Free Republic

President Donald Trump has removed the inspector general who was tapped to chair a special oversight board of the $2.2 trillion economic package intended to help businesses and individuals affected by the coronavirus, officials said Tuesday. Glenn Fine, the acting Defense Department inspector general and a veteran watchdog, had been selected by peers last month for the position. Now it’s unclear who will oversee the rescue law. The move threatens to upend the rigorous oversight that Democrats in Congress had demanded of the huge sums of money being pumped into the American economy because of the virus. “The president now...

THE JUSTICE Department’s inspector general has followed up his devastating December report on the FBI’s securing of a secret intelligence-gathering warrant on U.S. citizen Carter Page and, once again, the news is not flattering. In December, the inspector general, Michael Horowitz, found that the FBI supplied a secret panel of judges with unverified, inaccurate and, in one case, falsified data in support of its warrant applications regarding Mr. Page. Mr. Horowitz’s new report, released March 31, makes clear that this was not an isolated incident. In 29 cases drawn from five years’ worth of FBI secret warrant applications, Mr. Horowitz...

Six terrorists who carried out attacks were on the FBI's radar previously. The Justice Department's internal government watchdog released a report Wednesday identifying what it described as significant issues with how the FBI handled investigations of extremists based in the U.S. who either sought or successfully carried out attacks against Americans. The report from DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz scrutinized how agents investigated so-called 'homegrown violent extremists,' or HVE, and found several instances where individuals who went on to carry out attacks had been previously identified by the FBI but had their cases closed with no further action. "Since September...

The Justice Department's inspector general is reportedly close to releasing its report on the early stages of the FBI’s Russia investigation, The Associated Press reports. Those interviewed for the report and their lawyers have reportedly been invited by Inspector General Michael Horowitz to review portions of the draft report this week and next week, a move which is considered a precursor to the report's public release.

Another day, another Deep State participant outed. ICIG Michael Atkinson altered the whistleblower form to allow for second-hand information, which allowed suspected Schiff whistleblower Eric Ciaramella to present a bogus accusation on the President. Atkinson also oversaw the FBI lovers who altered the FISA warrant. This will soon be reported in the DOJ IG’s FISA Abuse report. Today we point out that Atkinson’s wife is connected to Fusion GPS. What a mess! Last weekend we learned from another leak to the Washington Post, that an individual in Obama’s FBI altered documents that provided support for a FISA Warrant obtained to...

Democrats are getting antsy with Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz. Ahead of next month's release of a report on the Russia investigation that is eagerly anticipated by Republicans, Democrats are asking why Horowitz has not taken up their requests to assess the conduct of President Trump's attorneys general over the past couple years. "Nobody is suggesting that Michael Horowitz, the independent watchdog appointed by Obama is partisan, or is unfair, or is unethical. But what Democrats are concerned about is they feel he’s avoiding the tough fights," journalist Ken Dilanian said on MSNBC. "They say he did a lot...

Quick bit of breaking news just dropped. About a month ago, IG Horowitz announced he had finished his report dealing with the Trump-Russia investigation, which most assumed would only cover possible FISA abuse. Now we are getting word it’s coming out this Friday. 🚨 BREAKING 🚨 The DOJ IG Report will be out this Friday and covers 'MORE than just FISA abuse' "It’s as thick as a telephone book." –@MariaBartiromo pic.twitter.com/rr3kfyZhpZ — Benny (@bennyjohnson) October 13, 2019 Per the Washington Examiner. “I’m hearing the IG report will be out this upcoming Friday, Oct. 18, and my sources say it’s as...

Former FBI Director Jim Comey violated bureau rules and procedures in his handling of certain memos he drafted after his May 2017 firing, the Justice Department Inspector General said in a report released on Thursday. The report said that both the memo he had handed over to a friend to be leaked to the press, as well as memos Comey shared with his attorneys, were improperly transmitted without seeking authorization from the FBI. However, the Inspector General’s investigation found no evidence that “Comey or his attorneys released any of the classified information contained in any of the memos to members...

The Justice Department inspector general is preparing to release a report on the conduct of fired FBI Director James Comey in the Trump-Russia investigation, according to a number of sources with knowledge of the situation. The specific timing of the report's release is not clear. The Comey report is separate from a larger inspector general report on the DOJ's handling of the Trump-Russia probe. That report, sometimes referred to by Republicans as an investigation into "FISA abuse," is expected to be released later. It is not clear why the inspector general, Michael Horowitz, chose to write a separate report on...

I know we’ve been waiting a long time for the Department of Justice’s inspector general on the alleged FISA abuses that occurred under the Obama administration. It was supposed to be released this summer. Now, it’s due out in early September. The contents might not send anyone from the Obama DOJ to jail, but it will reaffirm what we have been saying for quite some time: that the FBI was allegedly spying on Trump officials, that the meddling of the most concern was really coming from the J. Edgar Hoover Building, and that the Trump dossier was known to be...

The FBI lost track of more than 60 foreign cooperators in the U.S. after sponsoring them to aid in investigations, according to a report released Tuesday by the Justice Department’s (DOJ) Office of Inspector General. In addition, the watchdog's audit identified 1,000 DOJ-sponsored foreign nationals that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) was not provided information on in February 2018. By that August it was still seeking information from DOJ on 665. While DHS facilitates the cooperators' entries into the U.S., the DOJ takes custody of them once they are in the country. “We believe that all DOJ components need...

Full Title: This Republican Has An Idea About The Identity Of The Senior FBI Official Who Was Leaking Confidential Material Republican Congressman Doug Collins (R-GA), the ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee, wants to know whom the identity of the senior FBI official who was leaking confidential information to the media. Katie wrote about the Department of Justice Inspector General’s report on the matter, where it said a deputy assistant director at the FBI illegally disclosed sealed court material to the press. The person in question received gifts from the media in return. The person was never charged: The OIG investigation...

The Department of Justice Inspector General revealed this week that an unnamed former FBI Deputy Assistant Director [DAD] illegally disclosed sealed court information to the media in addition to a number of other violations. "The OIG investigation concluded that the DAD engaged in misconduct when the DAD: (1) disclosed to the media the existence of information that had been filed under seal in federal court, in violation of 18 USC § 401, Contempt of Court; (2) provided without authorization FBI law enforcement sensitive information to reporters on multiple occasions; and (3) had dozens of official contacts with the media...

“The OIG investigation substantiated that the SSA violated federal law or regulation in making false representations related to two mortgage loans and filing false annual financial disclosure forms by not reporting income received from the contractor. The OIG investigation also substantiated that the SSA violated federal law or regulations, and the FBI ethics policies, by working for a contractor that was currently under contract with the FBI, accepting gifts from an applicant for the FBI employment and assisting the applicant in the selection process, misusing the SSA’s government vehicle by allowing family members to ride in the vehicle, and exchanging...

As scores of Americans remain angry and frustrated by the FBI’s seemingly inappropriate arrest of political operative and Trump associate Roger Stone on Friday, in which the bureau employed 29 heavily armed agents, many in SWAT gear, the Justice Department’s Office of Inspector General quietly announced “findings of misconduct” by a pair of current FBI officials and one that has since retired. “The Department of Justice (DOJ) Office of the Inspector General (OIG) initiated this investigation upon the receipt of information from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) concerning multiple allegations involving an FBI contractor and three FBI officials,” the...

This is really interesting. Unfortunately, we don’t get the names. Findings of Misconduct by Two Current Senior FBI Officials and One Retired FBI Official While Providing Oversight on an FBI Contract . https://oig.justice.gov/reports/2019/f190129.pdf Key phrases: “two current senior FBI officials”, “one former”, relating to an “FBI Contractor”. Could this be an FBI contractor like Fusion-GPS or Crowdstrike? I wish we could know more.

"In view of the content of many of the text messages between Strzok and Page, the OIG also asked the Special Counsel's Office to provide the OIG the DOJ issues iPhones that had been assigned to Strzok and Page during their respective assignments to the SCO." After a number of steps by the OIG, "was the recovery of thousands of text messages within the period of the missing text messages, December 15, 2016 through May 17, 2017, as well as hundreds of other text messages outside the gap period that had not been produced by the FBI due to technical...

The Department of Justice has declined to prosecute an FBI special agent whom the department’s inspector general determined had received money from a former FBI confidential human source, had protected that source’s illegal business, had provided false information to a local police department and had misused FBI assets for personal gain.

WASHINGTON — Former FBI director James Comey is vulnerable to a possible obstruction of justice charge for his conduct in the Hillary Clinton email investigation. Comey deleted Barack Obama’s name from the Bureau’s report to conceal Obama’s knowledge of the illegal server, and also deleted evidence that Clinton’s emails were hacked by foreign adversaries. Comey’s firing by President Donald Trump in 2017 is at the center of Comey’s friend Robert Mueller’s attempt to charge President Trump for obstruction of justice. Mueller previously announced that he would try to wrap up an obstruction case by September 11, having found no evidence...

The Department of Justice's (DOJ) inspector general is investigating former FBI Director James Comey's handling of memos he wrote to memorialize his conversations with President Trump. DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz revealed the probe during testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Monday afternoon. He said Comey's memos are being investigated after the watchdog received a referral from the FBI and that the IG would release a report on its findings. “We received a referral on that from the FBI. We are handling that referral and we will issue a report when the matter is complete, consistent with the law...