The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Court to FBI: Fix problems seen with Trump inquiry
FBI rebuked for errors, omissions in applying to monitor Carter Page.
What happened
The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court on Tuesday ordered the government to explain what the FBI will do to ensure the bureau does not mislead judges again when applying for surveillance orders like those used in the 2016 investigation of the Trump campaign.
The four-page order from presiding Judge Rosemary Collyer publicly rebuked the FBI for 17 omissions and errors contained in applications to monitor the electronic communications of Carter Page, a former Trump campaign adviser. Collyer is the same judge who signed the first surveillance application for Page sought by the FBI in October 2016.
What led to it
Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz’s review of how the FBI investigated a possible conspiracy between Trump associates and Russia to influence the 2016 election concluded that the FBI had met the low legal threshold to open an investigation, but that the pursuit of Page as a suspected agent of the Russian government was plagued by errors, misstatements and omissions.
In a 434-page report released last week, Horowitz found serious failures in FBI procedures for ensuring that applications to the court are complete and accurate.
Why it matters
The FISA court order raises the prospect that the Page case may point to a larger problem:
“The frequency with which representations made by FBI personnel turned out to be unsupported or contradicted by information in their possession, and with which they withheld information detrimental to their case, calls into question whether information contained in other FBI applications is reliable,” Collyer wrote.
What’s ahead
■ Collyer’s order requires the government to submit a sworn submission describing what it has done and plans to do “to ensure that the statement of facts in each FBI application accurately and completely reflects information possessed by the FBI that is material to any issue presented by the application.”
■ Horowitz has announced he will do a broader audit to see whether factual problems with FISA applications extend beyond the Page case.
■ Attorney General William Barr has tapped the U.S. attorney in Connecticut, John Durham, to conduct an investigation of how the FBI and other intelligence agencies worked on the case.