Nov. 22, 2019
Permission to republish original opeds and cartoons granted.
Justice Dept. Inspector General report on FISA abuse against the Trump campaign will include criminal violations by Obama administration
The worst
possible outcome of the spygate scandal, where the Obama administration spied
on the Trump campaign, the opposition party, in an election year on false
charges they were Russian agents, would be that no laws were broken, and thus
there won’t be any criminal accountability. Because it would mean the law
designed to prevent this sort of abuse is toothless. But laws were broken. In
October we learned that the investigation by U.S. Attorney John Durham had been
expanded into a criminal probe. Now CNN has reported on Nov. 21 that there is
at least one criminal referral coming from the Horowitz report: “An FBI
official is under criminal investigation after allegedly altering a document
related to 2016 surveillance of a Trump campaign adviser, several people
briefed on the matter told CNN… The finding is expected to be part of Justice
Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz's review of the FBI's effort to
obtain warrants under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act on Carter Page,
a former Trump campaign aide.”
Cartoon: Quid Pros
This for that.
Video: Sondland says he presumed: 'No one told me directly that the aid [to Ukraine] was tied to anything.'
U.S. Ambassador to
the European Union Gordon Sondland admits nobody told him to leverage U.S.
military assistance to Ukraine in exchange for investigations: “No one told me
directly that the aid [to Ukraine] was tied to anything. I was presuming it
was.” So, why is there an impeachment hearing for those allegations?
Billionaires fund left-wing ‘resisters’ and schemers to abolish the electoral college, same-day registration and oppose voter ID
For years,
Democrats have argued that they will soon have a permanent majority due to the
country’s demographic changes. However, liberal billionaires, like George Soros
and John and Laura Arnold, are not content to wait. To speed things along, they
support left-wing organizations that constantly scheme to find ways to
undermine the integrity of our elections and boost Democrats’ chances of winning.
The ACLU, the Brennan Center, and FairVote, support the National Popular Vote
interstate compact. Under this scheme, states with 270 electoral votes would
agree to cast their electoral votes for whichever candidate wins the popular
vote regardless of whether that candidate actually won the states giving that
candidate their votes. Although a number of states have signed on, this end-run
around the Constitution may well be unconstitutional and could even spark a
constitutional crisis.
Three 'domestic political errands' Speaker Pelosi could be pursuing
Americans for
Limited Government President Rick Manning: "Fiona Hill's description of
Ambassador Gordon Sondland's activity as a 'domestic political errand' should
remind everyone that it is time for Speaker Nancy Pelosi to begin doing a few
domestic political errands of her own. She can start by passing USMCA as
negotiated. She can then follow up by cutting the monstrously large federal
spending bill by 10 percent in order to keep the budget deficit under $1
trillion. If she really gets ambitious, she could pass the MERIT Act, which
would allow the federal government to fire lazy, incompetent or recalcitrant
employees. It's time for Pelosi and the House Democrats to start tending to the
domestic political errands that the voters elected them to do."
John Solomon: The Ukraine scandal timeline Democrats and their media allies don’t want America to see
“For weeks now,
Democratic members of Congress, career State Department and National Security
Council experts and their allies in the media suggest questions about Joe Biden
and a Ukrainian gas company and Ukraine meddling in the 2016 election were
nothing more than debunked conspiracy theories. In reality, the facts on both
these issues are clearly substantiated. And as I pointed out last week, many of
the witnesses that House Intelligence Committee chairman Adam Schiff called
during the impeachment proceedings confirmed concerns about both. Here is a
detailed timeline of key events in the Ukraine scandal, complete with the
corroborating evidence.”
Justice Dept. Inspector General report on FISA abuse against the Trump campaign will include criminal violations by Obama administration
By Robert Romano
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) made big news on Nov. 20 when he announced on Fox News in an interview with Sean Hannity that the Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz would be releasing his report on Dec. 9 on FBI and Justice Department surveillance of the Trump campaign in 2016 under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), with Horowitz set to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Dec. 11.
The Horowitz report should cover how false allegations made by the intelligence agencies and the Justice Department that President Donald Trump and his campaign were Russian agents managed to get approved four times by the nation’s most top secret federal court without the claims ever being verified.
On Sept. 25, Justice Department spokesperson Kerri Kupec confirmed the investigation into the counterintelligence probe of the Trump campaign, “A Department of Justice team led by U.S. Attorney John Durham is separately exploring the extent to which a number of countries, including Ukraine, played a role in the counterintelligence investigation directed at the Trump campaign during the 2016 election.”
The worst possible outcome of the FISA abuse scandal would be that no laws were broken, and thus there won’t be any criminal accountability. Because it would mean the law designed to prevent this sort of abuse is toothless.
But laws were broken. And now we know that in October that the investigation by U.S. Attorney John Durham has been expanded into a criminal probe and a grand, and now CNN has reported on Nov. 21 that there is at least one criminal referral coming from the Horowitz report: “An FBI official is under criminal investigation after allegedly altering a document related to 2016 surveillance of a Trump campaign adviser, several people briefed on the matter told CNN… The finding is expected to be part of Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz's review of the FBI's effort to obtain warrants under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act on Carter Page, a former Trump campaign aide.”
This is not really a surprise, though.
We already know from the Oct. 2016 application to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) court that the government relied on the DNC and Clinton campaign-funded dossier from Fusion GPS and British spy Christopher Steele in order to spy on the Trump campaign. This gave the Obama administration, the incumbent party, unprecedented access to the Trump campaign and the GOP, the opposition party, in an election year, including access to emails, phone calls, text messages and other documents.
This was the same dossier that FBI Director James Comey had testified in Jan. 2017 as being “salacious and unverified.”
The last renewal, at least as we can see in the FOIA response, came in June 2017, after Special Counsel Robert Mueller had been appointed by Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein.
The Steele dossier pinned the alleged Russian intelligence hack of the DNC and John Podesta emails, which were published on Wikileaks, on the Trump campaign. Steele alleged his source had said “there was a well-developed conspiracy of co-operation” between then-candidate Donald Trump and Russia.
Steele elaborated, stating in July 2016, “This was managed on the TRUMP side by the Republican candidate’s campaign manager, Paul MANAFORT, who was using foreign policy advisor, Carter PAGE, and others as intermediaries. The two sides had a mutual interest in defeating Democratic presidential candidate Hillary CLINTON, whom President PUTIN apparently both hated and feared… Inter alia, Source E, acknowledged that the Russian regime had been behind the recent leak of embarrassing e-mail messages, emanating from the Democratic National Committee (DNC), to the WikiLeaks platform. The reason for using WikiLeaks was ‘plausible deniability’ and the operation had been conducted with the full knowledge and support of TRUMP and senior members of his campaign team.”
But after Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s exhaustive investigation and the publication of the Special Counsel’s final report to the Attorney General, the charges could not be proven. Per Mueller, “the Office did not find evidence likely to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Campaign officials such as Paul Manafort, George Papadopoulos, and Carter Page acted as agents of the Russian government — or at its direction, control or request — during the relevant time period.” As for Cohen, per Mueller, “Cohen had never traveled to Prague…”
To wit, Mueller stated, “the evidence was not sufficient to charge that any member of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with representatives of the Russian government to interfere in the 2016 election.”
Meaning it was all made up by someone.
Raising the stakes, Congress is presently considering reauthorizing FISA as a part of the omnibus appropriations bill at the end of the year. Americans for Limited Government President Rick Manning stated that FISA renewal should be pushed off until March: “A longer time window will also give Congress an opportunity to review the findings of the Justice Department on Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act abuses that occurred in the 2016 elections, when the Trump campaign, the opposition party, was placed under surveillance by the Obama administration in an election year, and give time to put in place real reforms so that political spying never happens again. We have to make sure we get this right, and rushing to reauthorize FISA would be foolish when we’re still waiting on these findings.”
Steele had his own doubts, including that the information he gathered might have been Russian disinformation. In court testimony, Steele said “all material contained this risk” of being disinformation. Further, Steele didn’t go to Russia himself, and was said to have relied on a network to relay information, stating that the allegations needed to be “further corroborated and verified.”
Steele said his sources were Russian, but they were not named: Source A was a “former top Russian intelligence officer”; Source B was a “senior Russian Foreign Ministry figure”; Source C was a “senior Russian financial official”; Source D was a “close associate of Trump” (golden showers source); Source E was an “ethnic Russian close associate” of Trump (golden showers source); Source F was a “female staffer of the hotel”; and source G was a “senior Kremlin official”.
The New York Times’ Scott Shane, Adam Goldman and Matthew Rosenberg reported on April 20 that in Jan. 2017 the FBI interviewed one of the main sources for the dossier and came away with “misgivings about its reliability [that] arose not long after the document became public” in Jan. 2017.
Per the Times report: “By January 2017, F.B.I. agents had tracked down and interviewed one of Mr. Steele’s main sources, a Russian speaker from a former Soviet republic who had spent time in the West, according to a Justice Department document and three people familiar with the events, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. After questioning him about where he’d gotten his information, they suspected he might have added his own interpretations to reports passed on by his sources, one of the people said. For the F.B.I., that made it harder to decide what to trust.”
The FBI appeared to discount the possibility of the dossier being Russian disinformation, per the Times report: “F.B.I. agents considered whether Russia had polluted the stream of intelligence, but did not give it much credence, according to the former official.”
So, if Steele’s sources were not senior Russian officials, as he alleged, then who were they? Also, who was the “Russian speaker from a former Soviet republic who had spent time in the West”? The FBI knew who it was. And the reliability of those sources should most certainly be covered by Horowitz.
Were there sources in Ukraine? That’s what U.S. Rep. Devin Nunes thinks. In questioning U.S. Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland on Oct. 17, Nunes asked, “Were you aware that the origins of the Steele dossier were from Ukraine, many of the origins in the original Steele dossier were from Ukraine, the politicians within Ukraine?”
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff actually interrupted Nunes and would not allow that characterization: “I would posit that this is the ranking member’s view. We cannot accept that as an actual or factual representation.”
Nunes went on to note that “in the Steele dossier itself it does source information from Ukraine.” That included allegations against former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort and supposed “kickbacks”.
Another question the Horowitz report might cover is whether the Steele Dossier was used in the Jan. 6, 2017 intelligence assessment by then-Director of National Intelligence James Clapper that stated the DNC and John Podesta hacks had been perpetrated by Russia, and the emails put on Wikileaks, in order to help President Trump win the elections.
The intelligence assessment stated, “We assess Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered an influence campaign in 2016 aimed at the US presidential election. Russia’s goals were to undermine public faith in the US democratic process, denigrate Secretary Clinton, and harm her electability and potential presidency. We further assess Putin and the Russian Government developed a clear preference for President-elect Trump… We also assess Putin and the Russian Government aspired to help President-elect Trump’s election chances when possible by discrediting Secretary Clinton and publicly contrasting her unfavorably to him.”
Critically, the version of the assessment that was given to former President Barack Obama and then-President-Elect Trump on Jan. 5, 2017 also reportedly included some of the allegations leveled by former British spy Christopher Steele in his infamous dossier, paid for by the Hillary Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee, that Trump was a Russian agent.
A Jan. 20, 2017 email that former National Security Advisor Susan Rice sent to herself on the day Trump was inaugurated about a Jan. 5, 2017 meeting in the Oval Office, detailed the White House’s interaction with that assessment, in which Rice wrote, “On January 5, following a briefing by IC leadership on Russian hacking during the 2016 Presidential election, President Obama had a brief follow-on conversation with FBI Director Jim Comey and Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates in the Oval Office. Vice President Biden and I were also present.”
According to Rice, former President Barack Obama wanted to make certain that the investigation, which was about to be carried over to the Trump administration, would be done “by the book.” Per Rice’s email to herself, “President Obama began the conversation by stressing his continued commitment to ensuring that every aspect of this issue is handled by the Intelligence and law enforcement communities ‘by the book’. The President stressed that he is not asking about, initiating or instructing anything from a law enforcement perspective. He reiterated that our law enforcement team needs to proceed as it normally would by the book. From a national security perspective, however, President Obama said he wants to be sure that, as we engage with the incoming team, we are mindful to ascertain if there is any reason that we cannot share information fully as it relates to Russia.”
The email continued, “The President asked [then-FBI Director James] Comey to inform him if anything changes in the next few weeks that should affect how we share classified information with the incoming team. Comey said he would.”
The email was uncovered from the National Archives by then-Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and the current Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) on Feb. 12, 2018, who wrote a letter to Rice.
Note that it was Comey’s job to brief then-President-elect Trump on the assessment, and that it was Comey who lied to President Trump after he was inaugurated repeatedly about the extent of the investigation. Comey assured Trump he wasn’t under investigation, and that was a lie. That’s why Comey was fired.
As for the assessment, the publication of that report was arguably the original sin of the Obama administration, as it set the stage publicly for an investigation of the President of the United States, newly sworn in, on allegations he was really a Manchurian candidate. This put the American people through what would be another two-and-a-half years of a national nightmare that absolutely undermined President Trump’s ability to do his job — and probably future presidents who think they have their own ideas to implement, especially in areas of foreign policy.
Trump, with Flynn as his campaign advisor, ran on the idea of calming tensions between the U.S. and Russia. What the intelligence community did with that assessment, and the Justice Department with its investigations into false charges he and Flynn were Russian agents, was to undermine the pursuit of that policy even though under Article II of the Constitution, the executive power is vested in the President. He sets the foreign policy. Not alphabet soup intel agencies.
What this essentially undermined is the cornerstone of a republican government: the peaceful transfer of power after elections. It was arguably an act of war. How do we put the genie back in the bottle?
Sometimes revolutions are born out of necessity. Rome never had a republic until the first Brutus slayed the last Roman king, and it was the king’s tyrannical rule that gave cause to do so. Afterward, Brutus made the people of Rome swear an oath they would never again suffer a tyrant. More than two millennia later, it was the tyranny of the British Parliament and King George that gave rise to the American Revolution.
Eventually, the weak Articles of Confederation gave rise to the Federal Constitution with the separation of powers, including a strong executive, which was supposed to prevent or at least mitigate this sort of thing from happening, with essentially two or more executive branches seeking primacy. It was a coup.
And now, after this ordeal, the Constitution hangs by a thread. Attorney General William Barr can rescue it, but he must act skillfully and wisely. And quickly. We cannot assume President Trump will be reelected in 2020, meaning the window of opportunity is now to hold those who abused their spying powers accountable. Or else this will happen again.
Robert Romano is the Vice President of Public Policy at Americans for Limited Government.
Cartoon: Quid Pros
By A.F. Branco
Click here for a higher level resolution version.
Video: Sondland says he presumed: 'No one told me directly that the aid [to Ukraine] was tied to anything.'
To view online: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0s1Ocu9YTes
Billionaires fund left-wing ‘resisters’ and schemers to abolish the electoral college, same-day registration and oppose voter ID
By Richard McCarty
For years, Democrats have argued that they will soon have a permanent majority due to the country’s demographic changes. However, liberal billionaires, like George Soros and John and Laura Arnold, are not content to wait. To speed things along, they support left-wing organizations that constantly scheme to find ways to undermine the integrity of our elections and boost Democrats’ chances of winning.
To begin with, Soros and the Arnolds support the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the Brennan Center for Justice. The ACLU has a long and sordid history of proudly defending the indefensible. These days, it brags that it has sued the Trump Administration more than 100 times. The Brennan Center was founded by former clerks for liberal U.S. Supreme Court Justice William Brennan; the Center is now run by a senior official in the Clinton Administration. In the early days of the Trump Administration, the Center was recognized as part of the “Resistance Network.”
Both the ACLU and the Brennan Center oppose voter ID laws. While these left-wing organizations do everything they can to make it easier to commit voter fraud, a 2016 Gallup poll shows just how out-of-touch they are on voter ID laws. Gallup found that 80% of voters support ID laws, including 95% of Republicans, 63% of Democrats, 83% of independents, 81% of whites, and 77% of nonwhites. Furthermore, although the ACLU and the Brennan Center claim that voter ID laws disenfranchise minority voters, they disregard evidence that shows that these laws do not suppress minority voter turnout.
Of course, there is much more to these group’s agendas than just blocking voter ID laws. For example, the ACLU opposes efforts to clean up voter rolls that would reduce chances of voter fraud. Not to be outdone, the Brennan Center supports having at least two full weeks of early voting (including nights and weekends), allowing people to register and vote on the same day, and having the government automatically register voters.
Why is it that the ACLU is so desperate to ensure that voter rolls are filled with dead people and those registered in multiple states? Good government? Doubtful. What the ACLU refuses to recognize is that, while some efforts to maintain the integrity of our elections might inconvenience some voters from time to time, the broader voting public has a right to expect that the government is taking reasonable steps to ensure that only those eligible to vote are allowed to do so. After all, no in their right mind wants their vote cancelled out by a non-citizen or someone who votes twice.
Despite the Brennan Center’s claims, there is very little justification for weeks of early voting. If a voter cannot find any time to vote on Election Day during the 12 or so hours that polls are open and cannot submit an absentee ballot, many would reasonably conclude that that voter is not sufficiently motivated to vote. In addition, despite liberal groups’ advocacy for early voting, the evidence suggests early voting does not increase turnout – and could even result in lower turnout. Early voting does, however, increase work for county workers, increase costs for taxpayers, and increase work for volunteers handing out sample ballots to voters.
Soros and the Arnolds, along with the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, support FairVote. FairVote is run by Rob Richie, a former campaign staffer for a liberal Democrat Congresswoman. FairVote supports same-day registration and voting, automatic voter registration, and even allowing 16- and 17-year-olds to vote.
All three of these organizations, the ACLU, the Brennan Center, and FairVote, support the National Popular Vote interstate compact. Under this scheme, states with 270 electoral votes would agree to cast their electoral votes for whichever candidate wins the popular vote regardless of whether that candidate actually won the states giving that candidate their votes. Although a number of states have signed on, this end-run around the Constitution may well be unconstitutional and could even spark a constitutional crisis.
When Soros and the Arnolds are not funding the abortion industry, trying to impose a carbon tax, or trying to erode your Second Amendment rights, they are trying to rig our elections. This is why we need more conservative donors and activists – as well as more cooperation between right-leaning organizations – to push back on these fronts.
Richard McCarty is the Director of Research at Americans for Limited Government Foundation.
Three 'domestic political errands' Speaker Pelosi could be pursuing
Nov. 21, 2019, Fairfax, Va.—Americans for Limited Government President Rick Manning today issued the following statement in response to former National Security Council official Fiona Hill's characterization of Ambassador Gordon Sondland's activity as a "domestic political errand":
"Fiona Hill's description of Ambassador Gordon Sondland's activity as a 'domestic political errand' should remind everyone that it is time for Speaker Nancy Pelosi to begin doing a few domestic political errands of her own. She can start by passing USMCA as negotiated. She can then follow up by cutting the monstrously large federal spending bill by 10 percent in order to keep the budget deficit under $1 trillion. If she really gets ambitious, she could pass the MERIT Act, which would allow the federal government to fire lazy, incompetent or recalcitrant employees. It's time for Pelosi and the House Democrats to start tending to the domestic political errands that the voters elected them to do."
To view online: https://getliberty.org/2019/11/three-domestic-political-errands-speaker-pelosi-could-be-pursuing/
ALG Editor’s Note: In the following featured report from John Solomon, the timeline of State Department and Joe Biden meddling in Ukraine and the Burisma scandal is clear and is proof positive that the corruption investigations of Burisma Holdings in Ukraine go back years and long predate either President Donald Trump or Ukrainian President Volodymyr’s 2016 and 2019 respective elections:
The Ukraine scandal timeline Democrats and their media allies don’t want America to see
By John Solomon
For weeks now, Democratic members of Congress, career State Department and National Security Council experts and their allies in the media suggest questions about Joe Biden and a Ukrainian gas company and Ukraine meddling in the 2016 election were nothing more than debunked conspiracy theories.
In reality, the facts on both these issues are clearly substantiated. And as I pointed out last week, many of the witnesses that House Intelligence Committee chairman Adam Schiff called during the impeachment proceedings confirmed concerns about both.
Here is a detailed timeline of key events in the Ukraine scandal, complete with the corroborating evidence. You make your own judgement as to what happened.
February 2014.
Vice President Joe Biden named by President Obama to be U.S. point man on Ukrainian crisis after Euromaidan Revolution of Dignity leads to ouster of Viktor Yanukovych as Ukrainian president.
February 21, 2014
George Soros’ Open Society Foundation publishes anticorruption strategy for Ukraine identifying the Anti-Corruption Action Centre, a nonprofit that Soros’ foundation and the U.S. State Department jointly fund, as the leading edge of the foundation’s strategy for Ukraine.
Validation: https://www.scribd.com/document/403223726/Open-Society-2014-Memo
March 2014
New Ukrainian elections set for May 2014 and Petro Poroshenko emerges as top Western-friendly candidate for president.
April 13, 2014:
Devon Archer, the business partner of Hunter Biden, son of the VP, and Christopher Heinz, stepson of Secretary of State John Kerry, is named an independent director of the Ukrainian gas company Burisma Holdings.
Validation: https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-echochambers-27403003
April 15, 2014:
Burisma Holdings makes two payments to the Morgan Stanley account of Devon Archer’s and Hunter Biden’s firm Rosemont Seneca Bohai in the amounts of $83,333.33 and $29,424.82, according to financial records obtained by Ukrainian authorities and the FBI.
Validation: Burisma Holdings financial records obtained by Ukraine Prosecutor General’s Office. https://www.scribd.com/document/436048670/Burisma-Holdings-Accounting-Ledger
FBI records obtained from Rosemont Seneca Bohai: https://www.scribd.com/document/404001731/Rosemont-Seneca-Partners-Court-File
April 15, 2014:
Devon Archer, Hunter Biden’s partner in Rosemont Seneca Bohai and Burisma Holdings, checks into White House for meeting with Vice President Joe Biden, according to the Secret Service’s official WAVES entry logs for the Obama White House.
April 22, 2014:
VP Joe Biden meets with Ukraine Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk and urges Ukraine to ramp up energy production to free itself from its Russian natural gas dependence. Biden boasts that “an American team is currently in the region working with Ukraine and its neighbors to increase Ukraine’s short-term energy supply.” Yatsenyuk welcomes help from American “investors” in modernizing natural gas supply lines in Ukraine.
April 24, 2014:
Joe Biden meets with candidate Poroshenko.
April 28, 2014:
Britain’s Serious Fraud Office freezes $23 million in assets kept in London by Burisma Holdings and its founder, Mykola Zlochevsky, on grounds it was fraudulently transferred from Ukraine. Zlochevsky and Burisma deny wrongdoing.
Validation: https://www.sfo.gov.uk/cases/ukraine-money-laundering-investigation/
May 13, 2014
Hunter Biden announced as a board member for Ukraine’s largest natural gas company Burisma Holdings, which is run by Mykola Zlochevsky, a former Cabinet official for ousted president Victor Yanukovych.
Validation: https://www.cnbc.com/2014/05/13/bidens-son-joins-ukraine-gas-companys-board-of-directors.html
https://burisma-group.com/hunter-biden-joins-the-team-of-burisma-holdings/
May 13, 2014
Christopher Heinz, business partner to Devon Archer and Hunter Biden and stepson to John Kerry, sends email to Secretary of State’s top aides distancing himself from Archer, Biden appointments to Burisma Holdings board, according to FOIA released to Citizens United.
Validation: https://www.scribd.com/document/433436789/CU-v-State-FOIA-Doc-Ukraine
May 15, 2014
Burisma Holdings makes two equal $83,333.33 payments totaling $166,666.66 to the Morgan Stanley account of Hunter Biden’s and Devon Archer’s firm Rosemont Seneca Bohai, according to the company’s official ledger and Rosemont Seneca Bohais bank records obtained by the FBI. Similar payments are made every month for more than a year.
Validation: Burisma Holdings financial records released by Ukraine Prosecutor General’s Office: https://www.scribd.com/document/436048670/Burisma-Holdings-Accounting-Ledger
Rosemont Seneca records seized by FBI: https://www.scribd.com/document/404001731/Rosemont-Seneca-Partners-Court-File
May 20, 2014
David Leiter, former chief of staff to John Kerry, hired as a lobbyist for Burisma Holdings, Senate lobbying records show. The firm is paid $90,000 in 2014 to lobby Congress and the State Department.
Validation: https://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/client_reports.php?id=F212407&year=2014
May 25, 2014
Poroshenko wins the Ukraine presidential election
July 5, 2014:
Burisma Holdings pays $250,000 retainer to Boies Schiller law firm where board member Hunter Biden also works.
Validation: Burisma Holdings financial records released by Ukraine Prosecutor General’s Office: https://www.scribd.com/document/436048670/Burisma-Holdings-Accounting-Ledger
Aug. 20, 2014
Ukraine Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin’s office opens criminal investigation of Burisma Holdings and Mykola Zlochevsky for alleged corrupt award of gas exploration permits and eventual looting of company, according to Ukrainian prosecutor general’s case file.
Sept. 16, 2014
Burisma Holdings makes $33,039.77 payment to Boies Schiller law firm, according to company records.
Validation: Burisma Holdings accounting ledger obtained by Ukraine Prosecutor General’s Office https://www.scribd.com/document/436048670/Burisma-Holdings-Accounting-Ledger
December 16, 2014
Former deputy national security adviser Tony Blinken, a longtime Joe Biden adviser, confirmed by Senate as Deputy Secretary of State under John Kerry.
Jan. 18, 2015:
Prosecutor General’s office in Ukraine declares Burisma Holdings founder Mykola Zlochevsky a fugitive “wanted in Ukraine.”
Jan. 29, 2015:
British Serious Fraud Office announces it is closing down investigation into Burisma and Zlochevsky for insufficient evidence.
Validation: https://www.sfo.gov.uk/cases/ukraine-money-laundering-investigation/
March 18, 2015
VP Biden has phone call with President Poroshenko.
Validation: https://ua.usembassy.gov/readout-vice-presidents-call-ukrainian-president-petro-poroshenko-6/
March 30, 2015:
George Soros announces plans to invest $1 billion in Ukrainian energy and technology sectors.
Validation: https://money.cnn.com/2015/03/30/investing/ukraine-soros-billion-russia/index.html
April 15, 2015
VP Joe Biden speaks in Ukraine, praising the decision to appoint a new head of the NABU, the new Ukrainian law enforcement investigative arm set up by United States.
March 22, 2015:
Hunter Biden emails his father’s longtime trusted aide, Deputy Secretary of State Tony Blinken, with the following message: “Have a few minutes next week to grab a cup of coffee? I know you are impossibly busy, but would like to get your advice on a couple of things, Best, Hunter.”
Blinken responds the same day with an “absolutely” and added, “Look forward to seeing you.”
The records indicate the two men were scheduled to meet the afternoon of May 27, 2015.
Validation: https://www.scribd.com/document/436054889/Hunter-Biden-Blinken-May-2015-Contacts
June 11, 2015
Burisma Holdings makes $20,000 donation to the Delaware Community Foundation in the name of Beau Biden, the vice president’s oldest son who died of cancer, according to the company’s financial records released by Ukraine prosecutor general’s office.
Validation: https://www.scribd.com/document/436048670/Burisma-Holdings-Accounting-Ledger
June 12, 2015
VP Biden calls President Poroshenko.
Validation: https://ua.usembassy.gov/readout-vice-presidents-call-ukrainian-president-petro-poroshenko-8/
July 15, 2015
VP Biden and Commerce Secretary Pritzker attend first ever US-Ukraine Chamber of Business meeting.
Validation: https://www.uschamber.com/first-annual-us-ukraine-business-forum
July 22, 2015:
Hunter Biden meets with Deputy Secretary Tony Blinken for lunch at State Department, according to State Department memos.
Validation: https://www.scribd.com/document/433389212/Biden-Blinken-Meeting
July 24, 2015:
VP Biden calls President Poroshenko, raises concerns about anti-corruption efforts in Ukraine.
Validation: https://ua.usembassy.gov/readout-vice-presidents-call-ukrainian-president-petro-poroshenko-10/
Aug. 16, 2015
Devon Archer throws a $10,000 a plate fund-raiser in New York for the Seed Global Health charity founded by Secretary of State Kerry’s daughter, Dr. Vanessa Kerry, according to official invite.
Validation: https://www.scribd.com/document/432522987/Devon-Archer-Fundraiser-Vanessa-Kerry
Aug. 28, 2015
VP Biden calls President Poroshenko
Validation: https://ua.usembassy.gov/readout-vice-presidents-call-ukrainian-president-petro-poroshenko-082815/
Sept. 25, 2015:
U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Geoffrey Pyatt gives speech imploring Ukrainian prosecutors to do more to bring Burisma’s Zlochevsky to justice.
Validation: https://www.rferl.org/a/us-ambassador-upbraids-ukraine-over-corruption-efforts/27271294.html
Sept. 29, 2015
VP Biden meets with President Poroshenko in Ukraine.
Validation: https://ua.usembassy.gov/readout-vice-president-bidens-meeting-ukrainian-president-petro-poroshenko/
Nov. 5, 2015
VP Biden calls President Poroshenko.
Validation: https://ua.usembassy.gov/readout-vice-president-bidens-call-ukrainian-president-petro-poroshenko-110515/
Nov. 18, 2015
Burisma Holdings makes $60,000 payment to the American legal, lobbying and communications firm Blue Star Strategies for consulting work, according to company’s official ledger.
Validation: https://www.scribd.com/document/436048670/Burisma-Holdings-Accounting-Ledger
Dec. 7, 2015
VP Biden meets with President Poroshenko and demands the president make “hard decisions” to eliminate “the cancer of corruption” in his country.
Dec. 8, 2015
The New York Times publishes article stating Prosecutor General Shokin’s office is investigating Burisma Holdings and its founder Zlochecvsky, and that Hunter Biden’s participation on Burisma board is undercutting Joe Biden’s anticorruption message in Ukraine. VP Biden office quoted in story.
Validation: https://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/09/world/europe/corruption-ukraine-joe-biden-son-hunter-biden-ties.html
Jan. 21-24, 2016:
Obama White House invites leaders of Ukraine’s general prosecutor office to Washington for a hastily arranged set of meetings to discuss anticorruption cases, including Burisma and Party of Regions case involving Paul Manafort..
Feb. 4, 2016
Ukraine general prosecutor’s office under the direction of Viktor Shokin announces the seizure of assets from Burisma Holdings founder Mykola Zlochevsky under a continuing criminal investigation. The seizure occurred on Feb. 2, 2016, according to the announcement.
Validation: https://en.interfax.com.ua/news/general/322395.html
Feb. 4, 2016
Burisma board member Hunter Biden sends a Twitter notification to Deputy Secretary of State Tony Blinken, a longtime adviser to Joe Biden, indicating he is following Blinken on Twitter.
Validation: https://www.scribd.com/document/433389211/HunterBidenFollowBlinkenTwitter
Feb. 11, 18, 19, 2016
VP Biden holds series of phone calls with President Poroshenko to check on status of pending items from their December 2015 meeting.
Feb. 24-March 1, 2016:
An American representative for Burisma Holdings, Karen Tramontano of Blue Star Strategies, seeks meeting with Undersecretary of State Catherine A. Novelli to discuss ending the corruption allegations against the Ukrainian gas firm. Hunter Biden’s name was specifically invoked by the Burisma representative as a reason the State Department should help. “Per our conversation, Karen Tramontano of Blue Star Strategies requested a meeting to discuss with U/S Novelli USG remarks alleging Burisma (Ukrainian energy company) of corruption.”
Validation: https://www.scribd.com/document/433389210/Bluestar-Novelli-Contacts
March 2, 2016:
Devon Archer, a business partner of Hunter Biden and fellow American board member on Burisma Holdings, secures meeting with Secretary of State John Kerry, State Department memos say.
Validation: https://www.scribd.com/document/433389208/Archer-Meeting-Kerry
March 15, 2016
Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland demands Ukraine “appoint and confirm a new, clean Prosecutor General, who is committed to rebuilding the integrity of the PGO, and investigate, indict and successfully prosecute corruption and asset recovery cases – including locking up dirty personnel in the PGO itself.”
Validation: https://ua.usembassy.gov/ukrainian-reforms-two-years-maidan-revolution-russian-invasion/
March 22, 2016
VP Joe Biden engages in phone call from Washington DC with Ukrainian president Poroshenko about U.S. loan guarantees. It is believed in this call that Biden renews his demands that the president fire Prosecutor General Shokin, who is overseeing the Burisma prosecution, or risk losing the next $1 billion in U.S. loan guarantees.
Validation: https://ua.usembassy.gov/readout-vice-president-bidens-call-president-petro-poroshenko-ukraine-032216/
March 29, 2016
Ukraine parliament fires Prosecutor General Shokin at urging of President Poroshenko.
March 29, 2016:
John Buretta, an American lawyer hired by Burisma Holdings, seeks to contact the Acting Prosecutor General Sevruk seeking a meeting about the Burisma investigation just hours after his boss, Prosecutor General Shokin, was fired under pressure from VP Joe Biden, according to email Buretta’s legal team sent the Ukraine embassy in Washington.
March 30, 2016:
Burisma Holdings’ U.S. legal team seeks help of Ukrainian embassy official Andrii Telizhenko in Washington seeking urgent meeting with new Acting Prosecutor General of Ukraine, according to legal team’s email to embassy.
March 31, 2016
VP Joe Biden arrives in Ukraine and announces $1 billion in loan guarantees, ending threat to withhold aid and force Ukraine into debt default, and also delivers $239 million more in promised aid.
Validation: https://ua.usembassy.gov/readout-vice-president-bidens-meeting-president-petro-poroshenko-ukraine-033116/
April 4, 2016:
George Kent, a senior US official at the American embassy in Ukraine, writes a letter asking Ukrainian general prosecutor’s office to stand down their investigation of the Soros-funded group the Anti-Corruption Action Centre.
Validation: https://www.scribd.com/document/402559592/Embassy2GPLetter4-4-16
April 6, 2016
Burisma Holdings’ U.S. legal team of John Buretta, Sally Painter and Karen Tramontano meets with Ukraine’s Acting Prosecutor General Sevruk to seek resolution of Burisma criminal investigation. American lawyers apologize for “false information” spread by U.S. government to force the firing of Shokin and offer Prosecutor General’s office an olive branch of arranging a meeting in Washington to clear the air.
Validation: Official Prosecutor General’s memo of meeting: https://www.scribd.com/document/427618143/Ukraine-PGO-Memo-Untranslated
English translation: https://www.scribd.com/document/427616178/Ukraine-PGO-Memo-Translation
April 14, 2016
VP Biden calls President Poroshenko and “stressed the urgency of putting in place a new Prosecutor General who would bolster the agency’s anti-corruption efforts.
Validation: https://ua.usembassy.gov/readout-vice-president-bidens-call-president-petro-poroshenko-ukraine-041416/
May 4, 2016:
DNC contractor Alexandra Chalupa writes email to bosses at party headquarters derailing her work to get dirt on Trump and Manafort from Ukraine.
Validation: https://wikileaks.org/dnc-emails/emailid/3962
May 12, 2016
Yurii Lutsenko named the new Prosecutor General of Ukraine, taking over investigations that include Burisma Holdings. VP Joe Biden later praises Lutsenko as a “solid guy” during 2018 speech at Atlantic Counsel.
Validation: : https://www.cfr.org/event/foreign-affairs-issue-launch-former-vice-president-joe-biden
May 25, 2016:
Senior George Soros adviser provides private briefing to Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland about Russian bond market, according to official State Department memo of briefing.
Validation: https://www.scribd.com/document/421082234/SorosNulandRussia-Bond-Market
May 27, 2016
VP Biden holds phone call with President Poroshenko.
Validation: https://ua.usembassy.gov/readout-vice-president-bidens-call-president-petro-poroshenko-ukraine-052716/
June 1, 2016:
George Soros seeks and receives a telephonic meeting with Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland to discuss Ukraine, according to the official State Department record of call
Validation: https://www.scribd.com/document/421081817/SorosNulandJune1-2016-Contacts-Ukraine
Aug. 4, 2016:
Ukraine’s ambassador to Washington, Valeriy Chaly, takes extraordinary step of writing an OpEd in The Hill intervening in the US presidential election, slamming Trump’s policies and comments on Russia.
Aug. 12, 2016
Phone call between VP Biden and President Poroshenko
Sept. 20, 2016
VP Biden meets President Poroshenko on sidelines of UN meeting. Confirms $1 billion in loan guarantees has been made.
Validation: https://ua.usembassy.gov/readout-vice-president-bidens-meeting-president-petro-poroshenko-ukraine/
Nov. 8, 2016
Donald Trump wins election to become 45th president of United States, ending eight years of Democratic control of the White House.
Dec. 15, 2016
VP Biden holds phone call with Ukraine president and prime minister, praises work of NABU.
Jan. 11, 2017:
Politico reports possible effort by DNC contractor Alexandra Chalupa to seek Russia dirt on Trump and Manafort from Ukraine embassy in Washington during 2016 election.
Validation: https://www.politico.com/story/2017/01/ukraine-sabotage-trump-backfire-233446
Jan. 17-18, 2017
Biden makes final appearance in Ukraine with President Poroshenko.
February 1, 2017:
John Buretta, the American lawyer for Burisma Holdings, gives interview in Kiev confirming there were criminal cases open in 2016 in Ukraine but all have been settled, the last with a penalty for tax violations.
Jan. 25, 2018
Former VP Biden boasts at Council of Foreign Relations events in Washington that he strong-armed Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko into firing Prosecutor General Shokin, using loan guarantees as leverage. He also calls Shokin’s replacement, Yuriy Lutsenko, “solid.”
Validation: https://www.cfr.org/event/foreign-affairs-issue-launch-former-vice-president-joe-biden
May 9, 2018
House Rules Committee chairman Pete Sessions writes letter to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo demanding removal of US Ambassador to Kiev Marie Yovanovitch.
Validation: https://www.scribd.com/document/402558867/Sessions-Pompeo-correspondence-2018
December 12, 2018:
Ukrainian court rules that the efforts by Ukrainian parliamentary member Sergey Leschenko and NABU chief Artem Sytnyk to publicize the Manafort black ledger documents in 2016 were an improper foreign intervention in the American presidential election.
Feb. 10, 2019
NABU revives dormant Burisma case, drafting a notice of suspicion against founder Mykola Zlochevsky and asking the special anticorruption prosecutor of Ukraine to bring Zlochevsky in for questioning.
March 28, 2019
Ukraine General Prosecutor’s office under the authority of Deputy Prosecutor General Kulyk announces it has opened a new money laundering investigation against Burisma founder Zlochevsky.
Validation: https://www.scribd.com/document/429942801/March282019NoticeofSuspicionZolchevskyBurisma
May 2, 2019:
Ukraine embassy in Washington issues statement confirming that in spring 2016 the DNC contractor Alexandra Chalupa sought the embassy’s help seeking dirt on Donald Trump and Paul Manafort and asking for Ukraine’s president to meet with an investigative reporter working on the issue.
Text of statement: https://www.scribd.com/document/432699412/Ukraine-Chaly-Statement-on-Chalupa-042519
May 16, 2019:
Artem Sytnyk, head of Ukraine’s National Anticorruption Bureau (NABU), confirms investigations remain open against Burisma and its founder Zlochevsky.
Validation: https://www.kyivpost.com/ukraine-politics/sytnyk-nabu-has-not-closed-cases-related-to-zlochevsky.html
