Bull Durham Looks Like He Might Be Swinging For the Fences Now. Durham Drops a Five Count Indictment on Igor Danchenko -- the "Primary Subsource" for the Steele "Dossier"

Shipwreckedcrew Nov 5

Comment Share Wow — where to start?

The Sussmann indictment was a bit of a shocker because there had been little if any suggestion — other than a couple of dated articles about Durham sniffing around the Alfa Bank issue which was the subject of a civil libel suit — that Durham was going inside the Clinton Campaign apparatus. The use of a 35 page “speaking indictment” for a single count “false statement” filed in the District of Columbia Circuit Court, with a lot of information that screamed out “I’ve got all the emails and billing records of Perkins Coie” no doubt started some phones ringing.

Clinesmith was clearly “low hanging fruit” in the sense that his misconduct was made clear by the Inspector General Report on the Four FISAs, and it was just a matter of time before Durham caught up with him.

Even the indictment of Danchenko today is not a real shocker from the perspective that it finally happened. It has been obvious since the 50+ page “EC” of the first FBI interview of Danchenko in January 2017 was made public that he had lied to the FBI in some obvious and significant ways.

But, the three taken together — with Danchenko coming last, and Durham CHOOSING to file in the Eastern District of Virginia after the first two were in the District of Columbia — start to bring a bigger picture into focus in terms of the universe that Durham has drawn a circle around.

Just because Clinesmeth pled guilty and has been sentenced does not mean his role in this drama is over. I’m certain he cooperated fully and has testified before the Grand Jury. He is a critical piece of the puzzle not because of anything he did, but because he was a witness to things more important players said and did from the origin of Crossfire Hurricane right up to the end. The Special Agents working the investigation rotated in and out, but Clinesmith was assigned to FBI HQ, and he didn’t have any other position to go back to. He was there for the entirety of the Special Counsel Office’s work. The precious little footnote in the Mueller Report went out of its way to point out “We found him here when we took over, like a lost little kitten, and we kept him around. But he wasn’t one of us.” But he was in the room when the others were talking, and he heard knew what they decided to do — and not do. That’s why he’s valuable to Durham still.

Sussmann isn’t Elias — but he’s close. Sussmann is sitting over there in the District of Columbia with a single felony count. If he doesn’t want to plead guilty and cooperate, Durham can keep feeding discovery to his lawyers and the meter will continue to run. He can watch the calendar days/weeks/months pass with a couple hundred January 6 trials ahead of him in line before he will get his turn in front of a jury. Think 2023 or later. Sussmann puts you inside the room and on the phone with many key participants in the Russian hoax hatched and engineered by the Clinton Campaign.

Also, don’t forget that Durham mentioned in the Sussmann indictment that Sussmann repeated his false statements about the Alfa Bank fraud to the CIA in Langley, Virginia. Durham could walk away from the District of Columbia indictment and proceed against Sussmann in the Eastern District of Virginia whenever he might have a reason and vehicle to do so.

Now we have Danchenko. He’s a bit of a bridge between the two worlds. With Danchenko you get Steele. With Steele, you get Bruce Ohr AND Glenn Simpson — just like Nellie Ohr. With Bruce Ohr you are back into DOJ and the FBI, and with Glenn Simpson you are back with Sussmann, Elias, and the Clinton Campaign officials like Jennifer Palmieri and Jake Sullivan.

This is like the climactic scenes in the original Ghostbusters — no one is quite sure what might happen if those streams ever cross.

I’ll save for another story a detailed analysis of the Danchenko indictment.

But some who read this may not have taken the time to read the indictment itself, or may not feel like they understand it completely. Here is a “Reader’s Digest” Version:

Danchenko was Steele’s “Primary Subsource”. Almost all the most significant “anti-Trump” false claims of Russian collusion in the various Steele Reports came from Danchenko. Danchenko sourced his information to a network of sub-sub-sources he had in Russia — friends who worked in positions where they might hear politically sensitive information.

Another player in the first part is a long-time Democrat party operative inside the Clinton circle of advisors named Charles Dolan. Dolan isn’t what you would call an “A” level Clinton player, but he’s a solid “B”. Danchenko was introduced to Dolan through his work at the Brookings Institute, a Demo-Crat party parking facility for senior bureaucrats while the GOP is in power. Dolan is a PR guy with a certain “affinity” for all things Russia — something I suspect we’ll learn more about in the weeks and months ahead. After they met, Danchenko introduced Dolan to people he knew in Russia, including a young woman who Steele claimed was one of his sub-sources. Dolan and the young woman struck up a friendship — at least that’s all we know right now.

Danchenko solicited and received information from Dolan about the Trump campaign and possible connections to Russia since Dolan did business in Russia. Dolan admitted to investigators that the information he provided to Dolan was mostly just gossip or speculation. Danchenko included Dolan’s information in what he gave to Steele, but he attributed it to the young woman sub-source.

At some point, the FBI became suspicious about this, and during a series of interviews in 2017, the FBI asked Danchenko if he knew Dolan. Danchenko admitted that he did know Dolan but claimed had never received any information from Dolan regarding Trump, and Dolan did not know about Danchenko’s work for Steele. Danchenko is charged with a “false statement” count for lying to the FBI about his connections to Dolan.

But, there seems to be a subtext to this part of the Indictment meant to communicate that a Clinton crony was behind some of the false information that ended up with the FBI and was used in the FISA application for Carter Page.

The second aspect of the indictment concerns Sergei Millian, who is a Russian-American citizen with a business connection to Trump in the real estate development industry.

Danchenko claimed that Millian was one of his sources for some of the most salacious parts of the Steele reports. When first interviewed by the FBI, Danchenko said he had met Millian in a restaurant, and Millian gave him the information in question at that meeting. Danchenko later claimed that he received a call from someone who wanted to remain anonymous, but he thought it was Millian. He claimed more information in the Steele reports came from that call.

Millian denied ever having met or talked with Danchenko and had the “receipts” to prove it. Durham was able to prove that the meeting reported by Danchenko never happened — shown by emails Danchenko sent to third parties lamenting the fact that he had not been able to meet with Millian. These emails are dated AFTER the date Danchenko told the FBI he had met with Millian. Danchenko was actually in New York on the day in question, and tried to arrange a meeting with Millian, but Millian wisely never responded.

In at least four separate interviews through 2017, Danchenko repeated the same lie about having met with and received the information from Millian that attributed to “Source E” in the Reports.

Those are the five counts of making “false statements” - one involving a denial that he obtained information from Dolan when he had, and four affirmative misrepresentations that he had obtained information from Millian when he had not.

But, from my perspective and with my experience, the bigger picture here is that Durham has drawn a circle around a wider group of people than was anticipated, and is working on multiple tracts as he continues to gather evidence that brings the Clinton campaign more closely to the center of a political dirty trick meant to derail the Trump candidacy.

Tactically, also important is the fact that Durham has now shown everyone that he is operating in the Eastern District of Virginia as well. They cannot count on the “friendly confines” of the District of Columbia for the ultimate adjudication of whatever charges might come their way.

These first three indictments are just setting the stage for an endgame.

That’s when they cross the streams.