Attorney General William Barr responded to the Justice Department inspector general’s report on the FBI’s abuse of the FISA system to surveil the Trump campaign by slamming the FBI for withholding exculpatory evidence from their filings with the FISA court.
“The Inspector General’s report now makes clear that the FBI launched an intrusive investigation of a U.S. presidential campaign on the thinnest of suspicions that, in my view, were insufficient to justify the steps taken,” Barr said. “It is also clear that, from its inception, the evidence produced by the investigation was consistently exculpatory. Nevertheless, the investigation and surveillance was pushed forward for the duration of the campaign and deep into President Trump’s administration.”
“In the rush to obtain and maintain FISA surveillance of Trump campaign associates, FBI officials misled the FISA court, omitted critical exculpatory facts from their filings, and suppressed or ignored information negating the reliability of their principal source. The Inspector General found the explanations given for these actions unsatisfactory,” Barr continued. “While most of the misconduct identified by the Inspector General was committed in 2016 and 2017 by a small group of now-former FBI officials, the malfeasance and misfeasance detailed in the Inspector General’s report reflects a clear abuse of the FISA process.”
Barr’s statement comes as the inspector general found “serious” problems with the way that the FBI conducted itself while trying to surveil the campaign. The report outlined 17 “inaccuracies and omissions” in the FBI’s FISA application of then-Trump campaign adviser Carter Page and also found that top officials doctored evidence that was used against Page. – READ MORE