Latest in FISA
The inspector general’s findings on the Carter Page FISA applications are actually worse than the president’s defenders understand—precisely because Michael Horowitz did not find any kind of political conspiracy.
The FBI has filed a response to the order of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) requesting further information on FBI and Justice Department practices in filing FISA warrants before the court in the wake of the Justice Department inspector general's report identifying failures in the Carter Page FISA application. The document is available here.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit found that incidental collection of U.S. persons’ communications under Section 702 does not violate the Fourth Amendment, but raised constitutional questions related to querying databases containing these communications.
The investigation may have taken steps that the inspector general thinks unwise, thinks should have been forbidden by policy, and thinks should have required more Justice Department consultation. But it was, in fact, about Russia. It was always about Russia. Full stop.
The Horowitz report poses a deep challenge to those of us who have broadly defended expansive surveillance authorities over the past several years. That challenge is not the one President Trump and his supporters have lodged against the FBI and its integrity.
Five observations about the Department of Justice Inspector General's report on the Crossfire Hurricane investigation.
The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court released a declassified order dated Dec. 5, which showed a request for information from the government by Dec. 20 regarding the FBI Office of General Counsel lawyer who altered the FISA applications of Carter Page as documented in the recent Justice Department inspector general's report. The court sought details related to other matters with which this attorney was involved and verification that he had been referred for investigation.
What should we make of the Department of Justice Inspector General’s analysis of the FBI’s role in preparing FISA requests?
When Doug Wilson and I set out to write the first edition of “National Security Investigations and Prosecutions” (NSIP), the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, were still recent, George W. Bush was in his first term as president of the United States, Vladimir Putin was in his first term as the leader of Russia, Robert Mueller was director of the FBI and Lawfare was not even a gleam in its founders’ eyes.
On Oct. 8, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence declassified two opinions released by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review (FISCR) relating to the FBI’s use of information collected under Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).