Attorney General William Barr
It's been called nothing less than an alleged "coup." The investigation and all its machinations was either to ensure the election of former presidential candidate Hillary Clinton or remove a duly elected president.
The mountains of evidence uncovered over the past two years all point in this direction but so many questions are still left unanswered.
Despite to years of grueling investigations, it is only the beginning. Moreover, the American people deserve full transparency into what actually occurred, who was behind the operation against Trump and how high up the chain of command did this go?
"Everyone will soon be able to read it," said AG Barr.Barr's decision to make Mueller's report public was the end of one investigation and the beginning of the next. He announced in a letter sent Friday afternoon to the Senate and House Judiciary chairmen, "our progress is such that I anticipate we will be in a position to release the report by mid-April, if not sooner."
"Everyone will soon be able to read it," said Barr, who added that the White House would not be reviewing the report before the release.
Members of Mueller's Special Counsel, along with other law enforcement officials, are combing through the report for sensitive or classified information that will be redacted before the release, said Barr. Secret grand jury testimony testimony will be removed from the 400 page report, he added.
Barr said he planned to testify on Capitol Hill in early May, shortly after the report's release, to discuss it with lawmakers.
One Investigation Ends, The Other Investigation Starts
More and more analysts, senior lawmakers and those who were targeted by the investigation have called it a 'coup.'
I have used those very word since early last year when more evidence became available through testimony given to lawmakers by senior FBI and DOJ officials that revealed the extent of malicious and bias behavior to remove Trump from office.
The DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz is still investigating the FBI's handling of the Russia probe and it is expected to be released sometime this year. Horowitz's investigation has been ongoing since last year and some U.S. lawmakers expect that he will be done with his investigation before summer.
The bulk of evidence to support the accusation of a 'coup' is reflected by the actions of some very senior Obama Administration officials who knowingly propagated lies in the media based on a fictitious dossier. It was compiled by former British spy Christopher Steele, who worked for research firm Fusion GPS, which was paid for by the DNC and the Hillary Clinton campaign to investigate Trump's alleged ties to Russia. Steele also relied on disinformation provided by former and current Russian FSB officers and never bothered to verify if it was accurate.
Those senior officials didn't stop there. In their own words they also pushed those lies through national media outlets and in publications over the past two years. Those media outlets assisted in spreading those lies. Why? Because these institutions had relied for years on these same senior Obama Administration officials for stories and most of these liberal media outlets supported the Democratic party.
This abuse of power must be fully investigated and it is no small charge. The insurmountable evidence uncovered over the last several years reflects that there was a silent "coup" by those in power, who weaponized the intelligence community to fix an election and then attempt to remove a sitting president.
Who are they? And who should be investigated?
Democrats like Rep. Eric Swalwell, Adam Schiff, Jerrold Nadler, Nancy Pelosi, Maxine Waters, among others, all hyped the claim over the past two years that Trump conspired with Russia. These politicians, however, were not the ones directly behind this insidious disinformation campaign. In fact, they were tools, like the media, who were used by those who instigated the plan to investigate Trump. These journalists and pundits clung to the coat tails of senior Obama Administration officials who spread the alleged conspiracy theories with their help.
Who should be questioned:
For one, President Barack Obama and his senior advisors. He received a Presidential Daily Briefing (everyday), known as the PDB, from top intelligence officials throughout his eight year tenure. More often than not, however, Obama elected not to receive the briefings but "there's no way the FBI opened an investigation into the Trump campaign without Obama being aware," said one senior law enforcement official with knowledge.
The Hill's John Solomon and I made this argument on Mark Levin's Life Liberty and Levin on Fox News, which will air this Sunday at 10 p.m. EST. We began our investigation into the FBI's handling of the Trump probe more than two years ago, however, then we never imagined the enormity of the alleged crimes.
It started with our investigation into former Deputy Director Andrew McCabe and the National Security Agency's illegal surveillance of Americans. The illegal surveillance involved more than 5 percent of NSA searches of databases derived from "upstream" collection of Internet communications. We also reported on the extraordinary increase in the unmasking of Americans.
These intelligence tools appeared to have been used in the investigation into Trump's campaign alleged collusion with Russia and the players were all the same.
Who would know these answers: Obama's senior advisor Valerie Jarrett, National Security Advisor Susan Rice and former Deputy National Security Advisor Ben Rhodes to start.
Other senior Obama officials that must be investigated: CIA Director John Brennan, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, DOJ Attorney General Loretta Lynch, DOJ Official Sally Yates, U.N. Ambassador Samantha Powers, FBI Director James Comey would have had knowledge to help guide the operation and appear to be directly vested in what happened.
Did Brennan push for the unverified dossier?
Just this week, Sen. Rand Paul revealed that a high-level source told him "it was Brennan who insisted that the unverified and fake Steele dossier be included in the intelligence report" that was briefed to both Obama and President-elect Trump in January, 2017.
"Brennan should be asked to testify under oath to Congress ASAP," Paul said.
Paul is absolutely right. Brennan, whose security clearance was pulled by Trump, should be brought to testify. He has spread malicious lies about the administration and Trump. He has also gone as far as calling Trump a "traitor" and a "charlatan."
The Salacious and Unverified Dossier
The dossier was based on intelligence from a former foreign spy and a good chunk of it was given to the FBI on July 5, when agents traveled to London to meet with Steele.
Several former senior intelligence officials with knowledge of overseas operations told this reporter that CIA officials stationed in London would have been well aware that Steele was passing information to the FBI.
"There is no way the agency wouldn't have known in London that the FBI was picking up information regarding a presidential candidate," said a former senior intelligence official. "Brennan would've been apprised of this - that much you can count on."
When did this investigation begin and what did they know about its inception?
Barr noted in his summary of Mueller's report "the Special Counsel's investigation did not find that the Trump campaign or anyone associated with it conspired or coordinated with Russia in its efforts to influence the 2016 U.S. presidential election."
The summary, however, wasn't enough for Democrats or those peddling Russia collusion theories. They demanded this week the entire report be declassified and made public. On cable news networks and in publications these 'collusion believers' stated they don't want to take Barr's word for it and have now shown doubt in Mueller, whom they previously touted as above reproach.
It is a silly demand since they were never up against any opposition.
Trump also stated that he wants the full report to be made public. And the House passed a full resolution earlier this month, 420 to 0, to make the investigation's findings public.
This is the beginning of full transparency. He also promised to declassify hundreds of pages of documents that former Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee Devin Nunes, R-CA, has been requesting for more than a year.
Trump told at Fox New's Sean Hannity in an exclusive interview last week that he will declassify the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Application warrant on former Trump campaign foreign advisor Carter Page.
Congressional investigators and senior lawmakers have told this reporter that the information in the FISA document will reveal the FBI and DOJ committed criminal actions in acquiring the warrant to surveil Page's communications.
"It will reveal the extraordinary malfeasance that occurred during the FBI's investigation into the Trump campaign," said a congressional source, with knowledge of the documents.
"Laws were broken," said a congressional official. "There needs to be a full investigation."
The Final Chapter
As the final chapters of this book are written the details of how some former senior Obama officials, FBI and DOJ conspired to remove a president of the United States will be revealed only if Barr, Horowitz and Congress do their job.
They must. There is no room for error. This egregious abuse of power must not be swept away. It must be fully investigated in order to restore the nation's faith in the CIA, FBI, DOJ and NSA.
The scales of justice must be balanced. And the institutions meant to protect the populace against foreign enemies must not ever again be used against the American people.
This will be the legacy of Barr's DOJ, only if he has the courage and integrity to see it through. I believe he does.
The collusion hoax fell apart July 2017 ... so RR and Mueller cooked up a new scope for the investigation