The Left says “It's not spying when we do it”

by Svetlana Lokhova via Threadreader

The “FBI did not spy on the campaign” fix won’t work. I have the evidence. Halper was paid to spy and manufacture evidence against @GenFlynn from late 2015, from the moment Gen Flynn met Trump. @ChuckGrassley already identified the payments to Halper as “partisan political”. /1 

Halper gets first Spygate contract from DoD in Sept 2015, draws expenses in Dec 2015, incl. trip to London. He is claiming he’s going to speak with “former Russian intelligence officers”, likely to manufacture lies about Flynn who previously cooperated with Ru intel under Obama/2

In Dec 2015, Halper gets Pentagon to pay for his trip from US to England. Within weeks, Halper attempts to arrange a dinner with me in England (I don’t attend). Halper arranges for other English academics to spy on me, tells them I am a Russian spy, having affair with Gen Flynn/3 

Halper did not just use informers to spy on @GenFlynn and me. He instigated electronic surveillance. How else a document I sent @GenFlynn in July 2016 was given to Harding of Guardian? (See his lawyers letter) Harding is under investigation by Grassley for receiving CIA leaks/4

At the same time as being paid for spying and manufacturing “intelligence” on top Trump campaign advisor @GenFlynn, Halper was paid to entrap Trump campaign advisors Page and Papadopoulos. Good luck to the FBI proving Halper did not spy on the Trump campaign! /5

“FBI source” using “cover to reach to out to Trump associates” is not spying on the Trump campaign! /6

On top of entrapping Trump campaign advisors Gen Flynn, Page and Papadopoulos, Halper had a go at campaign co-chairman Sam Clovis. As Clovis’ lawyer @VicToensing said, “To be infiltrating a presidential campaign within 2 or 3 months of an election campaign is outrageous” /7

Another campaign advisor CIA/FBI spy Halper targeted was Stephen Miller. The mysterious Steven Schrage, Halper’s “student” with deep CIA connections invited both Page and Miller to the Cambridge conference where Spygate started in July 2016. /8
 

Nunes: “When did the FBI really start to run the investigation, what types of processes did they use...it appears they were spying on the Trump campaign. Maybe [Halper’s student Schrage] was a guy working for minimum wage sweeping the floors around Cambridge. I highly doubt it /9

Then there is mysterious blonde bombshell FBI’s Azra Turk whom the “cloaked investigator” Halper unleashed on Trump campaign advisor Papadopoulos with a view of entrapping him. This was a Halper October surprise, a headline-grabbing potential arrest 1.5 months before election /10

There is an avalanche of evidence that Halper spied, entrapped, fabricated “intelligence” against the Trump campaign. This is before you consider that every piece of his “work” ends up in front pages of newspapers. During a top secret counterintelligence investigation! /11

Halper met Page in Cambridge in July 2016, shortly after his return from Moscow. Within days, Wall Street Journal contacts Page with false accusation that he met Putin's ally. It was also the WSJ who were the first to contact me with false story about Flynn, source was Halper /12

Days after Page’s meeting with Halper, Steele includes false account of Page’s trip to Moscow in his dodgy dossier. Not a coincidence that journalists and Steele have the same false story. In a book, Steele describes as his finest collector a man matching description of Halper/13

Steele is famously described by Richard Dearlove, his former MI6 boss, as a great expert on Russia. Dearlove is also full of praise for his friend and business partner Stef Halper, a good academic and a patriot. Dearlove shares Halper’s top secret mission with WaPo’s Ignatius./14

Page ends up in Steele’s dossier within days of meeting Halper. It’s impossible for this “intelligence” to get to Steele from Moscow securely in that time. Logically, this demonstratively false information might have come from Halper. This information is attached to the FISA. /15

Previously, the meeting between Halper and Page was described as a “chance encounter”. Page recently confirmed that he “had a longstanding relationship with Halper, my conversations with him intensified right in the month before my illegitimate FISA warrant in September 2016”/16

It’s September 2016, 2 months before election. Halper gets a $400k contract from CIA/FBI slush fund. By now, Halper has: —been spying on and smearing @GenFlynn as Russian agent for a year; —approached Page, who is then smeared in the Steele Dossier, newspapers as Russian agent/17

Proof that Halper was paid by your government in Sept'16, 2 months before election, to speak to former head of Russian foreign intelligence Trubnikov, referred to in Pentagon contract as former Ru Dep. Foreign Minister, Ambassador to India. But Halper met Trubnikov in 2015 /19

But Halper absolutely did not speak to Trubnikov or anybody for his bogus study, as the audit shows. Instead, he pocketed another $400,000 of taxpayers' money. /20
 

During 2016 campaign, Halper was paid nearly $700,000. In that time, Halper suppled: false intelligence on Trump and Flynn to CIA, FBI. Set up Carter Page and George Papadopolous. Approached numerous members of the Trump campaign. Conducted intelligence operation against me. /21

The intensity of Halper's activities and payments tracks the progress of the campaign. The burst of activity in July 2016 coincides with the kick-off of the official campaign: the conventions, the debates etc. It's going to reach a climax in October, just before the vote. /22