Congress, International

The Eyes Have It: U.S. Intelligence Allegedly Asked Foreign Countries to Surveil Trump Associates

There is a disturbing report published on Michael Shellenberger’s Public Substack detailing how the U.S. intelligence community called upon foreign governments to target associates of Donald Trump before the 2016 election. The request to the “Five Eyes” agencies (the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and New Zealand) appears to have come from Obama’s CIA Director, John Brennan.

According to Shellenberger, Matt Taibbi and Alex Gutentag, foreign intelligence agencies were asked to conduct the surveillance, including “bumping” the associates — a term for making contact with or casually engaging a target to generate intelligence. These encounters may also have been used to generate intelligence reports used to support further intelligence efforts by the United States in the Russian investigation.

The journalists reported that Britain’s Government Communications Headquarters intelligence apparatus, or GCHQ, went ahead in contacting the Trump’s associates as early as March 2016.

Keep in mind that this was the same month that George Papadopoulos joined the Trump campaign as an adviser. It was also when Papadopoulos met a London-based professor, Josef Mifsud, who Papadopoulos was led to believe had “substantial connections to Russian government officials.”

On March 21, 2016, Trump identified Papadopoulos and Carter Page as members of his foreign policy team.

If true, the question is the basis for such surveillance of U.S. citizens associated with the opposing political party and a presidential campaign.

The role of Brennan is intriguing. Brennan was the one who briefed President Barack Obama on Hillary Clinton’s alleged “plan” to tie then-candidate Donald Trump to Russia as “a means of distracting the public from her use of a private email server.”

It was also Brennan who later declared during the Trump Administration that a press conference with Vladimir Putin was “nothing short of treason.” He later said that he did not mean real treason when he said it was nothing short of treason.

Brennan also signed the infamous letter warning that the Hunter Biden laptop had all of the markings of Russian intelligence, a letter that he later admitted was “political.”

Now these sources are claiming that agents from the Five Eyes “were making contacts and bumping Trump people going back to March 2016.”

Former FBI lawyer Kevin Clinesmith was sentenced to probation in 2021 after admitting that he falsified evidence to renew a wiretap against former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page.

Shellenberger and Taibbi have a record of investigating in areas long avoided by other journalists, particularly in exposing the massive censorship system funded and coordinated by the government. There is much to learn about these allegations and their underlying support. If proven, it would appear that neither the Inspector General nor John Durham were given the full picture of the origins of the Russian investigation. Moreover, there are intriguing questions over a referenced binder that sources said contained much of this intelligence and analysis. That binder or binders allegedly disappeared from the CIA.

Once again, this is still the early reporting and we need to have more confirmation on these facts. However, Congress should be interested in whether the origins for the Russian investigation began with nudges from American intelligence in 2016 to the “Five Eyes.”

287 thoughts on “The Eyes Have It: U.S. Intelligence Allegedly Asked Foreign Countries to Surveil Trump Associates”

  1. I hear the politicians speak out against Putin’s imprisoning and probabley killing his political oppisition. But wait aren’t we are seeing the same tactics run by the Biden operatives against Trump. Life in prision is pretty tough stuff.

  3. No one, or nearly no one, addressed Turley’s main point this morning — that john brennan and his ‘pals’ within and outside the usa engaged in some heinous behavior — which it appears to only have been do-able with Barack hussein Obama in the white house —
    is it that none of you regular readers have anything to say about Brennan? Let’s not forget that Brennan voted in the mid 70’s for the Communist Party presidential candidate — he called it a ‘goof’, youthful indiscretion. In hindsight, I’d put this right up there with Bernie Sanders choosing to honeymoon in the 70’s in Moscow.

    1. Do you understand how bad this looks ? FOR DOJ/FBI ?

      DOJ/FBI are prosecuting their own source – one that FBI rated as highly reliable, for statements to the FBI that the FBI has no independnet way of confirming.

      This person is NOT the Republicans “star Witness” – this person is an FBI CHS and the FBI’s report of that CHS’s information was pried out of the FBI by force, and NOW because that report implicates the Biden’s – the DOJ/FBI is trying to prosecute their own source ?

      Can you spell COVER UP ?
      Can you spell Obstruction of justice ?
      Can you spell political weaponization of DOJ ?

      This is far more dangerous to Biden than it is to House republicans.

      1. John Say,
        It is obvious critical thinking skills are not something Bob has.
        Well said and thank you for pointing out what I felt was the obvious to the rest of us, that Bob cannot seem to comprehend.

      2. Thank you for commenting. This is a supposed star witness according to Bob, who never heard the name before and doesn’t recognize what you clearly lay out, “Can you spell political weaponization of DOJ ?”

        This is beyond Bob’s abilities.

    2. Bob, come on man. You CAN become a better troll. You really can. But you have to put the work. Putting a spot light on the Corrupt FBI/DoJ is not a good look for a troll
      You are supposed to be using ONLY doubleplus goodspeek when talking about the Biden Justice system, NOT SLAMMING them.
      Get serious about this or I’m going to quit being your troll coach.

    3. Bob, there’s more than one witness and there are photographs of Joe meeting with Hunters business associates. The Bidens are no longer denying the meetings or the laptop that they lied about in the past. These facts do not allow you have the icing on your cake. You just can’t stand that the facts reveal that the chocolate used to make your cake was of the bitter variety. You may refuse to eat it but eat it you must because it’s all you have in your pantry other than your grey matter. No water, milk or coffee will be allowed to wash it down. Your gagging is well deserved.

    2. Rather than hurl insults can you actually offer facts ? Any ?

      I am guessing that you are talking about the DOJ/FBI charging their own CHS – one that FBI rated as highly reliable,
      Because the Report from that Source that FBI was FORCED to provide to the house, was damaging to Biden.

      It is also interesting – DOJ/FBI did NOT provide the house with the identity of this CHS.

      This is NOT a problem for house republicans – but it could very easily become a HUGE problem for DOJ/FBI.

      DOJ/FBI have just opened up a new area of inquiry for House Republicans – Obstruction of justice.

  6. Democrats are evil but Republicans are just so damn stupid! They don’t give a f**k about anything but trying to prove their moral worth to the worthless evil Democrats. How else do you explain their voluntary reduction of their already razor thin margin in the House? They don’t give a f**k about the American people so maybe they’re evil too. Now I bet two worthless Republican House members will flip and approve the Senate bill to steal another $95B of our money and send it off to their donors in the military industrial complex and/or corrupt oligarchs half a world away so they can buy bigger yachts while thousands of little people die in the trenches and the world careens toward nuclear armageddon. But not to worry, at least on the home front we’re defunding the police, opening the border to gangs, cartels, and rapists, chopping little kids’ d*cks off in the name of “gender affirming care,” getting rid of cash bail so violent criminals can recidivate, putting men in women’s sports and bathrooms, printing money like there’s no tomorrow, destroying the military with wokeness, failing to educate children, jacking up the price of gas and groceries, spending hundreds of billions on the green new scam, and promoting a geriatric dementia patient as a so-called president that the rest of the world laughs at. So why should I care?

  7. Jonathan: I hate to be the bearer of bad news but Judge Merchon just shot down all of DJT’s motions to dismiss or delay the trial in NY DA Alvin Bragg’s 34 felony counts against DJT in the NY election interference case. Jury selection begins March 25. DJT’s only hope is an appeal to God–which he frequently does these days. I can hear DJT’s appeal: “Please God, save me from this corrupt judge and prosecutors who trying to prevent me from being re-elected”. I didn’t hear the conversation but I expect God said something like this: “Sorry, Donald but I have other concerns–like trying to prevent humans from destroying one of my favorite planets. This time you’re on your own”. So DJT is on his own now and facing his first criminal trial. His string of attempts to delay, delay and delay some more has finally run out!

    Then on another front DJT has lost another ally. In an interview this week Vladimir Putin says he is backing President Biden. And this comes just after DJT told supporters he would not back NATO if attacked by Russia. No gratitude! Putin said he preferred Biden because he is “more experienced and predictable”. When Putin was asked about Biden’s age Putin said this: “Even then [3 years ago], people were saying he was incompetent, but I didn’t see anything of this sort. Yes, he kept looking at papers, but to be honest, I kept doing the same. So there was nothing peculiar”.

    So there you have it from the guy has a pretty good record on predicting US presidential elections. Does Putin know something that the MAGA supporters don’t want to acknowledge? Frankly, I wouldn’t want to bet against Putin! But DJT had his own deranged spin on Putin’s statement. DJT called Putin’s lack of endorsement “a great compliment, actually”. Talk about lack of mental acuity!

    1. @DM, you said,

      “Frankly, I wouldn’t want to bet against Putin!”

      I agree! Let’s quit sending money and arms to Ukraine!

    2. Dennis – Your girl, Big Fani is going to the Big House. So is her Boo. Big Fani says he thinks women are only good for “making sandwiches.” Whoa, only sandwiches, Fani? I mean, not even a BJ? VP Kamala begs to differ. Ask Montel Williams or Willie Brown. Fani is the gift that keeps on giving, ain’t she Denny? LOL

    4. Dennis – Your girl Fani, one minute she’s taking Donald Trump’s mugshot, and the next she’s being cross examined in court about HER public corruption. You just can’t believe how stupid y’all Democrats are.

      1. FANI: “I don’t do my friends like that. So if you tell me it’s a G then you gon get a thousand dollas”

        This is the woman prosecuting the former president of the United States. LOL.

    5. 3 words you need to memorize, Denny: Biden’s Banana Republic.
      It’s now the 3rd world lawless hellhole we live in. Wake up!

    6. Dennis Mental acuity? you greatly over value yours. Joe Biden will not even be on the ballot by 11-2024. The following is a direct abjectly misquote. DT said if NATO country was not paying its way then…… It is tongue in check
      “Then on another front DJT has lost another ally. In an interview this week Vladimir Putin says he is backing President Biden. And this comes just after DJT told supporters he would not back NATO if attacked by Russia.

    7. Did you think this elected trial judge was going to kill his career by granting a motion to dismiss by Donald Trump? Don’t be silly. The case is legally ridiculous, but apparently we’ll have to wait for the grownups in the Appellate Division or the Court of Appeals to lay down the law.

    8. So you think that more lawfare is getting you anywhere ?

      Dennis – I doubt this case will go to trial, but even if it does – do you really think that the public is going to buy a corrupt prosecutor with a corrupt judge prosecuting a non-crime with a Manhattan jury ?

      Regardless, all Trump’s lawyers need is ONE decision by Merchan that can be appealed all the way to the Supreme court prior to trial and this case is DOA

      But the reality is the case should have been dismissed long ago – as I beleive YOU pointed out – Micheal Cohen has already plead guilty of paying the Hush money to Daniels. Two people can not be convicted of committing the exact same crime at two different times.

      Bragg has a mess – which if Marchan was an honest judge would have been tossed.

      Paying people for an NDA is legal. It does not matter whether Cohen did it or Trump did.
      The FEC has long ago ruled on both this and other related matters. You can not consider something a campaign contribution that has any otherwise legitimate purpose. Or put differently in the real world, people do things often for many reasons. Regardless, the FEC has already decided that the Payments to Danieals do NOT constitute an illegal campaign contribution by Trump – Arguably they COULD be an illegal campaign contrinbution if Cohen made them – but that would apply ONLY to Cohen.

      The next problem you have is that Campaign finance law is FEDERA:L law – and the FEC has already ruled on this.
      Which is again why Merchan and Bragg are corrupt.

      I would guess that Trump is likely to appeal to the federal courts – because Braggs prosecution requires a Federal Election violation that did not occur or that even if it did, was committed by Cohen not Trump.

      The next problem you have is that Braggs bizzare legal theory would make ALL payments for non-disclosures into a crime – unless you disclosed them which would defeat the point.

      People sing non-disclosures all the time – and the courts already YEARS AGO found the Daniels NDA legal.
      People sing NDA’s as a condition of taking a job, they sign them in return for money when they leave a job.
      Almost every legal settlement that ever was includes an NDA.

    9. So lets see you have told us all for almost a Decade that Trump is a Putin lackey, and now you report that Putin is backing Biden – and you think that hurts Trump ?

      BTW it is NOT news that Putin backs democrats. Contra the missinformation leaked by Brennan in 2016 – The CIA and other intel agencies ACTUAL found through REAL intelligence that Putin backed Clinton not Trump.

      It is likely that Putin backed Biden in 2020, there is also evidence that Xi backed Biden in 2020 and that Xi engaged in “election interferance”.

      Regardless, Dennis YOU are transparently Corrupt.

      You make a big deal of the fact that Putin allegedly is backing Biden.
      But you also made a big deal of the false claim that Putin backed Trump.

      You seem to think that it does not matter who Putin backs – that hurts Trump.

      That is piss poor logic.

    10. In Real news – the Fanni Willis hearing was a circus.

      First we have A friend of Wade who SUBSEQUENTLY represented him in his divorce claiming attorney client privildge when asked if Wade had told him about his relationship with Willis prior to 2021 when they were just Friends.

      That lawyer claimed Attorney Client priviledge – claiming that the Barr had told him that he can not discuss his conversations with Wade PRIOR to serving as his lawyer. The Judge tried to explain to him that was NOT how priviledge worked.

      Regardless, it is likely we will see a new criminal case opening up for obstruction of justice against what ever person at the GA Bar told this lawyer not to testify.

      Next Willis’s best friend until recently – the woman who rents Willis the condo that she is staying in because she does not feel safe in her home,
      testified that Willis and Wade had a romantic relationship in 2019 – 3 years before Wade was appoint SC. This means that Both Willis and Wade have lied in their filings with the divorce court, and with the court hearing the racketeering case.

      Subsequently Willis and Wade both testified – Wade was a lousy and not credible witness on his own behalf.
      Willis was worse – she was combative and evasive and seemed to think that She was the lawyer rather than the witness.

      The judge is going to have to figure out what he is going to do. But even if by some miracle he allows Willis and Wade to remain on the case – shich is highly unlikely, as the judge pointed out the standard is the appearance of impropriety, not proof of impropriety.

      Regardless, Willis and Wade are now on the record on many many many points which provide dozens of new areas of inquiry.

      My bet is that the Judge removes Willis and her office including Wade and this case dies because no other prosecutor will touch it,
      and meanwhile Wade and Willis face multiple investigations – some of which will be criminal.

      That alone will keep them busy for the next couple of years.

    11. In other news we learned that the CIA asked GHCQ to Spy on Trump and 26 of his associates during the 2016 election.
      This was active as well as passive spying, including sending operatives to engage Trump associates in attempts to make it look as if they were colluding with Russia.

      It Further appears that CIA Director HAskel was trying to hide this during the Trump administration, and that it appears that DOJ/FBI beleived that Trump had gotten proof of this prior to leaving office and that this is all or part of What FBI was looking for in the raid on MAL.

      That the purpose of the raid was not so much to fit up Trump but to recover documents that demonstrated the CIA malfeasance int he 2016 election.

      1. I find it strange that this revelation is considered breaking news. Those that read sources other than corporate media have been aware of this fact for years now. Sundance at TheLastRefuge, Emerald Robinson, and others reported on this at least four years ago. So, I’m wondering why it is suddenly a front page issue as if Matt Taibbi and Shellenberger (sp) uncovered the plot.

    12. In the continuing bad week that Biden has – it appears – according to NYT and sources from SC Hurs office, that Hur did NOT ask President Biden about the death of his son Beau. That Biden brought it up himself and then could not remember the date.

      Regardless, this has renewed demands that the transcript of the Biden/Hur interview be released.

      Lying to the american public is not a crime.

      But it is a really really bad look and a bad close to a bad week for Biden.

  8. John Henry Durham

    United States Attorney for the District of Connecticut, assigned as Special Investigator and Counsel on the Origins of “Crossfire Hurricane” by Attorney General William “Mr. Deep Deep State” Barr, is hereby revealed as an anti-American, anti-Constitution tergiversator, fraud, defector, and traitor, and stands embarrassed before Americans, the Founders and Framers, God and Country, on this date, February 15, 2024. 
    _____________________________________________

    “You [never intended to] see the forest for the trees.”

    – Anonymous

  9. OT: the DoJ has indicted the CHS whose reports memorialised in the Form 1023 allleged that Zlochevsky hired the Bidens for protection and paid bribes of $5m each to Joe and Hunter. Jeff Charles reported this on Red State and links to the indictment.

      1. What is astonishing is that the DOJ/FBI appears not to have investigated the truth of the allegations until they were about to be made public in the Spring of 2023. The Form 1023 was written in June 2020.

    2. This is stupid and risks backfiring on DOJ/FBI.

      If you want people as CHS’s – you do not indict them for saying things you do not like.
      Has DOJ indicted Christopher Steele ?

      This smalls like an effort to try to discredit the Biden impeachment.

      Frankly I think that DOJ probably has to appoint a SC to look into this – the 1023 implicates the president in criminal conduct.
      DOJ is conflicted from investigating Biden based on those allegations – because he is president, and from investigating the 1023 itself – Because Biden is president.

      1. “If you want people as CHS’s – you do not indict them for saying things you do not like.”

        I agree. Look at the timing.

  10. Off Topic

    IDF said that Hamas chief architect of the October 7th massacre, “Yahya Sinwar” is a dead man! The result maybe and probably will be collateral damage including civilians & hostages.

  11. Somebody needs to get a copy of Fani’s tax returns. She said that she had private clients, and NO CHECKING ACCOUNT??? So, are her client’s (some of them anyway) paying her in cash, and she is deep-sixing the retainer in the pillow under her head? How about the expenses related to those clients? How is she paying filing fees, subpoena fees, and medical records? Is she keeping a Bristol-shape trust account, or maybe does she have instead, a “tryst” account??? How is she filing a Sch. C for her taxes. Is she keeping receipts? Or, if she is SubS, or LLC, there must be an entity checking account. Also, it is “cash hoard”, not “cash horde.”

    1. Oh, and another trick, is when a client gives a check for the retainer, to go and cash the check at the client’s bank, and keep the cash. Or, if the check was for $5,000, cash it (to make sure that it is good before proceeding on the case) but just deposit $4,000 into the acct, putting the rest into the “pretty cash” account. Sounds to me like Fanny has been doing that sort of stuff maybe. And you know, if she has some poor black clients, then they often do not have checking accounts, so they have to settle up in cash.

      1. If clients paid Fanni privately more than 600/year they were required to file a 1099 and she was required to report it as income on her 1040 – whether she received a 1099 or not.

        You can legally get away with very small unreported cash transactions.

        You can not work as a professional, receiving payment in cash, and not reporting it on your taxes.

        Fanni’s cash claims could backfire. She is trapped between perjury and tax evasion – one or the other must be true.

        Regardless, she was a really bad witness – as was Wade.

        It is almost certain the judge removes them, because even if he did not – she has exponentially increased the grounds for which she is going to be investigated. She is not going to have time to prosecute these cases. She is going to be in court defending herself.

      2. What about the money that she got from settlements for her clients? In my state, and probably almost all others. such monies must be deposited into trust accounts. She is not supposed to be operating without bank records.

  12. Repeated incessantly by the Left like a cranky metronome: Trump/Putin/NATO, Trump/Putin/NATO . . .

    Meanwhile:

    Putin invades Ukraine — on Biden’s watch

    Iran (via Hamas) invades Israel, kidnaps and murders hundreds of Israeli citizens — on Biden’s watch

    China saber-rattles Taiwan — on Biden’s watch

    American military in the Middle East are target practice for Iran — on Biden’s watch

    The entire Middle East is a tinderbox — on Biden’s watch

    But keep focusing on the *words* Trump uses to ensure that NATO pays its bills. It’s a handy deflection from Biden’s *actions* — a monstrously incompetent, destructive foreign policy that encourages the world’s most barbarous countries.

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