The FBI is responding to a demand from the top judge for the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) court to identify any other cases a disgraced former FBI lawyer may have tainted in addition to cases related to the bureau’s “Crossfire Hurricane” probe of the 2016 Trump campaign.
The bureau faced a deadline set by Judge Rosemary M. Collyer to explain what happened in light of last week’s Justice Department inspector general report identifying 17 major missteps made in the FBI’s applications for a warrant to spy on Trump campaign volunteer Carter Page in 2016 and 2017.
Among the most egregious violations involved an attorney in the FBI’s Office of General Counsel who falsified information in an email provided to the FISA court.
The lawyer hid the fact that Page once worked as an informant for the CIA, instead making it appear as though he was not an already-cleared government asset.
That lawyer, not publicly identified yet, has since resigned and may now be facing criminal charges.
Still, Collyer demanded to know whether the attorney has tainted other cases presented to the secretive court.
“Identify all other matters currently or previously before this court that involved the participation of the FBI [Office of General Counsel] attorney,” she wrote.
“Describe any steps taken or to be taken by the Department of Justice or FBI to verify that the United States’ submissions in those matters completely and fully described the material facts and circumstances,” she added.
The order was declassified on Friday, the same day as the deadline Collyer set for the FBI to comply.
A spokesperson for the FBI confirmed to the Washington Times that the deadline had been met.
Not only did the lawyer falsify information, but other FBI agents relied on the anti-Trump Steele Dossier to justify its counterintelligence probe, despite a number of red flags that indicated the dossier was a political opposition document and unreliable.