OAN Newsroom
UPDATED 4:20 PM PT — Sunday, May 3, 2020
Twitter suspended conservative commentator Candace Owens’ account after she posted a tweet criticizing Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer.
In her now deleted post from Friday, Owens said, “Apparently Governor
Whitmer believes she is a duly elected dictator of a socialist
country.” She then called on Michiganders to defy the Democrat
governor’s stay-at-home orders and “go to work.”
A Twitter spokesperson confirmed this tweet violated the platform’s
misinformation policy, “specifically around heightened-risk health
claims.”
This came after Whitmer moved to extend the state’s stay-at-home order, which sparked demonstrations.
“I know that some people are angry,
and I know many are feeling restless. I know that people are itching to
get back to work and I get it, I respect it. It’s okay to feel that way.
There’s nothing that I want more than to just flip the switch and
return to normal, but that’s not how it’s going to work, unfortunately.” – Gretchen Whitmer, Governor of Michigan
According to reports,
Owens is standing by her statement, despite its removal from Twitter.
She reportedly said she believes she “should be allowed to encourage
lawful citizens to resume work.”
Twitter later reinstated her account after she agreed to delete the tweet.
For more than three years, Michael Flynn waged a strange battle to clear his name after pleading guilty to lying to FBI agents and then declining a judge’s invitation to withdraw the plea. But there has always been something very wrong about the case, and we’ve learned more about it in recent weeks.
The retired army general, fleetingly President Trump’s first national-security adviser, was investigated during the Trump transition by anti-Trump officials at the FBI and Obama Justice Department on nebulous grounds.
There was no criminal predicate for the probe: Flynn’s communications with Sergey Kislyak — then the Russian ambassador to the U.S. — during the transition, which set off the whole affair, were entirely proper. The idea that they violated the Logan Act forbidding private interference in the conduct of U.S. foreign policy was always absurd. The last indictment under the constitutionally dubious act was in 1852, and the statute wasn’t meant to tie the hands of high-level officials of an incoming administration.
Former FBI director James Comey broke protocol by having agents interview Flynn at the White House on his first day on the job, a tactic Comey subsequently told a chortling New York City audience he wouldn’t have “gotten away with” in a more organized administration. Though the agents had a recording of his conversation with the ambassador, they didn’t play it for Flynn — instead simply grilling him.
The just-revealed notes of an FBI official prior to the interview ask whether the goal was to elicit Flynn’s admission that he talked with Kislyak about sanctions (the supposed Logan Act violation) or “to get him to lie, so we can prosecute him or get him fired.” The notes are open to interpretation, but it’s not clear what the FBI was doing besides hoping he’d lie.
In a newly disclosed email, Lisa Page suggests slipping in as unobtrusively as possible a warning that lying to the FBI is a crime, so as not to put Flynn on his guard.
Still, the agents who interviewed Flynn didn’t think he lied. Even if he did, as our own Andrew C. McCarthy has noted, a false statement is not supposed to be actionable unless it is material to something properly under investigation.
This paper-thin case (at best) was apparently on the verge of being closed when top FBI officials intervened to keep that from happening. Then, the case got picked up by Special Counsel Mueller’s team. Mueller’s prosecutors pressured Flynn to plead guilty, hoping he’d help make some sort of case against Trump.
That obviously came to nothing, but Flynn has been financially ruined and still faces jail time.
As for Flynn’s guilty plea, his counsel contends that new disclosures show it was elicited on the basis of threatening his son with prosecution. His son’s alleged crime was failing to register with the Justice Department as a foreign agent. Such a violation of the Foreign Agents Registration Act had almost never been charged by the Justice department prior to Mueller’s investigation, and it’s not even clear the act would apply to Flynn’s son.
None of this was revealed to the court until now.
It was highly convenient for the Mueller team to have the Flynn guilty plea as a high-profile scalp to wave around for the media, which did indeed take delight in it and use it to argue that the probe was “closing in on” Trump.
We were never fans of Michael Flynn’s appointment as national-security adviser. How he handled himself in this matter — and especially his work for the government of Turkey while advising Trump in 2016 — shows poor judgment. But he’s been treated unjustly.
The court, Attorney General Bill Barr, and President Trump should all consider remedies. This isn’t how our justice system, or high politics, should work.
Russia has recorded 10,633 new
coronavirus infections in the past 24 hours, the highest daily rise
since the outbreak began in the country.
The increase brings Russia's total number of coronavirus cases to 134,686, the seventh highest tally in the world.
On Sunday, a further 58 coronavirus-related deaths were announced, bringing the total to 1,280 in Russia.
Moscow has been hit particularly hard by the virus, leaving its healthcare system struggling to cope.
Moscow's mayor Sergei Sobyanin on Saturday cautioned against
complacency, saying the capital was not past the peak of its coronavirus
epidemic.
The mayor said around 2% of residents in the city -
around 250,000 people - had tested positive for coronavirus. On Sunday,
Moscow's total number of cases jumped by 5,948 to a total of 68,606.
A
strict lockdown has been imposed in Moscow, where its 12 million
residents have been ordered to stay at home with few exceptions.
Russian
President Vladimir Putin has said situation remains "very serious",
warning Russians to brace for a "gruelling phase of the pandemic" in the
weeks ahead.
Earlier in the week Russian Prime Minister, Mikhail Mishustin, confirmed he had been diagnosed with Covid-19, the first senior minister in the country to do so.
President Putin has extended a nationwide non-working period until 11 May, saying "the peak is not behind us".
Beyond
that, the president said his government will consider gradually lifting
coronavirus restrictions from 12 May, depending on the region.
Last week, Mr Putin admitted there was a shortage of protective kit for medics on the frontline of the coronavirus crisis
The hypocrisy of Democrats, and their media allies, is on prominent display in their handling of sexual assault allegation against Joe Biden versus their treatment of Brett Kavanaugh. Another example of the hypocrisy relates to the demand, or lack thereof, for documents related to the official government work of the two men.
Until they switched at the last minute to Christine Blasey Ford’s allegation, Democrats’ main message and procedural complaint against Kavanaugh was that they needed to review millions of public records from his time of service in the executive branch. It was the basis for their theatrics in the first round of nomination hearings in the Senate Judiciary Committee. At issue was whether these documents were covered by executive privilege, and what kind of precedent it would create to be exchanging these documents between the branches of government. It wasn’t a new argument, but one that rears its head in confirmation battles.
For example, Cory Booker stunned the Senate Judiciary Committee on September 6, 2018, by announcing even before questioning began that he would violate Senate rules by releasing emails that had been marked “committee confidential.” His “Spartacus” moment, as he called it, followed months of battles over how many of documents related to Kavanaugh’s work for the president had to be turned over to the committee.
Committees usually seek paperwork when they’re trying to learn more about nominees whose judicial views are unclear. That wasn’t the case with Kavanaugh, who had spent 12 years as a prominent federal judge, with 307 opinions of his to peruse. If senators were curious about Kavanaugh’s judicial opinions, they could simply read them. By contrast, when Elena Kagan was nominated to the Court by Barack Obama, she had no opinions to her name and limited writings because she had never served as a judge. Her paperwork during her time in the executive branch was of relatively more importance.
Paperwork from early in Kavanaugh’s career as a government lawyer and presidential aide said less about how he’d be as a judge than the 12 years he spent as a federal judge. Beyond that, Kavanaugh had more papers in the government record than other nominees. He’d served on Ken Starr’s Whitewater investigation, in the White House counsel’s office, and as staff secretary in the George W. Bush White House. Technically staff secretaries have millions of papers come across their desk, even if they have nothing to do with the authorship of those papers. Nonetheless, Charles Grassley set about obtaining those papers because Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee said they needed to review them.
All papers had to go through multiple presidential reviews on account of how they affected multiple presidencies. The Whitewater papers, having previously been combed over, were easiest to produce and showed Kavanaugh in a favorable light. He had argued against releasing personally embarrassing details about President William Jefferson Clinton’s sexual misconduct, for example.
Grassley hired an “e-discovery” firm, marking the first time such techniques would be used in a Supreme Court confirmation process. He put together a team of dozens of staffers to go through the documents, working out of a windowless, rat-infested, cinder-block suite in the basement of the Senate’s Dirksen Office Building. Democrats still claimed it wasn’t enough.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer held a press conference on July 31, joined by Dick Durbin and Dianne Feinstein and assorted leaders of left-wing activist groups. He posed with a small pile of empty boxes labeled “missing records” and said he wanted to see them filled with Kavanaugh’s papers from his time as White House staff secretary.
“I want to make clear, for just a sec, how aggressive the obstruction is,” Schumer said.
A few days later, Republicans posed with 167 boxes representing the hundreds of thousands of pages that were being made available to the committee in easy-to-search digital form.
“If you were to stack up all these pages, it would be taller than the Big Ben, taller than the Statue of Liberty, taller than the Capitol dome, and taller than the Taj Mahal,” noted Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina. “I think it’s more than enough for the Democrats to make a rational decision about supporting Judge Kavanaugh.”
When the hearings finally began on September 4, Chairman Grassley barely began speaking before Sen. Kamala Harris of California interrupted him to complain there hadn’t been enough time to review a tranche of 42,000 Kavanaugh documents that had recently been released. Sen. Mazie Hirono of Hawai interrupted next to ask that the hearing be postponed so that she could review the documents. Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut called the hearing a charade and mockery. And Booker began complaining about the documents as Grassley calmly told him he was out of order. “What is the rush? What are we trying to hide?” Booker asked.
NBC News had previously reported that Schumer had orchestrated the Democratic protests over paperwork and Sen. Christopher Coons of Delaware told media outlets “It was important that we lay down a marker that this hearing is not a normal hearing.”
Booker performed his “Spartacus moment” a couple of days later, tweeting out links to documents that had been marked “committee confidential,” meaning they could be reviewed by the committee but not released publicly, per an agreement with the executive branch. There was nothing to connect Booker’s situation with the famous scene from the 1960 Kirk Douglas movie in which a group of slaves all claim to be the outlaw Spartacus to help the real Spartacus avoid being crucified. The emails themselves were a dud but Booker tried to make a big deal out of them. “I knowingly violated the rules put forward,” he bragged. He technically hadn’t even violated any rules, having been authorized by an official at the Bush library to release them hours prior.
The bottom line is that Democrats were certainly eager to get their hands on every last scrap of paper that had been within a six-foot radius of Kavanaugh, even if only as a delay and spectacle tactic against Kavanaugh. Democrats and their media allies also pored over Kavanaugh’s high school yearbook and personal notes he wrote friends as a teenager.
How is that standard being applied to Biden now that his official records are at the heart of a major controversy? To date, not one of the Senate Democrats who demanded that the Kavanaugh team spend months supplying them with paperwork have so much as mentioned the fact that Biden is hiding relevant documents at the University of Delaware. These are not documents where significant constitutional or legal precedent issues are at stake, unlike the battle over the documents in the Kavanaugh confirmation. The stakes are purely political. Nor is there an issue about who owns the documents and has the right to release them. Biden controls access to these papers, which he has granted to campaign operatives.
Biden — who opposed the Kavanaugh confirmation, said of Blasey Ford that he presumed “the essence of what she’s talking about is real,” and demanded an FBI investigation into the allegation — refuses to supply any papers from his 36 years as a United States Senator or 8 years as Vice President of the United States. That would cover any papers dealing with his handling of Tara Reade, his employee who accuses him of a 1993 sexual assault, and his handling of the Clarence Thomas confirmation hearings that were turned into a circus through an unsubstantiated claim of sexual harassment.
“Millions of documents provided by thee but none by me,” is the Democrats’ apparent standard.
Fox Business Host Lou Dobbs outlines some stunning information about the recently released FBI documents and how they align with President Obama’s involvement.
Additionally, General Mike Flynn’s defense counsel, Sidney Powell, gives her perspective on the release and what it could mean for their case. Additionally, Ms. Powell discusses a rather odd order from Judge Sullivan to stop the defense from submitting further evidence in the case until the DOJ attests there is no evidence left to deliver.
Brett Kavanaugh was a very difficult Supreme Court nominee for liberals to oppose. He had a stellar reputation, an impeccable record, and a genial disposition. While members of the Resistance held a protest on the steps of the Supreme Court minutes after President Trump announced him as the pick to replace retiring Associate Justice Anthony Kennedy, their early efforts to keep him off the bench showed little promise.
All that changed in mid-September 2018, when the Washington Post carefully packaged and presented Christine Blasey Ford’s claim that Kavanaugh had tried to rape her when she was in high school. The media and Democrats immediately latched onto the accusation in a desperate attempt to keep Kavanaugh from being confirmed.
It wasn’t the quality of the allegation that led to this reaction. Blasey Ford had no evidence she had ever met Kavanaugh, much less that he had tried to rape her. She wasn’t sure about any detail related to the event other than that she had precisely one beer and that Kavanaugh had tried to rape her.
She didn’t know how she got to the alleged event, where it was, how she got home, or whose house it was. None of the four witnesses she identified to reporters as having been at the event in question supported her claim. That included her close friend Leland Keyser, who was pressured by mutual acquaintances to change her testimony that she had no recollection of the event in question. Kavanaugh had an army of close friends and supporters who testified to his character throughout his adolescence and adulthood.
Nevertheless, over the next ten days, thousands of articles were published in newspapers and online while broadcast and cable news outlets devoted their entire schedule to covering the accusation. All hands were on deck to legitimize the allegation, paint the accuser in the most sympathetic light possible, downplay the many problems with her story, and ignore exonerating information. Anybody who supported Kavanaugh, from high school friends to sitting U.S. senators, was subjected to hostile media treatment and accusations of being a rape apologist.
The nation watched in horror as the federal judge, a happily married father of two young girls, was repeatedly called a rapist. MSNBC contributor Jason Johnson called Kavanaugh “the fifth guy in the gang rape.” That was after Michael Avenatti’s client Julie Swetnick claimed, absurdly, that Kavanaugh was the secret leader of a serial gang rape cartel that roamed the streets of suburban Maryland. One reporter admitted that she was trying to spin another murky claim from a Kavanaugh classmate at Yale specifically to show a pattern of misconduct.
It was a terrifying mob, the worst kind of feeding frenzy many Americans had ever witnessed. Democratic senators on the Judiciary Committee accepted each claim, no matter how outlandish. After Swetnick’s obviously ridiculous claim, all committee Democrats called for the immediate withdrawal of Kavanaugh’s nomination.
It all culminated with reopened hearings in which Blasey Ford publicly accused Kavanaugh, still with no evidence, and Kavanaugh fought to defend himself. In a lengthy opening statement, he reminded the gathered how they had publicly opposed him from the moment of his nomination, with Schumer saying publicly he would oppose Kavanaugh with everything he’s got. Another senator called Kavanaugh evil and said those who supported him were “complicit in evil.”
I understand the passions of the moment, but I would say to those senators, your words have meaning. Millions of Americans listen carefully to you. Given comments like those, is it any surprise that people have been willing to do anything to make any physical threat against my family, to send any violent e-mail to my wife, to make any kind of allegation against me and against my friends. To blow me up and take me down.
You sowed the wind. For decades to come, I fear that the whole country will reap the whirlwind.
The media and other partisans were enraged by Kavanaugh’s remarks. “Brett Kavanaugh just got remarkably angry — and political,” opined the Washington Post’s Aaron Blake. The New Yorker’s Benjamin Wallace-Wells editorialized that Kavanaugh had given an “Angry, Partisan, Trump-Like Opening Statement.” His successful renunciation of the charges was evidenced by his opponents coalescing around a new talking point that he was too upset at the false accusation he was a serial gang rapist.
The events of the last weeks have proven Kavanaugh right. While even two years ago the media and Democrats may have gotten away with burying the sexual assault allegation against Joe Biden, it’s not working now. They have no one to blame but themselves.
It may have seemed necessary to play around with false accusations of serial gang rape to stop a nominee from securing a place on the Supreme Court — or to make sure the justice would always have an “asterisk” next to his name on any abortion decision, as Blasey Ford’s attorney admitted was her client’s goal. But the move has unbelievably serious consequences.
Who was cheering them on the whole time? Joe Biden. The former vice president insisted that Ford ‘should be given the benefit of the doubt’ and declared that ‘for a woman to come forward in the glaring lights of focus, nationally, you’ve got to start off with the presumption that at least the essence of what she’s talking about is real, whether or not she forgets facts.’ He called, through a spokesperson, for ‘thorough and nonpartisan effort to get to the truth, wherever it leads.’ He hailed her testimony as ‘courageous, credible and powerful.’ He even explained away her lack of corroborating witnesses, declaring ‘if, God forbid, you walked out and somebody patted you in the rear end, your boss, or said something to you, how many of you would go report it?’
If the media and Democrats thought that they could get away with their despicable behavior with Kavanaugh and then turn around and attempt to bury a sexual assault allegation against Biden, they were sorely mistaken.
Since the media and Democrats don’t have consistent standards for how they deal with accusations of sexual assault, they are facing consequences. It’s an incredibly low bar, but there is no question that Tara Reade’s claim against Biden is significantly stronger than Blasey Ford’s claim against Kavanaugh.
For instance, Reade has evidence she met Biden. No one disputes she worked for him in 1993. Further, she has incredibly strong evidence that she told multiple people that Biden assaulted her at the time she claimed it happened. Her own mother called into CNN’s Larry King show to discuss the matter in 1993! Blasey Ford’s story changed in the recent years she began telling it, but was not told for several decades and not before Kavanaugh had become a nationally known figure.
None of this is to say that Biden is guilty, but the media and Democrats sure as hell are. They were willing to destroy a man’s life over far weaker claims, so they in no way can excuse ignoring Reade’s claim. Whether or not the media and Democrats want to acknowledge the growing anger over their despicable double standards, the anger is not going away.
They sowed the wind with their treatment of Kavanaugh. Now more than just Kavanaugh may fear that for the decades to come, the whole country will reap the whirlwind.
The recently unsealed documents in the Flynn case provide some key information to fill in a timeline that shows exactly why incoming National Security Advisor Michael Flynn needed to be removed by the pre-existing Obama intelligence community. WATCH:
You might note the recent releases from internal FBI documents surround three specific phases of activity, representing individual blocks of time, amid a longer timeline:
(1) The transition period. A set of actions in December 2016 through early January 2017; which includes the FBI deciding to stop the investigation of Flynn (FARA-Russia) January 4th; and the apoplexy of the FBI to continue it.
(2) The immediate days of the Trump administration; and the need for the FBI to target Flynn on January 24, 2017, surrounding a Logan Act violation.
(3) The assembly of an FBI narrative following the January 24th interview; which includes the planning by the FBI for how to write up the Flynn interview notes culminating on February 15th.
Each of the phases had a separate FBI and DOJ targeting approach; there was an evolution in the justification. The first targeting of Flynn (2016) used FARA-Russia. The second targeting (January 2017) used the Logan Act. The third targeting, taken over by Robert Mueller (mid-2017), was FARA-Turkey. In each phase the media was used by the FBI as a conduit for their effort.
If we look at specific actions, and overlay the new documents, the motives for the actions are a lot more clear. It starts with the Obama administration concocting a narrative that Russians interfered in the November 2016 election.
~ PHASE ONE ~
♦ December 29, 2016 – The intelligence community releases the Joint Analysis Report (JAR). This is timed to coincide with President Obama ordering 35 Russian officials to leave the country. (Yahoo Media)
♦ December 29, 2016 – Reacting to the sanctions, Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak calls incoming National Security Director Michael Flynn. The intelligence community is monitoring the call. (Mueller Report)
♦ December 31, 2016 – Kislyak Call #2 (Mueller Report)
♦ January 4, 2017 – The FBI Washington Field Office informs the intelligence community via an Electronic Communication, they are closing the 2016 Flynn investigation.
♦ January 4, 2017 – FBI Agent Peter Strzok says don’t close it.
♦ January 5, 2017 – James Comey goes to the White House: [Susan Rice Memo]
[Susan Rice] “President Obama began the conversation by stressing his continued commitment to ensuring that every aspect of this issue is handled by the Intelligence and law enforcement communities “by the book“.”
“The President stressed that he is not asking about, initiating or instructing anything from a law enforcement perspective. He reiterated that our law enforcement team needs to proceed as it normally would, “by the book.””
[Kathryn Ruemmler] The memorandum to file drafted by Ambassador Rice memorialized an important national security discussion between President Obama and the FBI Director and the Deputy Attorney General. President Obama and his national security team were justifiably concerned about potential risks to the Nation’s security from sharing highly classified information about Russia with certain members of the Trump transition team, particularly Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn.
January 6, 2017 – James Comey briefs President-elect Trump in Trump Tower on the Steele Dossier. [Comey Memos]
♦ January 7, 2017 – The intelligence community (Brennan, Clapper, Comey) released an “Intelligence Community Assessment” (ICA). The ICA took the ridiculous construct of the JAR and then overlaid a political narrative that Russia was trying to help Donald Trump.
♦ January 20, 2017 – Inauguration
~ PHASE TWO ~
♦ January 21, 2017 – The FBI is planning out how to exploit the transcript of Flynn’s conversation with Russian Ambassador Kislyak.
Crossfire Hurricane (CH) is the overall investigation that began in July 2016
Crossfire Typhoon (CT) is George Papadopoulos.
Crossfire Razor (CR) is Michael Flynn.
Cross Wind is still unknown. [Could be a person (Page), or a subset of the case]
First email is from Peter Strzok to the FBI team:
♦ January 22, 2017 – More planning and discussion about what approach to take. The follow-up email is from an unknown addressee to: Peter Strzok, John Moffa and Lisa Page. The outline is to provide Flynn [Razor] with a defensive briefing.
♦ January 23, 2017 – Lisa Page and Peter Strzok discussing FBI Deputy Director of Counterintelligence Bill Priestap having concerns about what they are doing:
♦ January 23 and 24, 2017 – Bill Priestap notes recently released highlight his concern:
FBI Director of Counterintelligence Bill Priestap is not comfortable with the way the FBI is planning to set-up Flynn on January 24th the day of the interview. He documents his concerns during a conversation with FBI Director James Comey and Deputy Director Andrew McCabe.
According to Lisa Page text: “(McCabe) dd is frustrated.”
~ PHASE THREE ~
The original authorization for the appointment of Special Counsel Robert Mueller was May 17th, 2017. However, the released Weissmann report shows there were two additional scope memos authorizing specific targeting of the Mueller probe. The first scope memo was August 2nd, 2017, OUTLINED HERE, and is an important part of the puzzle that helps explain the corrupt original purpose of the special counsel.
The second scope memo was issued by Rod Rosenstein to Robert Mueller on October 20th, 2017. The transparent intent of the second scope memo was to provide Weissmann and Mueller with ammunition and authority to investigate specific targets, for specific purposes. One of those targets was General Michael Flynn’s son, Michael Flynn Jr.
As you review the highlighted portion below, found on pages 12 and 13 of the Weissmann report, read slowly and fully absorb the intent; the corruption is blood-boiling:
This second scope memo allowed Weissmann and Mueller to target tangentially related persons and entities bringing in Michael Cohen, Richard Gates, Roger Stone and Michael Flynn Jr. Additionally and strategically (you’ll see why), this memo established the authority to pursue “jointly undertaken activity“.
The investigation of General Flynn never stopped throughout 2016 and led to the second investigative issue of his phone call with Russian Ambassador Kislyak in December 2016.
Within the case against Michael Flynn…. Prosecutor Brandon Van Grack filed a cover letter attempting to explain the reason for the Flynn interview on January 24th, 2017, and the official filing of the interview notes (FD-302) on February 15th, 2017, and then again on May 31st, 2017.
To explain the FBI delay, Van Grack claimed the FD-302 report “inadvertently” had a header saying “DRAFT DOCUMENT/DELIBERATIVE MATERIAL” (screen grab)
What the special counsel appeared to be obfuscating to the court was there was factually a process of deliberation within the investigative unit, headed by FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe, surrounding the specific wording of the 302 report on the Flynn interview. Likely how best to word the FBI notes for maximum damage.
In late 2018 Prosecutor Brandon Van Grack was attempting to hide the length of the small group deliberations within the FBI. It seems he did not want the court to know Andrew McCabe was involved in shaping how the Flynn-302 was written.
We know there was a deliberative process in place, seemingly all about how to best position the narrative, because we can see the deliberations in text messages between Lisa Page and Peter Strzok: See below (note the dates).
Peter Strzok edited the interview notes, several times. Then he handed them off to Lisa Page to edit… and she did…. significantly:
The text message conversation above is February 10th and Feb 14th, 2017.
The Michael Flynn FD-302 was officially entered into the record on February 15th, 2017, per the report:
Obviously the interview took place on January 24th, 2017. The FD-302 was drafted on January 24th, and then later edited, shaped, and ultimately approved by McCabe, on February 14th, then entered into the official record on February 15th.
The FBI notes were a deliberative document from the outset. Thanks to the Strzok/Page text messages we know the cover letter from the Special Counsel is misleading. The Feb 15th, 2017, date was the day after McCabe approved it.
May 17th, 2017, Robert Mueller was assigned as special Counsel. Then, the FD-302 report was re-entered on May 31st, 2017, removing the header; paving the way for Mueller’s team to use the content therein.
The first redaction listed under “personal privacy” is unknown; however, The second related redaction is a specific person, Michael Flynn Jr.
In combination with the October timing, the addition of Flynn Jr to the target list relates to the ongoing 2016/2017 investigation of his father, General Michael Flynn, for: (1) possible conspiracy with Russia; (2) unregistered lobbying (Russia then Turkey); (3) materially false statements/omissions on 2017 FARA documents; and (4) lying to the FBI.
This October 20th, 2017, request from Weissmann and Mueller aligns with the time-frame were special counsel team lawyers Brandon L. Van Grack and Zainab N. Ahmad were prosecuting Michael Flynn and attempting to force him into a guilty plea.
Getting Rosenstein to authorize adding Mike Flynn Jr. to the target list (scope memo) meant the special counsel could threaten General Flynn with the indictment of his son as a co-conspirator tied to the Turkish lobbying issue (which they did) if he doesn’t agree to a plea. Remember: “jointly undertaken activity“.
The October 20th, 2017, expanded scope memo authorized Mueller to start demanding records, phones, electronic devices and other evidence from Mike Flynn Jr, and provided the leverage Weissmann wanted. After all, Mike Flynn Jr. had a four month old baby.
The amount of twisted pressure from this corrupt team of prosecutors is sickening. A month later, General Flynn was signing a plea agreement: