Attorney General William Barr has assembled a
"team" to investigate the origins of the FBI's counterintelligence
investigation into the Trump campaign, an administration official briefed on
the situation told Fox News on Tuesday.
Republicans repeatedly have called for a thorough
investigation of the FBI's intelligence practices and the basis of the
since-discredited Russian collusion narrative following the conclusion of Special Counsel Robert Mueller's probe.
Now they appear to have
assurances that a comprehensive review was underway.
The FBI's July 2016
counterintelligence investigation was formally opened by anti-Trump former FBI
agent Peter Strzok. Ex-FBI counsel Lisa Page, with whom Strzok was romantically involved, revealed during a closed-door
congressional interview that the FBI “knew so little” about whether allegations
against the Trump campaign were “true or not true” at the time they opened the
probe, noting they had just “a paucity of evidence because we are just starting
down the path” of vetting the allegations.
Page later said that it was “entirely common” that the
FBI would begin a counterintelligence investigation with just a “small amount
of evidence.”
Former FBI Director James Comey
would testify later that when agency initiated its counterintelligence probe
into possible collusion between Trump campaign officials and the Russian
government, investigators "didn't know whether we had anything" and
that "in fact, when I was fired as director [in May 2017], I still didn't
know whether there was anything to it."
Barr told lawmakers at a contentious hearing earlier
Tuesday that he was reviewing the bureau's “conduct” in particular during
the summer of 2016.
The attorney general's explosive testimony marked his
first Capitol Hill appearance since he revealed the central findings of
Mueller’s investigation, and he indicated the full report -- with redactions --
would be made public within the week.
Mueller's investigation completed last month without
securing the indictment of a single American for collusion with Russia or
obstruction of justice, "despite multiple offers from Russian-affiliated
individuals to assist the Trump campaign."
“I am reviewing the conduct of the investigation and
trying to get my arms around all the aspects of the counterintelligence
investigation that was conducted during the summer of 2016,” Barr said at the
hearing.
Barr also was questioned about the initial Foreign
Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrants approved to surveil
members of the Trump campaign, including former Trump aide Carter Page.
Republicans have called for a careful review as to
whether the FBI, in violation of Page's constitutional rights and FBI
procedures, misled the FISA court or withheld exculpatory information, and Barr
testified that a DOJ review of the FBI's FISA practices was in progress.
The FBI's ultimately successful October 2016 warrant application to
surveil Page, which relied in part on information from British ex-spy
Christopher Steele – whose anti-Trump views are now well-documented – flatly
accused Page of conspiring with Russians. Page has never been charged with any
wrongdoing, and he since has sued the Democratic National Committee (DNC) for
defamation.
The FBI assured the FISA court on numerous occasions -- in the
October 2016 warrant application and in subsequent renewals -- that other
sources, including a Yahoo News article, independently corroborated Steele's
claims, without evidence to back it up. It later emerged that Steele was also
the source of the Yahoo News article, written by reporter Michael Isikoff.
The FBI also quoted directly from a disputed Washington Post opinion piece to argue that Trump's
views on providing lethal arms to Ukraine, and working towards better relations
with Russia, was a possible indicator that the campaign had been compromised.
The Trump campaign, at the time, supported only providing
only defensive arms to Ukrainians, and rejected a single Republican delegate's
proposed platform amendment that called for providing lethal arms.
Later, the Trump administration changed course and approved lethal arms sales
to Ukraine.
The FBI did not provide its own independent
assessment of whether the Washington Post opinion piece contained accurate
information, and did not mention that the Obama administration had the same
policy towards arming Ukraine as the one Trump's team supported.
The FBI also did not clearly state that Steele worked for
a firm hired by Hillary Clinton's campaign. Instead, the FBI only indicated
that Steele's dossier was prepared in conjunction with a presidential campaign.
Fox News exclusively obtained internal FBI text messages last
month showing that just nine days before the FBI applied for the Page FISA
warrant, bureau officials were battling with a senior Justice Department
official who had "continued concerns" about the "possible
bias" of a source pivotal to the application.
Fox News also has been told the Justice Department's
Inspector General (IG) was looking separately into whether Comey mishandled
classified information by including a variety of sensitive matters in his
private memos.
A DOJ court filing on Monday night revealed that Comey
incorporated into his private documents, among other key
details, the name and code name of a confidential human source.
Fox News' Brooke Singman contributed to this
report.
