Criminal law, Justice

Durham: The FBI Had Danchenko on Payroll as An Informant During the Russian Collusion Investigation

Yesterday, a filing by Special Counsel John Durham revealed that Igor Danchenko, who worked as a key contributor to the discredited Steele dossier funded by the Clinton campaign, was later put on the FBI payroll as an informant. The disclosure rocked Washington and raised additional questions of the FBI’s eagerness to pursue any allegations against Donald Trump despite being warned that the dossier appeared to be a vehicle for Russian disinformation.

Danchenko is facing five counts of lying to the bureau during that relationship. His trial is scheduled for next month in federal court in Alexandria, Virginia.

The filing states that “In March 2017, the FBI signed the defendant up as a paid confidential human source of the FBI. The FBI terminated its source relationship with the defendant in October 2020.”

The news shocked many of us who have closely followed the Russian collusion controversy for years. The FBI showed a zeal to investigate Trump and his campaign that seemed to border on the blind obsessive. It was not simply with the Steele dossier. On the baseless Alfa Bank allegations (also pushed by Clinton campaign through friends at the FBI)  the supervisory agent for the FBI’s Trump-Russia probe, Joe Pientka, sent a note to FBI special agent Curtis Heide, stating: “People on the 7th floor to include Director are fired up about this server.” Pientka then messaged Heide: “Did you guys open a case? Reach out and put tools on?”That description of the apparent eagerness of then-FBI Director James Comey and others only magnifies concern over the bureau’s alleged bias or predisposition on the Trump investigation. It was the same eagerness that led the FBI to pursue the Russian investigation for years despite being warned early by American intelligence that the Steele dossier contained not just unsupported allegations but possible Russian disinformation.

Indeed, Danchenko’s possible connections to Russian intelligence have been raised as a matter of concern. The filing states “During his January 2017 interview with the FBI, the defendant initially denied having any contact with Russian intelligence or security services but later — as noted by the agents, contradicted himself and stated that he had contact with two individuals who he believed to be connected to those services.”

What is particularly concerning is that the FBI also had former British spy Christopher Steele, on its payroll. Steele then assembled his dossier under the funding of the Clinton campaign which repeatedly denied such funding to the media. This money was funneled through the law firm of Perkins Coie and the campaign’s general counsel, Marc Elias. (The Federal Election Commission (FEC) fined the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign for violating election rules in hiding that funding).

So the FBI cut off Steele as a paid source after he allegedly worked with the media to spread these unproven claims. It then turned around and hired his principle source for the dossier.

The filing also states that Danchenko discussed an interest in obtaining classified information for possible sale to the Russians.

“As has been publicly reported, the defendant was the subject of an FBI counterintelligence investigation from 2009 to 2011. In late 2008, while the defendant was employed by a prominent think tank in Washington, D.C., the defendant engaged two fellow employees about whether one of the employees might be willing or able in the future to provide classified information in exchange for money.

According to one employee (‘Employee-1’), the defendant believed that he (Employee-1) might be in a position to enter the incoming Obama administration and have access to classified information. During this exchange, the defendant informed Employee-1 that he had access to people who would be willing to pay money in exchange for classified information. Employee-1 passed this information to a U.S. government contact, and the information was subsequently passed to the FBI.

Based on this information, the FBI initiated a ‘preliminary investigation’ into the defendant. The FBI converted its investigation into a ‘full investigation’ after learning that the defendant (1) had been identified as an associate of two FBI counterintelligence subjects and (2) had previous contact with the Russian Embassy and known Russian intelligence officers.”

The “prominent think tank” appears to be the Brookings Institution.  I have previously written about the prominent role of Brookings in spreading the Russian collusion claims and hiring an array of people who played critical roles in these investigations. That also included former FBI general counsel James Baker.  For some, it seemed like not just friends but “friends with benefits.” It seems that everyone in this scandal was six degrees from Brookings.

 

311 thoughts on “Durham: The FBI Had Danchenko on Payroll as An Informant During the Russian Collusion Investigation”

  1. SIR THOMAS MORE “SNUBS” THE CROWN AND LOSES HIS HEAD.

    THE ENTIRE DEMOCRAT SECURITY STATE CONDUCTS A BALD-FACED COUP D’ETAT AGAINST A SITTING U.S. PRESIDENT AND NOT A WORD IS SAID.
    __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

    Treasons Act 1534

    The Treasons Act 1534 (26 Hen. 8. c. 13) was an Act passed by the Parliament of England in 1534, during the reign of King Henry VIII.

    This Act was passed after the Act of Supremacy 1534, which made the king the “Only Head of the Church of England on Earth so far as the Law of God allows.” The 1534 Act made it treason, punishable by death, to disavow the Act of Supremacy. Sir Thomas More was executed under this Act.

    It was introduced as a blanket law in order to deal with the minority of cases who would refuse to accept Cromwell’s and Henry’s changes in policies, instead of using the more traditional method of attainders.

    The Act specified that all those were guilty of high treason who:

    do maliciously wish, will or desire by words or writing, or by craft imagine, invent, practise, or attempt any bodily harm to be done or committed to the king’s most royal person, the queen’s or the heirs apparent [Elizabeth], or to deprive them of any of their dignity, title or name of their royal estates, or slanderously and maliciously publish and pronounce, by express writing or words, that the king should be heretic, schismatic, tyrant, infidel or usurper of the crown…

    The word ‘maliciously’ was added in several cases to require evil intent, and the Act meant that it was very dangerous to say anything against what the King had done.

    – Wiki
    _____

    Sir Thomas More

    Indictment, trial and execution

    In 1533, More refused to attend the coronation of Anne Boleyn as the Queen of England. Technically, this was not an act of treason, as More had written to Henry seemingly acknowledging Anne’s queenship and expressing his desire for the King’s happiness and the new Queen’s health.[57] Despite this, his refusal to attend was widely interpreted as a snub against Anne, and Henry took action against him…

    More was pleading that the Statute of Supremacy was contrary to the Magna Carta, to Church laws and to the laws of England, attempting to void the entire indictment against him.[51] He was sentenced to be hanged, drawn, and quartered (the usual punishment for traitors who were not the nobility), but the King commuted this to execution by decapitation.[75]The execution took place on 6 July 1535 at Tower Hill.

    – Wiki

  2. I would say, and do believe this is the tip of the berg and a big derecho wind of disclosures will be forthcoming and soon. You just think Halloween is eerie. Big shakings by 10-31-2022.

    1. Whatever “October Surprise” do the democrats have on the schedule? A self-described ex government “remote viewer” on a late-night media program recently said that a “destructive” false flag event would occur pre-election.

      1. Hummmmm [?]

        Maybe Launch WW III with low-yield Nuke in Russia/Ukraine ?

        Wait-N-See, I’ll pick up some Iodine Pills on the way Home tonight.

  3. MISSION ACCOMPLISHED

    William “Mr. Deep Deep State Swamp” Barr, who, as AG, was forced on President Trump by the Advice and Consent of the Senate, engaged John Durham for the investigation of the most prodigious political crime in America history, a rendition of scandal that dwarfs Watergate. John Durham’s mission was to fail. John Durham is a dutiful soldier of the Deep Deep State Swamp. John Durham succeeded exceedingly in his mission; John Durham failed very well indeed.

  4. What is it about human nature that would compel people to defend obvious abuses of power committed by state actors? This is not a partisan question. It’s a self-evident truth that government will abuse power. Clearly both major political parties have abused power and will continue to do so. I’m a conservative Independent. I have no animosity towards anyone, regardless of how they identify themselves, as long they do not support actions that put my right to life, liberty and property at risk.

    We are well past the point of discovery that the entire Crossfire Hurricane saga was a total abuse of government power. We don’t even need the Durham investigation to prove that true. Sadly however, it takes that type of investigation to hopefully navigate through the complex legal infrastructure our government has created as a shield against holding bad government actors accountable. These bad actors have succeeded in essentially hypnotizing half the population with the power word: Trump. JT mentions six degrees of separation. Pick any issue and if the name Trump connects within six degrees, half the population will suddenly go into attack mode. Our government has succeeded in creating a cult out of at least half of the population and they will commit national suicide as a result.

    1. “Our government has succeeded in creating a cult out of at least half of the population and they will commit national suicide as a result.” And sadly, they’ll have the nerve to act surprised with no connecting of the dots how they contributed to the national suicide. They fail to realize THEIR OWN rights are also being denied while they cheer the loss of their perceived enemies rights.

      1. They fail to realize THEIR OWN rights are also being denied while they cheer the loss of their perceived enemies rights.

        Absolutely! Progressives are famous for an ideology who’s results are best reflected by the immortal words of that American *ahem* patriot, General Milley, when commenting about the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan saying it was a: tactical success, but a strategic failure.

  5. Its been reported that the FBI made him a Confidential Informant not because he was still providing new information, but more of a way to hide him.

  6. Before 9-11, I was focused on family and career and was pretty apolitical. That event started my interest in politics and policy. Then a friend of mine became a 9-11 conspiracy theorist, and that got me exploring the strange and odd places on the internet in an effort to understand and refute his clearly erroneous and frankly insane theories. 21 years later, after all the official hoaxes and propaganda, and them not even caring anymore if we catch them in their lies, and damn it, now I have to reevaluate that Loose Change movie.

  7. As to the mentioned Dreyfus Affair in France in an above comment. Dreyfus was charged and convicted of treason over the time span of 1894-1895 and then later pardoned and then much later exonerated. The Franco – Prussian War was in 1870 when Dreyfus was 11 years old. The guilty party was basically known to the military even when it convicted Dreyfus. Antisemitism was the overriding issue in the conviction.

    1. I am grateful for the correction, but I believe that he was charged with giving secrets to Germany.

  10. You can look at the facts of the past 30 years and see exactly what is going on here. I respect the noble ambitions of this site and am very grateful for them, but enough. There is quite literally only one toxic influence in this country, and they currently control the WH, the Senate, and the House. Conversation beyond that premise is, frankly, idiotic. There is one party in power, and only one party making decisions for the rest of the 300,000,000 of us. Fathom that; less than a hundred people in such a large and diverse country are f****** you and me simply because they can.

    And that goes for a scholar like our host, too. Stop voting dem. That is the only way to fix it. You have a bushel of problems, you try something different, if you are living in sanity. For all of their talk of change and evolution, the dem party drags us backward by decades, every year. Really. *Decades*. We’ve already see the result of Maoist or Guevaran ideas. We do not have to go there again, but the globalists are intent on taking us there. Prove to them that their money doesn’t matter in November. Old school dems do not seem to be capable of waking up, not even a centimeter. To them, since 2016, it is all, ‘Trump abused underage girls!’ (no, that was Bill Clinton, even if Trump is a blowhard, and he is). Truly, and sadly.

  11. ironic isn’t, how democrats actively colluded with Russian spies in order to concoct a claim that President Trump colluded with Russia. Or is it more of that fun leftist projection.

  12. Okay, in the realm of FBI informants, there have been many who aren’t quite stellar characters, let’s just say that. It’s part of the game. But the right just has to let go of their belief trump wouldn’t get Russian hookers to pee in a bed he believed Obama once slept in. In fact, it doesn’t even rank on the list of most disrespectful things trump has done to Obama. Let’s just get over it.

    The pee tapes are real. Trump paid Stormy to spank his bulbous butt with a rolled up magazine. Question there is: did he also pay her to get vertical with it? Come on Jon, that’s the content i’m here for.

    1. “Okay, in the realm of FBI informants, there have been many who aren’t quite stellar characters, let’s just say that. It’s part of the game.”
      True, but you do not pay someone as an informant, when you KNOW that all they have done is gather gossip and rumor from the DNC. The issue with Danchenko is not that he is disreputable, but that there is no reason to beleive he was useful. And that means that he was hired as a CHS to protect him – or more accurately to protect the FBI from being exposed. That is a coverup.

      “But the right just has to let go of their belief trump wouldn’t get Russian hookers to pee in a bed he believed Obama once slept in.”
      Maybe he would, maybe he would not. The fact is that it is a rumor with absolutely no substance.
      I am free to disbeleif it. You are free to beleive it. What you are not free to do is to claim it is fact or that there is proof, when their is not.
      I would further note that if True it is immoral. It is not a crime. Just as Clinton’s fabricating hoaxes about Trump are immoral but not crimes.

      “In fact, it doesn’t even rank on the list of most disrespectful things trump has done to Obama. Let’s just get over it.”
      True, nor has Obama been respectful – Obama disrepected Trump supporters – before they were Trump supporters.
      There are infamous rows between Clinton and Obama and Biden and Obama.
      We now have confirmation that AFTER the 2016 election Trump sent a message through Ivanka to Hillary that he was burrying the hatchet and there would be no investigations. We all forget that Ivanka and Chelsea were somewhat close friends, and that the Clinton’s and Trump’s were atleast casual friends prior to the election.

      But Clinton refused to bury the hatchet and Trump continues to go after her.
      Nor did Biden bury the hatchet as president, and so the Trump Biden feud continues.

      But the difference between Trump and Biden (and Obama) is that Trump has not used the power of government to go after political enemies. Biden and Obama have.

      “The pee tapes are real.”
      Only in your world. Are they possible ? maybe. But real means actually real, proven.
      I would further note that they never were a subject for FBI investigation.

      Trump disrespecting Obama is not a crime. Regardless, there is no one that has first hand knowledge of the event and no one that has the tapes.

      “Trump paid Stormy to spank his bulbous butt with a rolled up magazine.”
      Yup. And contra the left that revaluation was unbelievably tame.
      No one has any doubts that Trump has a past reputation as a playboy.
      Spanking is one of the most common sexual fetishes. While Urolagnia is fairly uncomon.
      Further people do not usually cross fetish.

      The response of an awful lot of america to the Stormy Daniels story was “Boy Trump is pretty vanilla.”
      Not what you were going for.

    1. Am an activist for a long time
      talk to our reps, getting to know who, what, where, when’s
      No lip services here

    2. Naw they are competent enough. Incompetence implies stupidity and accident. They know what they are doing and how to do it.
      Only now they have become so sloppy as to show their intentional corruption.
      Hiding their crimes has become their incompetence.

    3. Much of this is not incompetence. It is malice.

      I am sure as some politicians on the right are saying that there are good FBI agents.
      But damn few. The agency has been institutionally corrupt long before Trump came along.

  15. Daniel posted
    <<>>

    Confidential Human Sources.
    Hmmm why have I heard that just recently???? I remember. It is the left, exhibiting (actiing) faux outrage that Trump had at MAL, documents laying about that named some of the the worlds deeply embedded spies, putting their lives at stake. The harm to the IC in the US and our allies, is massive.

    Reality Check time

    President Trump was working for months to declassify all the Crossfire Hurricane, and Crossfire Razor documents. The agencies that created those classified documents would send them back, declassified (removal of Classified markings) and redacted in part. President Trump told them no. Declassify with no redactions. The involved agencies just slow walked the direct order until 1/20/2021. That is when President Trump just declassified on the spot, markings and all, had them boxed and shipped.

    That is why the DoJ had to raid the President to get back the documents that provide the evidence of DoJ corruption.

    FBI using CHS was not a need so much as a shield. Burying everything in the deep pit of CHS classification. As the Media is so eager to do. Take the info leaked to them ‘he’s got the name of international spies in with is grocery lists’. ‘they are all going to die!!!’ And exaggerate the simple facts
    But no, Just Derchenko, and Halper, and Steele, and Mifsud. More are involved. While the CIA is barred from spying in the US, There is nothing illegal about the CIA handling foreign spies working on US soil, spying on a political campaignat

    1. Doing what you say would have been helpful to his cause, but wouldn’t have gotten him clear of the espionage portion of the search warrant. And, as Michael Cohen pointed out, during the time trump could’ve been de-classifying he was instead busy planning a coup and selling pardons for money.

    2. What is the source of the latest Trumpland fairy tale about documments being “declassified on the spot, markings and all, and had them boxed and shipped”. Doesn’t this run counter to the other Trumpland fairy tale that the GSA is responsible for packing up TS/SCI documents? Wanna know how I know this is just another big, fat lie? Two reasons: first; he had an attorney representing him, so when the NARA demanded the return of the documents, and especailly upon receipt of the subpoena, if he had some actual legal right to the documents, the lawyer would have raised objections at thost times About legal entitlement, which is what the Federal Rules require; plus, the lawyer lied about all of them being returned; secondly, documents pertaining to nuclear secrets (ours or our allies’) have nothing whatsoever to do with Crossfire Hurricane or Crossfire Razor.IMHO, he stole these to use as bargaining chips against criminal prosecution and/or some hamhanded effort to be “reinstated”.

      I’d really like to know why you Trump saps fall for all of the lies and diversionary tactics away from the simple truth that Trump stole TS/SCI documents AFTER his lawyers told him he couldn’t take them, returned some, and lied about retaining the rest. Why do you people send him money? He is in the wrong here.

    3. There is little rational explanation for DOJ/FBI conduct – both right now, and during Trump’s presidency and before.

      Nor does it seem that those in power understand they need to establish credibility.

      So long as DOJ/FBI refuse to cdlarify what purportedly classified documents they took – most of us are going to believe they took Collusion Delusion documents that were declassified.

      Media leaks pretty much tell us what is NOT in the classified documents. An actual leak is a crime.
      But lying to the press and claiming it is a leak is not.
      In a different age the press would have grown tired of being used.
      Today they are begging to be used.

      If Trump directed the removal to MAL of highly classified documents that had nothing to do with the collusion delusion and that have no reasonable explanation for Trump to keep – if/when that is revealed Trump’s support will evaporate.

      Very Few people would continue to support Trump if as an example he took nuclear documents on the Israeli nuclear program and appeared to be selling them to the Saudi’s.

      But the odds of something like that are quite low. Something those on the left just do not grasp.

      On the other had if this is DOJ/FBI/NARA being weaponized to recover Collusion Delusion documents – Biden must be impeached and removed, Wray must be impeached and removed. Garland must be impeached and removed.

      The same is true if this was J6 related – but that will be a harder public case to make. Democrats have not succeeded in selling their narative of J6. Nor the narative that opposing the outcome of an election is criminal,
      But the democratic J6 narative is not discredited the way the Collusion Delusion is.

  16. The obvious questions now are who in the FBI decided to put Danchenko on the FBI payroll, who was his handler, and was the handler told everything the FBI knew about Danchenko?

    1. The obvious question is why once the FBI knew that the Steele Dossier was a hoax, they continued the investigation
      covering up the fact that it was a hoax rather then killing off the unconstitutional investigation.

  17. The FBI’s pursuit of Donald Trump is somewhat similar to the court martial of Capt. Dreyfus by the French military in the 19th century. Both were political prosecutions, brought, on false evidence, to cover up historical failures. In the case of the French, that failure was the defeat by Prussia in 1870. In the case of our FBI, it was the loss of HRC to Trump in 2016.

  18. As much as I dislike Trump (the person), what has transpired should scare every American. Couple this with the latest FBI tactics in Mar o Lago and against Trump associates, and we have what can be considered a government RICO enterprise. Nothing worse than a criminal with a badge, especially a federal one.

    1. True on all accounts. Ann Coulter has the best advice in how to fix the FBI

      https://anncoulter.com/2022/08/18/the-fbi-wing-of-blm/

      The FBI Wing of BLM

      Republicans, can you stop screaming like hyenas at every little indignity suffered by our former president? Donald Trump wouldn’t lift a finger to help you. Yes, it was asinine for the FBI to stage a raid on Mar-a-Lago when we all know the only documents Trump wanted were his letters and photos with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. (North Korea has nukes. See? “Nuclear documents.”) Trump needs those for his scrapbook, to accompany the photos of him with Kim Kardashian, Mark Zuckerberg and Sean Hannity. Still, the raid isn’t going to affect your life. It barely affected Trump’s. He was golfing in New Jersey at the time.

      Outstanding! Then Ann goes for the heart of the matter:

      Right-wingers, save your breath defending the most disloyal man alive. Do something useful and get a job at the FBI. Just be sure to put “BLM” on your resume! The next Republican president (Ron DeSantis) is going to need a lot of help.

      Alas, that would mean they disconnect from the internet, interact with people mano a mano, far more than keyboards, and leading by example. As if!

        1. Especially this line, which is mind-numbingly ignorant:
          “[T]he raid isn’t going to affect your life . . .”

          When the Left uses law enforcement to criminalize dissent — that affects everyone’s life!

          1. Even when I liked her, I noted she could be nasty and hyperbolic.

            Her redemption is that she supports Ron DeSantis only until she puts a knife in his back.

  19. We all know how dirty almost the entire DC swamp is yet all we do is sit around and post about it like Mrs. Piper and Mrs. Perkins. At least the Jaquerie knew what to do with traitors to France

  20. It was the Hillabeast strings…all along with the elite echelons…wow
    This is worst than Watergate!!!!!

    1. This has always been far worse than watergate.

      Idiots are denying a deep state.

      And yet as you move arround in this – the numbers involved are incredible.
      Biden, Obama, Rice, much of the FBI brass, much of the DC office, significant portions of the DOJ,
      the entire Mueller team, the Clinton campaign, top democratic lawyers – including ones heavily involved in the lawlessness of the 2020 election.

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