President Trump on Tuesday said he has “fully authorized the total Declassification of any & all documents” related to the Russia investigation and the FBI’s investigation into former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server.

“I have fully authorized the total Declassification of any & all documents pertaining to the single greatest political CRIME in American History, the Russia Hoax. Likewise, the Hillary Clinton Email Scandal. No redactions!” The president tweeted Tuesday night.

Donald J. Trump@realDonaldTrump
I have fully authorized the total Declassification of any & all documents pertaining to the single greatest political CRIME in American History, the Russia Hoax. Likewise, the Hillary Clinton Email Scandal. No redactions!

Paul Sperry@paulsperry_
When all the documents are finally declassified, and all the redactions removed from reports, the nation will see that the FBI and CIA not only knew the Russia “collusion” allegations against Trump were a political dirty trick, but that they were in on the trick.

Donald J. Trump@realDonaldTrump
“All Russia Hoax Scandal information was Declassified by me long ago,” Trump tweeted. “Unfortunately for our Country, people have acted very slowly, especially since it is perhaps the biggest political crime in the history of our Country.”

He added: “Act!!!”

Last year, the president gave Attorney General Bill Barr authority to declassify any documents related to surveillance of the Trump campaign in 2016. Trump, at the time, also ordered members of the intelligence community to cooperate with Barr’s probe.

Allies of the president, including Republicans on Capitol Hill leading their own investigations into the origins of the Trump-Russia probe, have criticized officials like FBI Director Christopher Wray and CIA Director Gina Haspel, claiming that the directors have been blocking the release of documents.

The president’s tweets come after Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe declassified documents that revealed former CIA Director John Brennan briefed former President Obama on Hillary Clinton’s purported “plan” to tie then-candidate Donald Trump to Russia as “a means of distracting the public from her use of a private email server” ahead of the 2016 presidential election.

DNI DECLASSIFIES BRENNAN NOTES, CIA MEMO ON HILLARY CLINTON ‘STIRRING UP’ SCANDAL BETWEEN TRUMP, RUSSIA

Fox News first reported that Ratcliffe declassified Brennan’s handwritten notes – which were taken after he briefed Obama on the intelligence the CIA received – and a CIA memo, which revealed that officials referred the matter to the FBI for potential investigative action.

“Today, at the direction of President Trump, I declassified additional documents relevant to ongoing Congressional oversight and investigative activities,” Ratcliffe said in a statement to Fox News Tuesday.

A source familiar with the documents explained that Brennan’s handwritten notes were taken after briefing Obama on the matter.

“We’re getting additional insight into Russian activities from [REDACTED],” Brennan notes read. “CITE [summarizing] alleged approved by Hillary Clinton a proposal from one of her foreign policy advisers to vilify Donald Trump by stirring up a scandal claiming interference by the Russian security service,” Brennan’s notes read.

The notes state “on 28 of July.” In the margin, Brennan writes “POTUS,” but that section of the notes is redacted.

“Any evidence of collaboration between Trump campaign + Russia,” the notes read.

The remainder of the notes are redacted, except in the margins, which reads: “JC,” “Denis,” and “Susan.”

The notes don’t spell out the full names but “JC” could be referring to then-FBI Director James Comey, “Susan” could refer to National Security Adviser Susan Rice, and “Denis” could refer to then-Obama chief of staff Denis McDonough.

The declassification comes after Ratcliffe, last week, shared newly-declassified information with the Senate Judiciary Committee which revealed that in September 2016, U.S. intelligence officials forwarded an investigative referral on Hillary Clinton purportedly approving “a plan concerning U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump and Russian hackers hampering U.S. elections” in order to distract the public from her email scandal.

That referral was sent to Comey and then-Deputy Assistant Director of Counterintelligence Peter Strzok.

“The following information is provided for the exclusive use of your bureau for background investigative action or lead purposes as appropriate,” the CIA memo to Comey and Strzok stated.

“This memorandum contains sensitive information that could be source revealing. It should be handled with particular attention to compartmentation and need-to-know. To avoid the possible compromise of the source, any investigative action taken in response to the information below should be coordinated in advance with Chief Counterintelligence Mission Center, Legal,” the memo, which was sent to Comey and Strzok, read. “It may not be used in any legal proceeding—including FISA applications—without prior approval…”

“Per FBI verbal request, CIA provides the below examples of information the CROSSFIRE HURRICANE fusion cell has gleaned to date,” the memo continued. ““An exchange [REDACTED] discussing US presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s approval of a plan concerning US presidential candidate Donald Trump and Russian hackers hampering US elections as a means of distracting the public from her use of a private email server.”

The memo is heavily redacted.

Ratcliffe informed the committee last week that the Obama administration obtained Russian intelligence in July 2016 with allegations against Clinton, but cautioned that the intelligence community “does not know the accuracy of this allegation or the text to which the Russian intelligence analysis may reflect exaggeration or fabrication.”

According to Ratcliffe’s letter, the intelligence included the “alleged approval by Hillary Clinton on July 26, 2016, of a proposal from one of her foreign policy advisers to vilify Donald Trump by stirring up a scandal claiming interference by Russian security services.”

Nick Merrill, Clinton’s spokesperson, called the allegations “baseless b———t” last week. A spokesman for Clinton did not immediately respond to Fox News’ request for comment on the declassified documents.

But Ratcliffe, in a statement released after the information was made public, pushed back on the idea he was advancing “Russian disinformation.”

DURHAM ASSUMED PARTS OF HUBER’S CLINTON INVESTIGATION

“To be clear, this is not Russian disinformation and has not been assessed as such by the Intelligence Community,” Ratcliffe said in a statement to Fox News. “I’ll be briefing Congress on the sensitive sources and methods by which it was obtained in the coming days.”

A source familiar with the documents told Fox News on Tuesday that the allegation was “not disinformation.”  “This is not Russian disinformation. Even Brennan knew, or he wouldn’t be briefing the president of the United States on it,” the source said. “There is a high threshold to orally brief the president of the United States and he clearly felt this met that threshold.”

Another source familiar with the documents told Fox News that “this information has been sought by hundreds of congressional requests for legitimate oversight purposes and was withheld for political spite—and the belief that they’d never get caught.”

The source added that the Brennan notes are significant because it is “their own words, written and memorialized in real time.”

Meanwhile, last week, during a hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Comey was asked whether he received an investigative referral on Clinton from 2016, but he said it didn’t “ring any bells.”

“You don’t remember getting an investigatory lead from the intelligence community? Sept. 7, 2016, U.S. intelligence officials forwarded an investigative referral to James Comey and Strzok regarding Clinton’s approval of a plan [about] Trump…as a means of distraction?” Graham asked Comey.

“That doesn’t ring any bells with me,” Comey said.

Graham questioned “how far-fetched is that,” citing the fact that Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee, through law firm Perkins Coie, hired Fusion GPS and ex-British intelligence officer Christopher Steele to author and compile information for the controversial and unverified anti-Trump dossier.The Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee, through law firm Perkins Coie, hired Fusion GPS and ex-British intelligence officer Christopher Steele to author and compile information for the controversial and unverified anti-Trump dossier.

The dossier contains claims about alleged ties between Donald Trump and Russia that served as the basis for Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrants obtained against former Trump campaign aide Carter Page.

Attorney General Bill Barr last year appointed U.S. Attorney of Connecticut John Durham to investigate the origins of the FBI’s Russia probe shortly after special counsel Robert Mueller completed his years-long investigation into whether the campaign colluded with the Russians to influence the 2016 presidential election.

It is unclear whether this information will be considered part of Durham’s investigation, or whether the president’s declassification will affect Durham’s investigation.

Last month, Fox News reported, though, that Durham had assumed aspects of U.S. Attorney John Huber’s investigation into the Clinton Foundation.

A source familiar with Durham’s investigation told Fox News last month that parts of what Huber was investigating in 2017 — involving the Clinton Foundation — have been incorporated in Durham’s investigation.

In November 2017, then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions directed Huber, the U.S. attorney for Utah, and other senior prosecutors to evaluate “certain issues” involving the sale of Uranium One, and other dealings related to the Clinton Foundation. Sessions tapped Huber after requests by congressional Republicans, who had been calling for the appointment of a special counsel to review the matters. Huber was also tasked with reviewing the FBI’s handling of the Clinton email probe, including allegations that the Justice Department and FBI “policies or procedures” were not followed.

It has been unclear, for years, the status of Huber’s investigation, but another source told Fox News Thursday that Huber has faced mounting criticism from the Justice Department and White House over his progress.

It is unclear whether any aspects of the Clinton email investigation were included in Huber’s review.

Brooke Singman is a Politics Reporter for Fox News. Follow her on Twitter at @BrookeSingman.

Source: https://www.foxnews.com/politics/trump-authorizes-declassification-of-all-russia-collusion-hillary-clinton-email-probe-documents

The post Trump authorizes declassification of all Russia collusion, Hillary Clinton email probe documents first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

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Trump told anchor Sean Hannity that his lawyers previously had advised him not to take that dramatic step out of fear that it could be considered obstruction of justice.

“I do, I have plans to declassify and release. I have plans to absolutely release,” Trump said. “I have some very talented people working for me, lawyers, and they really didn’t want me to do it early on. … A lot of people wanted me to do it a long time ago. I’m glad I didn’t do it. We got a great result without having to do it, but we will. One of the reasons that my lawyers didn’t want me to do it, is they said, if I do it, they’ll call it a form of obstruction.”

Trump added: “Frankly, thought it would be better if we held it to the end. But at the right time, we will be absolutely releasing.”

Trump also accused FBI officials of committing “treason” — slamming former FBI Director James Comey as a “terrible guy,” former CIA Director John Brennan as potentially mentally ill, and Democrat House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff as a criminal.

Redacted versions of FISA documents already released have revealed that the FBI extensively relied on documents produced by Christopher Steele, an anti-Trump British ex-spy working for a firm funded by the Hillary Clinton campaign and Democratic National Committee, to surveil Trump aide Carter Page. At least one senior DOJ official had apparent concerns Steele was unreliable, according to text messages exclusively obtained last week by Fox News.

The leaked dossier, and related FBI surveillance, kickstarted a media frenzy on alleged Russia-Trump collusion that ended with a whimper on Sunday, when it was revealed Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s probe concluded finding no evidence of such a conspiracy, despite several offers by Russians to help the Trump campaign. Page was never charged with wrongdoing, and he is currently suing the DNC for defamation.

FOX NEWS EXCLUSIVE: NEWLY REVEALED TEXTS SHOW DOJ OFFICIALS CLASHING WITH FBI OVER ‘BIAS’ OF KEY WARRANT SOURCE

Citing a high-level source, Kentucky GOP Sen. Rand Paul late Wednesday tweeted that anti-Trump ex-CIA Director John Brennan had internally pushed the dossier. Fox News has not independently verified Paul’s source.

“I think Brennan’s a sick person, I really do,” Trump said. “I believe there’s something wrong with him, for him to come out of the CIA and act that way was so disrespectful to the country and to the CIA. He was not considered good at what he did. He was never a respected guy.”

FILE – In this May 23, 2017, file photo, former CIA Director John Brennan testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington, before the House Intelligence Committee Russia Investigation Task Force. President Donald Trump is revoking the security clearance of former Obama administration CIA director Brennan (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais, File) (Photo: AP)

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Brennan was one of the loudest and most virulent voices to trumpet the Russian collusion theory over the past two years, asserting falsely just weeks ago that Mueller was likely planning to indict members of the Trump administration’s family in a scene reminiscent of the “ides of March” and the assassination of Julius Caesar. Trump, who revoked Brennan’s security clearance last year amid concerns Brennan was improperly hinting that he had inside information about ongoing federal probes, called those remarks “horrible” on Wednesday.

Brennan has since acknowledged he was wrong, but has said inaccurately that Mueller merely could not find evidence meeting the high bar needed for a criminal prosecution — when in fact Mueller found no evidence at all that the Trump team responded to Russians’ numerous efforts to involve them in a conspiracy.

“When I said there could be somebody spying on my campaign, it went wild out there,” Trump told Hannity. “They couldn’t believe I could say such a thing. As it turned out, that was small potatoes compared to what went on. … Millions and millions [spent] on the phony dossier, and then they used the dossier to start things. It was a fraud, paid for by Hillary Clinton and the Democrats.”

Just hours earlier Wednesday, Trump made clear he was enthusiastic about the idea of appointing a second special counsel to review the origins of the Russia investigation when it came up during a meeting Tuesday with Republican senators, a source familiar with the discussions told Fox News.

Trump, speaking to Hannity, separately raised doubts about the secretive and mysterious June 27, 2016 Phoenix airport tarmac meeting between Bill Clinton and then-Attorney General Loretta Lynch — which was spotted while Lynch was overseeing the Hillary Clinton email probe.

“I had a lot of planes for a long time. I’ve never stopped the plane on the tarmac to let somebody on the plane,” Trump said. “Bill Clinton said he was there to play golf, but I know the area very well. Arizona. It’s a little warm at that time of year for golf, OK?”

RAND PAUL BOMBSHELL: HIGH-LEVEL SOURCE SAYS BRENNAN PUSHED DISCREDITED ANTI-TRUMP STEELE DOSSIER

In an apparent shot at former Attorney General Jeff Sessions, Trump also told Hannity “this all would not have happened” if Attorney General William Barr had been with his administration from the beginning.

Trump also noted that ratings for several networks that aggressively pushed the Russia narrative have “fallen off” dramatically. MSNBC host Rachel Maddow’s audience of 2.5 million on Monday was 19 percent below her average this year, and it went down further to 2.3 million on Tuesday, according to the Nielsen company.

“If you wrote this as a novel, nobody would buy it; it would be a failure, because it would be too unbelievable,” Trump said. “We’re getting to the bottom of it. This can never, ever happen to a president again. That was a disgrace and an embarrassment to our country. … Hopefully they won’t get away with it.

“We’ll have to see how it all started, but I’m going to leave that to other people, including the attorney general and others, to make that determination,” Trump continued. “Fifty years, 100 years from now — if someone tries the same thing, they have to know the penalty will be very very great if and when they get caught.”

Trump also lashed out at Schiff, D-Calif., who has pushed strongly for investigations into possible Trump-Russia links. “Schiff is a bad guy, he knew he was lying — he’s not a dummy. For a year and a half he would just leak and call up CNN and others. You know, I watch him, so sanctimonious … He knew it was a lie, and he’d get in the back room with his friends in the Democrat Party, and they would laugh like hell. In one way, you could say it’s a crime what he did — he was making statements he knew were false. He’s a disgrace to our country.”

The president insisted the U.S. should have a “great relationship” with Russia and China, but that the “fake news” and “nonsense” distorted his intentions into something more sinister.

FILE – In this March 22, 2018 photo, Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., then ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, exits a secure area to speak to reporters, on Capitol Hill in Washington. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

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Trump also criticized Comey, whom he’d fired in 2017, as a “terrible guy.” He insisted he did not fire him to obstruct justice, telling Hannity he knew that firing Comey would only increase scrutiny on the White House.

“It was treason, it was really treason,” Trump said, referring to texts between former FBI Special Agent Peter Strzok and former FBI lawyer Lisa Page that discussed an “insurance policy” in the event of Trump’s election.

“You had dirty cops, you had people who are bad FBI folks … At the top, they were not clean, to put it mildly.” He said later, “We can never allow these treasonous acts to happen to another president.”

“I do, I have plans to declassify and release.”

— President Trump

Separately, Trump also said he hopes Democrats continue pushing the Green New Deal, which flamed out in a test vote on Tuesday, as most Democrats voted “present” instead of going on record supporting the sweeping transformation of the entire U.S. economy.

“I don’t want to speak badly about the New Green Deal, frankly, because I’m afraid they will stop using it,” Trump said. “I really do want to campaign against it. It’s ridiculous.”

Trump’s interview came as multiple GOP lawmakers have claimed the president may have somewhat undercut perhaps the best week of his presidency by backing the complete overturn of ObamaCare.

On Monday, the Justice Department asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in New Orleans to affirm last year’s ruling by a Texas federal judge stating that the Affordable Care Act was no longer constitutional because the 2017 tax reform legislation eliminated the health care law’s penalty for not having health insurance.

Multiple congressional Republicans told Fox News they were bothered by the timing of the Trump administration’s intervention in the matter, which came on the heels of the Mueller report findings, the House sustaining the president’s veto of a bill to halt the national emergency for the border wall and a Senate vote that shined a spotlight on what conservatives described as problems with the Green New Deal, championed by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y.

Trump, despite the pushback, vowed that Republicans would soon be the “party of great health care.”

Fox News’ Catherine Herridge contributed to this report.

Source: https://www.foxnews.com/politics/trump-vows-to-release-fisa-docs-now-that-mueller-probe-is-concluded-slams-treasonous-fbi

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“I’m with our agencies, especially as currently constituted with their leadership,” Trump said at a joint news conference with President Tran Dai Quang of Vietnam, giving a rare (and grudging) endorsement to the idea that the Russians sought to interfere with last year’s presidential vote.

Trump spoke the morning after causing a stir when he suggested to reporters that he believed Putin’s denials more than the conclusions of U.S. intelligence officials that Russia did in fact intervene in the election via hacked emails and fake news postings on social media.

That interference is the subject of an investigation by Special Counsel Robert Mueller and various congressional committees. They are also looking at possible links between Russians and Trump campaign associates, claims the president vehemently denies.

“I think that he is very, very strong in the fact that he didn’t do it,” Trump said hours before his news conference, going on to trash former CIA Director John Brennan, former National Intelligence Director James Clapper and ex-FBI Director James Comey, all of whom served during the Barack Obama administration.

More: Trump insults ‘short and fat’ (and nuclear-armed) Kim Jong Un

More: Trump tells APEC summit: ‘I am always going to put America first’

“They’re political hacks,” Trump said. “I mean, you have Brennan, you have Clapper, and you have Comey. Comey is proven now to be a liar and he’s proven to be a leaker.”

Trump’s dismissal of Comey back in May is the subject of an obstruction of justice investigation by Mueller’s office; Comey has said he believes he was fired over his role supervising the Russia investigation.

In defending Putin, Trump said on Air Force One: “Every time he sees me he says ‘I didn’t do that’ and I really believe that when he tells me that, he means it. But he says ‘I didn’t do that.’ I think he is very insulted by it, which is not a good thing for our country.”

Asked to clarify at the Hanoi news conference, Trump said of Putin: “I believe he believes that, and that’s very important for somebody to believe. I believe that he feels that he and Russia did not meddle in the election.”

Sunday’s news conference followed Trump’s meetings with President Tran Dai Quang of Vietnam.

Trump also met with other Vietnamese leaders, Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc and Communist Party Secretary General Nguyen Phu Trong.

Later in the day, Trump heads to the Philippines for another Asia economic summit. He begins by attending a dinner to mark the 50th anniversary of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).

The  Hanoi stop followed Trump’s attendance at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit, part of an Asia trip that has also included visits to Japan, South Korea, and China.

As he did at other stops, Trump protested that too many countries — presumably including Vietnam — take advantage of the United States on trade rules. Vietnam was to have been part of the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership, but Trump withdrew the United States from the dozen-nation Pacific Rim trade deal.

Also as in other countries, Trump asked Vietnam to buy more American goods.

In his meetings with Vietnamese leaders, Trump also said he would work to help resolve disputes over China’s military expansion into the  South China Sea.

“I am a very good mediator and a very good arbitrator,” he told his Vietnamese counterpart.

But Trump’s comments about Putin — whom he met on the sidelines of the APEC summit — overshadowed Asia news and drew criticism across the political spectrum.

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., a frequent antagonist of Trump, invoked the president’s campaign slogan in criticizing the comments on Putin: “There’s nothing ‘America First’ about taking the word of a KGB colonel over that of the American intelligence community.”

Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said Trump “fools no one. He understands that the Russians intervened through the hacking and dumping of his opponent’s emails, the fruits of which he exploited time and again on the campaign trail.”

Defending his views at the Hanoi news conference, Trump said he wants to get along with Russia so that it can help with challenges like the Middle East and North Korea’s nuclear weapons program. “Getting along with other nations is a good thing, not a bad thing,” Trump said.

Some U.S. lawmakers said Putin doesn’t want to help the U.S. McCain, for example, protested the Syria statement that Putin and Trump put together over the weekend.

Saying Russia only wants to prop up the “murderous” Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad, McCain said: “Vladimir Putin does not have America’s interests at heart. To believe otherwise is not only naive but also places our national security at risk.”

Source: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2017/11/11/trump-says-he-believes-intelligence-assessment-russia-interfered-eleelect-reeddnent-mcne-kintinettid/855783001/

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