Four FISA Applications Targeted Individual #1. He Provided Legal Support.

DOCUMENTED

The statement of offense describes Crossfire Hurricane as a Foreign Agents Registration Act investigation the FBI opened on July 31, 2016, into whether individuals associated with the Donald J. Trump for President campaign were coordinating with the Russian government. Clinesmith, the filing says, was assigned to provide legal support to FBI personnel on that investigation.

The same paper records four court-approved FISA applications targeting “Individual #1,” approved October 21, 2016; January 12, 2017; April 7, 2017; and June 29, 2017. It says he assisted FBI personnel with those applications. FISA #4 expired September 22, 2017. Contemporaneous reporting identifies Individual #1 as Carter Page. The plea does not find that Page committed a crime.

DOJ’s Office of the Inspector General later reviewed the four applications. That review is a separate episode. This page is the assignment and the four dates as the government wrote them in the plea.

Sources

United States v. Clinesmith, Statement of Offense. int.nyt.com PDF

DOJ OIG, “Review of Four FISA Applications and Other Aspects of the FBI’s Crossfire Hurricane Investigation.” oig.justice.gov

DOJ OIG examination PDF posted Dec. 9, 2019. justice.gov PDF

Opinion

The following is commentary by this site. It is not a finding of fact and not a legal conclusion.

Compiler take

Four bites at the same target. An FBI lawyer on the applications. The fourth one is where he altered the email. The first three are still the same shop, the same case, the same campaign they wanted on a wire.