Was the June 2016 Trump Tower Meeting a ‘Setup’ By Clinton Operatives with Russian Ties?

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Lee Smith of “Real Clear Investigations” (RCI) says it’s looking more likely that the “real Russian collusion may have taken place among those who arranged the meeting rather than the Trump officials who agreed to attend it.”

Background Information

Last week, the DOJ released documents (emails, texts and memos) to Congress that showed how closely the FBI worked with Glenn Simpson’s opposition research firm, Fusion GPS, and how large a role Bruce Ohr, the fourth highest ranking DOJ official at the time, played in the story.

• We know that the law firm Perkins, Coie hired Fusion GPS, on behalf of Hillary Clinton and the DNC.

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• We know that Fusion hired former British spy Christopher Steele to compile the infamous dossier.

• We know that Nellie Ohr was hired to work specifically on this project. And that her husband, Bruce Ohr, had frequent meetings and communications with Christopher Steele, even after the FBI ended their association with Steele for speaking to the press. The new documents show that “after Steele was dismissed by the FBI, Ohr took over the work of relaying Fusion GPS’ opposition research on the Trump campaign directly to the FBI.”

(Note: Bruce Ohr’s position at the DOJ was unrelated to any of this. Prior to his demotion, he was the Director of the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force.)

Fusion GPS Connection to Natalia Veselnitskaya

Russian lawyer, Natalia Veselnitskaya, had been a Fusion GPS client since 2014.

Veselnitskaya hired Fusion GPS to represent Pyotr Katsyv and his son Denis, both Kremlin-tied businessmen, in her campaign to repeal U.S. legislation sanctioning Russian officials under the 2012 Magnitsky Act, which was named for Sergei Magnitsky, a Russian corruption whistleblower who died in police custody. Simpson, sources told RealClearInvestigations, was tasked with running a smear campaign against the driving force behind those sanctions, Chicago-born financier William Browder, who had employed Magnitsky.

Glenn Simpson has testified that he had dinner with Veselnitskaya the night before the June 9, 2016 Trump Tower meeting and the night after.

Questionable Information Surrounding The Meeting

Glenn Simpson testified that he had only heard about the meeting one year later, which seems highly unlikely for several reasons.

First, we are being asked to believe that he and Veselnitskaya never discussed the meeting over dinner on either the night before or after the meeting. I will quote Hillary Clinton here. This requires a “willful suspension of disbelief.”

Next, RCI’s Lee Smith believes Simpson was lying because Veselnitskaya “has publicly stated that she used talking points developed by Simpson for the Russian government in that discussion. Kremlin officials also posted the allegations on the Prosecutor General’s website, and shared them with visiting U.S. congressional delegations.”

The theory that the meeting may have been a setup also makes sense because it so conveniently, too conveniently, corroborates one of the key allegations in the dossier, a point Simpson made sure he made in his testimony before Congress.

That allegation read “Trump and his inner circle have accepted a regular flow of intelligence from the Kremlin, including on his Democratic and other political rivals.”

Attending the Trump Tower meeting with Veselnitskaya was:

Russian-American lobbyist Rinat Akhmetshin, who had served in the Soviet Union’s military counterintelligence service. His role remains unclear, but evidence suggests he may have been the source Simpson was alluding to in December 2016 when Ohr recorded that Simpson told him, “Much of the collection about the Trump campaign ties to Russia comes from a former Russian intelligence officer (? not entirely clear) who lives in the U.S.”

How The Meeting Was Arranged

Smith says the real mystery is why British music publicist Rob Goldstone was involved.

On June 3, he emailed Donald Trump Jr. with an offer originating in a meeting in the office of the prosecutor general—Veslenitskaya’s point of contact with the Kremlin.

Goldstone promised “official documents and information that would incriminate Hillary and her dealings with Russia and would be very useful to your father.”

Trump Jr. promptly responded: “If it’s what you say I love it.”

The specificity of the phrasing in Goldstone’s email appears designed to establish the case for collusion:

“This is obviously very high level and sensitive information but is part of Russia and its government’s support for Mr. Trump.”

Even more curious than the wording of Goldstone’s email is the role he played in arranging the meeting. Goldstone, who has kept a low profile since news of the meeting broke in July 2017, testified before Congress that he now regrets his part in it.

According to the dossier, Trump himself as well as aides Paul Manafort and Carter Page were in clandestine contact with the Russian government. “If that was really the case,” former FBI agent Mark Wauck told RealClearInvestigtions, “it’s not clear why the Russian government needed a British music publicist to make an overture. And why would Moscow need to send a Russian lawyer who didn’t speak English to Trump Tower? That tends to confirm that the meeting was intended as a setup.”

Veselnitskaya turned the meeting into a discussion of William Browder, who had employed Magnitsky. When Trump Jr. saw Veselnitskaya’s real reason for setting up the meeting, he ended it quickly.

But if this were a sting operation, engineered by Simpson, with likely assistance from Justice Department officials he is now known to have been in regular contact with, the damage had already been done.

“The purpose of the meeting,” one congressional investigator told RCI, “was to substantiate the Clinton-funded dossier alleging that Trump was taking dirt on his rivals from the Russians.”

Was This Meeting a Setup?

Once we learned that the FBI tried to spy on the Trump campaign through operative Stefan Halper in May, it does not require much of a stretch of the imagination to believe Trump Jr. might have been played.

I’m not saying Trump, Jr. was naïve, but at the time he was approached by Rob Goldstone, he was relatively new to politics. He was a businessman, not a politician. As I’ve argued repeatedly, who could resist the opportunity to hear incriminating information about a political opponent?

And there are so many other reasons to believe this was one more plan from their massive campaign to bring down Donald Trump.

• The campaign to exonerate Hillary Clinton of wrongdoing in the investigation of her use of a private server as Secretary of State.

• The high level of hatred toward President Trump by liberals and the mainstream media. (Trump Derangement Syndrome)

• The level of corruption that’s already been revealed, especially over the last six to eight months.

• The reluctance of the DOJ and the FBI to turn over documents.

• The heavy redactions of documents when they are finally forced to provide them.

• The high number of former Obama era officials who have already been proven participants.

• If FBI officials tried to plant a spy into the Trump campaign, what would stop them from setting up this meeting?

Yes, I find Lee Smith’s theory to be entirely believable and I hope that Congress can find proof of it prior to the midterms.

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Maranatha
Maranatha
5 years ago

I believe any monstrosity the dem–sorry—socialists would do..

Maranatha
Maranatha
5 years ago

“”Please tell Vladimir that I will be more flexible on this missile deal after November election””
(Obomit on a open mic on october 2012)
That’s collusion.
..

Suresh
Suresh
5 years ago
Reply to  Halal Bacon

Agre. Clinton mafia still active after Trump takeover as they kill another witness to email investigation http://tinyurl.com/y8p9cv5l

They know their hold overs in FBI / DOJ /NSC will help them out !

Unless they are totally purged including Left/Liberal judges to keep out their bias …its uphill task to prosecute them.

felix1999
felix1999
5 years ago

Not only that!

The Lame Duck Timeline Strongly Suggests President Obama
Set Up Intelligence Scheme To Undermine Trump…

(Via ACLJ) […] First, as the New York Times reported earlier this week, in its final days, the Obama Administration expanded the power of the National Security Agency (NSA) to share globally intercepted personal communication with the government’s 16 other intelligence agencies before applying any privacy protections.

The new rules were issued under section 2.3 of Executive Order 12333 after approval by two Obama Administration officials: Attorney General Loretta Lynch and Director of National Intelligence Director, James Clapper.

Second, the new rules, which were issued in an unclassified document, entitled Procedures for the Availability or Dissemination of Raw Signals Intelligence Information by the National Security Agency (NSA), significantly relaxed longstanding limits on what the NSA may do with the information gathered by its most powerful surveillance operations.

These operations are largely unregulated by American wiretapping laws. Surveillances include collecting satellite transmissions, phone calls, and emails that cross network switches abroad, and messages between people abroad that cross domestic network switches.

The changes initiated by the Obama Administration in its waning days empowered far more agents and officials to search through raw intelligence data. As a direct consequence of the change in policy, it appears that the prospect of intel leaks grew exponentially. Attorney General Loretta Lynch signed the new rules permitting the NSA to disseminate raw signals intelligence information on January 3, 2017 after Director of National Intelligence James Clapper signed them on December 15, 2016. (read more)

https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2017/02/17/the-lame-duck-timeline-strongly-suggests-president-obama-set-up-intelligence-scheme-to-undermine-trump/

felix1999
felix1999
5 years ago

Sure looks like it!
Notice the date on this article – November 7, 2017!

Report: Fusion GPS Official Met With Russian Operative Before and
After Don Jr. Meeting…
Posted on November 7, 2017 by sundance

The role of Fusion GPS as an active participant in the 2016 election is growing in scope amid another report showing increased involvement. Previously the DNC and Clinton Campaign teams were forced to admit they hired Fusion GPS to engage in political activity and research against presidential candidate Trump. The outcome of their efforts centered around the Russian Dossier by Christopher Steele.

However, today a report shows the founder of Fusion GPS actually met with Russian operative Natalia Veselnitskaya immediately prior to her visit to Trump Tower and immediately after.

There is a concern that Fusion GPS might have been conducting a political operation against Trump using Veselnitskaya.

(Via Fox News) […] The June 2016 Trump Tower meeting involving Donald Trump Jr. and Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya occurred during a critical period. At that time, Fox News has learned that bank records show Fusion GPS was paid by a law firm for work on behalf of a Kremlin-linked oligarch while paying a former British spy Christopher Steele to dig up dirt on Trump through his Russian contacts.

But hours before the Trump Tower meeting on June 9, 2016, Fusion co-founder and ex-Wall Street Journal reporter Glenn Simpson was with Veselnitskaya in a Manhattan federal courtroom, a confidential source told Fox News. Court records reviewed by Fox News, email correspondence and published reports corroborate the pair’s presence together. The source told Fox News they also were together after the Trump Tower meeting. (read more)

https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2017/11/07/report-fusion-gps-official-met-with-russian-operative-before-and-after-don-jr-meeting/

Dennis
Dennis
5 years ago

My conclusion to all that is referred to in the article above, is that, if Muller is a patriotic American, he will see that the divisiveness that is permeating this country is tied into all of this, which now includes and is compounded by his so-called investigation into Trump, and if he wants this madness that is overwhelming this great country to END, he will immediately announce that he has found nothing to suggest improper activity, and END his investigation for the betterment of the country. I think it is as simple as that. He needs to douse the flames that are being fanned by the fallacious media and the left wing politicians before it is too late. He must recognize that Trump is moving this country in the right direction, and he should be expected to support that forward movement by bringing this inflammatory investigation to its end.

cuchulain
cuchulain
5 years ago
Alleged-Comment
Alleged-Comment
5 years ago

IF this is true Moe (Comey), Larry (Strosky), and Curly (Brennan) should go to jail. Not for the crime but for the amateur attempts of playing spy.

jimmy
jimmy
5 years ago

definitely a set-up.

Drew the Infidel
Drew the Infidel
5 years ago

These are dots a blind man could connect. The law firm was only employed as a “cut out”, a seeming intermediary, but was to be used to thwart any investigations of the scheme by being able to claim attorney-client privilege.

R. Arandas
R. Arandas
5 years ago

So much corruption…

William Wilhelm
William Wilhelm
5 years ago

And then there is that special visa given out and signed by whom on the Obama administration? Timely.

InfidelCrusader
InfidelCrusader
5 years ago

It certainly has all the hallmarks of a carefully orchestrated setup. To their great credit, once the Trump people who had been lured to the meeting realized they had been played they walked out of said meeting. The rest is history.

1984  George Orwellesque
1984 George Orwellesque
5 years ago

I had this premonition a long time ago, a setup, Dirty Tricks campaign. The first of it was about the totally discredited claim about sever in Trump Tower, by the same people.

Congressmen Devin Nunes believes so;
EDITORIALS
Russian Collusion: It Was Hillary Clinton All Along
https://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/russian-collusion-hillary-clinton/

Nunes, who heads Congress’ investigation into the matter, said it was likely that information “was handed directly from Russian propaganda arms to the Clinton campaign, fed into the top levels of the FBI and Department of Justice to open up a counterintelligence investigation into a political campaign that has now colluded (with) nearly every top official at the DOJ and FBI over the course of the last couple years. Absolutely amazing.”

What’s revealing is that (A) the Russians; i.e. Natalia Vladimirovna walked into this setup and really believed that the Trump campaign would be interested in her quest to repeal U.S. legislation sanctioning Russian officials under the 2012 Magnitsky Act, whose talking points (B) were developed by Simpson for the Russian government in that discussion..

Which leads to the next question; Rosenstein was Ohr’s boss prior to his demotion. It’s not credible that Rosenstein knew nothing.

How Bruce Ohr Could Implicate High-Ranking Obama Officials In Spygate
Reporting on Bruce Ohr suggests DOJ and FBI employees operated outside the chain of command and concealed evidence from congressional oversight committees.
http://thefederalist.com/2018/08/15/bruce-ohr-implicate-high-ranking-obama-officials-spygate/

The details revealed in the emails and texts, in conjunction with previously released information, suggest DOJ and FBI employees operated outside the chain of command, misled their bosses (and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court), and concealed evidence from congressional oversight committees. Let’s review two key questions the revelations raise.

1. How and why was Rosenstein kept in the dark?
Rosenstein was Ohr’s boss prior to his demotion, yet Rosenstein claims he knew nothing of Ohr’s involvement in the Russia investigation. Rosenstein declared to Congress in a letter reviewed by Solomon that he was “unaware of Ohr’s activities with Steele,” that Ohr was “not assigned” to the Russia investigation, and that Ohr “was not in the chain of command.” Rosenstein added, “Any involvement Mr. Ohr had in this matter was without my knowledge.”

Solomon’s reporting is consistent with Rosenstein’s congressional testimony. On June 28, Rosenstein told the House Judiciary Committee that “Ohr was never working to my knowledge on that Russian investigation.” He reiterated the point a second time, saying, “To my knowledge he wasn’t working on the Russian matter.”

Significantly, Rosenstein also testified that he did not know of Ohr’s connection to the Russian investigation until “sometime in the fall of 2017,” and said Ohr’s transfer to a different office was arranged “when we learned the relevant information.”

This timing proves significant, because it means Rosenstein did not know about Ohr’s involvement in the Russia investigation, or Steele’s continued role as a source when he signed off on the fourth and final Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) application from the FBI to spy on Page.

The FISA applications relied heavily on the Steele dossier, which Rosenstein apparently knew about. What he did not know, according to his testimony, is that his assistant, Ohr, was continuing to filter Steele’s intelligence to the FBI, even as the FBI declared in that final application that Steele was no longer a source. Ohr apparently did quite a bit of filtering from Steele to the FBI in order to keep Rosenstein in the dark.

1984  George Orwellesque
1984 George Orwellesque
5 years ago

This is outrageous. All of the FISA and 302 documents should be declassified.

This drip, drip of info is becoming a “whack a mole” absurdity.

1984  George Orwellesque
1984 George Orwellesque
5 years ago

The Democrats don’t want the truth. They want to railroad the President “by any means”.

1984  George Orwellesque
1984 George Orwellesque
5 years ago

How Bruce Ohr Could Implicate High-Ranking Obama Officials In Spygate
Reporting on Bruce Ohr suggests DOJ and FBI employees operated outside the chain of command and concealed evidence from congressional oversight committees.

http://thefederalist.com/2018/08/15/bruce-ohr-implicate-high-ranking-obama-officials-spygate/

1984  George Orwellesque
1984 George Orwellesque
5 years ago

Was Hillary The Real Colluder?
https://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/russian-collusion-hillary-clinton/

“So here you have information flowing from the Clinton campaign from the Russians,” House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rep. Devin Nunes told Fox News on Sunday.

Nunes, who heads Congress’ investigation into the matter, said it was likely that information “was handed directly from Russian propaganda arms to the Clinton campaign, fed into the top levels of the FBI and Department of Justice to open up a counterintelligence investigation into a political campaign that has now colluded (with) nearly every top official at the DOJ and FBI over the course of the last couple years. Absolutely amazing.”

We have to agree. If all that is true, it is absolutely amazing. After all, these are serious felonies, using the federal agencies to spy on a political opponent in league with a hostile foreign power.

As we said, the only real collusion appears to be on the part of the Clinton campaign — aided by the Obama administration, CIA chief John Brennan and a handful of high-level officials at the Department of Justice and FBI.

What’s next? It’s possible the collusion investigation soon will turn from Trump to Clinton. If so, it could lead to more resignations and possibly jail time for those involved. That includes perhaps even Hillary Clinton, who sits at the political epicenter of all this illegality.

1984  George Orwellesque
1984 George Orwellesque
5 years ago

Why is Rosenstein resisting the appointment of a Special Consul to investigate this? He appointed Muller on much less ground. Does he have skeletons in his closet?

Crystal Waters
Crystal Waters
5 years ago

It was a setup.

Court records show that when Veselnitskaya sought permission to extend
her stay, the U.S. attorney at the hearing told the judge that the
special visa the Russian lawyer received was part of a “discretionary
act that the statute allows the attorney general to do in extraordinary
circumstances.”

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