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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsHow a dubious Russian document influenced the FBIs handling of the Clinton probe
By Karoun Demirjian and Devlin Barrett May 24 at 3:02 PM
In the midst of the 2016 presidential primary season, the FBI received a purported Russian intelligence document describing a tacit understanding between the campaign of Hillary Clinton and the Justice Department over the inquiry into whether she intentionally revealed classified information through her use of a private email server.
The Russian document mentioned a supposed email describing how then-Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch had privately assured someone in the Clinton campaign that the email investigation would not push too deeply into the matter a conversation that if made public would cast doubt on the inquirys integrity.
Current and former officials have said that document played a significant role in the July decision by then-FBI Director James B. Comey to announce on his own, without Justice Department involvement, that the investigation was over. That public announcement in which he criticized Clinton and made extensive comments about the evidence set in motion a chain of other FBI moves that Democrats now say helped Trump win the presidential election. But according to the FBIs own assessment, the document was bad intelligence and according to people familiar with its contents, possibly even a fake sent to confuse the bureau. The Americans mentioned in the Russian document insist they do not know each other, do not speak to each other and never had any conversations remotely like the ones described in the document. Investigators have long doubted its veracity, and by August the FBI had concluded it was unreliable.
The document, obtained by the FBI, was a piece of purported analysis by Russian intelligence, the people said. It referred to an email supposedly written by the then-chair of the Democratic National Committee, Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.), and sent to Leonard Benardo, an official with the Open Society Foundations, an organization founded by billionaire George Soros and dedicated to promoting democracy. The Russian document did not contain a copy of the email, but it described some of the contents of the purported message.
In the supposed email, Wasserman Schultz claimed Lynch had been in private communication with a senior Clinton campaign staffer named Amanda Renteria during the campaign. The document indicated Lynch had told Renteria that she would not let the FBI investigation into Clinton go too far, according to people familiar with it.
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https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/how-a-dubious-russian-document-influenced-the-fbis-handling-of-the-clinton-probe/2017/05/24/f375c07c-3a95-11e7-9e48-c4f199710b69_story.html?utm_term=.8fee0e1f2221
emulatorloo
(43,982 posts)Very disturbing to hear about this deliberate piece of Russia disinformation was briefly treated as if it were real Intel.
MelissaB
(16,420 posts)Wellstone ruled
(34,661 posts)suspected . There was a report by one of the Techy Guru's talking about how the Russian Hackers placed altered e-mails in DNC and other agency files.
Gowdy and others are going to pay dearly for this use of fake E-Mails as evidence. Here you go DNC,what more do you need?
dalton99a
(81,073 posts)uponit7771
(90,225 posts)procon
(15,805 posts)have ever imagined in their fever dreams .. what an amazing *cough-cough* coincidence, yeah?