As the coup abuse against President Trump accelerates, Judicial Watch
focuses on the real Ukraine collusion scandal. We just sued the State
Department for documents related to a reported “untouchables list”
given by former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch to
Ukraine Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko in late 2016 (Judicial Watch
vs. U.S. Department of State) (No. 1:19-cv-03563).

[WEEKLY UPDATE]

DID OBAMA-APPOINTED UKRAINE AMBASSADOR INTERVENE TO HELP ANTI-TRUMP
UKRAINE GROUP?

[[link removed]]


As the coup abuse against President Trump accelerates, Judicial Watch
focuses on the real Ukraine collusion scandal. We just sued the State
Department for documents related to a reported “untouchables list”
given by former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch to
Ukraine Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko in late 2016 (_Judicial
Watch vs. U.S. Department of State_
[[link removed]])
(No. 1:19-cv-03563).

Lutsenko recently told
[[link removed]]
_The New York Times_ that Yovanovitch “pressed him not to prosecute
anti-corruption activists.” Lutsenko previously reportedly said
[[link removed]]
the
do-not-prosecute list included a founder of the Ukraine
group Anti-Corruption Action Centre
[[link removed]]
(AntAC), which was funded by George Soros
foundations and the U.S. federal government, and two members of the
Ukrainian Parliament who vocally supported the Soros group’s agenda
[[link removed]


> The implied message to Ukraine’s prosecutors was clear: Don’t
> target AntAC in the middle of an American presidential election in
> which Soros was backing Hillary Clinton
>
[[link removed]]
> to succeed another Soros favorite, Barack Obama, Ukrainian officials
> said.

Recently, Rudy Giuliani stated
[[link removed]]
that
AntAC “was co-funded by the Obama administration and far-left
billionaire financier George Soros,” and “was ironically under
investigation for alleged corruption, namely a ‘misplaced’ $4.4
million in U.S. funds designated to ‘fight corruption inside the
former Soviet republic,’ during the 2016 presidential election in
America.”

Amb. Yovanovitch, who was recalled from her Ukraine post in May of
this year by President Donald Trump, was a key witness for Democrats
last month in their public impeachment hearings. Yovanovitch denied
[[link removed]]
providing
any do-not-prosecute “list.”
We filed our FOIA lawsuit here in DC after the State Department
failed to respond to our September 24, 2019, FOIA request for:

* All records of communication between the Department of State and
any representative of the Ukrainian government regarding any actual or
proposed investigation or prosecution of the AntAC; the International
Renaissance Foundation [Open Society Foundations’ office in
Ukraine]; and/or Transparency International.
* All records concerning any meeting or telephonic conversation
between former Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch and former Ukrainian
Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko.
* All records related to the list of individuals and entities
provided to Lutsenko by Yovanovitch in late 2016.

Amb. Yovanovitch is on our radar for a number of issues. On October 9,
2019, we filed a FOIA request
[[link removed]]
for
State Department records related to the possibly illegal collection of
information by Yovanovitch on prominent conservative figures,
journalists and persons with ties to President Donald Trump.

Reports suggest that the Ukrainian Embassy was a hotbed of anti-Trump,
Deep State activism and tried to promote and protect leftist allies in
Ukraine and the United States. As the coup attack on President Trump
continues, this new federal lawsuit is designed to get to the real
truth of the Deep State’s games in Ukraine.

JUDICIAL WATCH SUES FOR KEY DOCS OF DEEP STATE OFFICIAL AT CENTER OF
LATEST COUP ATTACK ON TRUMP

It’s all too easy for our intelligence agencies, acting behind their
curtains of secrecy, to abuse their power. Fortunately, Judicial Watch
takes them to court to get to the truth. One Deep State player in
particular was likely up to no good, and we’re going to find out.

We have filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit against the
Justice Department for communications records of Michael K. Atkinson
[[link removed]]
– former Assistant Attorney General in DOJ’s National Security
Division (NSD) from 2016 to 2018 and currently Inspector General
[[link removed]]
of the Intelligence Community (ICIG).

The records we are seeking are regarding Donald Trump, Hillary
Clinton, Anthony Weiner, the Twenty-Fifth Amendment and/or
presidential impeachment. We’re also seeking all emails and text
messages of Representative Adam Schiff (D-CA) and members of
Schiff’s staff.

We sued after the Justice Department failed to respond to our October
1, 2019, FOIA request (_Judicial Watch v. U.S. Department of Justice_
[[link removed]]
(No.
1:19-cv-03566)). We asked for:

* All emails (whether on .gov or non-.gov email accounts) and text
messages sent to or from former Senior Counsel to the Assistant
Attorney General Michael K. Atkinson regarding Donald Trump, Hillary
Clinton, Anthony Weiner, the Twenty-Fifth Amendment, and/or
presidential impeachment.
* All emails and text messages between former Senior Counsel
Atkinson and Representative Adam Schiff or any member of Mr.
Schiff’s staff.
* All travel requests, travel authorizations and expense reports of
former Senior Counsel Atkinson
* All calendar entries of former Senior Counsel Atkinson.
* All SF50s and SF52s of former Senior Counsel Atkinson.

The NSD falls under the direct supervision
[[link removed]]
of the
assistant attorney general.

During Atkinson’s tenure at NSD
[[link removed]],
he was senior legal
counsel
[[link removed]],
first to NSD head John Carlin
[[link removed]]
(Robert Mueller's
former chief of staff when Mueller directed the FBI) and later to
acting NSD head Mary McCord
[[link removed]].
McCord accompanied
[[link removed]]
then-Acting Attorney General Sally Yates to see White House Counsel
Don McGahn regarding Michael Flynn.

During the period Atkinson was legal advisor to Carlin and later
McCord, the FISA court found
[[link removed]]
there was “significant non-compliance with the NSA’s minimization
procedures involving queries of data,” otherwise known as spying,
under the Obama Administration. Additionally, during this period,
DOJ-NSD was working in coordination with the FBI Counterintelligence
Unit on Operation Crossfire Hurricane
[[link removed]],
which included former FBI officials Bill Priestap, Peter Strzok and
Lisa Page. Page was the intermediary between FBI Counterintelligence
and DOJ-NSD.

Since becoming Inspector General, Atkinson also has come
under scrutiny
[[link removed]]
for
his handling of the so-called “whistleblower” complaint raising
concerns about President Trump’s dealings with Ukraine, which became
the basis for the ongoing impeachment proceedings against Trump:

* Atkinson changed
[[link removed]]
the standing practice of requiring whistleblowers to present firsthand
information in order to have their complaint considered both
“credible” and “of urgent concern” for submission under the
Intelligence Community Whistleblower Protection Act.
* After receiving the complaint and a recommendation from Atkinson
that it be referred to Congress, the DNI refused
[[link removed]]
to
forward the complaint because, based on an opinion of the Justice
Department Office of Legal Counsel, “The complaint submitted to the
ICIG does not involve an ‘urgent concern.’” In testimony before
Congress, Acting Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire
[[link removed]],
said
the complaint was essentially “hearsay” and not “corroborated by
other folks.”
* After the existence of the whistleblower was leaked to the press,
Atkinson told Congress he was unaware
[[link removed]]
the
whistleblower had first gone around him to House Intelligence
Committee Chairman Adam Schiff and his staff with his complaint before
submitting it to the IG’s office.

After listening to Atkinson testify about the whistleblower behind
closed doors before the House Intelligence Committee on October 4,
ranking Republican committee member Republican Devin Nunes (R-CA) said
[[link removed]]
of him:

> [The ICIG is] either totally incompetent or part of the deep state,
> and he’s got a lot of questions he needs to answer because he
> knowingly changed the form and the requirements in order to make
> sure that this whistleblower complaint got out publicly. So, he’s
> either incompetent or in on it … he’s either a quack or he’s
> lying … and he’s going to have more to answer for, I can promise
> you, because we are not going to let him go; he is going to tell the
> truth about what happened.

Rep. Adam Schiff has yet to release Atkinson’s testimony.

Atkinson has been a key Deep State official involved with questionable
and abusive investigations of President Trump. As Adam Schiff keeps
Atkinson’s testimony on the impeachment attack on President Trump
secret, we’re going to court for transparency under the law.

COURT TELLS FBI IT CAN’T HIDE RECORDS ABOUT FBI-CLINTON LAWYER
MEETING ON RUSSIA

The Justice Department wanted to pretend that a meeting between an FBI
official and a Clinton lawyer didn’t happen, telling Judicial Watch
that they would “neither confirm nor deny” it. And the DOJ wanted
a U.S. District Court to go along. U.S. District Judge James E.
Boasberg wasn’t having any of it.

The judge denied
[[link removed]]
the effort to block the release of communications between former FBI
General Counsel James Baker and Michael Sussmann, a Perkins Coie law
partner and former DOJ attorney, who reportedly met with Baker to
share information targeting Donald J. Trump during the presidential
campaign.

While at Perkins Coie, Sussmann represented the Democratic National
Committee (DNC) and Hillary Clinton’s campaign during the time
Perkins Coie secretly paid for the development of the anti-Trump
[[link removed]]
dossier the DOJ used to obtain FISA warrants to spy on the Trump
campaign. The court specifically rejected the FBI’s argument that it
needed to protect the “privacy” of Hillary Clinton’s lawyer.

Baker testified
[[link removed]]
before the House Judiciary and Oversight Committees that he received
documents as well as computer storage devices on Russian hacking from
Sussmann. The Mueller report
[[link removed]],
however, concluded that
there was no evidence that the Trump campaign improperly colluded with
Russia.

In March 2019, Judicial Watch filed suit
[[link removed]]
after the FBI failed to respond to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA)
request dated October 5, 2018 (_Judicial Watch v. U.S. Department of
Justice_
[[link removed]]
(No. 1:19-cv-00573)). The lawsuit seeks:

* Any and all records of communication between former FBI General
Counsel James Baker and former Department of Justice attorney and
current Perkins Coie Partner Michael Sussmann.
* Any and all records created in preparation for, during, and/or
pursuant to any meeting between Mr. Baker and Mr. Sussmann.
* Any and all calendars, agendas, or similar records, either in
paper or electronic format, documenting the schedule and activities of
Mr. Baker.

The FBI would neither confirm nor deny the existence of records.
Judicial Watch successfully argued
[[link removed]]
that:

> [T]he sworn testimony of Baker, the former FBI general counsel,
> confirms that Sussmann was sharing the same documents with the
> media.… Rather than privacy, this confirms that Sussmann was
> seeking to obtain attention for his activities. Hence, this is far
> from a typical case … Sussmann had no expectation of ‘personal
> privacy,’ as he was actively seeking publicity for himself and the
> information he wanted to share.

> In any event, the public interest in disclosure of the existence of
> records is manifest.

Judge Boasberg ruled
[[link removed]


> “[A]ny risk of invasion [of privacy] evaporated once Baker
> publicly testified that he had received documents from Sussmann, as
> well as met with and spoken to him on multiple occasions in 2016.”

In October, Baker testified before the U.S. House Judiciary and
Oversight committees in October 2018, where he stated
[[link removed]
“It was like — my recollection was it was a stack of material I
don’t know maybe a quarter inch half inch thick something like that
clipped together, and then I believe there was some type of electronic
media, as well, a disk or something.”

In his testimony Baker acknowledged that Sussmann’s information
related to the FBI’s Trump–Russia investigation. He also testified
that Sussmann had shared the same information with the media, stating
that Sussmann had told him “some elements of the press had this
information as well and were going to publish something about it.”

In August, another federal court judge rejected FBI efforts to protect
of the privacy of Clinton spy Christopher Steele and ordered
[[link removed]]
the FBI to conduct a search for certain records about Steele’s work
with the FBI during the Mueller investigation.

The FBI is corruptly trying to keep secret documents to protect those
behind the Russiagate smears of President Trump. Two federal courts
have now rejected the FBI’s desperate attempts to hide the details
of its anti-Trump conspiracy with Hillary Clinton’s Fusion GPS-FBI
spy operation. Why is Director Wray allowing the corrupt cover up the
FBI’s Russiagate collusions with the Clinton gang?

Judicial Watch previously obtained heavily redacted copies of FISA
warrants used by the Obama-era DOJ to spy on the Trump campaign, which
seem to confirm
[[link removed]]
the FBI and DOJ misled the courts in withholding the material
information that Hillary Clinton’s campaign and the DNC were behind
the “intelligence” used to persuade the courts to approve the FISA
warrants that targeted the Trump team. One of the FISA warrant
renewals
[[link removed]]
was granted in June 2017 and did not expire until September 2017, some
eight months after President Trump assumed office.

I’ll be sure to let you know about any major revelations as more
documents come in.

Until next week …





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