In a recent order from U.S. District Judge James A. Boasberg (the presiding judge of the FISA court), he directly criticized the excuse making from three specific Obama-era officials from the FBI and DOJ, going as far as to accuse them of misleading the Court.
Because the order wasn’t sympathetic to any media narrative it got no attention there, but John Solomon has the scoop:
In just 21 words, Boasberg provided the first judicial declaration the FBI had misled the court, not just committed process errors. “There is thus little doubt that the government breached its duty of candor to the Court with respect to those applications,” Boasberg wrote.
“The frequency and seriousness of these errors in a case that, given its sensitive nature, had an unusually high level of review at both DOJ and the Federal Bureau of Investigation have called into question the reliability of the information proffered in other FBI applications,” Boasberg wrote.
Finally, Boasberg put Wray on notice — even while praising the current director — that process fixes alone won’t suffice.
“The errors the OIG pointed out cannot be solved through procedures alone,” he wrote. “DOJ and the FBI, including all personnel involved in the FISA process, must fully understand and embrace the heightened duties of probity and transparency that apply in ex parte proceedings.”
This uproots the no-fault narrative spread by Rod Rosenstein and James Comey. As Solomon notes; “Some of these defenses — including a focus on fixing process suggested by current FBI chief Christopher Wray — have persisted even after Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz issued a damning report in December finding the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act warrant applications targeting former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page were riddled with mistakes, including 17 examples of misconduct, misinformation or outright lies.”
It sure would’ve been helpful to have known this four years ago, wouldn’t it?
