MASSIVE: The bogus ‘Trump dossier’ funded by Hillary’s campaign WAS used to obtain fraudulent FISA warrant to SPY on TEAM TRUMP
(National Sentinel) Politicized: Members of the Obama Justice Department and FBI enforcement apparatus used a 35-page opposition research document paid for in part by Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton to obtain a counterintelligence surveillance warrant so they could spy on President Donald J. Trump’s campaign.
The so-called “Trump dossier,” commissioned by Washington, D.C.-based firm Fusion GPS and also paid for in part by the Democratic National Committee, contained highly charged allegations of Team Trump “collusion” with the Russian government during the election, but have yet to be publicly verified by the FBI or Justice Department — meaning use of the document to obtain a warrant from the secretive FISA court was done so under false pretenses.
As reported exclusively by investigative correspondent Sara Carter of Circa News, “The unverified dossier alleging connections between President Trump’s campaign and the Russians was used as evidence by the FBI to gain approval from a secret court to monitor members of Trump’s team.”
Much of the so-called ‘evidence’ contained in the dossier was gathered by former British spy Christopher Steele has either been discounted outright or is still unsubstantiated.
Nevertheless, Carter reported, the FBI under Obama “gained approval…to surveil members of Trump’s campaign and ‘it’s outrageous and clearly should be thoroughly investigated,’ said a senior law enforcement source, with knowledge of the process.”
Carter said multiple sources told her that the dossier was used, along with other evidence, to obtain the warrant from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, or FISC.
Sources also stressed to her that in the coming week more information regarding systemic “FISA abuse” will be forthcoming.
Federal judges who serve on the FISA court meet in secret. They serve single seven year terms and do not have to have any particular knowledge of the U.S. Intelligence Community or intelligence functions. Their only ‘client’ is the U.S. government. They seldom turn down government agency requests for counterintelligence surveillance warrants because they don’t want to be seen as impediments to legitimate intelligence collection.
“(The dossier) certainly played a role in obtaining the warrant,” added another senior U.S. official, with knowledge of the dossier. “Congress needs to look at the FBI officials who were handling this case and see what, if anything, was verified in the dossier. I think an important question is whether the FBI payed anything to the source for the dossier.”
Carter said that on Wednesday, Fox News host Sean Hannity said that he has also independently verified that the dossier was improperly used to obtain the FISA surveillance warrant from three separate sources.
On Monday, The Daily Caller reported that the House Intelligence Committee had finally received all of the documents it subpoenaed last August pertaining to the Trump dossier from the FBI and Department of Justice.
In October, the Washington Post reported that Clinton and the DNC paid for a large portion of the dossier, which was initially opposition research but somewhere along the way became an ‘intelligence document.’
Fred Fleitz, vice president for Policy and Programs told One America News Network‘s Liz Wheeler in November that the dossier was something other than what has been portrayed.
“This was a foreign intelligence officer paid by the Democrats to work with the Russians to prepare a dossier to smear a presidential candidate from the other party,” he said, in reference to Steele.
“This is not ‘opposition research,’ and if they somehow got the FBI involved into investigating members of the other party…Liz, think what would have happened if Trump had did this,” Fleitz said.
Some have said if the FBI relied on the phony dossier to obtain a FISA warrant, that could have negative implications for special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation of Trump-Russia collusion.
In July last year, the Washington Times reported that some Democrats widely circulated the dossier on Capitol Hill.
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