Possible indictment over Russian collusion
05 Oct 2021, 9:59 am
Quote:
The tech executive referenced in the criminal case against leading cybersecurity lawyer Michael Sussmann was identified Thursday as an industry pioneer who’s founded the world’s first commercial internet hosting company, is an expert in detecting malware and holds 10 patents.
Rodney Joffe is the person referred to as “Tech Executive-1” in Sussman’s indictment for allegedly lying to the FBI by withholding his connections to Hillary Clinton’s losing 2016 election campaign against former President Donald Trump, according to CNN.
Joffe, who’s not accused of any wrongdoing, “retained Sussman as his lawyer” in February 2015 in connection with an unspecified “matter involving an agency of the US government,” according to the indictment.
[...]
According to Sussmann’s indictment, days after Trump’s victory, Joffe emailed someone and said, “I was tentatively offered the top [cybersecurity] job by the Democrats when it looked like they’d win.”
“I definitely would not take the job under Trump,” he added.
Rodney Joffe is the person referred to as “Tech Executive-1” in Sussman’s indictment for allegedly lying to the FBI by withholding his connections to Hillary Clinton’s losing 2016 election campaign against former President Donald Trump, according to CNN.
Joffe, who’s not accused of any wrongdoing, “retained Sussman as his lawyer” in February 2015 in connection with an unspecified “matter involving an agency of the US government,” according to the indictment.
[...]
According to Sussmann’s indictment, days after Trump’s victory, Joffe emailed someone and said, “I was tentatively offered the top [cybersecurity] job by the Democrats when it looked like they’d win.”
“I definitely would not take the job under Trump,” he added.
Source: https://nypost.com/2021/09/30/who-is-rodney-joffe-tech-executive-1-in-durham-indictment/
04 Nov 2021, 9:33 am
Quote:
WASHINGTON — Federal authorities on Thursday arrested an analyst who in 2016 gathered leads about possible links between Donald J. Trump and Russia for what turned out to be Democratic-funded opposition research, according to people familiar with the matter.
The arrest of the analyst, Igor Danchenko, is part of the special counsel inquiry led by John H. Durham, who was appointed by the Trump administration to scrutinize the Russia investigation for any wrongdoing, the people said.
Mr. Danchenko, was the primary researcher of the so-called Steele dossier, a compendium of rumors and unproven assertions suggesting that Mr. Trump and his 2016 campaign were compromised by and conspiring with Russian intelligence officials in Moscow’s covert operation to help him defeat Hillary Clinton.
The people familiar with the matter spoke on condition of anonymity because the indictment of Mr. Danchenko had yet to be unsealed. A spokesman for Mr. Durham did not respond to a request for comment.
The arrest of the analyst, Igor Danchenko, is part of the special counsel inquiry led by John H. Durham, who was appointed by the Trump administration to scrutinize the Russia investigation for any wrongdoing, the people said.
Mr. Danchenko, was the primary researcher of the so-called Steele dossier, a compendium of rumors and unproven assertions suggesting that Mr. Trump and his 2016 campaign were compromised by and conspiring with Russian intelligence officials in Moscow’s covert operation to help him defeat Hillary Clinton.
The people familiar with the matter spoke on condition of anonymity because the indictment of Mr. Danchenko had yet to be unsealed. A spokesman for Mr. Durham did not respond to a request for comment.
Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/04/us/igor-danchenko-arrested-steele-dossier.html
13 Feb 2022, 12:47 am
Some more interesting news...
Quote:
Yesterday, Durham filed a document that asserts that Sussman and another lawyer, believed to be [Marc] Elias, hired a techincal expert to monitor internet traffic from Trump Tower, Trump’s apartment, and the “Executive Office of the President.” The purported purpose of the court filing was to put on the record that Sussman’s defense counsel, the firm of Lathan & Watkins, may have conflicts of interest, and that Sussman was waiving those conflicts. The government does this so that Sussman cannot later claim that any conviction was invalid because of his counsel’s conflicts.
From Durham’s court filing
Yet Durham seems to have gone beyond what was necessary in revealing some enticing details.
Fox News reports:
From Durham’s court filing (emphasis added):
The monitoring of the White House is a little vague in this document as to the timeframe. Many people are asserting that it was while Trump was president, but that’s not crystal clear from the filing. It also is not alleged that this internet traffic monitoring was in itself illegal – the alleged illegality was Sussman lying to the FBI about it.
From Durham’s court filing
Quote:
1. The United States of America, by and through its attorney, Special Counsel John H. Durham, respectfully moves this Court to inquire into potential conflicts of interest arising from the representation of the defendant by his current counsel, Latham & Watkins LLP (“Latham”). The Government has discussed these matters with the defense and believes that any potential conflicts likely could be addressed with a knowing and voluntary waiver by the defendant upon consultation with conflict-free counsel as appropriate. The Government believes that any such waiver should be put on the record prior to trial. As set forth in further detail below, it is possible that conflicts of interest could arise from the fact that Latham and/or its employees (i) previously represented others in the Special Counsel’s investigation whose interests may conflict with those of the defendant, (ii) previously represented the defendant and his prior employer in connection with events that likely will be relevant at trial or at any sentencing, and (iii) maintained professional and/or personal relationships with individuals who could be witnesses in these proceedings. Accordingly, for the reasons set forth below, the government respectfully requests that the Court inquire into the potential conflicts of interest set forth herein. Defense counsel has advised that the defendant has been apprised of these issues, understands that he has the right to consult independent counsel, and presently intends to waive any potential conflict of interest.
Yet Durham seems to have gone beyond what was necessary in revealing some enticing details.
Fox News reports:
Quote:
Lawyers for the Clinton campaign paid a technology company to “infiltrate” servers belonging to Trump Tower, and later the White House, in order to establish an “inference” and “narrative” to bring to government agencies linking Donald Trump to Russia, a filing from Special Counsel John Durham says….
But Durham’s filing on Feb. 11, in a section titled “Factual Background,” reveals that Sussman “had assembled and conveyed the allegations to the FBI on behalf of at least two specific clients, including a technology executive (Tech Executive 1) at a U.S.-based internet company (Internet Company 1) and the Clinton campaign.”
Durham’s filing said Sussman’s “billing records reflect” that he “repeatedly billed the Clinton Campaign for his work on the Russian Bank-1 allegations.”
The filing revealed that Sussman and the Tech Executive had met and communicated with another law partner, who was serving as General Counsel to the Clinton campaign. Sources told Fox News that lawyer is Marc Elias, who worked at the law firm Perkins Coie.
But Durham’s filing on Feb. 11, in a section titled “Factual Background,” reveals that Sussman “had assembled and conveyed the allegations to the FBI on behalf of at least two specific clients, including a technology executive (Tech Executive 1) at a U.S.-based internet company (Internet Company 1) and the Clinton campaign.”
Durham’s filing said Sussman’s “billing records reflect” that he “repeatedly billed the Clinton Campaign for his work on the Russian Bank-1 allegations.”
The filing revealed that Sussman and the Tech Executive had met and communicated with another law partner, who was serving as General Counsel to the Clinton campaign. Sources told Fox News that lawyer is Marc Elias, who worked at the law firm Perkins Coie.
From Durham’s court filing (emphasis added):
Quote:
4. The Indictment also alleges that, beginning in approximately July 2016, Tech Executive-1 had worked with the defendant, a U.S. investigative firm retained by Law Firm-1 on behalf of the Clinton Campaign, numerous cyber researchers, and employees at multiple Internet companies to assemble the purported data and white papers. In connection with these efforts, Tech Executive-1 exploited his access to non-public and/or proprietary Internet data. Tech Executive-1 also enlisted the assistance of researchers at a U.S.-based university who were receiving and analyzing large amounts of Internet data in connection with a pending federal government cybersecurity research contract. Tech Executive-1 tasked these researchers to mine Internet data to establish “an inference” and “narrative” tying then-candidate Trump to Russia. In doing so, Tech Executive-1 indicated that he was seeking to please certain “VIPs,” referring to individuals at Law Firm-1 and the Clinton Campaign.
5. The Government’s evidence at trial will also establish that among the Internet data Tech Executive-1 and his associates exploited was domain name system (“DNS”) Internet traffic pertaining to (i) a particular healthcare provider, (ii) Trump Tower, (iii) Donald Trump’s Central Park West apartment building, and (iv) the Executive Office of the President of the United States (“EOP”). (Tech Executive-1’s employer, Internet Company-1, had come to access and maintain dedicated servers for the EOP as part of a sensitive arrangement whereby it provided DNS resolution services to the EOP. Tech Executive-1 and his associates exploited this arrangement by mining the EOP’s DNS traffic and other data for the purpose of gathering derogatory information about Donald Trump.)
6. The Indictment further details that on February 9, 2017, the defendant provided an updated set of allegations – including the Russian Bank-1 data and additional allegations relating to Trump – to a second agency of the U.S. government (“Agency-2”). The Government’s evidence at trial will establish that these additional allegations relied, in part, on the purported DNS traffic that Tech Executive-1 and others had assembled pertaining to Trump Tower, Donald Trump’s New York City apartment building, the EOP, and the aforementioned healthcare provider. In his meeting with Agency-2, the defendant provided data which he claimed reflected purportedly suspicious DNS lookups by these entities of internet protocol (“IP”) addresses affiliated with a Russian mobile phone provider (“Russian Phone Provider-1”). The defendant further claimed that these lookups demonstrated that Trump and/or his associates were using supposedly rare, Russian-made wireless phones in the vicinity of the White House and other locations. The Special Counsel’s Office has identified no support for these allegations. Indeed, more complete DNS data that the Special Counsel’s Office obtained from a company that assisted Tech Executive-1 in assembling these allegations reflects that such DNS lookups were far from rare in the United States. For example, the more complete data that Tech Executive-1 and his associates gathered – but did not provide to Agency-2 – reflected that between approximately 2014 and 2017, there were a total of more than 3 million lookups of Russian Phone-Provider-1 IP addresses that originated with U.S.-based IP addresses. Fewer than 1,000 of these lookups originated with IP addresses affiliated with Trump Tower. In addition, the more complete data assembled by Tech Executive-1 and his associates reflected that DNS lookups involving the EOP and Russian Phone Provider-1 began at least as early 2014 (i.e., during the Obama administration and years before Trump took office) – another fact which the allegations omitted.
5. The Government’s evidence at trial will also establish that among the Internet data Tech Executive-1 and his associates exploited was domain name system (“DNS”) Internet traffic pertaining to (i) a particular healthcare provider, (ii) Trump Tower, (iii) Donald Trump’s Central Park West apartment building, and (iv) the Executive Office of the President of the United States (“EOP”). (Tech Executive-1’s employer, Internet Company-1, had come to access and maintain dedicated servers for the EOP as part of a sensitive arrangement whereby it provided DNS resolution services to the EOP. Tech Executive-1 and his associates exploited this arrangement by mining the EOP’s DNS traffic and other data for the purpose of gathering derogatory information about Donald Trump.)
6. The Indictment further details that on February 9, 2017, the defendant provided an updated set of allegations – including the Russian Bank-1 data and additional allegations relating to Trump – to a second agency of the U.S. government (“Agency-2”). The Government’s evidence at trial will establish that these additional allegations relied, in part, on the purported DNS traffic that Tech Executive-1 and others had assembled pertaining to Trump Tower, Donald Trump’s New York City apartment building, the EOP, and the aforementioned healthcare provider. In his meeting with Agency-2, the defendant provided data which he claimed reflected purportedly suspicious DNS lookups by these entities of internet protocol (“IP”) addresses affiliated with a Russian mobile phone provider (“Russian Phone Provider-1”). The defendant further claimed that these lookups demonstrated that Trump and/or his associates were using supposedly rare, Russian-made wireless phones in the vicinity of the White House and other locations. The Special Counsel’s Office has identified no support for these allegations. Indeed, more complete DNS data that the Special Counsel’s Office obtained from a company that assisted Tech Executive-1 in assembling these allegations reflects that such DNS lookups were far from rare in the United States. For example, the more complete data that Tech Executive-1 and his associates gathered – but did not provide to Agency-2 – reflected that between approximately 2014 and 2017, there were a total of more than 3 million lookups of Russian Phone-Provider-1 IP addresses that originated with U.S.-based IP addresses. Fewer than 1,000 of these lookups originated with IP addresses affiliated with Trump Tower. In addition, the more complete data assembled by Tech Executive-1 and his associates reflected that DNS lookups involving the EOP and Russian Phone Provider-1 began at least as early 2014 (i.e., during the Obama administration and years before Trump took office) – another fact which the allegations omitted.
The monitoring of the White House is a little vague in this document as to the timeframe. Many people are asserting that it was while Trump was president, but that’s not crystal clear from the filing. It also is not alleged that this internet traffic monitoring was in itself illegal – the alleged illegality was Sussman lying to the FBI about it.
Source: https://legalinsurrection.com/2022/02/durham-court-filing-hillarys-campaign-spied-on-trump-tower-trump-apartment-bldg-white-house-internet-traffic/
Court filing: https://legalinsurrection.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/USA-v.-Michael-Sussman-Durham-Motion-re-Conflict-of-Interest-2-11-2022.pdf
22 May 2022, 11:07 pm
Time to catch up on the trial...
Quote:
Special counsel John Durham's prosecutors laid out their case against Hillary Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann during opening statements Tuesday, accusing him of scheming "to inject the FBI into a presidential election" by peddling an ultimately unsubstantiated tip about Donald Trump's ties to Russia, eight weeks before Election Day.
"The defendant's lie was all part of a bigger plan. ... It was a plan to create an October surprise on the eve of the election ... to use and manipulate the FBI," prosecutor Brittain Shaw said.
She described Sussmann as a "high-powered DC lawyer" who "lied to direct the power and resources of the FBI to his own ends, and to serve the agendas of his clients," who were the Clinton campaign and a tech executive. "This is a case about privilege," Shaw added.
[...]
Prosecutors appealed to the jurors to set politics aside and convict Sussmann because, they say, he abused the trust of senior FBI officials to try to help Clinton win the 2016 presidential election. Jurors' political affiliations, contributions and volunteer work for candidates, including Clinton, repeatedly came up during the jury selection process.
"Whether we hate Donald Trump or like him, we have to agree that some things have to be above politics. One of those things is our law enforcement agencies, and the other is truth," Shaw said.
[...]
The first day of witness testimony shed considerable new light on the FBI's efforts to run down Sussmann's tip -- that the Trump Organization had a secret server that was potentially communicating with Russia-based Alfa Bank during 2016, perhaps to collude on the election.
It's been public for years that the FBI determined there weren't improper cyber links. But the US government hasn't previously told the public what the FBI did to reach that conclusion.
FBI special agent Scott Hellman, a cyber division supervisor who examined Sussmann's data and a "white paper" with assertions about the data, testified that the people behind the material performed a "questionable" analysis and "jumped to some conclusions that were not supported."
"I thought perhaps the person who had drafted this document was suffering from some mental disability," Hellmann said, after he was asked to explain what he meant in an internal FBI chat message that he sent after reviewing the white paper, where he said: "it feels a little 5150-ish."
Durham's team also revealed the FBI's final conclusion on what the data showed. This has remained one of the unsettled mysteries from the 2016 election, especially after special counsel Robert Mueller released his sweeping report but never mentioned the Trump-Alfa server claims.
The FBI investigation found "the server was merely a spam email server used for sending out marketing emails," Shaw told the jury during her opening statements. "The server did not reflect a crime, nor was it a threat to national security."
"The defendant's lie was all part of a bigger plan. ... It was a plan to create an October surprise on the eve of the election ... to use and manipulate the FBI," prosecutor Brittain Shaw said.
She described Sussmann as a "high-powered DC lawyer" who "lied to direct the power and resources of the FBI to his own ends, and to serve the agendas of his clients," who were the Clinton campaign and a tech executive. "This is a case about privilege," Shaw added.
[...]
Prosecutors appealed to the jurors to set politics aside and convict Sussmann because, they say, he abused the trust of senior FBI officials to try to help Clinton win the 2016 presidential election. Jurors' political affiliations, contributions and volunteer work for candidates, including Clinton, repeatedly came up during the jury selection process.
"Whether we hate Donald Trump or like him, we have to agree that some things have to be above politics. One of those things is our law enforcement agencies, and the other is truth," Shaw said.
[...]
The first day of witness testimony shed considerable new light on the FBI's efforts to run down Sussmann's tip -- that the Trump Organization had a secret server that was potentially communicating with Russia-based Alfa Bank during 2016, perhaps to collude on the election.
It's been public for years that the FBI determined there weren't improper cyber links. But the US government hasn't previously told the public what the FBI did to reach that conclusion.
FBI special agent Scott Hellman, a cyber division supervisor who examined Sussmann's data and a "white paper" with assertions about the data, testified that the people behind the material performed a "questionable" analysis and "jumped to some conclusions that were not supported."
"I thought perhaps the person who had drafted this document was suffering from some mental disability," Hellmann said, after he was asked to explain what he meant in an internal FBI chat message that he sent after reviewing the white paper, where he said: "it feels a little 5150-ish."
Durham's team also revealed the FBI's final conclusion on what the data showed. This has remained one of the unsettled mysteries from the 2016 election, especially after special counsel Robert Mueller released his sweeping report but never mentioned the Trump-Alfa server claims.
The FBI investigation found "the server was merely a spam email server used for sending out marketing emails," Shaw told the jury during her opening statements. "The server did not reflect a crime, nor was it a threat to national security."
Source: https://edition.cnn.com/2022/05/17/politics/michael-sussman-john-durham-trial/index.html
Quote:
Hillary Clinton personally approved her campaign's plans in fall 2016 to share information with a reporter about an uncorroborated alleged server backchannel between Donald Trump and a top Russian bank, her former campaign manager testified Friday in federal court.
Robby Mook said he attended a meeting with other senior campaign officials where they learned about strange cyberactivity that suggested a relationship between the Trump Organization and Alfa Bank, which is based in Moscow. The group decided to share the information with a reporter, and Mook subsequently ran that decision by Clinton herself.
"We discussed it with Hillary," Mook said, later adding that "she agreed with the decision."
[...]
Federal investigators ultimately concluded there weren't any improper Trump-Alfa cyber links.
[...]
Sussmann passed along the same information about Trump and Alfa Bank to an FBI official in September 2016. Prosecutors charged him with lying to the FBI and allege that he falsely told the FBI official that he wasn't there for a client, even though he was there on Clinton's behalf.
He has pleaded not guilty and maintains that he went "to help the FBI" as a concerned citizen, and that the Clinton campaign wouldn't have wanted him to meet with the FBI in the first place.
Mook and another top Clinton campaign official, general counsel Marc Elias, reinforced that assertion this week on the witness stand. They both testified they didn't authorize or direct Sussmann to go to the FBI with the explosive Trump tip. Mook said Friday that he didn't even know who Sussmann was during the 2016 campaign, and would've opposed an FBI meeting.
[...]
Inside the courtroom, prosecutors showed the jury Clinton's tweet about the Trump-Alfa article from Slate, and Mook read aloud portions of the campaign's news release about the story. The release was from Jake Sullivan, who is currently President Joe Biden's national security adviser.
"We can only assume that federal authorities will now explore this direct connection between Trump and Russia as part of their existing probe into Russia's meddling in our elections," Sullivan said in the release on October 31, 2016, one week before Election Day.
The special counsel team has previously said that the Clinton campaign's media blitz around the Slate story "is the very culmination of Mr. Sussmann's work and strategy," to allegedly gin up news coverage about the Trump-Alfa allegations and then get the FBI to start an investigation.
Robby Mook said he attended a meeting with other senior campaign officials where they learned about strange cyberactivity that suggested a relationship between the Trump Organization and Alfa Bank, which is based in Moscow. The group decided to share the information with a reporter, and Mook subsequently ran that decision by Clinton herself.
"We discussed it with Hillary," Mook said, later adding that "she agreed with the decision."
[...]
Federal investigators ultimately concluded there weren't any improper Trump-Alfa cyber links.
[...]
Sussmann passed along the same information about Trump and Alfa Bank to an FBI official in September 2016. Prosecutors charged him with lying to the FBI and allege that he falsely told the FBI official that he wasn't there for a client, even though he was there on Clinton's behalf.
He has pleaded not guilty and maintains that he went "to help the FBI" as a concerned citizen, and that the Clinton campaign wouldn't have wanted him to meet with the FBI in the first place.
Mook and another top Clinton campaign official, general counsel Marc Elias, reinforced that assertion this week on the witness stand. They both testified they didn't authorize or direct Sussmann to go to the FBI with the explosive Trump tip. Mook said Friday that he didn't even know who Sussmann was during the 2016 campaign, and would've opposed an FBI meeting.
[...]
Inside the courtroom, prosecutors showed the jury Clinton's tweet about the Trump-Alfa article from Slate, and Mook read aloud portions of the campaign's news release about the story. The release was from Jake Sullivan, who is currently President Joe Biden's national security adviser.
"We can only assume that federal authorities will now explore this direct connection between Trump and Russia as part of their existing probe into Russia's meddling in our elections," Sullivan said in the release on October 31, 2016, one week before Election Day.
The special counsel team has previously said that the Clinton campaign's media blitz around the Slate story "is the very culmination of Mr. Sussmann's work and strategy," to allegedly gin up news coverage about the Trump-Alfa allegations and then get the FBI to start an investigation.
Source: https://edition.cnn.com/2022/05/20/politics/hillary-clinton-robby-mook-fbi/index.html
