The original requests to declassify the Carter Page FISA application came in January 2018 as a result of the Nunes memo. A classified and heavily redacted version of the application was released July 21st, 2018. A month later, in August 2018, Congress again requested the Trump administration to declassify the document(s).
In September 2018 DAG Rod Rosenstein told the President if he followed through with the request Special Counsel Mueller would consider that an obstruction of his investigation:

As a consequence of the Rosenstein threat President Trump reversed course (tweets above) and announced after Horowitz completed his investigation the FISA would be declassified and released.
The mid-term elections were held in November 2018; democrats took over the House.
In March 2019, after the Special Counsel finished his investigation, a now minority in congress again formally asked President Trump (3rd time) to declassify the FISA application.
On May 23rd, 2019, President Trump announced he was giving Attorney General Bill Barr the authority to declassify the FISA application, timed to support the IG investigation:
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President Trump hosts a press availability prior to a bilateral meeting with President Abdo Benitez of Paraguay. [Video and Transcript Below]
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[Transcript] – PRESIDENT TRUMP: Well, thank you very much. It’s great to have the President of Paraguay here. We’re doing a lot of work with Paraguay on terrorism, on drugs, on trade — a lot of different things. And we’ve had a great relationship. So, Mr. President, it’s an honor to have you. Thank you very much.
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Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell appears on Fox News to discuss the upcoming impeachment trial and the processes within the Senate that will be followed.
McConnell states he will be working closely with White House counsel and the President’s lawyers. The Senate Leader said “there’s no chance the President is removed from office”.
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[Sidebar (somewhat): I find it to be interesting timing for this interview… U.S-China trade agreement, phase-one, announced today and Senator McConnell comes out in full-throated defense of presidency. Perhaps just a coincidence.]
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There are several dozen critical issues that stem from revelations about the DOJ and FBI conduct in/around the Carter Page FISA application (2017) and Steele Dossier writ large; but DOJ official Bruce Ohr still being employed isn’t one of them, and here’s why.
What exactly would Bruce Ohr be held accountable for?
What Mr. Ohr did wrong was back-channel information from dossier author Christopher Steele into the FBI; made worse because this is after Chris Steele was persona non grata; and done by Ohr without telling his bosses at Main Justice. Obviously, not good.
However, considering the time-frames of the FD-302 reports written by Ohr’s handler FBI agent Joseph Pientka, Bruce Ohr was channeling information into the Crossfire Hurricane team in 2017. That same FBI team became the Mueller investigation FBI team, and from the 302 notes we know Ohr was channeling information from Christopher Steele into the Mueller team after the administrations’ changed. Again, not good, but…
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Representative Jim Jordan recaps the history of the investigative targeting of President Trump and the malicious partisan political impeachment. “They don’t like us”… “that’s why they want to get rid of us”… “that’s why they want to weaponize the government”…
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You know why the entire apparatus is united against President Trump. You know why the corrupt Wall Street financial apparatus is united against President Trump. You know why every institutional department, every lobbyist, every K-Street dweller, every career legislative member, staffer, and the various downstream economic benefactors, including the corporate media, all of it – all the above, are united against Donald Trump.
Donald Trump is an existential threat to the existence of a corrupt DC system we have exposed to his disinfecting sunlight. Donald Trump is the existential threat to every entity who benefits from that corrupt and vile system.
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Senate Judiciary Chairman Lindsey Graham appears on Fox News with Sean Hannity to receive attaboys for his efforts and discuss his views on IG Horowitz testimony.
Chairman Graham notes he would like to hear from current FBI Director Christopher Wray and former Deputy AG Rod Rosenstein…
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Tonight the House Judiciary Committee is urgently rushing to debate articles of impeachment against President Trump. The hearing begins at 7:00pm ET.
♦Article One is “Abuse of power” – and structured on a false premise that President Trump “exercised the powers of his public office to obtain an improper personal benefit, while ignoring or injuring the national interest.”
♦Article Two is “Obstruction of Congress” – and structured on a ridiculous premise that President Trump “engaged in unprecedented, categorical, and indiscriminate defiance of the impeachment inquiry”, by challenging congressional subpoenas and seeking relief from the judicial branch.
Fox Business Livestream – CBSN Livestream Link – CSPAN Livestream
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I’m not going to write a long history of the background again {Go Deep}. However, to be fair, if we are going to hold Barr accountable it is appropriate to be thankful when at least one aspect of a gross injustice has been addressed.
When the decision to allow James Wolfe to escape accountability for his leaking of the classified documents was made, there were only a few people within the DOJ who could make that decision.
AG Jeff Sessions was recused from anything to do with the ongoing DOJ activity into the 2016 election issues and the Russian-collusion/conspiracy investigation.
Therefore Robert Mueller, DAG Rod Rosenstein, DOJ liason Ed O’Callaghan and U.S. Attorney for DC Jessie Liu would have been the group of decision-makers. With Mueller and Rosenstein gone that left O’Callaghan and Liu still on staff at Main Justice. Today the last two were removed from positions of authority in the DOJ.
Whether John Durham is empowered to go back and re-enter the political issues with the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence is an unknown. Normally, I would doubt it, but the issue does actually have more consequential importance because of the ‘Gang-of-Eight’ authority/oversight; so it’s an unknown. But at the very least the poor decision-making has been addressed. The SSCI compromise is an outstanding issue for another time.
Thank you Bill Barr for addressing that significant issue, albeit obliquely.
Well, it looks like some efforts have paid off. In an unusual update two days after the IG report was published, the IG modifies the report content. See Update Notification Below:

Apparently the DOJ and FBI had a change of heart about the FISA dates.
Actually they’ve re-written a portion of the report, and moved some material completely. As an example this section formerly present on page ii of the executive summary is now moved to page vi:
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Amid the investigative and research questions over the past several years, there was always a question about who, within the Trump orbit, may have been subject to FISA court authorized surveillance during their activity in 2016.
Because they were initially the four targets of the FBI investigation, there was speculation Paul Manafort, George Papadopoulos and/or Lt. General Michael Flynn were also subjects of Title-1 FISA Court authorized surveillance, in addition to Carter Page.
Today during his testimony, Inspector General Michael Horowitz specifically noted there was no other FISA application against any other campaign official. [See 05:23 of testimony to questions by Senator Chris Coons – prompted just hit play]:
“The only FISA we found existed was the one we have written about here as to Carter Page”…
That means all other FBI investigative evidence documented against Manafort, Papadopoulos, or Flynn had to come from some other method of surveillance.
This begs a significant question….
Carter Page was not associated with the campaign or transition after the election, so under what authority did the DOJ allow the Mueller team to gain access to all of the Trump transition emails, texts, electronic and phone communications? (more…)
