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Trump administration releases Carter Page wiretap documents Trump-Russia: FBI releases Carter Page wiretap documents
(about 2 hours later)
The Trump administration has released a set of documents once deemed top secret relating to the wiretapping of a onetime adviser to Donald Trump’s presidential campaign. The FBI has released documents related to the surveillance of former Trump presidential campaign adviser Carter Page as part of a probe into whether he conspired with the Russian government to undermine the 2016 US election.
The New York Times reported that documents involving former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page were released to the Times and several other media organisations that had filed Freedom of Information Act lawsuits to obtain them. The FBI later posted the documents to its FOIA website. The 412 pages, mostly heavily redacted and made public by the Federal Bureau of Investigation late on Saturday, included surveillance applications to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (Fisa) and warrants surrounding the investigation into Page.
The materials include an October 2016 application to the foreign intelligence surveillance court (Fisa) to wiretap Page as well as several renewal applications. It is highly unusual for documents related to Fisa wiretap applications to be released. “The FBI believes that Page has been collaborating and conspiring with the Russian government,” says the surveillance application filed in October 2016 said. The documents released include applications and renewal warrants filed in 2017 after Trump took office. Page has denied being an agent of the Russian government and has not been charged with any crime.
While the documents were heavily redacted in places, the Times reported visible portions of the documents showed the FBI telling the intelligence court that Page “has been collaborating and conspiring with the Russian government”. The agency also told the court that “the FBI believes Page has been the subject of targeted recruitment by the Russian government”. Earlier Saturday on the New York Times reported it received a copy from the Justice Department after it and other news organisations filed suit.
Page, 47, has denied being a Russian agent. The documents released said “the FBI believes that the Russian government’s efforts are being coordinated with Page and perhaps other individuals associated with” Trump’s campaign. It added Page “has established relationships with Russian government officials, including Russian intelligence officers.”
After a redaction, the Times reported that the application to wiretap Page included a partial sentence: “… undermine and influence the outcome of the 2016 US presidential election in violation of US criminal law”. Republicans lawmakers have contended that the FBI made serious missteps when it sought a warrant to monitor Page in October 2016 shortly after he left the Trump campaign.
The surveillance of Page became a contentious matter between Republican and Democratic lawmakers earlier this year. Republicans alleged the FBI had abused its surveillance powers and improperly obtained the warrant, a charge that Democrats rebutted as both sides characterised the documents in different ways. The House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi said on Saturday that “these documents provide clear evidence of ‘Russia’s coordination with Carter Page,’ a high-ranking Trump campaign official, ‘to undermine and improperly and illegally influence the 2016 US presidential election’.”
House Democrats were quick to say that the documents bolstered their arguments.“For more than a year, House Republicans have bullied the Department of Justice and FBI to release highly sensitive documents to derail the special counsel’s and other legitimate national security investigations and cover for the president,” House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi said. “For the sake of our national security and our democracy, these vital investigations must be allowed to continue unhindered by Republican interference. The GOP must cease their attacks on our law enforcement and intelligence communities, and finally decide where their loyalty lies.” Last week a federal grand jury charged 12 Russian intelligence officers with hacking Democratic computer networks in 2016, in the most detailed US accusation yet that Moscow meddled in the presidential election to help Trump. Earlier this year 13 other Russians and three Russian companies were indicted on charges of conspiring to interfere with the election.
Adam Schiff, the California Democrat who is the ranking member of the House intelligence committee, said the documents underscored the “legitimate concern” the FBI had about Page’s activities. Yet Schiff said the materials should not have been released during an ongoing investigation because of national security. He blamed Trump for making public House Republicans’ initial memo about the Fisa applications, a move by Trump that the congressman called “nakedly political and self-interested, and designed to interfere with the special counsel’s investigation”. Michael Horowitz, the department’s inspector general, said in March that he would review whether the FBI and the Justice Department followed proper procedures when they applied for a warrant to secretly conduct surveillance on Page and his ties to Russia.
Republicans have claimed that the FBI used in part a dossier compiled by the former British intelligence officer Christopher Steele to justify the warrant, and failed to disclose to the court that Steele had been employed by a firm funded by Democrats to do opposition research on Trump’s business dealings.
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