________
Source: RealClearInvestigations
Here are the prime movers of the false Trump-Russia theory that roiled U.S. politics for years: Clinton lawyers Michael Sussmann, left, and Marc Elias. Some of Sussmann's role emerges in his recent indictment for lying to the FBI -- but more consequential acts are outlined below. And Elias's role in the Steele dossier was hidden through lies, "with sanctimony, for a year," as one journalist put it.
By Aaron Maté | RealClearInvestigations | October 19, 2021
Here are the prime movers of the false Trump-Russia theory that roiled U.S. politics for years: Clinton lawyers Michael Sussmann, left, and Marc Elias. Some of Sussmann's role emerges in his recent indictment for lying to the FBI -- but more consequential acts are outlined below. And Elias's role in the Steele dossier was hidden through lies, "with sanctimony, for a year," as one journalist put it.
By Aaron Maté | RealClearInvestigations | October 19, 2021
The indictment of Hillary Clinton lawyer Michael Sussmann for allegedly lying to the FBI sheds new light on the pivotal role of Democratic operatives in the Russiagate affair. The emerging picture shows Sussmann and his Perkins Coie colleague Marc Elias, the chief counsel for Clinton's 2016 campaign, proceeding on parallel, coordinated tracks to solicit and spread disinformation tying Donald Trump to the Kremlin.
In a detailed charging document last month, Special Counsel John Durham accused Sussmann of concealing his work for the Clinton campaign while trying to sell the FBI on the false claim of a secret Trump backchannel to Russia's Alfa Bank. But Sussmann's alleged false statement to the FBI in September 2016 wasn't all. Just months before, he helped generate an even more consequential Russia allegation that he also brought to the FBI. In April of that year, Sussmann hired CrowdStrike, the cybersecurity firm that publicly triggered the Russiagate saga by lodging the still unproven claim that Russia was behind the hack of Democratic National Committee emails released by WikiLeaks.
At the time, CrowdStrike was not the only Clinton campaign contractor focusing on Russia. Just days before Sussmann hired CrowdStrike in April, his partner Elias retained the opposition research firm Fusion GPS to dig up dirt on Trump and the Kremlin.
These two Clinton campaign contractors, working directly for two Clinton campaign attorneys, would go on to play highly consequential roles in the ensuing multi-year Russia investigation.
Working secretly for the Clinton campaign, Fusion GPS planted Trump-Russia conspiracy theories in the FBI and US media via its subcontractor, former British spy Christopher Steele. The FBI used the Fusion GPS's now debunked "Steele dossier" for investigative leads and multiple surveillance applications putatively targeting Trump campaign volunteer Carter Page.
CrowdStrike, reporting to Sussmann, also proved critical to the FBI's work. Rather than examine the DNC servers for itself, the FBI relied on CrowdStrike's forensics as mediated by Sussmann.
The FBI's odd relationship with the two Democratic Party contractors gave Sussmann and Elias unprecedented influence over a high-stakes national security scandal that upended U.S. politics and ensnared their political opponents. By hiring CrowdStrike and Fusion GPS, the Perkins Coie lawyers helped define the Trump-Russia narrative and impact the flow of information to the highest reaches of U.S. intelligence agencies.
The established Trump-Russia timeline and the public record, including overlooked sworn testimony, congressional and Justice Department reports, as well as news accounts from the principal recipients of government leaks in the affair, the Washington Post and the New York Times, help to fill in the picture.
In late April 2016, after being informed by Graham Wilson, a Perkins Coie colleague, that the DNC server had been breached, Michael Sussmann immediately turned to CrowdStrike. As Sussmann recalled in December 2017 testimony to the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, the cyber firm was hired based on his "recommendation."
Although it is widely believed that CrowdStrike worked for the DNC, the firm in fact was retained by Sussmann and his Clinton campaign law firm. As CrowdStrike CEO Shawn Henry told the House committee, his contract was not with the DNC, but instead "with Michael Sussmann from Perkins Coie."
And it was Sussmann who controlled what the FBI was allowed to see. After bringing CrowdStrike on board, Sussmann pushed aggressively to publicize the firm's conclusion that Russian government hackers had attacked the DNC server, according to a December 2016 account in the New York Times.
In a detailed charging document last month, Special Counsel John Durham accused Sussmann of concealing his work for the Clinton campaign while trying to sell the FBI on the false claim of a secret Trump backchannel to Russia's Alfa Bank. But Sussmann's alleged false statement to the FBI in September 2016 wasn't all. Just months before, he helped generate an even more consequential Russia allegation that he also brought to the FBI. In April of that year, Sussmann hired CrowdStrike, the cybersecurity firm that publicly triggered the Russiagate saga by lodging the still unproven claim that Russia was behind the hack of Democratic National Committee emails released by WikiLeaks.
At the time, CrowdStrike was not the only Clinton campaign contractor focusing on Russia. Just days before Sussmann hired CrowdStrike in April, his partner Elias retained the opposition research firm Fusion GPS to dig up dirt on Trump and the Kremlin.
These two Clinton campaign contractors, working directly for two Clinton campaign attorneys, would go on to play highly consequential roles in the ensuing multi-year Russia investigation.
Working secretly for the Clinton campaign, Fusion GPS planted Trump-Russia conspiracy theories in the FBI and US media via its subcontractor, former British spy Christopher Steele. The FBI used the Fusion GPS's now debunked "Steele dossier" for investigative leads and multiple surveillance applications putatively targeting Trump campaign volunteer Carter Page.
CrowdStrike, reporting to Sussmann, also proved critical to the FBI's work. Rather than examine the DNC servers for itself, the FBI relied on CrowdStrike's forensics as mediated by Sussmann.
The FBI's odd relationship with the two Democratic Party contractors gave Sussmann and Elias unprecedented influence over a high-stakes national security scandal that upended U.S. politics and ensnared their political opponents. By hiring CrowdStrike and Fusion GPS, the Perkins Coie lawyers helped define the Trump-Russia narrative and impact the flow of information to the highest reaches of U.S. intelligence agencies.
The established Trump-Russia timeline and the public record, including overlooked sworn testimony, congressional and Justice Department reports, as well as news accounts from the principal recipients of government leaks in the affair, the Washington Post and the New York Times, help to fill in the picture.
'We Need to Tell the American Public'
In late April 2016, after being informed by Graham Wilson, a Perkins Coie colleague, that the DNC server had been breached, Michael Sussmann immediately turned to CrowdStrike. As Sussmann recalled in December 2017 testimony to the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, the cyber firm was hired based on his "recommendation."
Although it is widely believed that CrowdStrike worked for the DNC, the firm in fact was retained by Sussmann and his Clinton campaign law firm. As CrowdStrike CEO Shawn Henry told the House committee, his contract was not with the DNC, but instead "with Michael Sussmann from Perkins Coie."
Dec. 2017: CrowdStrike CEO Henry testifies he worked for the now-indicted Clinton lawyer Sussmann. House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence
And it was Sussmann who controlled what the FBI was allowed to see. After bringing CrowdStrike on board, Sussmann pushed aggressively to publicize the firm's conclusion that Russian government hackers had attacked the DNC server, according to a December 2016 account in the New York Times.
"Within a day, CrowdStrike confirmed that the intrusion had originated in Russia," the Times reported, citing Sussmann's recollection. Sussmann and DNC executives had their first formal meeting with senior FBI officials in June 2016, where they encouraged the bureau to publicly endorse CrowdStrike's findings:
Instead of waiting for the FBI, the DNC went public with the Russian hacking allegation on its own. On June 14, 2016, the Washington Post broke the news that CrowdStrike was accusing Russian hackers of infiltrating the DNC's computer network and stealing data. Sussmann and Henry were quoted as sources. According to the Times' account, the DNC approached the Post "on Mr. Sussmann's advice."
The Washington Post's June 2016 story, generated by Sussmann, was the opening public salvo in the Russiagate saga.
But it was not until nearly four years later that the public learned that CrowdStrike was not as confident about the Russian hacking allegation that it had publicly lodged. In December 2017 testimony that was declassified only in May 2020, Henry admitted that his firm was akin to a bank examiner who believes the vault has been robbed – but has no proof of how. CrowdStrike, Henry disclosed, "did not have concrete evidence" that alleged Russian hackers removed any data from the DNC servers.
"There's circumstantial evidence, but no evidence that they were actually exfiltrated," Henry told the House Intelligence Committee. "There are times when we can see data exfiltrated, and we can say conclusively. But in this case it appears it was set up to be exfiltrated, but we just don't have the evidence that says it actually left."
Read in retrospect, public statements from U.S. intelligence officials indicate that they knew of this crucial gap early on, and used qualified language to gloss it over.
Please go to RealClearInvestigations to read more.
Among the early requests at that meeting, according to participants: that the federal government make a quick "attribution" formally blaming actors with ties to Russian government for the attack to make clear that it was not routine hacking but foreign espionage.But the FBI was not ready to point the finger at Russia. As the Senate Intelligence Committee later reported, "CrowdStrike still had not provided the FBI with forensic images nor an unredacted copy of their [CrowdStrike's] report."
"You have a presidential election underway here and you know that the Russians have hacked into the D.N.C.," Mr. Sussmann said, recalling the message to the F.B.I. "We need to tell the American public that. And soon."
Instead of waiting for the FBI, the DNC went public with the Russian hacking allegation on its own. On June 14, 2016, the Washington Post broke the news that CrowdStrike was accusing Russian hackers of infiltrating the DNC's computer network and stealing data. Sussmann and Henry were quoted as sources. According to the Times' account, the DNC approached the Post "on Mr. Sussmann's advice."
'We Just Don't Have the Evidence'
The Washington Post's June 2016 story, generated by Sussmann, was the opening public salvo in the Russiagate saga.
But it was not until nearly four years later that the public learned that CrowdStrike was not as confident about the Russian hacking allegation that it had publicly lodged. In December 2017 testimony that was declassified only in May 2020, Henry admitted that his firm was akin to a bank examiner who believes the vault has been robbed – but has no proof of how. CrowdStrike, Henry disclosed, "did not have concrete evidence" that alleged Russian hackers removed any data from the DNC servers.
"There's circumstantial evidence, but no evidence that they were actually exfiltrated," Henry told the House Intelligence Committee. "There are times when we can see data exfiltrated, and we can say conclusively. But in this case it appears it was set up to be exfiltrated, but we just don't have the evidence that says it actually left."
Read in retrospect, public statements from U.S. intelligence officials indicate that they knew of this crucial gap early on, and used qualified language to gloss it over.
Please go to RealClearInvestigations to read more.
________
Bonus article from Globes as Israel calls for the diaspora to head to Israel - only if you are highly skilled like in electrical engineering and microprocessor design. Our advice to the Jewish people? Stay in America and help us defuse these precarious circumstances. Precarious circumstances? Destroying America for a "greater Israel" while removing American technology to Israel. Does this figure into Russiagate and the material presented above? Isn't this a great set of circumstances - for Israel? America gets thousands and thousands of poor uneducated migrants moving into the US from who knows where, while Israel gets engineers, metallurgists, electrical engineers and and tech skilled people. Turn America into a welfare state ("reparations for migrants") while Israel becomes the "tech nation." The unvaxxed state of America is going to force welfare. Russiagate? Why not Israelgate?
Something to consider as we build our archives much of it from the Israeli media who are for the most part forthright and surprisingly honest. As an investigator into cyber security and computer crimes, what does Michael Sussmann know about Israel?
Intriguing no? Did the Israeli cybersecurity firm NSO Group get inside CrowdStrike and do a little "tweaking"?
Mysterious hacking group is quietly breaking into global telecommunications networks, research finds
Doesn't this make you wonder about the thousands of Russians who don't speak Hebrew working in the high tech sector in Israel and any possible connections to Russiagate? Was President Trump a threat or an immense benefit to Israel?
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.