The long-awaited investigative report from Special Counsel John Durham into the origins of the false Trump-Russia collusion narrative was released on Monday and it was especially damning for those who made up and perpetuated the blatant lies.
Durham's report concluded that the anti-Trump lies originated with 2016 Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton's campaign as a deliberate attempt to distract the public's attention from her own very real scandals involving the use of a private email server for official business, Breitbart reported.
The special counsel also exposed how the FBI and senior members of the Obama administration were well aware ahead of time of what the Clinton campaign planned to do and not only failed to investigate or stop it but actually helped further along the scheme for partisan purposes.
At one point in the 316-page report, Special Counsel Durham noted that "highly significant intelligence" had been received by the FBI from a "trusted foreign source pointing to a Clinton campaign plan to vilify Trump by tying him to Vladimir Putin so as to divert attention from her own concerns relating to her use of a private email server."
However, "Unlike the FBI’s opening of a full investigation of unknown members of the Trump campaign based on raw, uncorroborated information, in this separate matter involving a purported Clinton campaign plan, the FBI never opened any type of inquiry, issued any taskings, employed any analytical personnel, or produced any analytical products in connection with the information."
The report went on to contrast the FBI's non-handling of the tip-off about the Clinton campaign's plan to "vilify" their political opponent with how the FBI had run head-long into a full pursuit of any and all allegations against Trump and his campaign, no matter how baseless or false they appeared to be.
"The speed and manner in which the FBI opened and investigated Crossfire Hurricane during the presidential election season based on raw, unanalyzed, and uncorroborated intelligence also reflected a noticeable departure" from how it had drug its feet and even refused to take action in prior probes involving the former secretary of State.
Yet, Breitbart pointed out that while Durham's report noted that the FBI seemingly refused to follow up on the credible tip about Clinton's deliberate and false anti-Trump scheme, the same could not be said for certain senior officials within the Obama administration.
Indeed, per Durham's report, then-CIA Director John Brennan learned of Clinton's plan and within "days" of the initial tip being received had proceeded to deliver a briefing about the scheme at the White House to the likes of then-President Barack Obama, then-Vice President Joe Biden, then-Attorney General Loretta Lynch, then-FBI Director James Comey, and other senior officials at that time.
Brennan was also exposed for having reached out directly to both Comey and Peter Strzok, who at that time was the Deputy Assistant Director of the FBI’s Counterintelligence Division, and urged them to take action in support of the scheme against Trump, which ultimately became the Crossfire Hurricane investigation.
As for the FBI's utter partisanship in this matter, Fox News reported that Durham's report stated, "Based on the review of Crossfire Hurricane and related intelligence activities, we conclude that the Department and the FBI failed to uphold their mission of strict fidelity to the law in connection with certain events and activities described in this report."
Durham noted that with regard to the false anti-Trump information, "senior FBI personnel displayed a serious lack of analytical rigor towards the information that they received, especially information received from politically-affiliated persons and entities."
"This information in part triggered and sustained Crossfire Hurricane and contributed to the subsequent need for Special Counsel Mueller’s investigation," the report continued. "In particular, there was significant reliance on investigative leads provided or funded (directly or indirectly) by Trump's political opponents."
In the end, "The Department did not adequately examine or question these materials and the motivations of those providing them, even when at about the same time the Director of the FBI and others learned of significant and potentially contrary intelligence" -- such as the tip-off that the Clinton campaign was deliberately making it all up as a distraction from her own troubles ahead of the 2016 election.
