Paul Sperry:
The FBI omitted from its application to spy on Carter Page the fact that Russian spies had dismissed the former Trump campaign adviser as unreliable – or as one put it, an “idiot” – and therefore unworthy of recruiting, according to congressional sources who have seen the unredacted document.
The potentially exculpatory detail was also withheld from three renewals of the wiretap warrant before a special government surveillance court. The warrants issued by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act court allowed the FBI to spy on Page and others he was in contact with for almost a year, the sources also confirmed.
The FBI was aware of Russians’ skepticism that Page knew anything of value or was a significant player because the bureau had recorded them voicing such doubts in a wiretap, from an earlier espionage case involving three Russian spies working undercover for the Kremlin in New York.
The FBI cited that 2013 case, minus the disparagement of Page, in its applications to the FISA court. They have been made public only in redacted form, professing evidence that Page was “recruited” by Russian intelligence and had “coordinated” with the Russian government. But “that’s a mischaracterization of the facts in the case,” a congressional source said.
As first reported by RealClearInvestigations after Page became a central focus of the Trump-Russia investigation, court filings that emerged from the earlier case show the Russian government wasn’t interested in cultivating Page as a spy. Rather, it tried to use him as a source of economic information, but soon “discarded” him as low-value and unreliable.
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Withholding material and exculpatory evidence from the FISA applications may also have violated Page’s Fourth Amendment protections against omissions of material facts that would undermine or negate probable cause to search.
“It is illegal,” said veteran FBI agent Michael Biasello. “The affiant” — the person swearing to the affidavit — “cannot cherry-pick only information favorable to the case.”
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