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“The FBI lacked ‘actual evidence’ to investigate Donald Trump's 2016 presidential campaign and relied too heavily on tips provided by Trump's political opponents to fuel the probe, U.S. Special Counsel John Durham concluded in a report released on Monday.” Reuters
Here’s our prior coverage of the Durham investigation. The Flip Side
The right praises Durham’s conclusions, and accuses the FBI of helping the Clinton campaign go after Trump.
“The report details how the Russian collusion conspiracy was invented by Clinton operatives and put into the now-infamous Steele dossier, funded by the Clinton campaign. The funding was hidden as legal expenses by then-Clinton campaign general counsel Marc Elias. (The Clinton campaign was later sanctioned by the FEC over its hiding of the funding.)…
“The most essential player in this conspiracy was the media, which pumped up the dossier as gospel. On MSNBC, Rachel Maddow assured her viewers that ‘no major thing from the dossier has been conclusively disproven.’… CNN host Alisyn Camerota attacked Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) and said the dossier ‘hasn’t been discredited, in fact, it has been opposite, it has been corroborated.’ Durham has laid out how the most cited claims were not supported, let alone corroborated…
“[Yet former FBI Director James] Comey went on to make millions selling books and giving speeches on ‘ethical leadership.’ Former FBI special agent Peter Strzok was given a job by CNN. Clinton general counsel Marc Elias is advising people on election ethics and running a group to ‘defend democracy.’… In Washington, the more people involved in a conspiracy, the less culpable it becomes.”
Jonathan Turley, New York Post
“The FBI lacked ‘any actual evidence of collusion’ between the Trump campaign and Russia when it violated its standards and jumped over several steps to initiate a full investigation, including probes into four members of the Trump campaign…
“The pretext for the probe—a random conversation between unpaid Trump adviser George Papadopoulos and an Australian diplomat—was so flimsy that FBI agents complained it was ‘thin’ and British intelligence was incredulous. The FBI opened the probe without doing interviews, using any ‘standard analytical tools,’ or conducting intelligence reviews—which would have shown that not a single U.S. agency had evidence of collusion.”
Editorial Board, Wall Street Journal
“The special counsel elaborates on attempts by two foreign governments to buy influence with Clinton by making donations to her campaign. Contrary to the zealousness with which the FBI opened a full-blown investigation of Trump’s campaign based on risibly thin information in the stretch run of the 2016 race, the bureau sat on the Clinton information for months…
“Clinton’s campaign was given a defensive briefing to ensure she was not placed in a compromising position. Trump’s campaign, by contrast, was immediately subjected to a full-court press, including eavesdropping and the deployment of informants… There is not a chance that the FBI — or anyone in America — was unaware that the Clinton campaign wanted Trump to be seen as a Russian operative. But the bureau expected Clinton to be the next president. That was her Trump strategy, so it became the FBI’s Trump strategy.”
Andrew C. McCarthy, National Review
The left criticizes Durham’s conclusions, and argues that the FBI was right to investigate the Trump campaign’s ties to Russia.
The left criticizes Durham’s conclusions, and argues that the FBI was right to investigate the Trump campaign’s ties to Russia.
“Durham found that the FBI did not pursue allegations against Clinton with the same vigor with which they acted against Trump. Clinton’s supporters will however consider that charge as laughable, given that they blame then FBI Director James Comey for swinging the election against her with his public statements on her emails. At the same time, Americans had no idea that Trump was under investigation as well.”
Stephen Collinson, CNN
“It’s worth running through a few highlights [from 2016]. During the campaign, Trump, members of his family and his campaign aides had dozens of contacts with Russian nationals and officials. His campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, and Manafort’s deputy, Rick Gates, who both worked for pro-Russian oligarchs and politicians in Ukraine, passed confidential internal polling data to a Russian intelligence operative…
“Russia hacked Democratic National Committee servers, then passed embarrassing information to WikiLeaks so it could be released publicly at moments advantageous to Trump. WikiLeaks was in communication about the information with Trump adviser Roger Stone, whom Trump later pardoned for lying to Congress about the scandal, witness tampering and obstruction…
“Russia also mounted a comprehensive trolling campaign through social media to boost Trump’s presidential bid. Plus, the infamous Trump Tower meeting with Russian nationals… It would have been insane for the FBI not to investigate.”
Paul Waldman, Washington Post
“Durham acknowledges that ‘there is no question that the FBI had an affirmative obligation to closely examine’ the tip that sparked the probe. So what is Durham’s actual difference with the bureau’s decision to launch an investigation? He reveals his hand at page 295 of the report, where the exhausted reader learns he believes the FBI could have instead taken the ‘sensible step’ of opening a preliminary investigation that could have later escalated into a full one…
“This is a mighty thin reed on which to support Durham’s insinuations of FBI misconduct. It’s also highly debatable. Information from an ally suggesting our greatest foreign adversary might be collaborating with a presidential campaign required an immediate and thorough response.”
Harry Litman, Los Angeles Times
“There were flaws in the FBI’s handling of the matter, especially involving dubious Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) applications to surveil 2016 Trump adviser Carter Page, but they flowed from confirmation bias rather than politically motivated misconduct… Though Mr. Durham continues to disagree that it was appropriate for the FBI to open a full investigation, rather than a preliminary one, he makes no finding that doing so was prohibited under agency rules… Durham’s investigation reveals nothing except a broken process.”
Editorial Board, Washington Post
