Durham said he wasn't trying to 'politicize' case against Clinton lawyer

Special Counsel John Durham said Thursday he wasn’t trying to ‘politicize’ or ‘inflame media coverage’ in his case against indicted Hillary Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann with last Friday’s filing that led to spying claims. 

‘If third parties or members of the media have overstated, understated, or otherwise misinterpreted facts contained in the Government’s Motion, that does not in any way undermine the valid reasons for the Government’’s inclusion of this information,’ a court filing from Thursday said.  

Sussmann has been charged with making false statements to the FBI as part of Durham’s broader probe into the origins of the Russia investigation. 

Those statements came when Sussmann met with the FBI in September 2016 and provided the FBI’s general counsel with data and white papers ‘that allegedly demonstrated a covert communications channel between the Trump Organization and a Russia-based bank.’ 

Sussmann allegedly lied in the meeting by not revealing he was working for the Clinton campaign. 

What set off a firestorm, however, was in Durham’s filing last Friday he says that a Sussman was working with a tech executive who asked researchers to ‘mine Internet data’ to establish the now infamous Trump-Russia link.  

The filing says that among the data the tech executive and his associates ‘exploited’ was DNS traffic to a healthcare provider, Trump Tower, a Trump-owned apartment building and the Executive Office of the President of the United States. 

This revelation allowed for the creation of a media narrative that Clinton’s associates were spying on now former President Donald Trump. 

In his filing Thursday – protesting a motion from Sussmann’s lawyers to ‘strike’ part of the controversial February 11 filing – Durham said this wasn’t his intention. 

‘As an initial matter, defense counsel has presumed the Government’s bad faith and asserts the Special Counsel’s Office intentionally sought to politicize this case, inflame media coverage, and taint the jury pool,’ Durham’s Thursday filing said. 

‘That is simply not true,’ it continued, noting the February 11 filing ‘included two paragraphs of limited additional factual detail in its Motion for valid and straightforward reasons.’  

Durham also said he wasn’t responsible for the way the filing was interpreted by the press.  

The legal team for Hillary Clinton’s campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann (pictured) filed a motion on Thursday for Special Counsel John Durham to dismiss his case against their client that alleges he lied to the FBI in September 2016

Durham (pictured) accused Sussmann of lying to then-FBI General Counsel James Baker by saying he wasn’t hired by anyone to find links between Trump and Russia even thought he was paid by then-presidential candidate Hillary Clinton. Sussmann pleaded not guilty and his team is now calling for the charges to be dismissed 

Durham said those paragraphs were included because they ‘reflect conduct that is intertwined with, and part of, events that are central to proving the defendant’s alleged criminal conduct.’ 

‘Second, the Government included these paragraphs to apprise the Court of the factual basis for one of the potential conflicts described in the Government’s Motion, namely, that a member of the defense team was working for the Executive Office of the President of the United States (“EOP”) during relevant events that involved the EOP,’ Durham also wrote.  

Durham argued that ‘there is no basis to strike any portion of the Government’s Motion.’  

Sussmann’s lawyers, in the motion to dismiss, claim Durham is engaged in an ‘extraordinary prosecutorial overreach’ by bringing the case.

Durham’s indictment alleges that Sussmann told FBI General Counsel at the time James Baker in September 2016 that he was not working or ‘any client’ upon requesting a meeting to show evidence that he claimed ‘demonstrated a covert communications channel’ between the Trump Organization and the Kremlin Alfa Bank.

Sussmann pleaded not guilty.

His latest motion, filed on Thursday, claims Durham’s indictment ‘fail[s] to state an offense.’ 

His legal team also insisted on the filing that Sussmann ‘did not make any false statement to the FBI’.

‘It has long been a crime to make a false statement to the government. But the law criminalizes only false statements that are material—false statements that matter because they can actually affect a specific decision of the government,’ Sussmann’s lawyers added. 

They also claim his statement to Baker ‘cannot give rise to criminal liability’ because he ‘voluntarily’ met with the FBI in fall 2016 to ‘pass along information that raised national security concerns’ and the indictment is based on a separate ‘ancillary matter’.

They argue Sussmann provided a ‘tip’ to the FBI ‘voluntarily’ and claim Durham’s indictment does not dispute its validity.

‘He met with the FBI, in other words, to provide a tip,’ Sussmann’s legal team wrote. ‘There is no allegation in the indictment that the tip he provided was false. And there is no allegation that he believed the tip he provided was false.’

‘Rather, Mr. Sussmann has been charged with making a false statement about an entirely ancillary matter – about who his client may have been when he met with the FBI – which is a fact that even the Special Counsel’s own Indictment fails to allege had any effect on the FBI’s decision to open an investigation.’ 

 Clinton also finally responded on Wednesday to the recent revelations from Durham’s filing claiming she hired people to spy on Trump.

‘Trump & Fox are desperately spinning up a fake scandal to distract from his real ones. So it’s a day that ends in Y,’ the former presidential candidate tweeted along with an article from the Democrat-friendly Vanity Fair.

‘The more his misdeeds are exposed, the more they lie,’ Clinton added. ‘For those interested in reality, here’s a good debunking of their latest nonsense.’

She linked to a column filed under ‘conspiracy theories’ and titled: ‘You’ll never believe it but Hillary Clinton did not, in fact, spy on Trump’s White House .’ The subtitle said: ‘In less breaking news, Donald Trump remains a moron.’

Clinton is in New York City this week for the state’s Democratic Convention.

She claimed during her address to the convention on Thursday that the findings by Durham that her allies spied on Trump’s campaign are just ‘conspiracies’ peddled by Fox News.

‘We can’t get distracted, whether it’s by the latest culture war nonsense, or some new right wing lie on Fox or Facebook – by the way they’ve been coming after me again lately in case you might have noticed,’ Clinton told Democrats in a comeback speech at the party’s nominating convention in New York.

‘It’s funny, the more trouble Trump gets into the wilder the charges and conspiracies about me seem to get,’ she added.

‘So now his accountants have fired him. And investigations draw closer to him. And on the right the noise machine gets turned up.’

Clinton arrives at the New York State Democratic Committee State Nominating Convention in Times Square on Thursday. She refused to answer questions about the Durham revelations that she paid Sussmann to find links between Trump and Russia but tweeted Wednesday it was a ‘fake scandal’

Clinton on Wednesday called the allegations ‘desperate’ in her first and, so far, only tweet on the matter

‘Fox leads the charge with accusations against me counting on audience to fall for it again,’ the former first lady and one-time Secretary of State continued before introducing Gov. Kathy Hochul who won the Democratic nomination for the upcoming gubernatorial race. 

The latest motion to dismiss comes after Sussmann’s lawyers on Tuesday accused Durham of adding inflammatory accusations to a legal filing purely to ‘taint’ the jury pool and ‘inflame’ the media by using language that suggested Clinton spied on Trump.   

The allegations have electrified Trump allies who claim them as proof that the former president was the victim of subterfuge in 2016.

Durham’s claim is not included in an indictment but instead offered as ‘factual background’ in a dispute over Sussmann’s choice of lawyers and whether they represented a conflict of interest. 

‘Unfortunately, the Special Counsel has done more than simply file a document identifying potential conflicts of interest. Rather, the Special Counsel has again made a filing in this case that unnecessarily includes prejudicial—and false—allegations that are irrelevant to his Motion and to the charged offense, and are plainly intended to politicize this case, inflame media coverage, and taint the jury pool,’ write four lawyers from Latham & Watkins in their response. 

They accuse Durham’s team of ‘misleadingly’ introducing information that Sussmann exploited domain name system (DNS) Internet traffic associated with Trump and the Executive Office of the President.

The motion says Durham is succeeded in the effort, and cites several news clips that came out since he made the filing Friday.

In a footnote the lawyers take on the notion that Sussmann was acting in concert with the Clinton campaign, saying the motion ‘conveniently overlooks’ the fact that Sussmann’s meeting with a government agency ‘happened well after the 2016 presidential election at a time when the Clinton Campaign had effectively ceased to exist.’

It also notes how former President Trump ‘seized’ upon the filing, and cites Trump statement that it ‘provides indisputable evidence that my campaign and presidency were spied on by operatives paid by the Hillary Clinton Campaign in an effort to develop a completely fabricated connection to Russia.’ 

It accused Durham of other instances of ‘using inflammatory and prejudicial rhetoric’ against ‘uncharged conduct.’ Sussmann has been charged with lying to the FBI, and has pleaded not guilty. He has not been charged in any spying conspiracy.

‘These allegations were not included in the Indictment; these allegations post-date the single false statement that was charged in the Indictment; and these allegations were not necessary to identify any of the potential conflicts of interest with which the Motion is putatively concerned. Why then include them? The question answers itself,’ write the lawyers. 

The government’s indictment of Sussmann says he told then-FBI general counsel James Baker he was not doing work ‘for any client’ when he brought forward information that purported to show a communications channel between the Trump Organization and Kremlin-linked Alfa Bank.

Lawyers for attorney Michael Sussmann blast special counsel John Durham for the ‘Factual Background’ section of his latest filing, saying it includes false and irrelevant allegations

The FBI looked into the matter and found there was nothing to it.  

Durham, in his Feb. 11th filing, said Sussmann ‘ had assembled and conveyed the allegations to the FBI on behalf of at least two specific clients, including a technology executive (Tech Executive 1) at a U.S.-based internet company (Internet Company 1) and the Clinton campaign.’ 

The exec has since been identified as Rodney Joffe, and the second agency he went to after going to the FBI has been identified as the CIA. 

‘To make this case a partisan affair and to inflame media coverage, the Special Counsel chose to include allegations that Mr. Sussmann was part of a wide-ranging scheme involving a number of uncharged parties including the Clinton Campaign, Law Firm-1, Campaign Lawyer-1, a U.S. Investigative Firm, Tech-Executive-1, and a number of computer data researchers who all worked together to unfairly influence the 2016 election, according to Sussmann’s lawyers.     

The special counsel  omitted statements ‘that showed the researchers agreed with the findings and otherwise operated in good faith.’

The lawyers want the special counsel to strike the ‘Factual Background’ portion and say Sussmann ‘reserves all rights to submit appropriate motions and seek appropriate relief.’ 

A Joffe spokesperson also pushed back at the Durham filing. ‘Contrary to the allegations in this recent filing, Mr. Joffe is an apolitical Internet security expert with decades of service to the U.S. Government who has never worked for a political party, and who legally provided access to DNS data obtained from a private client that separately was providing DNS services to the Executive Office of the President (EOP),’ the statement said.

Sussmann’s filing was signed by four lawyers, including Sean Berkowitz and Michael Bosworth of Latham & Watkins. 

Meanwhile, Clinton refused to answer questions about allegations that her allies spied on the Trump campaign as the controversy continued to engulf her Tuesday.

Exclusive pictures and video obtained by DailyMail.com show a stoney faced Clinton silently waving away repeated questions of whether she spied on Donald Trump.

She refused to say when or if she planned to comment. Clinton was arriving at her daughter Chelsea’s Manhattan apartment mid morning.

Wearing a blue coat and black pants, she looked strained behind her black face mask as she stoically ran the gauntlet of questions. 

The former first lady and secretary of state is slated as the keynote speaker at Thursday’s New York state Democratic convention. 

A short while later, a considerably more dolled-up Clinton was seen heading out to lunch with her daughter at Kusina Pinoy Bistro in Woodside, New York in the borough of Queens. A film crew was seen setting up inside the restaurant.

Chelsea also looked dressed up for the occasion in a long black puffer jacket, with a blood orange skirt peeking out underneath and black heels.  

Republicans are also calling for increased scrutiny on President Joe Biden’s National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan after the longtime Democratic operative’s links to Special Counsel John Durham’s investigation were revived in the wake of a bombshell new court filing.

Sullivan had been a top foreign policy adviser to Clinton’s campaign. 

Clinton was stony-faced as she arrived in Manhattan on late Tuesday morning, as questions swell over recent allegations made by Special Counsel John Durham in his probe of the origins of the Russia investigation

Clinton waved off questions about the bombshell filing as she headed to her daughter Chelsea’s home

CThe former 2016 presidential candidate is the keynote speaker at New York state Democrats’ convention on Thursday

Durham’s court filing alleged that Clinton’s 2016 campaign hired a tech firm to infiltrate Trump servers in an effort to establish a connection between the former president and Russia

Durham’s probe into the origins of the Russian investigation moved closer to the White House late last year with a report that Sullivan was the ‘foreign policy adviser’ mentioned in the indictment of former Clinton presidential campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann. 

Sussmann was charged in September with allegedly lying to the FBI, and has pleaded not guilty. 

Rep. Jim Banks of Indiana told DailyMail.com Sullivan should be removed from office if the allegations were proven to be true.

‘No one who has spied on the White House is fit to serve in the White House. Jake Sullivan is already a notorious partisan and if he participated in Clinton’s illicit spying on President Trump, he must be removed from office and held responsible,’ Banks said. 

Clinton emerged from Chelsea’s home alongside her a short while later looking considerably more dolled-up

Chelsea Clinton was also seen dressed up in a black puffer coat, blood orange skirt and black heels

The mother and daughter pair were headed to lunch at Kusina Pinoy Bistro in Woodside, Queens where a film crew was setting up inside

A black truck with lighting was parked on the side street and crew members spotted going in with black shades. Secret Service had parked outside of the restaurant while they are inside filming

Prior to Durham’s Thursday filing, Sussmann’s legal team said Durham ‘seems to be succeeding in his effort to instigate unfair and prejudicial media coverage of Mr. Sussmann’s case.’

The lawyer slammed the special counsel’s allegations as ‘false.’ 

Without naming Sullivan, Rep. Mike Waltz of Florida told DailyMail.com it was ‘hard to believe’ such a high level of privacy invasion could have taken place without the Clinton campaign’s knowledge.

President Joe Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, is the ‘foreign policy adviser’ mentioned in the indictment of a former Hillary Clinton campaign lawyer, according to Fox News. There is no suggestion that Sullivan is a target of Special Council John Durham’s investigation into the origins of the Russia probe

‘If these allegations prove true, I would find it hard to believe that there was potentially some type of collusion with a tech company that had access to servers and computers to spy on the Trump campaign – and potentially the White House – without authorization from top officials in the Clinton campaign,’ Waltz said. 

When asked about the revelations on Monday, White House deputy press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre repeatedly said she ‘can’t speak to’ Durham’s filing and referred questions to the Justice Department. 

Additionally, a past tweet from Clinton has ignited a firestorm and renewed attention on Sullivan’s role in potentially pushing lies about then-candidate and later President Trump.

Clinton shared a statement from Sullivan, a top foreign policy adviser on her campaign, on October 31, 2016, just days before the presidential election. 

It was in response to an article in Slate covering a team of computer scientists who claimed to have discovered a link between Trump and Russia-based Alfa Bank.

‘This could be the most direct link yet between Trump and Moscow,’ Sullivan said. ‘Computer scientists have apparently uncovered a covert server linking the Trump Organization to a Russian-based bank.’

He added, ‘This secret hotline may be the key to unlocking the mystery of Trump’s ties to Russia.’

Top Republicans are now questioning whether the Biden official with a heavy hand in US foreign policy knowingly promoted faulty information while hiding his boss’ link to it. 

The timing of the matter raises particular concerns about Sullivan’s role in the US response to the rapidly worsening crisis between Russia and Ukraine.

‘Jake Sullivan pushed the Russia hoax. He knew it was a lie. He now works in the Biden White House,’ Rep.  Jim Jordan of Ohio wrote on Twitter Monday.

Senator Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee accused Sullivan of a ‘conflict of interest’ in his current efforts trying to de-escalate with Moscow.

‘Jake Sullivan’s involvement in the Russia collusion hoax is a clear conflict of interest, and he should not be allowed to speak on behalf of the U.S. as Russia-Ukraine tensions heighten,’ Blackburn told DailyMail.com on Tuesday.

Trump (pictured golfing in West Palm on Friday) has also expressed outrage at the bombshell court filing, claiming what Clinton’s campaign did amounted to ‘treason’

Prominent Republicans came down hard on Sullivan and his former boss Hillary Clinton

She also said Sullivan ‘lied to the American people in hopes of winning an election.’ 

Conservative Political Action Conference chair Matt Schlapp demanded that Sullivan quit his role in the Biden administration.

‘With the revelations that Trump was indeed spied on during 2016 and deep into his presidency it is time for anyone complicit in this crime resign from the Biden Administration and be charged. Jake Sullivan must step down,’ Schlapp said.

South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham said that if proven true, the Clinton campaign’s actions are ‘unacceptable.’

‘Court filings by Special Counsel Durham suggesting the Clinton campaign may have engaged in an orchestrated effort to infiltrate the Trump campaign are unacceptable and should not be swept under the rug,’ Graham said on Tuesday. 

Texas Senator Ted Cruz called out the Clinton campaign as well as mainstream media outlets that have largely been ignoring the filing.

‘The corrupt corporate media breathlessly covered every contour of the Russia lies spread by Hillary & her cronies. Now it’s reported that Hillary’s team paid to hack the White House & Trump Tower, crickets! Zero coverage on NBC, ABC, & CBS morning shows. The silence is damning!’ Cruz said on Monday night.  

Blackburn questioned the White House’s silence on the matter after the daily briefing

In Durham’s filing on Friday, he revealed how Sussmann ‘had assembled and conveyed the allegations to the FBI on behalf of at least two specific clients, including a technology executive (Tech Executive 1), named as Rodney Joffe, at a U.S.-based internet company (Internet Company 1) and the Clinton campaign.’  

The filing also reveals how Joffe worked with Sussmann at the instruction of the Clinton campaign to ‘assemble the purported data and white papers’ – essentially to gather information that would tie Trump to Russia.    

Blackburn called the White House out over dodging questions on the matter Monday evening: ‘Why is the White House refusing to comment about Jake Sullivan’s role in fabricating evidence against President Trump?’ 

Sullivan has been a key figure in Democratic circles since 2008 when he was foreign policy adviser to Hillary Clinton’s presidential run, before joining Barack Obama’s general election team. 

Special Counsel John Durham (l) is investigating the origins of the Russia probe. Michael Sussman was indicted in September. He denies lying to the FBI

The Durham investigation appears to have entered a critical phase. A grand jury indictment was returned last week for Igor Danchenko, a Russian analyst accused of being a key source in the Steele dossier. 

He is charged with five counts of making false statements to the FBI.

When Clinton became Secretary of State, Sullivan joined as her deputy chief of staff, before becoming Vice President Joe Biden’s national security adviser in 2013.

There is no suggestion that Sullivan is a target of Durham’s investigation, only that he received information from Sussmann. 

Trump has long denied any illegal conspiracy with Russia in his 2016 campaign, insisting that the allegations were trumped up by his political enemies. Likewise, Democrats claim that Durham’s probe is a political hatchet job.

Former President Donald Trump this week praised Durham’s work, claiming ‘it all leads back to the Democrats, Hillary [Clinton] and the dirty lawyers’ during an interview with Fox News

Durham was appointed as special counsel by Trump administration Attorney General Bill Barr in October 2020, and tasked with investigating whether the FBI’s Trump-Russia probe, code-named ‘Crossfire Hurricane,’ was opened and conducted legally.

The first criminal charges in Durham’s probe were against Kevin Clinesmith, an FBI attorney assigned to the Robert Mueller probe, who altered an email during the process of acquiring a wiretap warrant renewal on Page.

Igor Danchenko was arrested last week by US federal agents

Clinesmith pleaded guilty and was sentenced to probation. 

Last week, a key source who provided information to British ex-spy Christopher Steele for his ‘dirty dossier’ of allegations against Donald Trump was been arrested in the US. 

Igor Y. Danchenko, a Russian-born analyst living in the United States, was arrested on Thursday in Virginia by federal agents assigned to Durham’s investigation, according to the Justice Department. 

He is charged with five counts of lying to FBI agents about the sources he used in collecting information for Steele, who is identified in the indictment only as ‘UK Person-1’. 

Danchenko, 43, was the primary researcher for Steele’s dossier alleging that Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign conspired with Russia in a covert operation to beat Hillary Clinton, and that Russia had salacious videos that could be used to blackmail Trump.

Trump himself has praised Durahm’s effort multiple times. 

The former president, 75, predicted that Durham’s investigation, which he was first assigned to in April 2019, will show that ‘it all leads back to the Democrats, Hillary [Clinton] and the dirty lawyers.’

‘It really has come out,’ Trump said to Fox after Durham produced his second of two indictments.  ‘In all fairness, while it has taken a long time, hats off to John Durham.’ 

‘Hats off, because, it’s coming out, and it is coming out at a level – Durham has come out with things that are absolutely amazing.’

The Steele dossier ‘source’, an attorney linked to Hillary and a lawyer in Mueller’s probe: The accusations in Durham’s investigation

HILLARY CLINTON 

A recently revealed filing from Special Counsel John Durham alleged Hillary Clinton paid a lawyer to infiltrate Trump Tower and White House servers in the 2016 campaign and after. It claims she was seeking to fabricate a link between Trump and Russia’ Alfa Bank to distract from her email scandal at the time. 

Igor Danchenko

IGOR DANCHENKO

The 43-year-old Russian-born analyst was arrested in November 2021 in Virginia by federal agents assigned to Durham’s special counsel and charged with five counts of lying to FBI agents about the sources he used in collecting information for Michael Steele, who is identified in the indictment only as ‘UK Person-1’.

Danchenko was the primary researcher for Steele’s opposition research dossier alleging that Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign conspired with Russia in a covert operation to beat Clinton. He also informed Steele that Russia had the infamous ‘golden showers’ tape that could be used to blackmail Trump.  

Michael Sussmann

MICHAEL SUSSMANN 

In September 2021, Durham indicted the cybersecurity lawyer, accusing him of lying to the FBI during a September 2016 conversation when relaying concerns about potentially suspicious cyber contacts between a Trump Organization server and the server of a Russian bank.

When bringing the concerns to then-FBI general counsel James Baker, the indictment alleged that Sussmann lied and said he was not representing a client when he was actually hired by Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign  

Sussmann has pleaded not guilty and his lawyers have claimed the case is driven by politics. 

Kevin Clinesmith

KEVIN CLINESMITH

The first criminal charges in Durham’s probe were against Kevin Clinesmith, an FBI attorney assigned to the Robert Mueller probe. 

Clinesmith, 38, pleaded guilty to altering an email during the process of acquiring a wiretap warrant renewal on former FBI lawyer Lisa Page. 

He was sentenced to probation.

JOHN BRENNAN

 The Obama-era CIA Director was questioned by Durham’s team for eight hours in August 2020 as part of the ongoing investigation. Specifically the special counsel was interested in whether Brennan pushed for a more blunt assessment of Russia’s motivations

Trump-era Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe said Monday that Brennan did brief then President Barack Obama and Vice President at the time Joe Biden in 2016 about the allegations Clinton was trying to ‘fabricate’ a link between Trump and Russia.

Rodney Joffe

RODNEY JOFFE 

While a ‘key player’ in the Durham investigation, Rodney Joffe is not officially indicted or accused of any wrongdoing as of yet. He is, however, referred to as ‘Tech Executive-1’ in Sussmann’s indictment for allegedly lying to the FBI by withholding his connections to Clinton’s 2016 campaign. 

The indictment for Sussmann notes that Joffe ‘retained Sussman as his lawyer’ in February 2015 in connection with an unspecified ‘matter involving an agency of the US government.’