David Weiss Was Planning on Using Alexander Smirnov’s Claims against the Bidens Until He Wasn’t Anymore
On November 16, CNN reported on David Weiss’ ongoing use of a California grand jury. It reported that by that point, the FBI had concluded its renewed look at money laundering and FARA violations and was not going to file charges.
Prosecutors working under Weiss told a judge earlier this year that in addition to tax charges, they could also bring charges related to possible violations of the Foreign Agent Registration Act. Internal Revenue Service investigators who were part of the Hunter Biden investigation have alleged that the prosecutors slow-walked and blocked efforts to look into possible money laundering and foreign lobbying allegations.
The FBI, which oversaw the money laundering and FARA portions of the investigation, concluded its findings and didn’t anticipate charges to emerge from those allegations, people briefed on the matter told CNN.
That was over a month after the September 27 interview at which Smirnov renewed and expanded his lies. No charges were going to be filed on November 16, CNN reported.
But on November 15, Abbe Lowell asked for discovery on the Scott Brady side channel and subpoenas to serve on people like Trump and Bill Barr.
- All documents and records reflecting communications from January 20, 2017 to the present (the “Relevant Time Period”) to, from, between, or among Donald J. Trump, William P. Barr, Geoffrey Berman, Scott W. Brady, Richard Donoghue, or Jeffrey A. Rosen relating to or discussing any formal or informal investigation or prosecution of Hunter Biden, or a request thereof.
- All documents and records reflecting communications from the Relevant Time Period to, from, between, or among Donald J. Trump, William P. Barr, Geoffrey Berman, Scott W. Brady, Richard Donoghue, or Jeffrey A. Rosen and any Executive Branch official, political appointee, Department of Justice official, government agency, government official or staff person, cabinet member, or attorney for President Trump (personal or other) discussing or concerning Hunter Biden.
Lowell raised the Brady side channel in his selective prosecution filing, too. David Weiss’ responses to such requests always misrepresented the ask, pretending it pertained to no more than directions from Jeffrey Rosen’s office to avoid overt pre-election investigative steps.
And all the while, according to the Alexander Smirnov detention memo, he kept getting on planes to meet Russian spooks.
In October 2023, SMIRNOV had in-person conversations with RUSSIAN OFFICIAL 1 overseas. During these conversations, RUSSIAN OFFICIAL 1 discussed his knowledge and seeming control of two groups of Russian operatives who were previously tasked with the assassination of a high-ranking official of COUNTRY C. RUSSIAN OFFICIAL 1 offered to stop the assassination efforts in exchange for certain things, including an agreement by COUNTRY C to stop targeting civilian-family members of certain Russian officials living in Moscow
[snip]
SMIRNOV attended a meeting in COUNTRY A [probably UAE] in December 2023 that was attended by RUSSIAN OFFICIAL 2, a high-ranking member of a Russian Foreign Intelligence Service. The primary purpose of the meeting was to discuss a potential resolution to the Russia-Ukraine war.
Against that background, there’s a detail in the Smirnov indictment that hasn’t attracted the attention it deserves.
David Weiss bases his authority for charging Smirnov — in California, not Delaware — on his Special Counsel authority.
41. In July 2023, the FBI requested that the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Delaware assist the FBI in an investigation of allegations related to the 2020 1023. At that time, the United States Attorney’s Office for the District of Delaware was handling an investigation and prosecution of Businessperson 1.
42. On August 11, 2023, the Attorney General appointed David C. Weiss, the United States Attorney for the District of Delaware, as Special Counsel. The Special Counsel was authorized to conduct the investigation and prosecution of Businessperson 1, as well as “any matters that arose from that investigation, may arise from the Special Counsel’s investigation, or that are within the scope of 28 C.F.R. § 600.4(a).”
The only way Smirnov could be covered under that Special Counsel grant of authority is if, when investigators interviewed Smirnov on September 27, they were investigating Hunter Biden. David Weiss was made Special Counsel to investigate Hunter Biden, not those who framed him and his father.
There’s a lot that Weiss left out of the indictment, like Scott Brady’s claim to have vetted Smirnov’s travel records and Bill Barr’s claim that Weiss was ordered in 2020 to further investigate the claim and Richard Donoghue’s order to Weiss, just days after Trump yelled at Bill Barr for not doing enough to investigate Hunter Biden, to accept a briefing on Smirnov’s claims.
But that detail makes it clear that the point of the interview was to investigate Hunter Biden, not — not at first, anyway — to investigate Smirnov. This is why, if Abbe Lowell gets discovery on this issue, I think this footnote will be vindicated (an argument I made back in November).
4 The discussion about the scope of the immunity agreement appears shaped by the prosecution’s investigation of the Smirnov allegations, which it began looking into just days before the July 26, 2023 hearing. (Smirnov Indict. ¶ 41 (noting the prosecution team began investigating Smirnov’s claims in July 2023).) While a host of possible crimes had been investigated, the defense understood that the FARA/bribery investigation had been closed and that the only pending issues concerned gun and tax charges. The Diversion Agreement resolved the gun and tax charges, which is why defense counsel believed the immunity agreement covered everything and would conclude the investigation. The push back from the prosecution and its discussion of an “ongoing” investigation—apparently tied to the Smirnov allegations—came as a surprise to defense counsel. (7/26/23 Tr. at 50, 54.) Having taken Mr. Smirnov’s bait of grand, sensational charges, the Diversion Agreement that had just been entered into and Plea Agreement that was on the verge of being finalized suddenly became inconvenient for the prosecution, and it reversed course and repudiated those Agreements.
The reason why David Weiss reneged on a plea deal was to chase this bribery claim. The reason why David Weiss charged Hunter Biden with a bunch of felonies rather than resolving this in a diversion and misdemeanors was because he wanted to chase the false claims floated by someone dallying with Russian spies.
And I’d be willing to bet that if Lowell hadn’t asked for discovery that may expose that fact, David Weiss would never have indicted Alexander Smirnov.
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Thank you.
I’m sure you’re right about why he reneged on Hunter charges. The only thing that gives me pause on why *Smirnov* was finally charged is that it sounds like the efforts were ongoing, with new lies being planned. And so I can imagine a scenario where the new lies are what prompted reconsideration of his prior statements.
(Unrelated, but so it doesn’t get lost, and since I’m already commenting, may as well call attention to my earlier comment today about what seems to be a mistake made in the photo that was right after the sawdust photo. https://www.emptywheel.net/2024/02/21/hunter-bidens-ca-motions-to-dismiss/#comment-1040505 )
Thanks. Good point.
Weiss must believe there’s still a way out for Weiss here.
Bravo. Is this potential fodder for the Senate Judiciary Committee?
Let’s hope not, they need to be confirming judges much more than this nonsense.
Agreed. Let the courts deal with it. After all, Putin’s puppets are not just in the House.
Indeed.
Paging Dick Durbin.
I was scrolling through the US Circuit active judges lists for the upper Midwest a few days ago and in all but one District there was a vacancy, several of them being of some length already. And some of the Circuits only have a few judge positions anyway, such that it might represent a quarter of the appellate bench. Talk about a disservice to the Districts they serve, as well as a deeper skewing to the right in their outputs.
I don’t think “paging” is adequate any more. There needs to be claxons and air raid sirens going off. This is the kind of misfeasance that makes one wonder about Dem leadership.
“Blue slip” is Decorum-speak for “Don’t do shit.” Problem is, only one side speaks that language.
It might be legit fodder for the DoJ IG, except that Captain Renault is currently occupying the office.
Wouldn’t this be Office of Professional Responsibility territory given it’d be an investigation into DoJ’s lawyers?
Yes, and they will do absolutely nothing. People need to give this up. It is not going to happen.
I love your “keeping it real” comments, bmaz—experience matters!
Perhaps the Intelligence Committee can dig here, given who we’re talking about and the insinuation that HB was a Russian agent.
Yes, appointing judges is job number one. But my takeaway from these reactions is that nothing will be done to get to the bottom of all this – which is quite remarkable.
One might think a competent DoJ could walk and chew at the same time
They can, you would just rather have hyperbolic bullshit at this point. That should never be the priority.
Who exactly has Garland fired yet?
Not in this climate. Maybe later after this resolved by the courts, and only for the purposes of enacting legislation to correct any failures with the current code.
Josh Marshall is on the case:
A Bigger Story Than You Can Possibly Imagine
Nice of him to finally tune in. ;p
right?
Josh did mention this website directly in a related post…or it might have been Kurtz…let me see if I can track it down.
It was David Kurtz:
Call me crazy, and a little OT here, but every time I see the cocaine / sawdust photo I see the “Monster” caffeinated beverage logo. Long ago, I knew people in recovery who consumed LOTS of caffein – any chance the carpenter was representing his sobriety in that photo?
I am a long-time reader at TPM. I emailed Josh three years ago he should pay to send somebody to help you. That you had found a gusher and he should get in on the ground floor and have a tap in the scoops. I know he remembers because he wrote me back something that he greatly admired you but doubted you’d agree. He respected you a lot in his message to me though he’s probably not been reading enough here trying to keep his people on their copy. George Santos made fun of his bald head on Twitter the other day so he has reach, but nobody’s reading court filings at the papers. It’s like none of the journalists could pass the LSAT, but Josh has got no excuse.
I tried the same thing, but found out then that Josh cut me off a long time ago. Can’t remember why. I first emailed him on something when TPM was pretty new, and it was a one-person operation. Back then, he wrote back. Petulantly.
He may have been about to reference Marcy’s work today when he was on MSNBC, but Ari sort of cut him off.
Josh and I have some … prior history going back over a decade. Plus I called him out for making garbage claims about the Jan6 investigation.
It’s cool. He does good work. I’m glad he recognizes how important this is.
Your reply was extremely gracious and diplomatic, and lets me remind you of the well-earned accolades you receive on this site and add mine. It is overwhelmingly impressive to read your systematic, thorough, careful analyses day after day after day after day. Really, truly, extraordinary work – and a ton of it, too. No other source, to my knowledge, has been so consistent, detailed, and aware of a staggering number of facts within a coherent story. Thank you.
Alas, paywalled out.
Here’s a link for those who would like to read Josh Marshall’s entire post.
Slowly people may be coming to grips with what Marcy has been elucidating for months.
The Smirnov indictment seems to be the tipping point for a number of people. It’s like… this pot of pasta sauce has been simmering on the stove FOREVER but now that you can smell it burning you’re finally paying attention to it.
You have to give credit to Lowell for the legal maneuvering that has led us to this point, and credit to Marcy to having a bunch of material already laid out that people who are suddenly paying attention can use for remedial homework.
Yes, catching up a day after your comment, it feels as if the rubber is finally hitting the road in a whole new way.
I can’t get here enough these days, but thank God for Nicole Sandler’s Fridays with EW!
You’ve been missed, glad to see your pixels here.
Thank you for the link!
Sometimes the articles are interesting. But more often, I find the work on TPM superficial, a day late and dollar short, but promoted as if it was the NYT. Then again….
I, unfortunately, agree. David Kurtz on Morning Memo is good. Most of the rest is meh.
My impression is that, for a professionally run operation, Josh is doing pretty good within TPM’s budget. Rather than worry about TPM not meeting your individual standard, it’s maybe better to think of it as a good place where a handful of modern young reporters cut their teeth. Not all of the folks there are PhDs or lawyers per se, not grizzled old newspaper hands, they’re just folks trying to work on the craft of being a web reporter that does enough copy to justify the subscriptions and the mentoring.
I’ll stick with my own evaluation, thanks, based on their work product.
It is like a sanitized Raw Story in many regards. Marshall can give cogent opinions sometimes though.
Like EW, he has stayed in business for nearly twenty years, so I give him high marks for that.
Josh has been just enough ahead of the curve to build and maintain a fairly vital operation. (Goodness knows he finds the opportunities to pat himself on the back for that, but credit where credit is due.)
I think they have some good original reporting – especially on the scandal-mongering side, and they don’t take themselves too seriously. I appreciate willingness to reconsider positions based on reader input. He brings a historian’s zoomed out perspective (okay, Michael Beschloss he ain’t) and has a knack for crystalizing the moment, albeit with a studied stream of consciousness writing style that can trip on itself.
Despite the click-bait headlines I still get my Prime AF’s membership’s worth there.
This Smirnov Affair seems like one of the biggest scandals in American history to me, but so far nary a trace on the NY Times home page.
There once was a man named Smirnov
Who gave the DOJ a jerk off
A bunch of claptrap
Coming from a laptop
Dance he got in Kovrov
Dude, if you’re going to do this, you’ve got to commit to either the rhyme or the meter.
Here’s my attempt:
There once was a fellow named Smirnov
Always spreading bs like a stern oaf.
It covered his arms,
So despite all his charms:
Now the stink won’t even burn off.
There once was a fellow named Smirnov
And for him, the truth was a turn-off
He gathered his lies
From GRU spies
Then spun them to credulous jerk-offs
Yours are both better.
“In Soviet Russia, poem writes you!
What a country!”
Wetzel I thought laptop dance was a clever descriptive pairing.
I love EW commenters.
I’ll fix my meter, but just to say, your second line has five feet, and your fourth line has three. I used a trochee, which is not good in limericks, and one of my short lines has three feet instead of two like yours. I don’t know how to scan ‘DOJ’ but I think it adds an extra spondee, so that line has four feet instead of three. My limerick was bad!
There once was a man named Smirnov
Who gave ole Weiss the jerk off
With a bunch of claptrap
Because of a laptop
Dance he received in Kovrov
Now it has the right 3 3 2 2 3 meter and makes better sense, though it doesn’t come up to your rhyming.
Very nice! Like one of the other commenters said, the double-meaning with laptop is clever.
And yeah, you are completely right about the meter on the 2nd line. (I think the 5th works because the pause at the end of 4 lets you reset the placement of your heavy beat — but that doesn’t really come across in text.)
okay — how’s this? (riffing off a classic)
a perversion grotesque and unsavory
kept the Comer/Jordan committees in slavery
with lascivious dick-sniffing howls
they waggled beefy jowls
and trumpeted Smirnov’s knavery
Man, that is pure Lewis Carroll like if you rewrote Animal Farm as a musical.
thank you, wetzel.
another assault on the walls of limerick
You should write fourteener ballads. That would give you more room to breathe, and give you a reason to get a ukulele.
I was thinking who knows what fourteener ballads are so I put it into Google and the AI said fourteener couplets hadn’t been popular since the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. This is a fourteener couplet. They’re all over country music ballad writing.
The silence of a falling star lights up a purple sky
And when I wonder where you are I’m so lonesome I could cry
The key is to have a breath after the first four beats in the line. The rules are super more flexible than you’d think on songwriting like this is one long fourteener in singing by Willie Nelson that has twenty syllables.
The bright lights of Denver were shining like diamonds like ten thousand jewels in the night
Townes van Zandt loved fourteeners.
Fourteeners!
There once was a fellow named Smirnov
Whose mendacity would talk your ear off
The whole GOP
Not wishing to see
Had been Putin’s best hope for a coup >>cough<<
Strokeahnov anyone?
Smirnov is now in the limelight
Just make up shit fitting Trump’s right
Coating Biden with slime
By now time after time
So whose tool, guess Russian and look bright?
There once was a fellow named Smirnov
Who supplied lies to the Trumpist caucus
While swilling their vodka the Russians at Pravda
are now dancing and laughing their ass off
Here’s one to the cadence of John Masefield’s Sea Fever
I wish I could do my 1023 again, back when I was running high
Now all I ask is not to end up dead, like that Litvineko guy
From the GRU, to the GOP, my lies paid out for the taking
And now my little part is played, a nation closer to a breaking.
Their once was a fellow named Smirnov
Who Republicans want you to learn of
Though it seems that he lies
Like all KGB spies
So I guess we should all have some Smirnoff
(or: Fuck it, this merde we should turn off)
“Informant” Smirnov
Told tales to the DOJ
Weiss left holding dick (pics)
So the House members who have been hyperventilating on camera for the last few months about the rock solid evidence they have from a premier FBI informant received this informant’s information from the FBI or did they actually interview Smirnov himself?
At what point was the FBI going to disabuse the House of their hobby horse’s validity ? I ask this because you point out that if Lowell hadn’t asked for discovery, Weiss may never have charged Smirnov. So there are people in the FBI who knew of Smirnov’s sketchiness and were perfectly happy to let Weiss sandbag the Bidens with a foreign agent ? I find this very disturbing.
BTW, MSNBC just said that Weiss has gone to the judge in LA that will be overseeing the Smirnov case requesting that he not be released, after the judge in Vegas was prepared to release him.
Molly, your comment makes me wonder where the characterization of Smirnov (before he got named) as “very reliable” and “highly credible” originated. It was brandished by the committee chairs Jordan and Comer, but they acted as if it must have come from the FBI.
So…did it? And if so, how long did it take for the Bureau to realize they had been gulled? How much of the problem here derives from, say, the DC field office thirsting after information that might in some universe be seen as vindicating Trump?
“highly reliable” seems to have come from “a source familiar” speaking to Brooke Singman at Fox News:
Person alleging Biden criminal bribery scheme is a ‘highly credible’ FBI source used since Obama admin: source Accuser alleges Biden involved in a $5 million bribery scheme with a foreign national https://www.foxnews.com/politics/person-alleging-biden-criminal-bribery-scheme-is-a-highly-credible-fbi-source-used-since-obama-admin-source Published June 2, 2023
GRASSLEY noted this article in his 10/24/23 letter to Garland and Wray, that Marcy wrote about here: https://www.emptywheel.net/2023/11/01/chuck-grassley-and-james-comer-brag-that-40-informants-couldnt-substantiate-a-crime-against-biden/
Harpie I found this in relation to Zlochevsky
https://oversightdemocrats.house.gov/news/press-releases/ranking-member-raskin-shares-key-evidence-directly-contradicting-bribery
Thank you, Molly!
That is exactly the feeling I have. I think we are not wanting to believe what we are seeing because the thought that our governmental institutions are replete with bad actors working against democracy and the actual rule of law is so alarming. We need to accept that we are in the midst of a long planned, slow moving coup.
This. It seems that the Congress and some in the FBI, etc are dupes, sometimes willingly. Folks like Jordan and Comer don’t really seem to care what is actually true, just that they can insult and degrade unfettered anyone that they wish to target.
I saw a compilation of Comer, Jordan, Graham, Cruz and a bunch of their co-conspirators all painting Smirnov as legit, all using the exact same words “very reliable” and “highly credible” over and over, always with great emphasis and (now it’s easy to see covering themselves by) prefacing these words with “in the past.”
I thought, oh shit, that should have told us all along they knew Smirnov was lying. Because this is how they operate.
Regarding Smirnov statement, Rep. Buck stated that “We were warned that the credibility of this statement was not known” during a Kaitlin Collins Interview yesterday. Which means the FBI had not misled Comer and Jordan, they just made it up!
The interview is on Kaitlin Collins Twitter account and here,
https://www.newsweek.com/gop-congressman-says-colleagues-were-warned-about-ex-fbi-informant-1872237
I admit that at this time it’s pure speculation, but my money is on Bill Barr or an associate being a major part of the dots as to how information about the 1023 got from Pittsburgh to Congress.
This seems to be more and more likely the case. We may not be done with new Special Prosecutor appointments under Garland yet…
Weiss CA motion to review Magistrate’s decision –
https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cacd.915062/gov.uscourts.cacd.915062.11.0_4.pdf
CNN report on CA detention effort by Weiss –
https://www.cnn.com/2024/02/21/politics/smirnov-bail-release/index.html
It looks as if Weiss and team cloned the Vegas Detention memo for California. Both say “Russian” an awful lot, try a word search, as if look here, not anywhere else. The guy is not a Russian dual citizen.
MSN: “After Smirnov was ordered released by a magistrate judge on Tuesday, Weiss petitioned U.S. District Court Judge Otis Wright to detain the defendant.”
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/special-counsel-continues-to-seek-detention-of-informant-accused-of-lying-in-biden-probe/ar-BB1iF4ag
If that is judge shopping one of the other EW community folks would need to say.
Marcy, your table saw post got a mention (though no link) from Philip Bump.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/02/21/hannity-hunter-sawdust-cocaine/
He’s added a link. Thanks for alerting me that he hadn’t.
I feel emboldened to ask the perhaps intrusive question of whether you asked him? I’m interested in how this stuff works.
Cocaine? One need only apply Occam’s table saw.
According to Raw Story, the knives are out for Hannity, who chose this hill of sawdust to die on.
https://www.rawstory.com/sean-hannity-cocaine/
Hannity another link:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/02/21/hannity-hunter-sawdust-cocaine/
I’m so confused how Weiss thought this was going to end.
Was this a genuine surprise to him because he never actually looked into Smirnov? I understand being bad at your job, but that would be next level laziness.
Did he hope Hunter would plead guilty and he’d never have to present this at trial?
Was there some parallel construction planned? But how do you do parallel construction on bullshit…
By turning the sawdust into cocaine lines.
That’s a messiah I could get behind!
Imagine what could be done with flour on a kitchen counter.
IIRC*, Hunter Biden’s lawyer up until the collapsed plea deal was far less aggressive than Abbe Lowell. Which isn’t that surprising, since the apparent plan was to plead out with no prison sentence. It didn’t exactly matter that the charges were rotten if the consequences that HB faced were low enough to be worth putting it all behind him. By the time the DOJ took a wrecking ball to the plea deal and Lowell came on board, Weiss was kind of stuck with this line of inquiry and couldn’t back off. The RWNM (and therefore his masters) had all kinds of expectations of this “highly credible informant” and he couldn’t back away. Once Weiss was looking for prison time, it made sense to HB’s team to pull out all the stops in the defense and expose the rot at the root.
It wouldn’t shock me if Weiss knew this was how it was going to end and has been trying to find a way off the runway that doesn’t tank what remains of his career.
* Please correct me if I don’t remember correctly
Perhaps Weiss had a deal with earlier counsel he thought to be totally fair. There was a noise storm, and he becomes special prosecutor and at hearing the deal got repudiated. That repudiation decision seems the main enigma in everything up to and after that point.
I have been more than impressed with the Lowell writings. Clear, concise, pointing to the laws and flaws straight on. And as Peterr masterfully stated; is fighting the gaslighting too. Few possess that skill and/or ignore. HB is fortunate to have him and his team on this expanding mess.
Your general impression was/is mine. Yesterday after reading the full transcript from the Delaware plea/diversion hearing I came away with a better grasp after Judge Norieka’s first class line of questioning and cause for concerns. She was very well prepared and let no stone go unturned.
I’m sort of imagining a conversation taking place in someone’s office where some person says to Weiss, and maybe others, “Let me get this straight. You have been stovepiping Russian disinformation to top government officials and the public as good and true information. How does that square with your oath to defend the Constitution from all enemies? You consider yourself a loyal American, a defender of America, and yet this happened. What do you intend to do to make things right?”
Seriously, there’s been a sudden turn here. Marcy is suggesting that it was discovery requests that has made the turn, but it’s kinda feeling bigger than that. It’s tough to bet against Marcy though. I hope its bigger than that. So many of these guys think of themselves as loyal Americans, but the whole gay/trans thing has got them so muddled it’s nuts.
For the longest time, the premise of why Weiss blew up the diversion agreement was that he was bowing to political pressure to charge something, anything in order to satisfy the House GOP’s bloodthirst. The hypothesis Lowell presents in his motion turns that on it’s head.
If Weiss was duped by Smirnov then putting any political pressure aside, Weiss would have blown up the diversion agreement because he did not want to be prohibited from pursuing the bibery and FARA charges. Upon learning that he’s been duped, there’s no way in hell he’s going to come back and be like “um yeah I guess that diversion agreement was fine.”
So Plan B is to move forward with anything he thinks he can make stick so let’s go ahead and throw the tax charges onto the pile and if he’s lucky then nobody needs to find out what a chump he was.
How could Weiss predict that Hunter Biden would suddenly get a much better, much more aggressive defense attorney?
Allowing Lowell to get discovery that shows Weiss was the victim of a Russian disinfo op, that he knew he was a victim, and then tried to sweep it under the rug? That blows up your case and maybe blows up your career too. Indicting Smirnov at least allows you to show that you went after the guy that crimed you. If it has the unintended consequence of humiliating a few congresspeople, well Weiss has to look out for himself first and foremost.
One would think this gives Garland an opportunity to fire Weiss as SC. Weiss obviously shouldn’t be handling the prosecution of Smirnov, and there are now a host of credible questions about the extent to which Weiss’ Biden investigation was tainted by bad actors. It’s time to bring in an untainted outsider to clean up this mess. Even the political fallout would be minor. GOP faux-outrage over the firing would only serve to focus even more attention on Smirnov.
OTOH, Weiss just blew the cover off a scandal of…well, scandalous dimensions. He has arguably crippled a (now, visibly) tainted prosecution of Hunter Biden. Is this the moment for Garland to make that move?
Weiss charged Smirnov before he himself was more deeply implicated by this scandal. Whether Weiss is clean or not in this is not yet clear at all.
don’t see that happening in today’s political climate, but I’d love to see Geoffery Berman get a second bite at the apple (exposing Russia-invented conspiracy theories about Ukraine).
Can anyone opine on how Weiss established jurisdiction in CA? Venue too? It’s Smirnov’s former state of residency, but I thought his handler was in DC? Haven’t had time to dig into the filings, other than cursory scan of detention document, so a bit uninformed at the moment… just was thinking that Weiss already having a GJ already established in CA can’t change the jurisdiction caselaw.
If case dismissed for lack of jurisdiction… now that’d be something that could get an SC removed (rookie mistake). not saying we’ve got that here, tho. haven’t had time to dig in.
Indictment explains jurisdiction: https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cacd.915062/gov.uscourts.cacd.915062.1.0.pdf
Opening sentence: “Defendant ALEXANDER SMIRNOV was a resident of Los Angeles,
California in 2020.” — where/when the crime occured.
Weiss may see he has only one option, which is to describe how his higher ups, for whatever reason, set up his investigation of the President’s son to be predicated on Russian active measures. How-was-he-to-know? He has come to the Senate, under oath, to explain everything. Weiss can help the American people resolve the Smirnov affair and restore the reputation of the Department of Justice before it becomes a media circus with him at the center. William P. Barr, Geoffrey Berman, Scott W. Brady, Richard Donoghue, and Jeffrey A. Rosen. One of them is John Dean, if not Weiss, but only one can take the spot as a hero in the Senate. This is a huge scandal. World historic. It is a prisoner’s dilemma. Who gets the book tour. Who is Benedict Arnold? Weiss has the initiative! He should go for it!
OT: in the classified documents case, looks like Cannon didn’t go for Trump’s 318 Motion for Leave to File Consolidated Brief. The Feb 22, 2024 deadline she mentions for defendants to send their “unredacted copies of all pre-trial motions” is tomorrow.
docket entry 320 from yesterday:
I’m a bit cynical after watching how long this process has taken so far, but maybe we’ll get some interesting filings to read in the next few days.
[Edit: also IIRC, her order from Feb 9 makes the defendants’ response to Special Counsel’s Motion for Reconsideration 294 due on Friday–Feb 23, 2024]
Smirnov’s comments are a regurgitation of the what John Bolton called Giuliani’s and Trump’s “dope deal” regarding rooting around in Ukraine for dirt on Biden. It looks like the dealers got sucked in my Russian disinformation.
The sad thing here is that anyone who’s ever read a decent spy novel should be immune to this shit.
It sounds like Weiss trusted Brady too much (pretty clearly, they didn’t let Weiss in on “the joke” until too late) unless I’m skimming too quickly here. If I were Weiss, I’d be very pissed off about this.
OT: Cannon has issued an oral order for a hearing on defense theories in two days (the 23rd). It was a bit later than Smith wanted. This week, she’s being pretty even keel instead of leaning over too far for Trump. But can anyone explain how badly this delay hurt the trial schedule? Seems like she’s trying to hit that May trial date anyway.
In my best Inspector Clouseau voice: Madam, that is not a ball of thread, it is a BIM!!!!
From the moment I heard Trump say “Russia, if you’re listening…” I suspected something like this.
NO American politician had ever come close to uttering something like that. It would have been completely disqualifying. It is obvious he works, in some capacity either wittingly or otherwise for Russia.
This is also true for some members of Congress.
I think it is now evident that there are malign actors at DOJ/FBI as well.
I agree with the previous comment that said we are paralyzed by a failure of imagination.
But I swear there were a few times during the first Trump term where I thought Putin was going to address the nation in the voice from 2112.
We have assumed control.
Empty, you keep winding that thread you’re the best!!
Turn the tables with our unity
They’re neither moral nor majority
Wake up and smell the coffee
Or just say no to individuality
[Chorus]
When we pretend that we’re dead…
Link to the (catchy) song: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=g-UOTOqtU0M
By now, every US citizen should realize the Smirnov case is much bigger than the Hunter Biden case and saga.
Smirnov is the tip of the iceberg that will show just how extensive the Putin, Mogilevich and Abramovich organized crime syndicate has brainwashed and infiltrated the Republican Party, Senate Republicans, House Republicans, SCOTUS, Federal and State Judges and the various right-wing think tank organizations.
Abramovich has successful corrupted specific leaders in Israel’s government, too, notably Netanyahu.
And having watched and witnessed the Watergate hearings, I thought nothing could be has corrupt as that was in 1972-74. Putin and his oligarchs have surpassed Watergate.
Great synopsis.
We also need a better sense of potential corruption of US-based corporate boards.
(I am in no conceivable way advocating any kind of witch hunt; more on the order of an oncologist trying to map out the pathologies.)
And remember Smirnov carries an Israeli passport.
Lev Parnas is going to be on MSNBC with Joy Reid RIGHT NOW about the disinformation.
The interesting thing that Parnas said was that when he was arrested, he and his lawyer reached out to the FBI to tell them that the whole Biden family bribe was a lie. But he said he never heard back from anyone. “I don’t know what is going on in the FBI, they don’t want to hear the truth.”
lol. With folks like Lev, it’s never clear what the truth could even be?
With the arrest and conviction of McGonigal, is there really any question that the FBI is thoroughly corrupted? FFS, how was it that they missed what was going to happen on January 6? Or so wrong as to put forward that ANTIFA was a national security threat? It’s not that “they don’t want to hear the truth”. They don’t want anyone to notice the truth. The organization is operating as an arm of MAGA. It is populated by folks who have long given up on liberal democracy.
A tad reductionist.
It might turn out that Garland gave them enough rope, to hang themselves. I don’t believe for a moment that conscious decisions were made so they could Keystone cops themselves off a cliff. Hell, Barr thought he had a winner with Durham and his so called cases. I don’t see Garland doing 11 dimensional chess. I’ll take randomness for a win if it turns out to be a win.
Most things are random but we make up stories about them.
Even saying outcomes are random is a made-up story. “The only thing I know is that everything you know is wrong” (Firesign Theater)
But I agree that no one would have the foresight to set up the outcomes we are seeing. I’ll still stand by the claim that slamming Garland for choosing Hur is a story (at the least) ultimately just as harmful to Biden as anything Hur said in his summary.
In shaping an opinion of Weiss and Wise, is this Smirnov story bigger than Hunter Biden?
Weiss surely does not want Smirnov walking about into oblivion and appears to favor having a full story get out; the evidence being a dual detention effort, first in Vegas where Smirnov was picked up, and losing the Magistrate’s reconsideration, filing for detention in LA, where Smirnov was in 2020 when he – details pending – made statements where travel tracking showed lying.
Not that we, here, tracked any travel records.
What we’ve seen from Weiss is Smirnov – Russia ties stated in court papers in many ways. Ultimately, if neither dies soon, Smirnov and his Handler will have to publicly flesh things out. Including Smirnov “reliable information” presented the Handler about others than the Russians. Upward from there?
The thing is politicized to the extent it would be hard now for anyone to bury it. It likely would be helpful to understanding things if Smirnov’s entire travel records were public.
Smirnov back in custody per WaPo – https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/02/22/hunter-biden-fbi-informant-lying-bribery-burisma/ebecc3d4-d1d1-11ee-ac8b-765284b5203e_story.html
Marcy 12 minutes ago on Bluesky:
https://bsky.app/profile/emptywheel.bsky.social/post/3km24esip3s2l
Feb 22, 2024 at 6:12 PM
It would be easy to overestimate Smirnov’s life expectancy on the outside.
But in general Ms. Wheeler is describing the Sp Counsel team as made up of minor leaguers. Real DofJ attorneys are staying on team Garland it appears.
I still think attorney Lowell needs acquittals in order to go on offense.
Epstein did not have much of a life expectancy on the inside. But Vegas or LA, either is a different detention facility than the one in NYC. Let us hope that if detained Smirnov avoids any similar despondency.
As Marcy has noted on Twitter, Smirnov’s lawyers have filed this motion arguing that the government botched the re-arrest today:
https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nvd.167064/gov.uscourts.nvd.167064.24.0.pdf
I’m not competent to weigh in on the legal arguments of Smirnov’s filing, but it seems to be a rush job. It’s titled: “DEFENDANT’S EMEREGENCY MOTION FOR IMMEDIATE DETENTION HEARING AND RELEASE ON PREVIOUSLY IMPOSED CONDITIONS”. That’s right, “emeregency.” And although filed today (Feb. 22) and referencing events yesterday and today, it’s “DATED this 20th day of February, 2024” at the end.
Judge Wright issued a separate arrest warrant. dated Feb. 22. The Vegas release earlier was on a prior arrest. Link –
https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nvd.167064/gov.uscourts.nvd.167064.24.2.pdf
That was the basis for Federal Marshal’s Service seizing him from the lawyers’ office. With Wright having scheduled a detention hearing for Monday..
The guess is the Marshals Service follows Wright, where the charge is pending, not the Vegas court, where Smirnov currently resides.
It is a tug of war. How does habeas corpus fit? You tell me.
Yes, error prone. This likely is the original arrest warrant presented as an exhibit to a Smirnov defense paper, given the final page. Still, the tension between two courts – is it common? It seems unseemly.
Not really. Magistrates are appointed by the judges in their district. The trial is held in another district and the trial judge wants the defendant in his court so that he can decide if the defendant should be free pending trial. Especially since neither he nor any other federal judge in his district had a say in the magistrate’s appointment.
I do hope that somewhere along the way this reeking ball of thread reveals why and what the July 4th (2018) Moscow Eight were really doing there.