Documents that indicate Hillary Clinton approved a Russia collusion hoax against her rival Donald Trump during the 2016 presidential campaign were “buried in a back room,” FBI Director Kash Patel said on Thursday.
He made the comment after the release of a newly declassified annex from former Special Counsel John Durham that discussed how the Obama-era FBI appeared to ignore intelligence that indicated Clinton’s campaign, its supporters, or Russian disinformation fueled allegations of ties between Trump’s 2016 campaign and Moscow in order to distract from the controversy over her unauthorized use of a private email server while serving as Secretary of State.
“We uncovered this annex, along with thousands of other documents, buried in a back room at the FBI,” Patel said in a post on X. “It revealed a highly classified piece of the Durham report: evidence that the Clinton campaign plotted to frame President Trump and fabricate the Russia collusion hoax. We worked with Chairman Grassley and declassified the documents immediately. And now the American people can see the truth for themselves. The Russia hoax was a disgrace that President Trump and our country should’ve never been put through.”
Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA), who is chairman of the Judiciary Committee and a lead Russia-gate investigator who pushed for the declassification of the annex, released the document on Thursday.
“This political weaponization has caused critical damage to our institutions and is one of the biggest political scandals and cover-ups in American history,” Grassley said in a statement. “The new Trump administration has a tremendous responsibility to the American people to fix the damage done and do so with maximum speed and transparency.”
Attorney General Pam Bondi has already initiated a new “strike force” tasked with evaluating the evidence relating the Obama administration’s efforts to drive the Russia collusion allegations in response to various documents the Trump administration has been releasing to the public, such as findings that allegedly show officials in the Obama administration manufactured and manipulated intelligence regarding Russia to undermine Trump.
The declassified annex, which still contains some redactions, spoke of how the FBI received information detailing a plan that Clinton purportedly approved to use firms to spread disinformation through media, expecting the bureau to “put more oil into the fire” and distract from her email scandal. Durham also wrote how it seemed the FBI “dismissed” the intelligence as “not credible without any investigative steps actually having been taken to either corroborate or disprove the allegations.”
Former President Barack Obama and top national security veterans from his administration have pushed back on claims there being a “treasonous conspiracy,” but the Trump administration has pledged to keep on digging into the matter.
“This should be a step toward justice,” Patel said in his post on X. “There will be more to come. Your FBI will keep being relentless to get the truth out. We’re thankful for federal partners [at the Justice Department, CIA] and more. And thank you [Grassley] for your tireless investigative work.”