by Hans Mahncke at the Federalist
The black ledger story makes clear that the real foreign collusion did not come from Donald Trump — it came from his opponents.
The newly released Nellie Ohr documents from Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, have already made waves for two major reasons. First, they show the FBI concluded Nellie Ohr lied to Congress and then failed to act on it. Second, they revealed an internal FBI “black hole” filing system designed to bury evidence that contradicted or disproved the Donald Trump-Russia narrative, shielding it not just from the public but from the FBI’s own agents.
Yet there’s more. Buried in the release is also confirmation of another key aspect of how the Russiagate smear unfolded, one that has so far escaped much attention: Clinton campaign operative Ohr appears to have had advance knowledge of the so-called “black ledger” operation by Ukrainian officials.
This operation ultimately led to the political downfall of Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort in 2016. This information also provides more evidence that it wasn’t Trump who colluded with foreign powers against domestic opponents — it was Democrats.
While the broad outlines of this connection between the Clinton campaign and Ukraine have been known for some time, the newly released documents reveal the FBI was aware of Ohr’s foreknowledge as early as 2019. That’s when a report on her activities was written — but the FBI took no action.
Notably, this was before the first impeachment of President Trump,…
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