“Oh, what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive!” the poet once proclaimed, and it certainly appears to be the case with Democrat Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign.
Former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe, who previously served as a federal prosecutor, told special counsel John Durham he believed he had passed on “enough evidence” to support the indictments of “multiple people” in relation to the origins of the Russia probe that targeted former President Donald Trump, Fox News reported Monday.
The outlet said that “sources pointed to one key piece of declassified intelligence revealing that intelligence community officials within the CIA 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 as a means of distracting the public from her use of a private email server.'”
You’ll recall one of the top issues shaping the race between Clinton and Trump was her failure to turn over tens of thousands of work emails, as required by law, when she left office as secretary of state in 2013.
Further, Clinton had conducted her work correspondence on a private, unsecured server, meaning highly sensitive information was open to hacking.
At first, the Democrat assured reporters that the deleted emails on her server were personal in nature, regarding yoga and such, and contained no classified material.
Then we learned the emails were work-related and some of them were classified.
Clinton next insisted none of the emails was classified at the time they were sent or marked that way.
These statements also proved to be false.
Then-FBI Director James Comey announced in July 2016 his agency would not be making a criminal referral because it could not establish Clinton’s intent to mishandle classified information.
Comey pointed out that it is also a crime, regardless of intent, to mishandle such material in a “grossly negligent way,” but nonetheless he gave Clinton a pass.
The former secretary of state wasn’t going to jail, but the whole affair left many voters with questions about Clinton’s integrity.
According to a Friday court filing by Durham, the Clinton campaign hatched a plot to infiltrate computer servers at Trump Tower and later the White House in order to establish an “inference” and “narrative” linking Trump to Russia, Fox News reported.
Here, in four tweets, are all 13 pages of John Durham’s new finding that is getting a lot of attention: pic.twitter.com/BUArrsbhGp
— Byron York (@ByronYork) February 13, 2022
That information was then passed on to the FBI by Perkins Coie law firm attorney Michael Sussmann, according to Durham.
“The Special Counsel’s Office has identified no support for these allegations” of wrongdoing by Trump, Durham noted in the court filing.
A tech executive brought in to conduct the server infiltration “indicated that he was seeking to please certain ‘VIPs,’ referring to individuals at Law Firm-1 and the Clinton campaign.”
Was one of these VIPs Hillary Clinton?
She tweeted at least twice in support of the false narratives in late October 2016 as she tried to smear Trump just days before the election.
“Computer scientists have apparently uncovered a covert server linking the Trump Organization to a Russian-based bank,” Clinton wrote.
Computer scientists have apparently uncovered a covert server linking the Trump Organization to a Russian-based bank. pic.twitter.com/8f8n9xMzUU
— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) November 1, 2016
Then-Clinton campaign senior policy adviser Jake Sullivan — now President Joe Biden’s national security advisor — elaborated on that in a statement that the candidate included in her tweet.
“This could be the most direct link yet between Donald Trump and Moscow,” Sullivan said. “Computer scientists have uncovered a covert server linking the Trump Organization to a Russian-based bank.”
He added that the “secret hotline may be the key to unlocking the mystery of Trump’s ties to Russia.”
“This line of communication may help explain Trump’s bizarre adoration of Vladimir Putin and endorsement of so many pro-Kremlin positions throughout this campaign,” Sullivan said. “It raises even more troubling questions in light of Russia’s masterminding of hacking efforts that are clearly intended to hurt Hillary Clinton’s campaign.”
He concluded, “We can only assume federal authorities will now explore this direct connection between Trump and Russia as part of their existing probe into Russia’s meddling in our elections.”
It’s time for Trump to answer serious questions about his ties to Russia. https://t.co/D8oSmyVAR4 pic.twitter.com/07dRyEmPjX
— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) October 31, 2016
So Clinton and Sullivan were active participants in plugging the fake “Russia, Russia, Russia” narrative that cast a shadow over the first two years of Trump’s presidency but was ultimately debunked by special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation.
In November, Kash Patel — a former federal prosecutor who also served as senior counsel for the House Intelligence Committee under former committee chairman and GOP Rep. Devin Nunes — suggested that Sullivan could be the next to be indicted by Durham.
Patel recounted to Fox News that he deposed Sullivan as part of the committee’s investigation.
“He testified under oath to Congress that he had no idea what the Perkins Coie lawyer Sussmann was saying, yet the Durham indictment shows communications between Jake Sullivan, the current national security advisor, and Michael Sussmann about the Russiagate hoax,” he said.
“So either he lied to Congress or he’s lying in the indictment.”
High level non political sources telling me that the Durham investigation has a lot of names being looked at…”two names to keep an eye on…Jake Sullivan and…… Colin Kahl….. both being looked at very closely…both of em nose deep.”
— Adam Housley (@adamhousley) February 14, 2022
Former Perkins Coie attorney Marc Elias, who worked for the 2016 Clinton campaign, might be another person Durham is investigating.
Durham’s Sussmann indictment last fall said an unnamed Clinton campaign lawyer (reportedly Elias) exchanged emails in mid-September 2016 with the candidate’s campaign manager, its communications director and Sullivan explaining that Sussmann had shared the Russian bank allegations with a reporter.
The Friday filing by Durham further revealed that Sussmann and a tech executive met in 2016 and communicated with another law partner, who was serving as general counsel to the Clinton campaign, about the plot against Trump.
Sources told Fox News that lawyer was Elias.
Durham has indicted three people so far in his probe: Sussmann, former FBI attorney Kevin Clinesmith and Democratic operative Igor Danchenko.
Who will be next? Could it be Sullivan, Elias or perhaps even Clinton herself?
Time will tell.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
