Lawsuit Raises New Biden Questions

[INSIDE JW]

SECRET SERVICE DESTROYED RECORDS OF ALLEGED BIDEN ALTERCATION WITH
AGENT

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There are a number of stories
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about Joe Biden and women, and Judicial Watch may have uncovered
confirmation concerning one of these allegations.

That’s why Judicial Watch filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA)
lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security for records that
the Secret Service claims to have destroyed related to a reported
physical altercation between a Secret Service Agent and Joe Biden at a
photo op in 2009 (_Judicial Watch v. U.S. Department of Homeland
Security_
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(No. 1:20-cv-02457)).

We sued after the Secret Service failed to respond to a July 14, 2020,
administrative appeal challenging its claim that all files related to
the 2009 altercation, “ha[d] been destroyed,” due to “retention
standards.”

On March 29, 2020, the Gateway Pundit republished a 2017 report
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alleging that an unidentified Secret Service agent was suspended for a
week in 2009 for “shoving Biden after he cupped his girlfriend’s
breast while the couple was taking a photo with him.” “The
situation got so heated … that others had to step in to prevent the
agent from hitting the then-Vice President,” according to the
report.

We followed up with a May 2020 FOIA request for:

All records related to a reported incident in 2009 in which a United
States Secret Service Agent reportedly was involved in an altercation
with, or attempted to strike, then Vice President Joe Biden” during
a photo opportunity.

The records sought shall include, but not be limited to, witness
statements, the Agent’s statement, victim’s statement, alleged
perpetrator’s statement, incident reports, investigative reports,
communications among USSS personnel regarding the incident, and
disciplinary records related to the incident for the Agent in
question.

In a July 13, 2020 response to our request, the Secret Service
appeared to confirm that a file on the alleged incident existed at
some point, asserting, “[T]here are no responsive records or
documents pertaining to your request in our files,” because “the
above mentioned file(s) has been destroyed” due to “retention
standards.” The Secret Service added that, “[n]o additional
information is available.” It did not deny that the incident had
occurred. In our lawsuit, we intend to test the Secret Service’s
assertion that it destroyed all records about the incident.

So, was there a “groping” incident involving Biden that almost led
to fisticuffs with a Secret Service agent?

We had not been able to confirm whether the report about the alleged
altercation might be true until the Secret Service itself suggested it
destroyed records about the incident. Stay tuned to this space – as
I’ll report to you as further developments warrant!

STATE DEPT RECORDS SHOW US EMBASSY IN UKRAINE MONITORED SEAN HANNITY,
LAURA INGRAHAM, DONALD TRUMP JR., RUDY GIULIANI, JOURNALISTS AND OTHER
U.S. CITIZENS IN POTENTIAL VIOLATION OF FEDERAL LAW

You may remember Marie Yovanovitch. She was the ambassador to Ukraine,
first appointed by President Obama and then recalled by President
Trump, who attacked
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Trump in the impeachment proceedings last year and for Joe Biden in
the Democratic convention this year.

She was also the center of a lawsuit
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we
filed In November 2019 seeking documents related to a reported
“untouchables list” Yovanovitch gave in late 2016 to Ukraine
Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko. Lutsenko told
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_The
New York Times_ that Yovanovitch “pressed him not to prosecute
anti-corruption activists.”

Lutsenko reportedly said
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earlier
the do-not-prosecute list included a founder of the Ukraine
group Anti-Corruption Action Centre
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(AntAC), which was funded by Soros
foundations and the U.S. federal government, and two members of the
Ukrainian Parliament who vocally supported the Soros group’s agenda
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Is it any surprise that her embassy was busy monitoring the social
media doings of Trump supporters and journalists -- with her
knowledge?

We just received 372 pages
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of
records from the State Department confirming our prior, exclusive
reporting that the Ukraine Embassy under Yovanovitch monitored, in
potential violation of law, Donald Trump, Jr. Rudy Giuliani, and major
journalists on Twitter on their commentary on Ukraine,
“Biden-Burisma 2020”, and George Soros.

The documents list the targeted persons as Sean Hannity, Laura
Ingraham, Rudy Giuliani, Dan Bongino, Sebastian Gorka, John Solomon,
Jack Posobiec, Ryan Saavedra, Sara A Carter, Donald Trump Jr., Michael
McFaul, Lou Dobbs and Pamela Gellar. The search terms that were
flagged to be monitored by State Department officials on social media
included Yovanovitch, Ukraine Ambassador, Ukrainian Ambassador,
Ukraine Soros, Clinton campaign, and Biden-Burisma.

The emails show that Yovanovitch was aware
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of
the social media monitoring program.

Moreover, a State Department contractor warned his colleagues that
their monitoring of private citizens was potentially in violation of
the Privacy Act of 1974.

These documents confirm that Deep State officials at the Ukraine
Embassy seemed to set up an enemies list to help illicitly monitor and
report on the social media postings of President Trump’s family and
lawyer, as well as journalists. The State Department hid these smoking
gun documents for months.

We received the records in the January 2020 FOIA lawsuit
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we
filed after the State Department failed to respond to an October 2019
FOIA request for records tied to the alleged monitoring of President
Trump’s family, lawyer, and journalists, as ordered by US Ambassador
to the Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch. (_Judicial Watch v. U.S. Department
of State_
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(No.
1:20-cv-00124). In October 2019, we began an investigation
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into
the alleged monitoring, via CrowdTangle
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and
other means, of journalists and persons linked to President Trump.
Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch is alleged to have ordered State
Department entities to conduct the monitoring:

“This is not an obscure rule. Everyone in public diplomacy or public
affairs knows they can’t make lists and monitor U.S. citizens unless
there is a major national security reason,” according to a senior
State Department official. If the illicit operation occurred, it seems
to indicate a clear political bias against the president and his
supporters. Yovanovitch, a career diplomat who has also led American
embassies in Kyrgyzstan and Armenia, was appointed ambassador to
Ukraine by Obama in 2016.

An email exchange on March 27, 2019, titled “monitoring developing
U.S. social media narratives on Ukraine” concerns the monitoring of
major conservative social media and TV commentators on their
commentary on Ukraine, as well as Marie Yovanovitch and George
Soros’ involvement in Ukraine and the Clinton Campaign. The persons
involved in the discussion include then-Ambassador
Yovanovitch; former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for European
and Eurasian Affairs George P. Kent; a digital media associate EUR/PD
from the Kenjya-Trusant Group, the public diplomacy desk officer for
Ukraine, Moldova, and Belarus; and other redacted State Department
officials.

In the discussion, a State Department official, whose name was
redacted, writes
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“Hi [redacted]

Thanks very much for your notes. He English-language Twitter search
phrases we’re currently using for this issue are:

Yovanovitch

Yovanovich (common misspelling)

Ukraine Ambassador

Ukrainian Ambassador

Ukraine Soros

We are also monitoring the tweets of roughly 10 high-profile
U.S.-based social media users (verified accounts with large numbers
of followers) who have already commented on this particular issue
before, either on social media or television, to see if they have
posted something new relevant to this issue that does not directly
align with our search terms.

Happy to pass along that list of Twitter users if DC wishes, but even
just keeping an eye on the search terms above during DC afternoon
business hours would be a huge help so that Kyiv/Washington team
members don’t miss out on new online narratives that are likely to
generate new media inquiries.

I’m going to send around one more evening batch of social media
content to Desk and Post colleagues in a few minutes on this topic.

Kent writes
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“key thing is to get up to ramming speed from the get go.”

Other actual or proposed search terms include “Clinton campaign”
and “Biden Burisma.” A redacted State Department Official writes
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on
March 29:

We appreciate the crowd Tangle reports you have sent us. Can you
confirm this tool in tracking content from the full list of
influential social media users that [redacted] flagged (which included
George’s suggestions as well)? Does this also track their posts if
it does not include out key work “Ukraine?” We have seen some of
these people comment obliquely without using the key words.

We appreciate the RSS suggestion, but we already have an effective
automated search tool

[Redacted]

* US Diplomats in Kyiv Yovanovitch and Kent + NABU;
* Clinton campaign and Manafort 2016;
* Biden-Burisma 2020;
* Soros (ANTAC)”

On March 29, 2019, an email
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to
Kent summarizing the monitoring activity shows that reports were set
up at least twice a day. A redacted official writes to Kent: “I will
have it set to recap at noon and 5pm. Will also try to have a separate
report for you to provide info from the past 12 hours.

On May 15, 2019, a redacted Digital Media Associate for EUR/PD
Keniya-Trusant Group warns
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the
State Department of legal issues of monitoring private citizens:

Going to chime in here – so regarding the influencers, there are
some legal implications of making a list of Facebook influencers of
Twitter influencers since they are technically private citizens (even
though they’re publicly on the internet) and we cannot compile them
into a list and monitor what they are saying using a third-party
application without their knowledge. To see what they’re saying,
you unfortunately need to use the old school way and manually go to
their feeds and view that way. Cumbersome but it’s in compliance
with the Privacy Act of 1974.

Regarding automated emails, I’m not sure if you can set up feedback
reports, I’ll look into that for you.

And on Instagram, shouldn’t be a problem to add the IG account. We
would just need to create it as a separate list, which can then be
added into the display.

I can take care of that for you if you’d like! On hashtags and
influencers, I don’t believe CT has that capability unfortunately.

An email
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dated
May 15, 2019, related to the use of CrowdTangle to monitor social
media in Bosnia and Herzegovina indicates that the prohibition on
monitoring US persons was understood:

[Redacted] – thank you so much. And now [sic] worries, I thought I
have heard somewhere that that doesn’t apply to non-U.S. citizens,
but wasn’t 100% sure, so thank you again for checking that for us.

I just went to our live display page and I don’t have any
possibility of changing anything on it. The only option it’s giving
me is to switch to Dark Interface <smile emoji>

Is there a way for someone to guide me through the process of adding
the IG to our live display, and also, how to create the list adding
the influencers we already know, which are not U.S. citizens?

Later in the day, the redacted official in this chain writes: “Also,
I’d like to correct something I said previously. Turns out I was
incorrect on the influencers list. You can create lists of them so
long as they are not U.S. Citizens. Happy to assist with that if you
need and my apologies for giving you incorrect information.”

On March 27, 2019, at 3:50 pm a redacted public diplomacy desk
officer writes
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Both [redacted] and I have talked with our fantastic social media team
in our PD shop and they are familiarizing the team with our existing
tools that will give them the reports they want and set this all up
for them.

I’m happy to discuss more about these tools at our next meeting too.


This should greatly improve their ability to track and monitor
stories/tweet, etc as it’s all automated these days.

Thanks!

At 9:11 pm, a digital media associate from the Kenjya-Trusant
Group writes
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Great! Thanks so much. So I set up a Hootsuite Dashboard (which I can
share with the team) and will have CrowdTangle searches set up that I
can have sent to your inbox if you’d like.

Just let me know.

At 2:26 pm an email
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with
the sender and recipients’ names reacted includes a list of
individuals whose Twitter accounts were to be monitored, including the
president’s s son and his personal attorney:

Hi [redacted]

Thank you! Below are some of the Twitter users with large followings
whom we’ve seen tweeting on (and/or discussing on TV) Ukraine
related issues over the past several days. They all have verified
Twitter accounts that should be pretty easy to spot.

Sean Hannity

Laura Ingraham

Rudy Giuliani

Dan Bongino

Sebastian Gorka

John Solomon (of the Hill)

Jack Posobiec

Ryan Saavedra

Sara A Carter

Donald Trump Jr.

Michael McFaul

Lou Dobbs

Pamela Gellar

Thanks again very much,

At 8:08 pm on March 27 a Kenjya-Trusant Group member asks
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“Would you be able to add those high-profile usernames with us too?
Would be good to have as I set things up.”

On March 28, 2019, a redacted State Department official states
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“P.s. Here is a sample of the monitoring report for U.S. social
media (scroll down for specific tweets and photos). Make sure to click
the link at the top to show photos”

A redacted State Department official emails
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a
group of officials including Kent saying:

First I want to assure everyone that we understand the strain Embassy
Kyiv and Ambassador for Yovanovitch are under. We definitely want to
support Post and the EUR Front Office’s needs at this time. Full
stop.”

The new records include an email
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written
on March 28, 2019, with the subject line “Ukraine Twitter Report”
features a “Rolling Two-Hour Twitter Digest” with the search
“Most Recent Tweets in Yovanovitch, Yovanovich, Ukraine Ambassador,
Ukranian Ambassador, Ukraine Soros (Saved Search)” The report
includes tweets by numerous U.S. persons, including Donald Trump Jr.,
Dan Bongino, Laura Ingraham, John Solomon, Sara Carter, Sean Hannity,
Rudy Giuliani, and others. Many of the tweets have nothing to do with
Ukraine and pertain to U.S. politics.

On March 29, 2019, Kent clarifies that the monitoring should focus
on negative attacks
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on
the work of the Department or Embassy and adds specific individuals
who should be monitored:

I would suggest the direct recipient social media audience here
includes [redacted] and me in the front office, for starters, as well
as the desk. The attaboy (or attagirl) tweets in support of what we
are doing are less of an issue to track, frankly, than the attacks…

The list of tweeters has many of the heavy hitting amplifiers we need
to be aware of; Sara Carter should be added, since she often acts as
an amplifying vanguard for issues that then get picked up on Hannity.
Giuliani too.”

A redacted person responds to Kent: “Happy to add more people once
we get the feed set up correctly. We will add Sara Carter and Guiliani
to the list for monitoring.”

While leaving out the use of CrowdTangle, an April 1, 2019, email
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with
all addressees names redacted has the subject line “Ukraine Twitter
Report” and says, “Thank you so very much for alerting everyone to
this issue. We appreciate you shutting down the automated report.
[Redacted] We do not have, and have not had, any separate automated
monitoring tools tracking specific individuals. We will continue to
follow Ukraine-related news and commentary via simple internet
searches.”

Included in the new documents are a CrowdTangle virtual training
manual
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and
a guide from CrowdTangle as to what “social listening” is.

On September 18, 2019, CrowdTangle, which had recently been acquired
by Facebook, removed access
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to
the platform “all Department users” effective October 2019.

On October 10, 2019, Congressman Devin Nunes told
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Sean
Hannity on his program that, “What I’ve heard is that there were
strange requests, irregular requests to monitor not just one
journalist, but multiple journalists…” Hannity followed this
statement by adding, multiple sources also told him that they
“believe there is evidence that government resources were used to
monitor communications” of U.S. journalists and that Yovanovitch may
have been involved. Yovanovitch was questioned on the issue during the
impeachment proceeding in the House and seemed to deny
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any
illegal monitoring took place.

The Justice Department should follow Judicial Watch’s lead and
investigate this issue further.

Until next week …



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