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Findings of Misconduct by an FBI Special Agent for Contacting Witnesses for an ImproperPurpose, Divulging Law Enforcement Sensitive Information to Unauthorized Individuals,Providing Misleading Testimony, Providing False Information to the OIG, MishandlingClassified Information, and Misusing Government Devices and his Position, all sounds like a common condition within the FBI, right?
- A former Minneapolis FBI agent who sought to expose what he called “systemic biases” within the bureau has been charged after allegedly leaking secret documents to a national news reporter, according to federal criminal charges filed in Minnesota this week.
The charges, filed by prosecutors for the Justice Department’s National Security Division, are the first to come in Minnesota since Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced a broad crackdown on government leaks last year.
A two-page felony information, a charging document that typically signals an imminent guilty plea, outlines two counts filed against Terry James Albury of unlawfully disclosing and retaining national defense information.
Albury is accused of sharing a document on assessing confidential human sources — otherwise referred to as informants — and a document “relating to threats posed by certain individuals from a particular Middle Eastern country” with a reporter for a national media organization.
The second count charged against Albury alleged that he failed to turn over a document “relating to the use of an online platform for recruitment by a specific terrorist group” last year.
The charges do not name the reporter or news organization but allege that Albury possessed and shared the information between February 2016 and Jan. 31, 2017 — the same date that the Intercept published an entry to its “FBI’s Secret Rules” series on how the bureau assesses potential informants.
The report drew upon a secret document obtained by the Intercept that has the same publication date described in the charges against Albury. More here.
- But we still have the whole Andrew McCabe affair that dovetails with the Peter Strzok and Lisa Page. McCabe lost a large portion of his retirement due to many of the same charges as Albury. Yet, Peter and Lisa are still on the payroll. So?
- We have yet this other SA, Special Agent, whose name has not been released caught up in a case very much like that of Albury. Yet, there will be NO criminal charges. Why? Calling Director Wray for an explanation.
An FBI agent found to have leaked sensitive information to witnesses, mishandled classified information and lied to investigators will not face criminal charges and appears to have retired while an inquiry into his conduct was underway, according to the Justice Department Office of Inspector General.An investigative summary posted online by the department’s internal watchdog unit on Monday is short on details, but says investigators opened an investigation after receiving allegations that the unidentified special agent “contacted witnesses in a criminal investigation for an improper purpose.”
“The OIG found that the SA contacted individuals who he either knew were, or had reasonable belief would be witnesses in the criminal investigation and that the SA’s contacts with several individuals appeared to be designed to improperly influence their prospective testimony,” the statement said. “Accordingly, the OIG concluded that the SA’s contacts with the witnesses were improper and constituted misconduct.”
Investigators also uncovered other instances of serious misconduct by the agent, saying he “divulged law enforcement sensitive information to unauthorized individuals; misused his government issued electronic devices; provided misleading testimony during a related civil deposition; mishandled classified information; misused his position during contacts with local law enforcement officers; and provided false information to the OIG.”
All rather a funky way to apply the law, policy and maintain integrity eh?
Category Archives: Legislation
Take Honduras as an Example
The caravan, the caravan…
There is a crisis going on at the California border check point where an estimated 200 migrants are attempting to gain entry into the United States by using all tactics stressing our resources and laws.
(Note the sign provided by ANSWER Coalition)
So, the big question is if these people are desperate to leave their home countries out of fear, crime and corruption, then why have they not visited our embassies in their home countries? They just fled. People fleeing to the United States must and do travel through Mexico. So, where is the humanitarian policy of Mexico to accept these desperate people?
A large number of people attempting to enter the United States come from a handful of countries in Central America such as Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras and Nicaragua. So, let us examine Honduras as an example. for a summary of the crime and threat assessment in Honduras, go here.
In 2009, Obama cut $200 million in non-humanitarian aid to Honduras. The United States must address stabilizing these countries, rather than allowing their failures and exporting the problem(s) to the United States.
But:
Honduras, one of Latin America’s poorest nations, strives to improve its economic and democratic development with U.S. assistance. The United States has historically been the largest bilateral donor to Honduras. U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) programs target a variety of sectors including education, health, economic policy, microenterprise, environmental conservation, food security, municipal development, and justice sector reform. USAID has provided more than $3 billion in economic and social development assistance to the Honduran people since it began working in the country in 1961. Currently, programs focus on addressing the main push factors of migration by improving citizen security, reducing extreme poverty, and improving public administration through transparency and accountability reforms. To achieve these objectives, USAID’s efforts address citizen security through community-based crime prevention activities, with a focus on the highest crime neighborhoods and those youth who are most at-risk. Additionally, USAID strengthens local and national governance, as well as civil society monitoring and watchdog organizations; helps the poorest sectors of society increase food security and incomes; supports the sustainable management of natural resources; expands quality basic education and workplace and life-skills training; and improves the quality and participation of local citizens and civil society in decentralized basic services.
In 2017, the U.S. Department of Commerce will be dedicating $1.5 million for a customs and border management program focused on improving trade into Honduras and others parts of Central America. The U.S. Department of Agriculture provided $47 million in 2015-2016 for its two programs that deliver school meals to 53,000 students and increase agricultural productivity and trade.
The United States Armed Forces maintain a small presence at a Honduran military base. U.S. forces conduct and provide logistical support for a variety of bilateral and multilateral exercises–medical, engineering, counternarcotics, and disaster relief–for the benefit of the Honduran people and their Central American neighbors. Through the Central America Regional Security Initiative, the United States supports the Government of Honduras by assisting law enforcement entities in disrupting criminal networks; building investigative, prosecutorial, and judicial capacity; and implementing violence prevention programs for vulnerable communities.
In June 2005, Honduras became the first country in the hemisphere to sign a Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) Compact with the U.S. Government. Under the Compact, the U.S. Millennium Challenge Corporation invested $205 million over 5 years to help Honduras improve its road infrastructure, diversify its agriculture, and transport its products to market. In 2013, Honduras received a $15.6 million MCC Threshold Agreement to support Honduran efforts to improve public financial management and create more effective and transparent public-private partnerships.
The State Department website for the embassy in Honduras explains that in order to obtain a visa, the applicant must establish they meet all requirements to receive a visa. The website even includes a ‘visa wizard’ that aids in the application process to determine the specific visa that best fits the case.
There is a fraud unit at all embassies and if fraud is committed during in the visa process, benefits are lost, fines are applied and a jail sentence can be applied.
There is yet another requirement for travel and approval to enter the United States, vaccines.
They include: mumps, measles, rubella, polio, tetanus and diphtheria, pertussis, Haemophilus influenzae/type B, hepatitis A and B, rotavirus, meningococcal disease, varicella, pneumococcal disease, and seasonal influenza.
So, given just the vaccine requirements, detention in either Mexico or the United States for those attempting to enter the United States is warranted. The cost however of medical examinations and detention is significant and government agencies cannot estimate those costs to the taxpayer.
Now, here is something quite curious:
Who is a refugee?
According to the 1951 United Nations Refugee Convention, a refugee is defined as someone who “owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group, or political opinion, is outside the country of his nationality, and is unable to or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself of the protection of that country…”
- Asylum seekers have submitted a claim for refugee status and are waiting for this claim to be accepted or rejected.
- Refugees and asylees comprise the majority of displaced persons resettled to the United States.
What are the top countries of origin and asylum*?
The top ten countries of refugee origin are Afghanistan, Iraq, Somali, DR Congo, Myanmar, Colombia, Sudan, Vietnam, Eritrea, and China.
The top ten countries of refugee asylum are Pakistan, Iran, Syria, Germany, Jordan, Kenya, Chad, China, United States, and United Kingdom.
* Countries are listed in order from greatest to least number of refugees as of Dec 2010.
Source: UNHCR Global Trends (2010)
Statistics on International Refugees and US Domestic Refugee Admissions:
Source: UNHCR, 2009 Global Trends: Refugee, Asylum-Seekers, Returnees, Internally Displaced and Stateless People
- As of 2009, an estimated 15.2 million refugees were located around the world. Of these refugees, 251,500 were voluntarily repatriated to their home nations.
- In 2011, the United States accepted 56,424 refugees for resettlement.
Source: U.S. Department of State, Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration (PRM), Worldwide Refugee Admissions Processing System (WRAPS)
The U.S. has projected a refugee resettlement ceiling of 76,000 individuals for FY 2012.
Source: Presidential Determination No. 2011-17: FY 2012 Refugee Admissions NumbersImmigrant, Refugee and Migrant Health Branch (IRMH)
The goal of the IRMH Branch within the Division of Global Migration and Quarantine is to promote and improve the health of immigrants, refugees, and migrants and prevent the importation of infectious diseases and other conditions of public health significance into the U.S. by these groups. To accomplish this goal the IRMH branch plays a significant role in refugee health, both overseas and domestically.
Overseas
- IRMH develops and implements the Technical Instructions used by overseas panel physicians who are responsible for conducting the medical examinations for U.S.-bound refugees. The Technical Instructions consist of medical screening guidelines, which outline in detail the scope of the medical examination. The purpose of the medical examination is to identify, for the Department of State and the US Citizenship and Immigration service, applicants with medical conditions of public health concern.
- IRMH also maintains an anonymous collection of surplus blood samples from overseas screenings called the Migrant Serum Bank (MSB). Scientists from around the world can request to use the samples for research projects.
Domestic
- The Domestic Refugee Health Program facilitates collaboration with state and local health department partners to improve the health care and monitor medical conditions of refugees after their arrival into the United States.
- IRMH also maintains the Electronic Disease Notification System (EDN), which notifies states and local health departments of the arrival of refugees to their jurisdictions. EDN provides states with overseas medical screening results and treatment follow-up information for each refugee.
IRMH Partners
To accomplish its goals in refugee health, IRMH works with many external partners:
- U.S. Department of State
- International Organization for Migration
- United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
- U.S. Office of Refugee Resettlement
- U.S. Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration
- World Health Organization
- State and Local Health Departments
- Voluntary Agencies
Apparently Comey did not Lie or Leak, Apologies in Order?
Hold on just so you know Huma Abedin holds that SGE status also…we are slowly finding out so many wild things about our government.
What is an SGE? Special Government Employee, a status for a person established by Congress in 1962 and many agencies use them. Nefarious reasons? Yes, there seems to be some of that perhaps. But read here about how ‘special’ they are.
Financial Conflicts of Interest & Impartiality
- An SGE’s agency can use special waiver provisions to resolve financial conflicts of interest arising under 18 U.S.C. § 208 (a criminal conflict of interest statute prohibiting an employee from participating in any particular Government matter affecting personal or “imputed” financial interests).
- An SGE who is serving on an advisory committee may rely on special exemptions from 18 U.S.C. § 208.
- An SGE is not eligible to receive a certificate of divestiture if required to sell property to resolve a conflict of interest.
Meanwhile, Daniel Richman, a Columbia Law School Professor and that friend of James Comey who received the memos has top secret security clearance which apparently came from the time he also worked at the Justice Department as a former prosecutor and at U.S. Treasury. He later gained that SGE status working for the FBI and was in fact an advisor to James Comey or others at the Bureau. Richman by the way did NOT leak information from those memos to the New York Times, he merely called them and used context for a story clarification as it is told.
Humm okay. But then there is Huma Abedin. And we must ask about Sid Blumenthal, Cody Shearer or John Podesta among others…..
Earlier this year, (2013) Hillary Clinton aide Huma Abedin drew scrutiny for a special arrangement that allowed her to work part time at the State Department while simultaneously maintaining a side gig working for a corporate consulting firm.
Under the arrangement, first reported by Politico, Abedin was a “special government employee,” a category created decades ago designed to allow experts to serve in government while keeping outside jobs.
So who else is a special government employee at the State Department? The department won’t say — even as eight other federal agencies readily sent us lists of their own special government employees.
A State Department spokeswoman did confirm that there are “about 100” such employees. But asked for a list, she added that, “As general policy, [the department] does not disclose employee information of this nature.”
Meanwhile, after we filed a Freedom of Information Act request in July for the same information, State responded in September that no such list actually exists: The human resources department “does not compile lists of personnel or positions in the category of ‘special government employee.’”
Creating such a list would require “extensive research” and thus the agency is not required to respond under FOIA, said a letter responding to our request.
In late September, after we told State we were going to publish a story on its refusal to provide the list, the agency said our FOIA request was being reopened. The agency said it would provide the records in a few weeks.
The State Department has since pushed back the delivery date three times and still hasn’t provided any list. It has been four months since we filed the original request.
Several other agencies, including the Energy and Commerce departments, the Federal Communications Commission, and the Federal Trade Commission, promptly responded to similar FOIA requests with lists of their own special government employees. Requests with several other agencies are still pending.
Agencies reported having anywhere from just one special government employee (SEC) to nearly 400 over the past several years (Energy Department). Many are academics, interns, or private industry professionals and they often serve on government advisory boards.
As for the State Department, two other special government employees have been identified recently, and both are former Clinton staffers. As of August ex-chief of staff Cheryl Mills was still working at the agency part time with a focus on Haiti, according to the Washington Post’s Al Kamen. Maggie Williams, who ran Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign, worked at the agency’s Office of Global Women’s Issues in 2011 and 2012, according to Politico.
Abedin, for her part, was a special government employee between June 2012 when she resigned her position as deputy chief of staff, to February 2013. She also worked for Teneo, a consulting firm founded by former Bill Clinton aide Doug Band.
In a July letter to Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-IA, Abedin rejected the Senator’s suggestion that she had used her government contacts to provide political intelligence for Teneo’s clients.
“I was not asked, nor did I undertake, any work on Teneo’s behalf before the Department,” Abedin wrote. She said her work consisted of providing “strategic advice and consulting services to the firm’s management team.”
(The New Republic recently explored at length the web of connections between Teneo, the Clinton Foundation, and various wealthy individuals and corporations.)
Abedin said in the letter she sought the special arrangement with State because she wanted to spend the bulk of her time at home in New York following the birth of her son in December 2011.
Abedin made $135,000 working for State in 2012, and she and husband ex-Rep. Anthony Weiner made approximately $355,000 in combined additional earnings. We don’t know how much Abedin was paid by Teneo or by the Clinton Foundation, which also employed her during this period.
Following time off during Weiner’s unsuccessful New York City mayoral bid, Abedin is now working directly for Clinton, in a private capacity, as her “Transition Director.”
Germany’s al Qaeda/Jihad Problems Include Welfare Payments
Primer: May 16. Ziyad K., a 32-year-old Iraqi Yazidi, was sentenced to 11 years in prison for raping two Chinese students, aged 22 and 28, at the University of Bochum in August and November 2016. Police linked the man, who was living with his wife and two children in a refugee shelter in Bochum, to both crimes through DNA evidence. “He has never shown remorse,” Prosecutor Andreas Bachmann said. “How could a person fleeing from violence and danger come to do this terrible violence to other people?”
The Muslim population of Germany surpassed six million in 2017 to become approximately 7.2% of the overall population of 83 million, according to calculations by the Gatestone Institute.
A recent Pew Research Center study on the growth of the Muslim population in Europe estimated that Germany’s Muslim population had reached five million by the middle of 2016, but that number is short by at least a million.
Pew, for instance, “decided not to count” the more than one million Muslim asylum seekers who arrived in the country in 2015-2017 because “they are not expected to receive refugee status.” European Union human rights laws, however, prohibit Germany from deporting many, if not most, of the refugees and asylum seekers back to conflict areas. As a result, most migrants who arrived in the country will almost certainly remain there over the long term.
In addition, German authorities have admitted to losing track of potentially hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants, many of whom are living on German streets and are believed to be sustaining themselves on a steady diet of drug dealing, pickpocketing, purse snatching and other forms of petty crime. Much more detail here.
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According to the German newspaper WAZ, Sami A. allegedly recruited young Muslims in Bochum mosques to join the “Holy War.” The paper also linked him to the radicalization of two members of the so-called Düsseldorf al Qaeda cell.
WAZ also reported that Sami A. had taught two terrorists in Bochum mosques: 21-one-year-old Amid C. from Bochum and 28-year-old Halil S. from nearby Gelsenkirchen. Both reportedly received ideological training from him for their alleged terrorist plan. The two young men are on trial in Düsseldorf, accused of planning an attack together with two accomplices. According to the indictment, they intended to plant a cluster bomb in a crowd of people and “spread fear and terror in Germany.” More here.
Newsweek: The alleged former bodyguard of 9/11 mastermind Osama Bin Laden has been found collecting welfare checks from the government in Germany, according to local media, because he cannot be deported—even though he was refused asylum status.
A report in the German tabloid Bild said the man, named only as 42-year-old Sami A to protect his privacy, cannot be deported to his native Tunisia because he is at risk of torture there. He has lived in Germany since 1997 and has a wife and three children.
Sami A collects around $1,430 a month in welfare from the German government, a figure revealed after the far-right political party Alternative for Germany (AfD) asked questions of the local authority where he lives in Bochum, near the Dutch border.
He was accused by witnesses in a terrorism trial back in 2005 of having been Bin Laden’s bodyguard near the Afghanistan-Pakistan border for a few months at the turn of the millennium, something the judge said he believed to be true, though Sami A denies it.
German authorities regard Sami A as a “dangerous preacher,” reported Spiegel Online in 2012, and prosecutors say he was responsible for the radicalization of two men who later former part of a terror cell caught planning a bomb attack.
Though considered a security risk, no charges of Al Qaeda membership have so far been brought against Sami A. He must report every day to the police in Bochum, which he has done so since 2006. He was refused asylum status because of the security concerns, the BBC reported.
Lesley Stahl vs. Betsy DeVos on Education
US Parents Involved in Education, USPIE, explains more details about the Federal government in public education. Common Core is still alive in many states, while in others, it just has a different name. Furthermore, not only is the Federal government at the state level working on regulating homeschooling, there is the whole matter of zero privacy for students. This is a terrifying condition.
Wonder if Lesley Stahl reads The Hill and this significant report or if Betsy DeVos has read it.
Education Secretary Betsy DeVos’ recent interview with Lesley Stahl on “60 Minutes” caused quite a bit of backlash from critics.
DS: As my colleague Jonathan Butcher has written, “60 Minutes” ignored many of the facts about the state of education in America. Response to the interview drew quite a bit of criticism of DeVos and her policy solutions.
Perhaps one of the most pivotal moments came when she suggested that the United States’ heavy federal investment in education has not yielded any results. Stahl hit back, asserting that school performance has been on the rise.
But the latest government data show otherwise. According to the recently released 2017 National Assessment of Educational Progress, also known as the nation’s “report card,” we now have more evidence that DeVos was correct.
In fact, recent scores show virtually no improvement over 2015 scores. Eighth-grade reading saw a single point improvement over 2015 scores (10 points is considered equivalent to a grade level), while all other categories saw no improvement.
These lackluster results come on the heels of declines on the 2015 assessment, suggesting the beginning of a trend in the wrong direction for academic outcomes.
>>> Nation’s ‘Report Card’ Shows Federal Intervention Has Not Helped Students
Indeed, Stahl’s claim that the state of public schools has gotten better simply doesn’t hold up to the data. It fact, DeVos is entirely correct to point out that public school outcomes have not meaningfully improved, and that our nation’s heavy federal intervention in K-12 education has failed to help the problem.
As Heritage Foundation education fellow Lindsey Burke writes:
Forty-nine out of 50 states were stagnant on the 2017 report card, and achievement gaps persist. Historically, federal education spending has been appropriated to close gaps, yet this spending—more than $2 trillion in inflation-adjusted spending at the federal level alone since 1965—has utterly failed to achieve that goal.
Increasing federal intervention over the past half-century, and the resulting burden of complying with federal programs, rules, and regulations, have created a parasitic relationship with federal education programs and states, and is straining the time and resources of local schools.
Indeed, for decades, Washington has poured billions of dollars into the public education system under the assumption that more federal spending will close achievement caps and improve the academic outcomes of students. With mounting evidence that more federal spending is not the answer, it may be time to consider other policy approaches.
DeVos is correct to suggest school choice as a solution to lackluster school performance. Parents who cannot afford to send their child to a school that is the right fit deserve to have options. As DeVos told Stahl:
Any family that has the economic means and the power to make choices is doing so for their children. Families that don’t have the power, that can’t decide, ‘I’m gonna move from this apartment in downtown whatever to the suburb where I think the school is gonna be better for my child.’ If they don’t have that choice, and they are assigned to that school, they are stuck there. I am fighting for the parents who don’t have those choices. We need all parents to have those choices.
In light of recent evidence from the nation’s report card, “60 Minutes” and other school choice critics should consider that DeVos was correct in her framing of problems facing the nation’s schools and is on the right track with possible solutions—namely, that empowering parents is the right approach to improving American education.