A Wall Street Journal editorial is demanding “radical transparency” on the Mueller investigation not only from the FBI and Congress, but also from other news outlets.
Several days ago, Senators Chuck Grassley and Lindsey Graham released a less redacted version of their criminal referral letter to the Justice Department concerning Christopher Steele — the former British spy and author of the infamous dossier alleging collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia. The letter from the two senators clarifies the recently released House Intelligence Committee’s memo describing FISA surveillance abuse by the FBI, and provides even more evidence that the Clinton campaign was involved in the controversy.
As the Wall Street Journal explains, the letter “makes public for the first time actual text from the FBI’s FISA application, as well as classified testimony the FBI gave the Senate Judiciary Committee about the dossier and FISA application. In particular, the referral rebuts the Democratic claim that the FBI told the FISA court about the partisan nature of the Steele dossier.” As Grassley and Graham write in their letter: “The FBI noted to a vaguely limited extent the political origins of the dossier.”
Although the letter “stated that the dossier information was compiled pursuant to the direction of a law firm who had hired an ‘identified U.S. person’ — now known as Glenn Simpson of Fusion GPS … the application failed to disclose that the identities of Mr. Simpson’s ultimate clients were the Clinton campaign and the DNC.”
The letter also states that Steele received “at least some of the information” from the Obama State Department. The names of individuals involved were redacted, but it’s widely believed that all roads lead to Sidney Blumenthal.
In its editorial on the referral letter, the Wall Street Journal rightfully takes aim at other publications that seem to be uninterested in these details:
Some of our media friends are so invested in the Steele dossier, or in protecting their Fusion pals, or in Donald Trump’s perfidy, that they want to ignore all this. But journalists ought to tell the complete story.
The best way to learn what’s true and false in the Russian influence story is radical transparency, and the Trump Administration should declassify all four FISA applications on Mr. Page and all of the documents behind them. Meanwhile, thanks to the two Senators for helping get closer to the truth.
The Wall Street Journal hasn’t exactly been one of Trump’s fiercest supporters, which is why it’s significant that the newspaper is now confronting other outlets that tried to bury or downplay the information put forth by the Nunes memo and the Grassley-Graham letter. The WSJ’s editorial board are anything but the president’s cheerleaders. It’s quite a step for them to take a stand against their media colleagues and for Team Trump.
Something tells me that this investigation is going to explode, but not at Trump. It will backfire at Democrats — and especially at members of Team Obama and Team Clinton.
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