both of whom visited last fall — Kirsten Gillibrand and Amy Klobuchar. Former U.S. Representative and businessman John Delaney announced in mid-2017 and has been actively working to raise his name recognition in the state. “It’s definitely much sooner this time,” Pat Rynard said of candidates who have already declared their intention to run. Rynard is a former Democratic campaign staffer who runs the political news site Iowa Starting Line. During the run-up to the 2016 election, for example, the first Republican and Democrat hopefuls formally announced their bids in March and April of 2015. “I think it’s a reflection of how big the field is, and the fact that there aren’t any front-runners,” Rynard said. He expects recent poll results indicating voter preferences for former Vice President Joe Biden…
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