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Top Mueller investigator's Democratic ties raise new bias questions

Johnson said:
If this Sztork fella really did something that beyond the pale, the scandal would be him NOT being demoted and removed from the investigation would it not? I don't see what your specific problem is. You keep repeating how Sztork wasn't removed for this or that and making assumptions on why he was removed but you haven't drawn a clear line between his demotion and wrongdoing in this investigation.

He acted improperly, he was removed from the investigation. Where's the issue?
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He wasn't just removed from the investigation.
Two things happened to Sztrok. He was fired from Muellers team and he was removed as acting head of the FBIs Counter Intelligence Division and placed in Human rescources.

That is the FBI made went out of their way to remove him from all Counter Intelligence operations. That speaks volumes considering Sztrok headed up the Hillary Email investigation and ran the Trump/ Russia investigation prior to Mueller taking over.

Which one of those has to do with Counter intelligence ?

As for why he's still employed ? If he's accused of dressing up opposition research to look like legitmate intel to obtain a FISA warrant, I would think there would have to be a investigation before any action was taken

Director Wray stated their was a current IG investigation into his actions.

Its worth noting CNN reported back in April that the FBI DID use the dossier to bolster their case for obtaining a FISA warrant, and Congress has requested the FISA application submitted to the Court by the FBI so I suspect we'll know soon enough
https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.cn...-donald-trump-russia-investigation/index.html

If he did dress up a dossier ( opposition research) funded by the Hillary campaign and the DNC to obtain a FISA warrant to spy on the opposition for Political purposes ?

Wow. Im really not sure what would happen. It would be a scandal of epic proportions, it would make Watergate look like a jay-walking ticket and it would implicate more than just him.
It would be a unprecedented abuse of power

A siting adminsitration conspiring with a candidate to use the power and authority of the Federal Govt to run surveillance on the opposition for Political purposes seems far fetched, but this was the Obama administration and this didnt stop at surveillance. These people were also unmasked.

A administration that could go after a American journalist by declaring him a criminal co-conspirator under the 1922 Espionage Act jut so they could hack into his emails and phone records is capable of doing something this corrupt, add in the tarmac meeting theyre capable of just about anything
 
upsideguy said:
Benghazi investigation delivered your desired result: it kept Hillary from winning the White House. Declare victory and move on.

The Whitewater investigation delivered your desired result: it led to the impeachment of Bill Clinton. Declare victory and move on.

The investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election is actually a real issue. While we have had to watch the Cons execute the con-jobs of Whitewater and Benghazi, with critical results unrelated to the original investigation, the very least you Con artists can do is take your medicine. This is is a real issue being prosecuted and all you do is whine. The Cons set the table, man-up and deal with it when those tables are turned.

Live by the sword / die by the sword.
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Hillary kept Hillary from winning the White House.
She was the victim of her own arrogance and stupidty. Benghazi didnt keep her from campaigning in Michigan and Wisconsin prior to the election

Had she not taken the voters in those Blue states for granted, she probably would have won.

As for letting all of this go ? If the Obama FBI used opposition research funded by the DNC and the Hillary campaign to obtain a FISA warrant for the purpose of surveilling and unmasking the opposition for Political purposes, then people need to be held accounable

Its would be a extraordinary abuse of power and Hillary Clinton would be complicit as would others.
 
Johnson said:
Ok, I'm getting tired of this. You just interject these quasi-relevevant one liners and expect every question you ask to be answered to an impossible, unmeetable standard. Even then, whatever answer you're given you just ignore and fire off another one-liner. I have a wild idea, hear me out. How about you take all these one-liners, sew a few together and actually make a point for once? I know, you'll read this, ignore everything I've said and reply with "so you have nothing" and declare yourself victorious. Knock yourself out. But once, just once, instead of sniping in witty little snarks, just MAKE A POINT!
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IOW, you have zero proof.

My point? You have zero proof.
 
On exculpatory evidence (from Wiki):
In Giglio the Supreme Court held that the prosecution's failure to inform the jury that a witness had been promised not to be prosecuted in exchange for his testimony was a failure to fulfill the duty to present all material evidence to the jury, and constituted a violation of due process, requiring a new trial. This is the case even if the failure to disclose was a matter of negligence and not intent. The case extended the Court's holding in Brady v. Maryland, requiring such agreements to be disclosed to defense counsel. "Giglio material" is refers to any information pertaining to deals that witnesses in a criminal case may have entered into with the government.
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Any deals with Flynn is “Giglio material".
Deliberately deceiving the trial court and jury by presenting evidence known to be false had been held to be incompatible with the "rudimentary demands of justice", the Court has had held that the same result occurs "when the State, although not soliciting false evidence, allows it to go uncorrected when it appears." In Brady, the Supreme Court had held that, irrespective of the good faith or bad faith of the prosecution, suppression of material, exculpatory evidence required a new trial.
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Does exculpatory evidence include documented prosecutorial bias?
Aaron Zebley served as Mueller’s chief of staff at the FBI and as a senior counselor in the National Security Division at the Department of Justice, as an assistant U.S. attorney in the National Security and Terrorism Unit in Alexandria, Virginia. He is often referred to in the media as Mueller’s “right-hand man.” He represented Justin Cooper, the IT staffer who personally set up Hillary Clinton’s unsecure server in her Chappaqua home, Fox News’ Tucker Carlson revealed on his show Thursday. Cooper, it so happens, is also the aide who destroyed Clinton’s old BlackBerries with a hammer.

Jeannie Rhee, who was hired by Mueller last summer to work on the probe, was the personal attorney of Ben Rhodes and also represented the Clinton Foundation, Fox News’ Laura Ingraham reported on Wednesday.

The [Justice] department’s Bruce Ohr, a career official, served as associate deputy attorney general at the time of the campaign. That placed him just below the deputy attorney general, Sally Yates, who ran the day-to-day operations of the department. In 2016, Ohr’s office was just steps away from Yates, who was later fired for defying President Trump’s initial travel ban executive order and still later became a prominent anti-Trump voice upon leaving the Justice Department.

Unbeknownst to investigators until recently, Ohr knew Steele and had repeated contacts with Steele when Steele was working on the dossier. Ohr also met after the election with Glenn Simpson, head of Fusion GPS, the opposition research company that was paid by the Clinton campaign to compile the dossier.

Word that Ohr met with Steele and Simpson, first reported by Fox News’ James Rosen and Jake Gibson, was news to some current officials in the Justice Department. Shortly after learning it, they demoted Ohr, taking away his associate deputy attorney general title and moving him full time to another position running the department’s organized crime drug enforcement task forces.
https://spectator.org/did-peter-strzok-present-the-steele-dossier-to-the-fisa-court/
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At what point does an anti-Trump animus in Mueller’s team call into question their prosecution of the law?
We have not yet seen the text messages between Strzok and FBI lawyer Lisa Page, who are said to have had an affair while working together on both the Clinton emails investigation and, for a brief time, Robert Mueller’s special-counsel investigation. But let’s assume he and Ms. Page are liberal Democrats and ardent anti-Trumpers, and that this is reflected in their exchanges, as it has been reported.

Are we now saying that whether a prosecutor or agent is qualified to work on a political-corruption case depends on his or her party affiliation or political convictions?

That would be a terrible mistake. It would do more to intrude politics into law enforcement than remove it. FBI Agent Peter Strzok & Robert Mueller Investigation | National Review
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I would prefer to think the FBI and DOJ employed attorneys and agents whose political views never clouded their professional integrity, but here we have evidence this is not the case. I’ve seen news items scandalously reporting the substantial donations of multiple Mueller team attorneys to Hillary’s campaign. Should we presume attorneys sympathetic to Hillary, who claims she lost to Trump due to his collusion with Russia, can objectively investigate and prosecute Trump and his campaign team’s collusion with Russia?
 
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Fenton said:
Hillary kept Hillary from winning the White House.
She was the victim of her own arrogance and stupidty. Benghazi didnt keep her from campaigning in Michigan and Wisconsin prior to the election

Had she not taken the voters in those Blue states for granted, she probably would have won.

As for letting all of this go ? If the Obama FBI used opposition research funded by the DNC and the Hillary campaign to obtain a FISA warrant for the purpose of surveilling and unmasking the opposition for Political purposes, then people need to be held accounable

Its would be a extraordinary abuse of power and Hillary Clinton would be complicit as would others.
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I notice how you leave out the fact that the Trump campaign was actively trying to obtain what they believed was a dossier Russia had on Clinton throughout the campaign, and were aware of Russia being in possession of stolen government material before anyone else was.

You really don't have to be all that smart to see that what probably has got Trump so hysterical and hell bent to shut these inquiries down, is that he's just guilty and knows it. He was aware of what Russia was doing, was complicit and welcoming of it, and has been trying to cover-up the facts since then.

It's pretty obvious that's what happened to everyone that's not a fanatic of his. Just the facts surrounding how involved Russia was in their campaign, and his constant nervous breakdowns, pretty much give it away.

It's not that difficult to see through really, when you take off the MAGA hat.
 
Fenton said:
He wasn't just removed from the investigation.
Two things happened to Sztrok. He was fired from Muellers team and he was removed as acting head of the FBIs Counter Intelligence Division and placed in Human rescources.

That is the FBI made went out of their way to remove him from all Counter Intelligence operations. That speaks volumes considering Sztrok headed up the Hillary Email investigation and ran the Trump/ Russia investigation prior to Mueller taking over.

Which one of those has to do with Counter intelligence ?

As for why he's still employed ? If he's accused of dressing up opposition research to look like legitmate intel to obtain a FISA warrant, I would think there would have to be a investigation before any action was taken

Director Wray stated their was a current IG investigation into his actions.

Its worth noting CNN reported back in April that the FBI DID use the dossier to bolster their case for obtaining a FISA warrant, and Congress has requested the FISA application submitted to the Court by the FBI so I suspect we'll know soon enough
https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.cn...-donald-trump-russia-investigation/index.html

If he did dress up a dossier ( opposition research) funded by the Hillary campaign and the DNC to obtain a FISA warrant to spy on the opposition for Political purposes ?

Wow. Im really not sure what would happen. It would be a scandal of epic proportions, it would make Watergate look like a jay-walking ticket and it would implicate more than just him.
It would be a unprecedented abuse of power

A siting adminsitration conspiring with a candidate to use the power and authority of the Federal Govt to run surveillance on the opposition for Political purposes seems far fetched, but this was the Obama administration and this didnt stop at surveillance. These people were also unmasked.

A administration that could go after a American journalist by declaring him a criminal co-conspirator under the 1922 Espionage Act jut so they could hack into his emails and phone records is capable of doing something this corrupt, add in the tarmac meeting theyre capable of just about anything
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Congress has asked for the FISA warrant for months now.
It isnt really a difficult problem to resolve. All the president has to do is tell Rosenstein to tell the FBI to hand it over to Congress. The Congressional commitee could have it by Tuesday.

That the order from Trump hasnt occurred should suggest that the warrant request was legitimate.
 
MovingPictures said:
I notice how you leave out the fact that the Trump campaign was actively trying to obtain what they believed was a dossier Russia had on Clinton throughout the campaign, and were aware of Russia being in possession of stolen government material before anyone else was.
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There are no such facts. That fellow who pled guilty had told the Trump campaign he knew somebody who knew somebody who might know where the missing Clinton emails were hidden.
Moreover, there are no facts which indicate that Trump was aware that Russia had stolen government material before anyone else.
 
American said:
It doesn't look good for Mueller to hire someone like that. There are thousands and thousands of lawyers, he can do better,
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The real danger of bias in an investigator is bias in favor of the person under investigation. Looking the other way is easy to do. Even sweeping evidence under the rug can be fairly easy to do. Creating evidence where none exists is very difficult and dangerous to do.
 
Fenton said:
He wasn't just removed from the investigation.
Two things happened to Sztrok. He was fired from Muellers team and he was removed as acting head of the FBIs Counter Intelligence Division and placed in Human rescources.

That is the FBI made went out of their way to remove him from all Counter Intelligence operations. That speaks volumes considering Sztrok headed up the Hillary Email investigation and ran the Trump/ Russia investigation prior to Mueller taking over.

Which one of those has to do with Counter intelligence ?

As for why he's still employed ? If he's accused of dressing up opposition research to look like legitmate intel to obtain a FISA warrant, I would think there would have to be a investigation before any action was taken

Director Wray stated their was a current IG investigation into his actions.

Its worth noting CNN reported back in April that the FBI DID use the dossier to bolster their case for obtaining a FISA warrant, and Congress has requested the FISA application submitted to the Court by the FBI so I suspect we'll know soon enough
https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.cn...-donald-trump-russia-investigation/index.html

If he did dress up a dossier ( opposition research) funded by the Hillary campaign and the DNC to obtain a FISA warrant to spy on the opposition for Political purposes ?

Wow. Im really not sure what would happen. It would be a scandal of epic proportions, it would make Watergate look like a jay-walking ticket and it would implicate more than just him.
It would be a unprecedented abuse of power

A siting adminsitration conspiring with a candidate to use the power and authority of the Federal Govt to run surveillance on the opposition for Political purposes seems far fetched, but this was the Obama administration and this didnt stop at surveillance. These people were also unmasked.

A administration that could go after a American journalist by declaring him a criminal co-conspirator under the 1922 Espionage Act jut so they could hack into his emails and phone records is capable of doing something this corrupt, add in the tarmac meeting theyre capable of just about anything
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Hmm. Political opposition research being used to obtain national intelligence surveillance on a presidential candidate and his campaign.

Anyone else besides me see this as a problem? As a dangerous precedent even?

Yes, Obama weaponized the federal government against its own people, in multiple instances with multiple agencies.
 
Athanasius68 said:
Congress has asked for the FISA warrant for months now.
It isnt really a difficult problem to resolve. All the president has to do is tell Rosenstein to tell the FBI to hand it over to Congress. The Congressional commitee could have it by Tuesday.

That the order from Trump hasnt occurred should suggest that the warrant request was legitimate.
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I wonder if thats true, if the President can just order the FBI to provide documents to a oversight comittee.

Seems like the Democrats on the oversight commitee would scream bloody murder if that happened, that he interfered in the process
 
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Fenton said:
I wonder if thats true, if the President can just order the FBI to provide documents to a oversight comittee.

Seems like the Democrats on the oversight commitee would scream bloody murder if that happened, that he interfered in the process
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The FBI is under the Justice Department which is in the Executive dept. The president is head of the executive department.
They are not independent operators. They answer to the president.

Since the president can a fire an FBI director, i do not see why he cannot order to director to release the document to Congress, or to the public at large.
 
eohrnberger said:
Hmm. Political opposition research being used to obtain national intelligence surveillance on a presidential candidate and his campaign.

Anyone else besides me see this as a problem?
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It is a problem, people are describing this dossier as objective work from a senior western intelligence source, Steele was hired to produce a report that portrayed Trump in a bad light, this is what he delivered; unverifiable, plausible allegations. Hillary then had the dossier peddled to different media sources, which despite their unabashed support for her, found Steele's concocted accounting not credible.

For this dossier, which was dismissed as not credible by a supportive media, to premise the FBI's investigation of collusion with Russia by Trump's campaign is clearly wrong. Arguably, the FBI's greater resources, it's power, authority, and more skilled intelligence analysts could have enabled them to verify Steele's allegations -but we've heard nothing of this.

The dossier raises other serious concerns because despite it being a work commissioned as "opposition research", the FBI subsequently engaged it's author to continue his research, and this could mean the FBI literally fabricated evidence to sustain their request for a warrant to monitor communications by the Trump team. If this is actually what happened, the evidence of Flynn's calls to the Russian ambassador is inadmissible in court.
 
Plus Ultra said:
It is a problem, people are describing this dossier as objective work from a senior western intelligence source, Steele was hired to produce a report that portrayed Trump in a bad light, this is what he delivered; unverifiable, plausible allegations. Hillary then had the dossier peddled to different media sources, which despite their unabashed support for her, found Steele's concocted accounting not credible.

For this dossier, which was dismissed as not credible by a supportive media, to premise the FBI's investigation of collusion with Russia by Trump's campaign is clearly wrong. Arguably, the FBI's greater resources, it's power, authority, and more skilled intelligence analysts could have enabled them to verify Steele's allegations -but we've heard nothing of this.

The dossier raises other serious concerns because despite it being a work commissioned as "opposition research", the FBI subsequently engaged it's author to continue his research, and this could mean the FBI literally fabricated evidence to sustain their request for a warrant to monitor communications by the Trump team. If this is actually what happened, the evidence of Flynn's calls to the Russian ambassador is inadmissible in court.
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Agreed, and thanks for reinforcing the point I was making in my rhetorical question.

The entire process from start to finish and it's end result seems awfully corrupt and disconcerting to me, so. If the FBI believes it needs a FISA warrant on someone, they should at least have factual evidence with which to obtain it with, not some questionable information from questionable sources.

Big black eye for the FBI and the administration of those times.
 
I don't think Mueller is doing as well as the critical left seems to think. In a normal plea-bargain the prosecutor gets an accomplice to plead guilty to the charge being brought against co-conspirators (in this case collusion with the Russians). At the hearing the pleading accomplice acknowledges the conspiracy and lays out enough details to support the prosecutor's case against the co-conspirators. Mueller let Flynn plea to false statements, but Flynn didn't outline any conspiracy to collude.

The FBI had the transcripts of Mueller's conversations with Russian ambassador Sislak, they successfully questioned him about these to get him to somehow describe something different and convinced Flynn this difference was an indictable crime. I suspect Mueller realized Flynn's conversations with Sislak actually were not criminal, we know they did not discuss the US removing sanctions or anything like collusion. Thus Flynn could not be made to cop a plea for conspiring with Russians.

Now Mueller has Manafort, Flynn and Gates guilty of misrepresentations, frauds or maybe money laundering, but nothing related to collusion with the Russians to defeat Hillary. I wonder how long this will go on.
 
AlbqOwl said:
I made no implications of any kind. I made a very simple and easy to understand statement of fact.
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A conspiracy theorist gets called on his bull**** and backs down pretending he didn't make the accusations he made.
That's par for the course.

:shrug:
 
Parrish said:
Mueller et al wouldn't have been called in if the current administration and family had been above-board.
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Lie.

Comey admitted he broke his nda to get his buddy a job.

Comey says he asked a friend to share content of his memo with a reporter because it would prompt special counsel



Comey will be ok regardless. He has a safehouse in russia just waiting for him if it gets too hot around here.

"Russian President Vladimir Putin reportedly said his country is willing to offer former FBI Director James Comey political asylum if he is prosecuted in the U.S. for leaking his memos on his private conversations with President Trump.

According to a translation by RT, a Russian-controlled television network, Putin said Comey's leaks put him "in a vulnerable position." He compared the former FBI director to NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, who currently has asylum in Russia.

Comey, like Snowden, acted as an "activist," Putin said."

 
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