New emails bolster GOP claims of FBI, DOJ 'coordination' on Clinton case response

Emails reviewed by Fox News from February 2016 suggest the FBI and DOJ worked together to craft a response to a key development in the Hillary Clinton email investigation, amid newly raised Republican concerns about a “concerning level of coordination” between the two agencies during the probe.

The emails concern the period after 22 messages with "Top Secret" information were found on the former secretary of state's personal email server.

Republican Rep. Mark Meadows cited them in a letter earlier this week claiming former FBI Director James Comey’s testimony to Congress – in which he downplayed FBI-DOJ coordination on the Clinton case – may be at odds with documents suggesting “frequent” coordination.

Comey specifically said in public testimony that he did not coordinate with the DOJ for his July 2016 public recommendation not to pursue charges against Clinton. Meadows, however, pointed to a series of messages he claims indicate potential coordination at several “crucial moments of the investigation” – including the July statement and the period in February. While the FBI is part of the Justice Department and communication between the two agencies is inevitable, Meadows’ letter also suggests some at the FBI were concerned about the perception it was not acting independently in a politically explosive case.

The February messages reviewed by Fox News start on Feb. 8, 2016, when Gregory Starr, then the assistant secretary of state for diplomatic security, told FBI Head of Counterintelligence Bill Priestap that the State Department was prepared to punish those responsible for the misplaced messages.

"The Department of State is prepared to take appropriate administrative action for any instances of mishandling of classified information in accordance with our own internal processes," Starr wrote.

However, the official added that the department did not want to hinder the ongoing FBI investigation and, if instructed, would postpone the "administrative action" over the emails until after the bureau's case had concluded.

Five days later, on Feb. 13, an unidentified senior Justice Department official wrote to FBI agent Peter Strzok, Jonathan Moffa of the FBI’s criminal division and the bureau's Office of General Counsel, as well as members of the U.S. Attorney’s office for the Eastern District of Virginia.

"Wanted to make sure that DOJ is kept in the loop as response is drafted," wrote the unnamed official in the Justice Department's National Security Division. "We have discussed a bit more here at CES and have some additional thoughts on the best response on the admin action question. Can we make sure we discuss as a group as response is put together?"

"CES" appears to refer to the Justice Department's "counterintelligence and export control section." That section was led by David Laufman, who left the department this past February citing personal reasons.

The State Department took no immediate administrative action over the 22 "Top Secret" emails on Clinton's email server. Many of those involved in the matter had left the department by the time the FBI investigation closed in July 2016.

Meadows has gotten support for his inquiry from House Oversight Committee chairman Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-S.C.

On Wednesday, Gowdy asked Attorney General Jeff Sessions, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, FBI Director Christopher Wray and Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz to review allegations of coordination between the FBI and the Justice Department in the Clinton investigation.

FBI spokesman Andrew Ames told Fox News the bureau had no comment on the newly uncovered emails and added that the FBI would respond to Gowdy "as appropriate."

The Justice Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Justice Department IS NOW investigating Clinton Foundation over 'pay to play' allegations

The Justice Department has launched another investigation into allegations the Clinton Foundation used "pay to play" politics while Hillary Clinton was U.S. secretary of state, IPRESSTV  has confirmed.

Sources close to the investigation told Fox News the probe, led by the U.S. attorney’s office and the FBI in Little Rock, Ark., has been ongoing for months. IPRESSTV has learned that investigators have already conducted multiple interviews associated with the probe.

Fox News also has learned investigators are looking into whether the Clinton Foundation violated tax law. Accusers of "pay to play" have claimed the foundation promised favors in exchange for donations or pledges of cash or gifts.

The Hill, which broke the story Thursday evening, added that FBI agents have taken the lead in the investigation and have interviewed at least one witness in the last month.

The witness said that agents inquired specifically about donations to Clinton entities and official government actions during Clinton's leadership of the State Department under President Obama, according to the Hill.

The Hill reported that law enforcement officials said there will be "additional activities" relating to the investigation in the coming weeks.

In a statement to Fox News, Clinton Foundation spokesman Craig Minassian suggested that the organization had done nothing improper.

“Time after time, the Clinton Foundation has been subjected to politically motivated allegations, and time after time these allegations have been proven false," Minassian said. "None of this has made us waver in our mission to help people."

Clinton spokesman Nick Merrill told Fox News that the investigation is an attempt by the Trump administration to distract the public.

"Let’s call this what it is: A sham," Merrill said. "This is a philanthropy that does life-changing work, which Republicans have tried to turn into a political football. It began with a long-debunked project spearheaded by Steve Bannon during the presidential campaign. It continues with Jeff Sessions doing Trump’s bidding by heeding his calls to meddle with a department that is supposed to function independently. The goal is to distract from the indictments, guilty pleas, and accusations of treason from Trump’s own people at the expense of our justice system’s integrity. It’s disgraceful, and should be concerning to all Americans."

Late last year, Attorney General Jeff Sessions told prosecutors to evaluate “certain issues” raised by congressional Republicans cocerning alleged unlawful dealings related to the Clinton Foundation, leading to speculation about the potential appointment of another special counsel.

In September, the conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch said that emails from Clinton aide Huma Abedin's account showed Clinton Foundation donors requesting and receiving favors from the State Department.

Federal investigators are also reviewing Clinton's use of a private email server when she was secretary of state, according to The Daily Beast.

Expert predicts Hillary Clinton and Bill Clinton will both be convicted for crimes in 2018

In just a few short weeks, former U.S. Rep. Corrine Brown will begin serving a five-year prison sentence for participating in an $800,000 charity fraud. But her conviction and sentencing will no doubt raise questions about why she is behind bars, but Hillary Clinton and, to another extent her philandering husband and ex-president, Bill Clinton, remain free.

As Lifezette has reported, that question and the fact that Clinton has yet to be charged for so very obviously (and carelessly) mishandling classified information during her tenure as Barack Obama’s Secretary of State has raised substantial, well-deserved doubts about the unequal application of justice in America. Those with less or no political influence seem to be dealt with much more harshly than those who are considered powerful.

Brown, an African-American Democrat who long represented the Jacksonville, Fla., district, was convicted last year in a case that, in terms of dollars involved, was paltry compared to the Clinton Foundation. Begun in 1997 as the former president’s library project, it morphed into a $2 billion cash cow for the former first family, in what one nonprofit expert has called “the biggest charity fraud ever.”

That expert, Charles Ortel, told Lifezette on Sunday that he believes fired FBI Director James “Comey will rat out Hillary and the Clintons faster than [Olympic runner] Usain Bolt runs the 100-meter dash.”

Further, he predicted, “Both Clintons will be convicted, bigly,” this year.

Ortel, a New York investment banker who became a non-profit fraud investigator, first gained national prominence in 2007 when he exposed fraudulent accounting practices at General Electric and a number of other large corporations. He also became known for warning of the then-approaching financial crisis that became known as the Great Recession of 2008.

Since 2015 Ortel has documented extensively cases involving what he sees as the Clinton Foundation’s multiple violations of laws and rules governing charities. They include, significantly, examples of the foundation operating international medical and disaster relief programs in violation of its tax-exempt status granted by the IRS.

Lifezette noted further:
He also believes former President Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton, especially during her tenure as President Barack Obama’s Secretary of State from 2009 to 2013, used the family foundation as a vehicle for selling their influence and becoming wealthy in the process, thanks in great part to the lack of politically independent regulation of charities soliciting funds and operating programs in multiple countries around the globe.

In his interview, Ortel said, “the sad truth is that international charities are perfect vehicles for influence-peddling, and for financial mischief, especially when they are overseen by conflicted directors/trustees, and ‘audited’ by under-resourced professional firms.”

As expected, various spokespeople for the Clinton Foundation have regularly denied that the charity has engaged in any wrongdoing. And to be sure, no charges have ever been filed against either Clinton or the foundation. That said, Ortel believes the foundation’s obvious illegal fundraising activities and operations may prove to be the house of cards that finally collapses around the former first family.

For example, he notes that the French government has been conducting a major investigation for months, while a similar probe is beginning to take shape in Sweden. The foundation received millions in donations from both governments and from private entities in both countries.

But there have been previous investigations by the Department of Justice — however, without any charges. The first was overseen by then-FBI Director Robert Mueller (sound familiar?) during George W. Bush’s administration; his then-deputy was none other than Comey.

There is supposedly a second investigation underway that began in March 2016, but so far no charges have been filed.

And the Clinton email scandal made news again last week, as legal watchdog group Judicial Watch announced that a handful of additional classified emails had been found on the laptop of former U.S. Rep. Anthony Weiner, the estranged husband of top Hillary aide Huma Abedin.

“The fact that classified information has been found from Clinton and Abedin on Weiner’s laptop shows the urgent need for a criminal investigation by the Justice Department,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. 

source: https://www.lifezette.com/polizette/heres-the-two-clinton-issues-shake-america-2018/

Hillary Clinton Criticized for ‘ignorant’ statement About guns after Las Vegas shooting

Hillary Clinton took heat Monday for issuing what critics called an “ignorant” and “irrelevant” statement going after the NRA and silencers in the hours after the Las Vegas mass shooting.

As details were still emerging about the worst mass shooting in modern U.S. history – which killed at least 58 people – the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee took to Twitter to imagine how much deadlier the massacre might have been if silencers had been used.

“The crowd fled at the sound of gunshots. Imagine the deaths if the shooter had a silencer, which the NRA wants to make easier to get,” she tweeted, adding: “Our grief isn't enough. We can and must put politics aside, stand up to the NRA, and work together to try to stop this from happening again.”

It was an apparent reference to the NRA’s push to ease federal rules for silencers.

But conservative critics quickly hit back, saying silencers probably would only moderately dampen the sound of gunfire in this kind of attack – especially from what was described as a high-powered weapon.

“Suppressors only reduce by a few decibels, still same decibel level as a jackhammer,” tweeted Dana Loesch, a talk radio host and NRA spokeswoman.

Conservative commentator Ben Shapiro, editor in chief of The Daily Wire, blasted Clinton’s tweets as “Ignorant, irrelevant and exploitative.”

Radio host and CIA veteran Buck Sexton had a similar take: “Appallingly stupid, and entirely irrelevant, Mrs Clinton She knows nothing about firearms, and even worse, she doesn't care.”

It’s unclear what weapons the shooter, identified as 64-year-old Stephen Paddock, was using. Witnesses described the sound of rapid automatic gunfire – which many believed to be firecrackers – ringing out as thousands ran for cover. One vendor told Fox News that “it sounded like a machine gun.” Authorities said the shooter had more than 10 rifles in the hotel room where he fired on concert-goers below.

The casualties in the attack exceeded those of the Pulse nightclub tragedy in Florida more than a year ago. As with the Pulse attack, the Las Vegas shooting led to prompt calls from Democrats – not just Clinton – for gun legislation, though the party has struggled to tighten laws even when the Obama administration was in power.

Connecticut’s senators, who have been especially outspoken on gun control ever since the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, were among the first to issue statements Monday.

“Nowhere but America do horrific large-scale mass shootings happen with this degree of regularity,” Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., said in a statement. “This must stop. It is positively infuriating that my colleagues in Congress are so afraid of the gun industry that they pretend there aren't public policy responses to this epidemic. There are, and the thoughts and prayers of politicians are cruelly hollow if they are paired with continued legislative indifference. It's time for Congress to get off its ass and do something."

Connecticut’s other Democratic senator, Richard Blumenthal, issued a similar statement.

“It has been barely a year since what was previously the largest mass shooting in American history – the deadly attack at Pulse nightclub. In the interim, thousands more have been lost to the daily, ruthless toll of gun violence. Still, Congress refuses to act. I am more than frustrated, I am furious,” he said.

As the lawmakers seemed to acknowledge, gun legislation stands little chance of passing under a Republican-controlled Congress and White House.

After the Pulse shooting, Senate Democrats launched a 15-hour filibuster followed by a Democratic sit-in on the House floor in a high-profile push for gun control legislation. But the divided Senate ultimately rejected all four gun measures put on the floor for a vote.

The battle over gun restrictions has, meanwhile, played out in a more substantive fashion on the state level – and at the courts.

Most recently, a federal appeals court last week delivered a win for gun rights activists by keeping in place another court’s ruling that it was unconstitutional for the District of Columbia to require gun owners to provide a “good reason” for legally carrying a concealed weapon in the nation’s capital. The dispute could be on a path to the Supreme Court. 

On Jailing Hillary Clinton: Trump Said He will Think About It Thoroughly

President-elect Donald Trump said he plans to consider hiring a special prosecutor to investigate his former Democratic opponent Hillary Clintonover her emails.

In an interview with 60 Minutes‘ Lesley Stahl that aired Sunday night on CBS, Trump, 70, talked about the “lovely” concession call from Clinton. He also addressed his previous claimsthat he would try and put the former Secretary of State in prison.

“I’m going to think about it,” he said, later adding he was more focused on getting “the country straightened away.”

Clinton Explains To High Dollar Donors FBI Comey Letter Spoilt Her Chance Of Becoming The Next President

Hillary Clinton has offered a couple of private but candid explanations about why she lost her White House bid, telling high-dollar fundraisers Saturday that FBI announcements about a second probe into her emails from her time as secretary of state were too damaging.

Clinton said, "Our analysis is that Comey’s letter raised doubts that were groundless and baseless..." and "stopped our momentum," a DNC fundraising source who was on the call told Fox News.





Clinton made the remark on a roughly 30-minute conference call with Democrats who raised more than $100,000, according to Politico.

The former State Department leader lost in a surprising defeat to Republican nominee Donald Trump -- a first-time candidate who essentially trailed in almost every major poll for the entire campaign.

FBI Director James Comey told Congress in an Oct. 30 letter that the agency was looking at emails found in an unrelated case that could be related to a closed FBI case specifically about the Clinton emails.

Clinton suggested her campaign’s internal poll numbers plunged after the letter but nevertheless rebounded, a person on the Saturday call told Politico.

However, she said the second Comey letter, three days before Election Day, saying that she had essentially been cleared in the unrelated case, awakened Trump voters.

The FBI investigated Clinton using a private email server system while secretary of state. Comey said some of the emails included classified information and that she was “extremely careless” in her action. But he concluded the case in July without recommending criminal charges.

Clinton on Thursday told her campaign staff that she had “stepped in it” by saying half of Trump’s supporters were “deplorables,” according to The New York Times.

She and her campaign essentially defended the remark by saying she regretted saying “half” of the supporters were “racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic" people.

Sarah Palin Believes Donald Trump Will Win. "America Wins If Trump Wins"

Sarah Palin believes Donald Trump is headed for a victory on Election Day, no matter what the polls may say.

The former Alaska governor and Republican vice presidential nominee appeared on "The O'Reilly Factor" last night from Detroit, where she was campaigning for Trump.

She said she disagreed with any speculation about the Republican nominee's flagging support, arguing that Michigan is still "hot, hot, hot" for Trump's message.

"If Trump wins, then America wins," Palin stated.

O'Reilly pointed out that most polls show Clinton with a comfortable lead - approximately five points - in Michigan.

"'Polls' are only good for strippers and cross-country skiers," Palin remarked. "I just don't put a whole lot of faith in polls."

She pointed out that there have been many significant changes in elections at the last minute, and she expects the 2016 presidential race to follow suit.

Clinton's Daughter Chelsea Clinton Mocks Melania Trump’s Vow to Fight Cyber Bullying

It’s a little bit ironic, don’t you think? Chelsea Clinton couldn’t help pointing out the irony of Melania Trump’s vow to fight cyber bullying during a new interview with Extra TV on Friday, November 4,





“I did think it was a little ironic,” Clinton, 36, said of Trump’s Thursday, November 3, speech in Berwyn, Pennsylvania. “I do think we all need to pay attention to what some call the Trump effect, the rise of bullying that is haunting middle school hallways, but also what’s happening in high schools and elementary schools. … We absolutely have to pay attention.”

On Thursday, Melania stumped for her husband, Donald Trump, in a rare public appearance, telling the crowd that her primary role as a first lady would be as an advocate for a safer, friendlier social media culture.

The Slovania-born model, 46, told the assembled crowd that social media at present is “too mean and too tough,” full of insults by Internet trolls based solely on “looks and intelligence.”

Despite their parents’ differences, however, Chelsea told Extra TV that she and Donald’s daughter Ivanka still remain friends.


“She is someone I am really grateful to call my friend,” she said. “It is clear we have different views on what the right answer is for our country and I’m going to do everything I can to keep making the case for my mom till the polls close.”

The Clinton Foundation Agrees State Department Was Never Notify of $1 million Qatar Gift

The Clinton Foundation has said it accepted a $1 million gift from the Qatari government without notifying the State Department that it had done so, an apparent violation of an ethics agreement Hillary Clinton signed when she became Secretary of State in 2009.





Under the terms of the agreement, Clinton promised the foundation would notify the State Department's ethics official if a new foreign government wished to donate or if a current foreign donor wished to "increase materially" its contributions.

Qatari officials pledged the money in 2011 to mark former President Bill Clinton's 65th birthday. The following April, Amitabh Desai, the Clinton Foundation's foreign policy director, emailed several of his colleagues to say that the Qataris wanted to meet Bill Clinton "'for five minutes' in NYC to present [the] check." Hillary Clinton served as secretary of state until Feb. 1, 2013.

When contacted by Reuters, which first reported on the deal's ethical ramifications, Clinton Foundation spokesman Brian Cookstra said the $1 million gift did not constitute a "material increase" in the Middle Eastern nation's contributions.

Reuters, citing the foundation's own website, reported that Qatar's own government has directly given a total of between $1 million and $5 million over the years.

The State Department told the news agency it had no record of the Qatar donation and said it was up to the foundation to submit it for review.

The number of foreign donations to the Clinton Foundation has opened the Democratic nominee up to conflict-of-interest accusations and raises the possibility that donors gave money with the expectation of receiving political favors in return.

Republican nominee Donald Trump has repeatedly called for Clinton to return donations from countries like Qatar, which has a questionable human rights record.

Last year, the Foundation admitted that no complete list of donors to its health program, the Clinton Health Access Initiative, had been published since 2010, despite promises from Clinton two years earlier that such a list would be produced annually.

The email from Desai was part of a trove of hacked messages from Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta's account that were published by Wikileaks last month.

Click for more from Reuters.

CNN DISOWN DONNA BRAZILE AFTER WIKILEAKS EMAILS SHOWS SHE LEAKED DEBATE QUESTIONS TO HILLARY CLINTON

Another leaked email has emerged showing Democratic National Committee boss and former CNN contributor Donna Brazile sharing a debate question in advance with the Hillary Clinton campaign -- despite Brazile's persistent claims to the contrary.





CNN announced in a statement soon after the email became public Monday that Brazile had tendered her resignation and the network accepted it on Oct. 14, days after the controversy over Brazile tipping off the Clinton campaign initially broke.

According to documents released Monday by WikiLeaks, Brazile sent Clinton Communications Director Jennifer Palmieri an email titled, “One of the questions directed to HRC tomorrow is from a woman with a rash,” the night before the March 6 CNN primary debate in Flint, Mich.

“Her family has lead poison and she will ask what, if anything, will Hillary do as president to help the ppl of Flint,” Brazile wrote.

The following night, Lee-Anne Walters, a mom whose twin boys stopped growing and whose daughter lost her hair during the Flint water contamination crisis, posed a question to both Clinton, the eventual Democratic presidential nominee, and her primary opponent Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders.

“After my family, the city of Flint and the children in D.C. were poisoned by lead, will you make a personal promise to me right now that, as president, in your first 100 days in office, you will make it a requirement that all public water systems must remove all lead service lines throughout the entire United States, and notification made to the — the citizens that have said service lines?” Walters asked.

Clinton responded with a lengthy answer that moderator Anderson Cooper had to twice interrupt in an attempt to keep to the agreed-upon time limit. Clinton’s remarks drew applause from the crowd, though she wound up ultimately losing the state’s primary to Sanders two days later.

The apparent email tip-off was included in the latest trove of messages hacked from Clinton Campaign Chairman John Podesta’s Gmail account and posted by WikiLeaks.

Brazile had been under fire over an earlier email chain appearing to show her tipping off the campaign before a town hall event later that same month. That exchange began with Brazile sending Palmieri the text of a question about the death penalty in an email with the subject line: “From time to time I get the questions in advance.”

After Palmieri responded, Brazile wrote back: “I’ll send a few more.”

Roland Martin asked the death penalty question verbatim the next night during a CNN town hall.

Brazile's role as a CNN contributor was suspended when she took over as interim DNC head in July, but on Oct. 14, in light of the email revelations, CNN said it accepted her full resignation.

"We are completely uncomfortable with what we have learned about her interactions with the Clinton campaign while she was a CNN contributor," the network said Monday in a statement.

Brazile on Monday tweeted a "thank you" to CNN and in a second tweet told the media to refer to an Oct. 11 statement she gave to Politico about the controversy.

“As a longtime political activist with deep ties to our party, I supported all of our candidates for president," Brazile's statement said. "I often shared my thoughts with each and every campaign, and any suggestions that indicate otherwise are simply untrue. As it pertains to the CNN Debates, I never had access to questions and would never have shared them with the candidates if I did."

Brazile, in an interview with Fox News Channel’s Megyn Kelly on Oct. 19, again denied aiding Clinton during the primaries.

“Well, Kelly, since I play straight up and I play straight up with you, I did not receive any questions from CNN,” she said.

When Kelly pressed, Brazile said she was being persecuted and questioned the credibility of the hacked files.

“As a Christian woman, I understand persecution, but I will not sit here and be persecuted,” Brazile said. “Your information is totally false.”

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump called out the DNC head over the emails at a rally Monday in Grand Rapids, Mich.

“[Brazile] should be fired from the DNC," he said. "What would happen if I did that? The electric chair, I think."