Chris Lange, FISM News
Special Counsel John Durham’s four-year probe into how the FBI handled the 2016 Donald Trump-Russia collusion allegations has ended with castigation for the Bureau but no new indictments.
Durham wrote in his 300-plus page final report to the Justice Department that the FBI “failed to uphold [its] mission of strict fidelity to the law” in its probe of Trump, which he said was “seriously flawed.”
Per the report, the FBI launched what became known as “Crossfire Hurricane” with what Durham described as a notable departure from the way in which the Bureau handled other issues involving a presidential election. Durham said that when the Bureau began its inquiry, “neither U.S. law enforcement nor the Intelligence Community appears to have possessed any actual evidence of collusion” between Trump’s 2016 campaign and Russia. Moreover, agents “ignored or simply assessed away” any evidence that could exonerate Trump, which Durham attributed to “confirmation bias.”
The FBI opened its probe into then-candidate Trump based on a tip from Alexander Downer, Australia’s ambassador to the U.K. Downer claimed that Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos told him that the campaign knew in advance that Russia planned to meddle in the 2016 election and had bragged that the Russian government had damaging information about Trump’s presidential rival Hillary Clinton.
Durham said there is a “continuing need for the FBI and the Department to recognize that lack of analytical rigor, apparent confirmation bias, and an over-willingness to rely on information from individuals connected to political opponents caused investigators to fail to adequately consider alternative hypotheses and to act without appropriate objectivity or restraint in pursuing allegations of collusion or conspiracy between a U.S. political campaign and a foreign power.
“Although recognizing that in hindsight much is clearer, much of this also seems to have been clear at the time,” Durham wrote. “We therefore believe it is important to examine past conduct to identify shortcomings and improve how the government carries out its most sensitive functions.”
FBI ADMITS TO ‘MISSTEPS’ IN PROBE
The FBI released a statement on Monday acknowledging “missteps” in the Trump-Russia probe. The Bureau stated that, as a result of Durham’s investigation, “FBI leadership already implemented dozens of corrective actions, which have now been in place for some time. Had those reforms been in place in 2016, the missteps identified in the report could have been prevented.”
Special Counsel Robert Mueller completed his investigation into alleged Trump-Russia collusion in April 2019 but found no evidence of criminal conspiracy or any coordination between the Trump campaign and the Russian government to influence the outcome of the election.
Durham was appointed in 2019 by former Attorney General Bill Barr to investigate the origins of the FBI’s probe and whether intelligence and law enforcement officials committed any wrongdoing. He issued three indictments in the course of his probe. Former Clinton attorney Michael Sussmann and Steele dossier source Igor Danchenko were found not guilty in their respective trials. Former FBI lawyer Kevin Clinesmith pleaded guilty to altering an email that was used to obtain a FISA warrant to wiretap Trump’s campaign adviser back in 2017.
JORDAN ASKS DURHAM TO TESTIFY BEFORE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE
Trump said Monday that the Democrats and former FBI Director James Comey should pay a “heavy price” for spending years investigating alleged collusion between his campaign and Russia that should never have been launched in the first place.
“I, and much more importantly, the American public, have been victims of this long-running and treasonous charade started by the Democrats — started by Comey,” Trump told Fox News Digital. “There must be a heavy price to pay for putting our country through this.”
Republican lawmakers said that Durham’s report proves that the Russia collusion probe was a hoax cooked up by the Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Convention in an attempt to take down Trump ahead of the election.
“Trump was right about the Russia hoax. Again,” Judiciary Committee Republicans declared in a tweet.
“The Durham report confirms that the FBI had no legitimate intel of Russia collusion when it launched a political witch hunt against Donald Trump,” Rep. Ben Cline (R-Va.) wrote. “There must be accountability for this intentional weaponization of [the] government.”
House Judiciary Committee Chair Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) sent a letter to Durham following the release of his report calling on him to testify before the committee on May 25.
“The hearing will examine the report you issued, dated May 12, 2023, and entitled ‘Report on Matters Related to Intelligence Activities and Investigations Arising Out of the 2016 Presidential Campaigns,'” it read.
We’ve reached out to the Justice Department to have Special Counsel John Durham testify next week.
— Rep. Jim Jordan (@Jim_Jordan) May 15, 2023
Judiciary Committee member Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.) slammed Durham’s report as the culmination of a probe resulting in “two failed trials … at the cost of more than 6.5 million taxpayer dollars” in a statement.
“Mr. Durham has, one last time, over promised and under delivered,” Nadler said. “Nothing in this report changes the outcome of the Mueller investigation, which resulted in multiple convictions, found more than one hundred contacts between the 2016 Trump campaign and the Russian government, and substantial reason to believe that Donald Trump had committed obstruction of justice.”
This article was partially informed by an Axios report.