OPINION — Last Tuesday, Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe promised, or maybe threatened, “Additional declassification and public disclosure of related intelligence remains under consideration.”
That sentence was part of the same September 29, letter that he sent to Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) that contained declassified, unverified, information about Russian allegations concerning the 2016 Hillary Clinton campaign.
Therefore, during the remaining 28 days before the presidential election, the public should be prepared for what may turn out to be unprecedented releases of once-classified information and other formerly undisclosed government information.
Ratcliffe disclosed in the Graham letter “Russian intelligence analysis alleging that U.S. Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton had approved a campaign plan to stir up a scandal against U.S. Presidential candidate Donald Trump by tying him to Putin and the Russians' hacking of the Democratic National Committee.”
It was no surprise that during last Tuesday night’s presidential debate with former Vice President Joe Biden, President Trump made a brief reference to information in Ratcliffe’s letter. When Trump said, “What happened today with Hillary Clinton, where it was a whole big con job,” he meant the “con job” was his campaign colluding with the Russians and Ratcliffe’s declassified information was proof that it was Clinton’s campaign instead.
Needless to say, Trump ignored the part of Ratcliffe’s letter that read, “the IC [Intelligence Community] does not know the accuracy of this allegation or the extent to which the Russian intelligence analysis may reflect exaggeration or fabrication released information.”
This is the same John Ratcliffe, who because of his pro-Trump reputation, said under oath at his May 5, 2020, confirmation hearing before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, “If confirmed as DNI, one of the things that I’ve made clear to everyone is that I will deliver the unvarnished truth…It won’t be shaded for anyone. What anyone wants the intelligence to reflect won’t impact the intelligence that I deliver.”
Ratcliffe also failed to tell Graham that the Republican-led Senate Intelligence Committee had known of the very Russian 2016 allegation about Clinton’s campaign and discarded it as disinformation during its multi-year investigation of Russia’s interference with the U.S. 2016 election.
Nonetheless, Trump supporters on September 29, the day Ratcliffe’s letter was released, spread its substance on Twitter.
At 3:25p that afternoon, Donald Trump Jr. tweeted to his 5.7 million followers: “OMG JUST DECLASSIFIED: The Russia hoax was Hillary’s plan, and the Obama-Biden White House was briefed on it.” He attached Ratcliffe’s letter to his tweet.
Less than 30 minutes later, White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany, interestingly using her personal Twitter account, sent out to her one million followers, “CIA believed Clinton campaign was 'stirring up a scandal' over Russia.” She attached a Washington Times story headlined, “CIA asked FBI to investigate Clinton campaign over 'stirring up' Trump-Russia allegations.”
Donald Trump Jr. then re-tweeted her Tweet to his 5.7 million followers, so that within a short time, that distorted message had been pushed out to almost seven million people.
Needless to say, there were attempts to correct the record. Former CIA Deputy Director Mike Morrell released a statement which said, “This is the most blatant act of politicization by a DNI that I have ever seen.”
The next day, former FBI Director James Comey, appearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee, told Chairman Sen. Lindsey Graham, “I don’t understand the Ratcliffe letter well enough to comment. It contains within it a statement that it is unverified information, so I really don’t know what he’s doing.”
It was pretty clear what Ratcliffe was doing, but he is not the only administration official that is playing this Trump campaign game.
Attorney General William Barr also has been using Justice and FBI material in the effort.
During last week’s debate, Trump confronted Biden at one point saying, “We’ve caught them all. We’ve got it all on tape. We’ve caught them all. And by the way, you gave the idea for the Logan Act against General Flynn. You better take a look at that, because we caught you in a sense, and President Obama was sitting in the office.”
Where did Trump get the idea that Biden initiated the idea of going after Flynn for a Logan Act violation? It turns out that allegation emerged from a packet of notes, attributed to former FBI agent Paul Strozk. They were released last June to Flynn’s lawyers and made public recently by them in court during their attempt to support Barr’s effort to drop the charges against Flynn.
The notes were originally undated and reflected what Comey had told Strozk had taken place at an Oval Office meeting on January 5, 2017. However, when introduced in court, it had the prospective dates “1/4-1/5/17” written on it. At a January 4, 2017, Justice Department meeting, there was discussion about newly discovered information about Flynn having spoken several times with Russian Ambassador Sergei Kislyak. That was when the Logan Act was first discussed, and Biden was not there.
Comey, in testifying last Wednesday under oath at a Senate Judiciary hearing, was asked if at the January 5 White House meeting, “Did either President Obama or Vice President Biden suggest prosecuting Lieutenant General Flynn under the Logan Act? Would you remember that if that suggestion had been made to you?”
Comey replied: “I would remember it because it would be highly inappropriate for a president or vice president to suggest prosecution or investigation of anyone, and it did not happen.”
Trump’s use during last week’s debate reflected another information leak from Justice which I wrote about last week. It involved the mid-September investigation at the Luzerne County Pennsylvania Election Bureau after nine ballots were discovered in a wastebasket. After the FBI was called in, a U.S. attorney disclosed that seven of the military ballots were for Trump, details that normally would not be disclosed in an inquiry that involved a mistake rather than a crime.
However, it not only became public and was adopted by President Trump as part of his anti-mail-voting campaign rhetoric, but he also used it during the debate. In criticizing mail voting Trump said, “They cheat. Hey, they found ballots in a wastepaper basket three days ago and they all had the name, military fellas. They were military, they all had the name Trump on them. You think that’s good?”
Last Friday, a House Intelligence Committee hearing looked into allegations that officials at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), “had engaged in efforts to politicize intelligence,” according to Chairman Adam Schiff (D-Calif.). Specifically, Schiff focused on a past attempt that “sought to influence the production of election threat intelligence by elevating and emphasizing activity by China and Iran despite acute ongoing interference operations by Russia” and at a time when “the intelligence community’s public statements indicate only Russia is engaged in active measures to denigrate one candidate and support another and sway the outcome of the presidential election.”
Brian Murphy, former chief of DHS’ Office of Intelligence and Analysis, was to be the witness to testify about his whistleblower complaint that alleged senior Trump officials, including his boss, acting DHS Secretary Chad Wolf, sought to censor or manipulate intelligence for political purposes.
Joseph Maher, who had replaced Murphy as the acting DHS Under Secretary for Intelligence and Analysis, testified before the committee that Murphy had been unable to get access to what he referred to as classified information related to his allegations.
On being asked about Murphy’s complaint about Wolf and other allegations that Trump officials pressured DHS personnel, Maher responded in effect, saying that he did not know the specific facts involved and so did not want to comment.
Although President Trump’s coronavirus exposure will dominate public attention in the coming days, his administration’s efforts to release once classified information - DHS or Justice information - to try to change the subject remains an attractive conversation alternative.
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