Disgraced Obama-era CIA Director John Brennan, whose every conspiracy theory about President Donald Trump’s alleged Russian collusion has been debunked, appeared on MSNBC this Wednesday evening to push back again Attorney General Bill Barr’s factual observation to Congress earlier that afternoon that the Obama administration had indeed spied on the president’s election campaign.
“Well, I was very disappointed in what Attorney General Barr said today about spying when he was referring to the investigation that was predicated certainly and that the FBI was trying to understand what the Russians were doing,” he said to MSNBC host and fellow conspiracy theorist Chris Matthews.
Listen:
While testifying to the Senate Appropriations Committee earlier, the attorney general had rightly noted that “spying did occur” but questioned whether it was “adequately predicated,” i.e., whether the spying had been justified, or whether it’d been politically motivated, as some have suggested.
“For the same reason we’re worried about foreign influence in elections … I think spying on a political campaign is a big deal,” he’d said. “There were a lot of rules put in place to make sure that there’s an adequate basis before our law enforcement agencies get involved in political surveillance. I’m not suggesting those rules were violated, but I think it’s important to look at that.”
“I just want to make it clear, thinking back on all the different colloquies here, that I am not saying that improper surveillance occurred. I am saying I am concerned about it and looking into it, that’s all,” he’d later clarified near the end of Wednesday’s tumultuous hearing.
Barr’s observation that “spying did occur” and commitment to determine whether the spying was legal has triggered backlash from Democrats, media pundits and the likes of Brennan.
“U.S. intelligence agencies were spying against foreign adversaries so that we can understand the threat to our national security,” the former CIA director added in exasperation Wednesday night.
“But for the attorney general to imply or to say they were spying domestically, he knows the language very well and he knows the terminology and he knows what is it connotes, which is an extra legal activity taking place when, in fact, the FBI and CIA and others were trying to understand just what the Russians were doing and we know now it is incontrovertible the Russians were trying to influence the outcome of the 2016 election,” the former CIA director added.”
It’s unclear why, much like congressional Democrats and their media allies, Brennan remains so allergic to the now-indisputable fact that the Obama administration did indeed spy on Trump.
According to historian and columnist Victor Davis Hanson, a man whom Trump administration official Sebastian Gorka recently described as “the most preeminent conservative thinker, writer and strategist alive today,” Brennan’s aversion to the truth may stem from his alleged culpability.
Writing for American Greatness earlier this month, Hanson argued that in 2016 Brennan “reached out to foreign intelligence services, primary British and Australian, to surveille and entrap Trump aides, as a way of circumventing rules preventing CIA monitoring of American citizens. And he may well have also reverse-targeted Americans, under the guise of monitoring foreign nationals, in order to build a case of so-called Trump collusion.”
U.S. law forbids CIA from spying on Americans. Did Brennan illegally use foreign spies to spy on Americans? Make him testify!https://t.co/ZjeGBUP8SE
— Senator Rand Paul (@RandPaul) April 1, 2019
To be clear, while Hanson’s point that Brennan had allied with British and Australian intelligence services to surveil the president’s aides is a fact, what’s not so clear is whether the spying was part of an entrapment operation meant to damage Trump and derail his election or presidency.
But therein lies the purpose of Barr’s investigation — to ferret out once and for all the truth about the Obama administration’s spying operation, not to mention its use of a Democrat-funded, Russian intelligence-based dossier to obtain a FISA warrant against Trump’s campaign operatives.
Assuming that everything the Obama administration and its officials, including Brennan, did was legal and justified, then what does the former CIA director have to fear? And why does he appear to believe that the attorney general is a so-called “toadie,” as Matthews described him?
“I’ve been very disappointed in Attorney General Barr. I had higher expectations for him,” Brennan replied when asked by Matthews whether Barr is indeed a toadie. “He shaped the narrative after the Mueller report. He, in fact, then also had this testimony today that I think was very carefully nuanced as a way to try to support the — Donald Trump’s positions. So, he acted like a personal lawyer for Donald Trump today rather than the attorney general.”
Despite the Mueller report not implicating Trump in “Russian collusion,” Brennan didn’t acknowledge the fact that the Mueller’s findings reportedly found no evidence of Trump/Russian collusion when pressed by Mathews.
Brennan oddly maintained that even if the Trump admin were cleared of criminal conspiracy charges, the report “never said that there was no collusion or cooperation.”
It’s true that the president personally believes the spying operation had been illegal.
“It was an illegal investigation. … Everything about it was crooked,” Trump reportedly told reporters on Wednesday, adding that the investigation was essentially an attempted “coup.”
However, this extraneous fact doesn’t negate the legitimate concerns that have been raised by congressional Republicans and political analysts/commentators about the spying operation and the conduct of Obama officials such as Brennan and even former President Barack Obama.
Like former White House Press Secretary, Ari Fleischer recently noted on Twitter, They spied on a US campaign, wiretapped Americans, bit on the dossier and unmasked Flynn. What did Barack Obama know and what and when did he authorize it?”
Now that Mueller says there was no collusion, it is time to scrutinize the Obama Administration. They spied on a US campaign, wiretapped Americans, bit on the dossier and unmasked Flynn. What did Barack Obama know and what and when did he authorize it?
— Ari Fleischer (@AriFleischer) March 24, 2019
That’s a fair question.
So are these:
Surveillance is spying ?️♀️ period. The question is did @BarackObama authorize the upper echelon of the @FBI @TheJusticeDept to spy on his political opponent? Were the FICA Warrants obtain fraudulently?
— Covfefe Israela (@loladeantonia26) April 12, 2019
The definition of spying is secretly observing which obviously happened. The question is whether or not court authorization to spy was obtained appropriately.
— Jim (@jimb39) April 12, 2019
Essentially he said there was definitely spying going on, he has to determine if it was warranted or not. Hell, everybody knows the resistance was doing everything they could to diminish Trump. The question is did they break the law?
— Steve Goff (@stevegoff26) April 12, 2019
The entire clip can be watched below via the Media Research Center:
DONATE TO BIZPAC REVIEW
Please help us! If you are fed up with letting radical big tech execs, phony fact-checkers, tyrannical liberals and a lying mainstream media have unprecedented power over your news please consider making a donation to BPR to help us fight them. Now is the time. Truth has never been more critical!
[email protected]
V. Saxena is a staff writer for BizPac Review with a decade of experience as a professional writer, and a lifetime of experience as an avid news junkie. He holds a degree in computer technology from Purdue University.
- Trump makes most of mandated NYC stay to visit Harlem and, WOW, bet Dems didn’t see this coming - April 18, 2024
- ‘What if?’ Jan 6 committee members are really starting to SWEAT over possible Trump win - April 18, 2024
- INSIDER: Democrat NJ power couple hit with slew of disturbing charges stemming from alleged abuse of teen daughter - April 18, 2024
Comment
We have no tolerance for comments containing violence, racism, profanity, vulgarity, doxing, or discourteous behavior. If a comment is spam, instead of replying to it please click the ∨ icon below and to the right of that comment. Thank you for partnering with us to maintain fruitful conversation.
BPR INSIDER COMMENTS
Scroll down for non-member comments or join our insider conversations by becoming a member. We'd love to have you!
