The DOJ made a move today after a failed attempt to label Michael Flynn a co-conspirator in the case against his former business partner Bijan Rafiekian. [Backstory Here]
In today’s development [h/t Techno Fog] the DOJ is calling Michael Flynn Jr as a witness to replace the witness testimony of his father, Lt. Gen Gen Michael Flynn.

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Given what we know about how the DOJ pressured Michael Flynn Sr. to take the plea deal based on threats against his son Flynn Jr; and against the backdrop of the DOJ losing with Judge Anthony Trenga in EDVA; the DOJ now appears to be re-leveraging the original plea to compel cooperation from Jr.
This explains why the DOJ said yesterday they would await the DC sentencing (against Flynn Sr.) pending the outcome of the EDVA case against Bijan Rafiekian.
The DOJ in DC said they anticipated Flynn Sr might be a witness for Rafiekian’s defense; so they’ve moved to put Flynn Jr. in opposition to any potentially supportive testimony from Flynn Sr. in EDVA by revisiting (re-leveraging) the threat against Flynn Jr.
If Flynn Jr. didn’t agree to testify in the Rafiekian case, the DOJ would likely have cancelled his father’s plea agreement in DC and re-initiated cases -with new charges- against both Flynns’.
This also explains why corrupt U.S. Attorney Jessie Liu added new lawyers in the DC case.  Sneaky bastards.   In essence, Jessie Liu is anticipating a change in plea from Flynn, per new Flynn lawyer Sidney Powell, and proactively positioning the DC case to reignite against both the father and the son if: (a) the Rafiekian case goes sideways; or, (b) Flynn Sr. changes his plea agreement.
The benefits for purposefully charging in two distinct courts now surfaces.
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Some updates in the Michael Flynn case.  As requested the DOJ has filed a response to Judge Sullivan’s order.   The DC judge wanted to know what the status of the prosecution position was now that Michael Flynn is no longer a cooperating witness for the DOJ in the EDVA case, against his former business partner.
The prosecution responds:

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Breakthrough – Things Making Sense Now…

Lots of things going on in/around the two legal cases involving Michael Flynn today.  The origination of the DOJ shift in position involves the indirect case (EDVA) where Flynn is/was a witness in the FARA (Foreign Agent Registration Act) case against Bijan Rafiekian and the Flynn Intel Group.
Hat Tip to Techno-Fog for a litany of legal filings assembled today [132 pages here].  This is somewhat complex to explain.

The direct case against Flynn (Judge Sullivan court – Washington DC), where Flynn copped a guilty plea for lying to FBI investigators, has a sentencing predicated on Flynn’s ongoing cooperation in the Eastern District of Virginia (EDVA) case against Bijan Rafiekian and FIG (Flynn Intel Group).  However, in a stunning move today the DOJ prosecuting Rafiekian now says it will not call Flynn as a witness; and further the DOJ state they now consider Flynn an “unindicted co-conspirator”.
From court filings (on behalf of Flynn) we find the reason.  Michael Flynn refused a demand by the DOJ to testify that the Flynn Group FARA filing was completed with knowingly false information and contained “false statements”.
Michael Flynn refused to testify to this DOJ construct because the claim was not true.
Michael Flynn and his lawyers say there was no intentional filing of false information in the Flynn Group FARA submissions; and the FARA forms were submitted based on legal advice provided for their completion.  If there were mistakes in the FARA filing, they were not falsehoods and/or mistakes made purposefully or with purposeful intent.
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Comey FBI apologist, Fusion GPS co-conspirator and Lawfare Alliance media narrative engineer, Natasha Bertrand, has an outline published today on the background interview of dossier author Christopher Steele.

From within the article, beyond the sympathetic propaganda, some overarching details are interesting:
♦(1) As expected Mr. Steele would only talk to OIG investigators from Horowitz’s office; Steele would not speak to speak to U.S. Attorney John Durham.
♦(2) The interview took place at the same time President Trump traveled to the U.K (June 3rd-5th) for a state visit.  Likely coordinated so FBI officials could travel innocuously without media scrutiny (lots of security officials traveled on behalf of U.S. interests at the time); likely the preferred timing of Steele himself.
♦(3) The interview(s) took place over two days for a total of sixteen hours of conversation. The recent reports of IG delay and follow-up interviews are almost certainly related to the outcome of the investigative findings (ie. Kathleen Kavalec cooperation etc.).
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Attorney General William Barr discusses the shift in DOJ approach to support President Trump’s request to put the citizenship question on the 2020 census; also his support for Robert Mueller if the special counsel should change his mind and not testify on July 17th to the House Intelligence and Judiciary committees.

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Real Clear Investigations has a deep dive into the underpinnings of the Mueller report surrounding the sketchy conclusions about Russian interference.  What Real Clear outlines parallels our own review where most of the substance claimed by Andrew Weissmann, Robert Mueller and Rod Rosenstein is essentially baseless.

(RCI) […] The report claims that the interference operation occurred “principally” on two fronts: Russian military intelligence officers hacked and leaked embarrassing Democratic Party documents, and a government-linked troll farm orchestrated a sophisticated and far-reaching social media campaign that denigrated Hillary Clinton and promoted Trump.
But a close examination of the report shows that none of those headline assertions are supported by the report’s evidence or other publicly available sources. They are further undercut by investigative shortcomings and the conflicts of interest of key players involved: (read more)

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In a new report Fox News journalist Catherine Herridge outlines a “reluctant witness” who has recently agreed to cooperate with DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz and his review of potential FISA abuse by the Obama DOJ and FBI.

Fox News – Key witnesses sought for questioning by Justice Department Inspector General Michael E. Horowitz early in his investigation into alleged government surveillance abuse have come forward at the 11th hour, Fox News has learned.

Sources familiar with the matter said at least one witness outside the Justice Department and FBI started cooperating — a breakthrough that came after Attorney General William Barr ordered U.S. Attorney John Durham to lead a separate investigation into the origins of the bureau’s 2016 Russia case that laid the foundation for Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s probe.

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In our opinion the content of the diary by former FBI Director James Comey, as outlined in what has formally been called “The Comey Memos”, is devastating to the U.S. Department of Justice and FBI.   How do we know? Because the FBI is fighting like hell to keep even descriptions of the memo(s) content from becoming public.

Rather complex backstory with citations HERE and HERE and HERE.

In the background of what was The Mueller Investigation, there was a FOIA case where the FBI was fighting to stop the release of the Comey memos.  Within that courtroom fight Mueller’s lead FBI agent David Archey wrote a series of declarations to the court describing the content of the memos and arguing why they should be kept classified.
The FOIA fight shifted.  The plaintiffs argued for public release of the content of the FBI agent’s descriptions, now known as the “Archey Declarations”.
After a lengthy back-and-forth legal contest, on June 7th Judge James E Boasberg agreed to allow the FBI to keep the Comey memo content hidden, but instructed the DOJ/FBI to release the content of the Archey Declarations.
Today, the U.S. Department of Justice -under Attorney General Bill Barr- while waiting until the last minute (28 days since prior ruling), filed a motion [full pdf below] to block the release of the Archey Declarations, despite the June 7th court order.
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A new John Solomon article today, based on an interview with Russian Billionaire Oleg Deripaska, is essentially confirming a May 2018 article where it was presumed that Oleg had hired Christopher Steele at the same time Steele was working with Nellie Ohr and Fusion GPS to write the Trump dossier.  Here’s the interview:

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The report on the FBI contacting Oleg Deripaska in September 2016 for help to structure a narrative of Russian involvement in the Trump Campaign via Paul Manafort has some ramifications.
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An interesting discussion between Representative John Ratcliffe, former congressman Trey Gowdy and Fox News Host Jason Chaffetz surrounding: the pending Inspector General Report into FISA abuse; the upcoming Mueller testimony; and the activity of U.S. Attorney John Durham.
Within the interview Ratcliffe notes he has recently spoken to Inspector General Horowitz about the timing of his upcoming report where Ratcliffe says the “investigative work is complete”. WATCH:

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If previous reports of Christopher Steele being willing to speak to U.S. authorities about his dossier work in 2016 are accurate; and if Horowitz has completed his investigative work; then it’s likely Horowitz has already interviewed Steele.
The IG FISA investigation began in May of 2018, approximately 14 months ago. The assembly of the investigative details into a draft report should be expected to take about four to six weeks depending on the OIG referencer team and the scale of the summary documentation assembled.
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