Sunday, April 21, 2019

14 ANGRY DEMOCRATS INDEED: How Could a 400-Page Report About Russian Collusion Fail to Mention Fusion GPS?

Aside from the five critical questions I posed for Robert Mueller yesterday, there is a stunning omission in the Special Counsel report that simply must be highlighted.

To put this omission into perspective, consider that Michael Cohen is mentioned in the report 877 times, Paul Manafort 624 times, Carter Page 31 times and Christopher Steele 24 times.

"Steele reporting" (the Mueller term for the Russian "Dossier") is mentioned a scant nine times, yet it played -- according to former-FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe -- a central role in the initiation of FISA surveillance against the Trump campaign.

Underscoring the egregious, partisan nature of the Mueller report is the fact that nowhere does the massive document touch upon the role of Fusion GPS. Instead there is a single, oblique reference to "the firm that produced the Steele reporting":

Before the President’s flight home from the G20 landed, the New York Times published its story about the June 9, 2016 meeting. In addition to the statement from Trump Jr., the Times story also quoted a statement from Corallo on behalf of the President’s legal team suggesting that the meeting might have been a setup by individuals working with the firm that produced the Steele reporting.
Somehow, the Mueller team failed to pursue the setup allegations, even though substantial reporting about the curious nature of the meeting had occurred in the summer of 2018 by the likes of Lee Smith (emphases mine):

[Fusion GPS founder Glenn] Simpson also testified that he had no knowledge of the meeting with Donald Trump Jr. and others until it was reported a year later. There is reason to doubt that account.

In fact, the Russian lawyer at the center of the meeting, Natalia Veselnitskaya, was his client.

She has publicly stated that she used talking points developed by Simpson for the Russian government in that discussion... In addition, Simpson has testified that he had dinner with Veselnitskaya the night before the meeting and the night after.
Amazingly, the Special Counsel chose not to pursue any angle related to Fusion GPS, going so far as to keep the name of the firm out of the report altogether.

This convenience permitted Mueller and his "14 angry Democrats" to avoid mention of the ultimate source of funding for the "Dossier" -- the Hillary Clinton campaign and the Democrat National Committee -- as well as the name of the law firm (Perkins Coie) that acted as the cutout.

The Conservative Treehouse asserts, and it's hard not to disagree, that Mueller may never testify before Congress. Because (as the invaluable Mark Levin has noted) his report is less a legal document than it is a 400-page New York Times op-ed.

The Special Counsel's kid-glove treatment of Fusion GPS makes the partisanship of the report eminently obvious.

For the ultimate Spygate Reference, please see The Timeline of Treason.

No comments: