Legislative Blog
J.B. Williams, J.D.
Millian/Danchenko and Others
A Blog about Durham Report
A Bit of Background
The following backgrounds help summarize the author's views on both the general topic: Other and more specifically Durham Report as it relates to that topic.
Brief Summary of Other
Topics here may be related to legal matters but not innately legal. For instance, discussing grocery plastic bags versus cotton cloth bags. The item itself is not legal but many city governments have placed it into legislation.
Summary of Durham Report
The Durham report is the attempt to review what occurred during Crossfire Hurricane. It shows major fails on the part of the FBI to remain non-political and significantly harms their reputation. It makes Watergate look like child's play, even if taken in a light most favorable to the FBI.
Blog Summary
Danchenko lied about talking to Millian and fabricated a telephone call with an anonymous source that he said was Millian. Page had previously been approved as an operational contact for another government agency, yet Crossfire Hurricane neglected to mention it in their Page FISA application or any renewals. Page offered to be interviewed long before the FBI actually interviewed him.
Millian/Danchenko and Others
Published: 2023-08-30
Danchenko/Millian and Others
Millian. Danchenko claimed he met with Millian, but he never did. The 'well-developed conspiracy' between Trump and Russia was entirely based upon a purported anonymous telephone call received by Danchenko by someone Danchenko had never spoken with before. Danchenko did state he reached out to Millian twice via email and never heard back. Odd that this supposedly came from Millian since he was a vocal Trump supporter and this would provide damaging information to a complete stranger. Danchenko, at one point, advised he had multiple calls with Millian. And while Danchenko stated that Millian confirmed the Ritz Carlton information, that would have been impossible because Danchenko stated he didn't speak with someone he thought was Millian until July 2016 and the Ritz Carlton information was contained in a June 2016 report.
Based upon the Office's review of evidence, Danchenko fabricated facts regarding Millian. In fact, Millian left for Asia on June 10, 2016. This as per an email between Millan and Zlodorev when Zlodorev mentioned Danchenko wanted to talk to Millian. Millian did not return to New York until July 27, 2016. He even suspended his cell service on July 14, 2016 and reconnected on August 8, 2016. Emails between Zlodorev and Millan show that Millan had forgotten about Danchenko, and then on August 18, 2016 exchange Zlodorev reminded him. Supposedly this was 2 weeks after Danchenko purported to have received the anonymous call and agreed to meet Millian in New York. Regardless Fusion GPS implicated Millian as a source, stating Millian's connections to Trump. While Fusion GPS had no actual information connecting Trump and Millian, they continued to claim Millian was the contact to Russia. They even tried to tie Millian to Alfa Bank. Claiming at one point that Millian's website was hosted by Alfa, but it was not Alfa Bank but Alfa Telecom, a Lebanese-based telecom company.
From September 2007 to March 2011, Millian was an FBI CHS. He reported on matters concerning Belarus and Russia. On January 17, 2019 the FBI closed Millian case finding no confirmation the he was engaged in activities related to the Russian governments efforts to interfer with the 2016 Presidential election. Even though there were obvious fabrications in the information Danchenko provided to the FBI relating to information supposedly provided by Millian, the information remained in the Page FISA applications through their final renewal in June 2017.
The FBI failed to disclosed to OI that Page had been approved as an operational contact for at least one other government agency from 2008 to 2013. On August 17, 2016 the OGA provided a memorandum to Crossfire Hurricane that advised of this. Then on October 21, 2016, months later, the FBI received approval on their initial FISA application targeting Page, yet never mentioned this fact. It wasn't until June 15, 2017 that Clinesmith would request clarification on Page, and advised that Page may have been a source. OGA liaison provided Clinesmith with a list that included the August 17 memorandum. Clinesmith forwarded this response but only after removing the initial email he'd sent to OGA. An agent was pulling all of the documents on his behalf, while he later advised the FBI OGC Unit Chief that Page was not a source. Since Clinesmith advised he was not a source, then it was not necessary to address it in the FISA renewals. A Supervisory Agent wanted it in writing that Page was not a source, although Clinesmith perhaps a sub-source of a CHS. Clinesmith then went into the email from the OGA liaison and added the words 'not a source'.
There were many omissions and much misleading information found in the Page FISA applications. One particular CHS had been closed in January 2011 for 'displaying an aggressiveness toward handling Agents as a result of what he/she perceived as not enough compensation... and for exhibiting questionable allegiance to the intelligence targets with which CHS maintained contact.' However a case Agent with Crossfire Hurricane reopened the CHS within 2 months, and continued serving as the handling agent. The FBI originally ask CHS about Pappadopoulos, but the CHS was not familiar with him but ask about Carter Page. The CHS did not disclosed that he had sent an email to the Trump Policy Director with his resume and was attempting to seek a position in the Trump administration.
56 Manafort Page - Other CHS Page advised the CHS that he had never met Manafort. In fact Page had sent 2 emails to Manafort, one direct and one copied him. Manafort never replied to any of these. All of which Page disclosed to the CHS. The CHS directly as Page if the Russians had all the emails and Page stated he did not know. Page either implicitly or explicitly denied any relationships with the Russian government. And he never provided the CHS with any information or evidence that connected the Trump campaign and Russia. The closest was when Page said that Trump wanted improved relations between the US and Russia. The CHS tried bringing up the information concerning Pappadopoulos and his statements to the Australian diplomats by alluding to this; but Page did not confirm it. In fact after the Yahoo news article, Page sent a letter to the FBI stating he was willing to be interviewed. Post the Yahoo news article and the FBI's receipt of the first Steele Report, Crossfire Hurricane never attempted to obtain Page's email or phone records to verify or disprove any of the information. The additional recordings from the CHS have Page stating he never met with Sechin as reported and was unfamiliar with Divyekin. Merely interviewing Page would have provided the FBI with the ability to talk directly with Page, ask him direct questions, and if they felt he was not being candid, they could have requested he submit to a voluntary polygraph exam and produce relevant records. When the FBI finally authorized the interview of Page in March 2017, he sat for 5 voluntary interviews and fully cooperated with the FBI, even bringing a PowerPoint presentation to one interview.
57 Page Sechin Other CHS Rather than do this sooner, a Supervisory Special Agent advised Strzok that Page did not deny knowing Sechin and outright denied knowing Divyekin. However, Page denied meeting either which is what the Steele Report stated. But none of this information was included in the FISA application. They also had Page remaining involved with the Trump campaign even after Page told the CHS that he was taking a break from the campaign. Despite Page's explicit denials regarding the Yahoo news article, the FISA application stated the exact opposite. Page did admit to being invited to a Christmas party at the Russian energy companies Gazprom and Rosneft, but said he would not be attending since he had enough investigation due to the Yahoo news article.
58 Pappadopoulos Other CHS This CHS also met with Pappadopoulos. He offered to pay him to write a research paper on oil and energy involving Cyrpus, Turkey, Greece, Russia and Syria. The two then discussed world affairs. Eventually the CHS ask him about additional DNC emails that Russia might have, but Papadopoulos stated the 'Assange has stated that get ready for October. Whatever that means no one knows'. The conversation eventually turned to Page and Papadopoulos stated that Page had never met Trump. And during the conversations Papadopoulos never mentions support from Russia to Trump, even when led in that direction. During a second meeting Papadopoulos says no one with the campaign is reaching out to WikiLeaks or whoever requesting they work with the Trump campaign. He even states that this is illegal activity, stating espionage is treason. There has been no collusion and it's going to remain that way. In the 6 weeks after receipt of the Australian report, this was the most significant information the FBI had; yet they did not disclose this or treat it like it meant the exact opposite of what was being said. There was no change in Papadopoulos tone when he made these statements, and it should have been brought to the attention of the OI attorneys working on the Page FISA applications. These statements were made more than a month prior to the initial Page FISA. All in all the CHS made 23 separate recordings for the FBI, wherein Papadopoulos was challenged with approximately 200 baited statements which elicited approximately 174 clearly exculpatory statements. Indeed Papadopoulos repeatedly denied the he, the Trump campaign, and Russia had any type of cooperative relationship.
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