Exclusive: Dutch Intelligence and The Russian Collusion Story

What The CIA Knew

The Obama administration compromised highly sensitive intelligence networks, according to sources familiar with the matter who spoke exclusively to Sleuth News on the condition of anonymity.

Highly classified documents, obtained by the CIA from Dutch intelligence, indicate that by the summer of 2016, the American government knew enough to stop a fledgling investigation into Russian collusion. Dutch intelligence had infiltrated Russian intelligence groups, including a group known as Cozy Bear who had allegedly hacked the Democratic National Committee beginning in 2015 in a lesser known hack that did not result in the release of documents.

The CIA received numerous reports from the Dutch intelligence service including a highly classified memorandum produced by the Russians detailing a purported conversation from Attorney General Loretta Lynch with a Clinton staffer named Amanda Renteria. The Russian intelligence document alludes to an email presumptively obtained from the Democratic National Committee in which Debbie Wasserman Schultz emailed Leonard Bernardo regarding the alleged assurances Lynch had given to Renteria. The memorandum, received by the FBI in early March 2016 suggested the existence of an agreement by Lynch not to let the investigation into Clinton’s email server progress too far.

In September 2020, then Director of ODNI John Ratcliffe declassified another piece of this puzzle, summarized in three bullet points in a letter sent to Senator Lindsay Graham. The three bullet points are as follows:

• In late July 2016, U.S. intelligence agencies obtained insight into Russian intelligence analysis alleging that U. S. Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton had approved a campaign plan to stir up a scandal against U.S . Presidential candidate Donald Trump by tying him to Putin and the Russians' hacking of the Democratic National Committee. The IC does not know the accuracy of this allegation or the extent to which the Russian intelligence analysis may reflect exaggeration or fabrication.

• According to his handwritten notes, former Central Intelligence Agency Director Brennan subsequently briefed President Obama and other senior national security officials on the intelligence, including the "alleged approval by Hillary Clinton on July 26, 2016 of a proposal from one of her foreign policy advisors to vilify Donald Trump by stirring up a scandal claiming interference by Russian security services."

• On 07 September 2016, U.S. intelligence officials forwarded an investigative referral to FBI Director James Comey and Deputy Assistant Director of Counterintelligence Peter Strzok regarding "U.S. Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton's approval of a plan concerning U.S. Presidential candidate Donald Trump and Russian hackers hampering U.S. elections as a means of distracting the public from her use of a private mail server."

Sleuth’s sources suggest that the Russians had picked up communications between Clinton campaign operatives and public relations personnel containing details of the smear campaign, which Sleuth News has learned included a plan to have the FBI amplify the collusion allegations. The emails described to Sleuth News are strikingly similar to an email released by Wikileaks, authored in February 2016 and sent from Jennifer Palmieri, a Clinton campaign official, to Joel Johnson of The Glover Park Group in which a “swift boat” project is mentioned, weeks before the alleged DNC hack.

On August 3, 2016, then CIA Director John Brennan briefed President Obama, then Vice President Joe Biden, Attorney General Loretta Lynch, FBI Director James Comey and other senior officials on highly classified memorandums authored by Dutch intelligence with details of Clinton’s alleged plans.

The next day, Brennan called Alexander Bortnikov, the head of Russia’s FSB intelligence network, to which Cozy Bear is suspected of belonging. Brennan would tell members of the House Intelligence Committee in 2017 that he called Bortnikov to warn Russia to stop interfering in America’s elections.

That call apparently led to an immediate shift in Cozy Bear, cutting off the Dutch’s access and compromised friendly assets working for Western Intelligence. The call also had the effect of stopping additional memorandums that would have shed light on Clinton’s plans.

It’s unclear whether the Dutch had any visibility into the alleged DNC hack conducted by “Fancy Bear”, thought to be Russia’s GRU intelligence service. The GRU and FSB operate independently and have often been subject to a rivalry.

Obama administration officials later played down the reports about the Renteria memo and Clinton plan intelligence, but Special Counsel Mueller brought a federal indictment based in part on intelligence gained from the same source against Concord Management relating to the Internet Research Agency, suggesting the American government selectively chose which intelligence reports were credible for the purposes of crafting a narrative.

The new report adds context to a lengthy interview John Brennan had with Special Counsel Durham and suggests a far more complicated picture. Contemporaneous to briefing President Obama on the Clinton plan intelligence, Brennan formed a “fusion cell” composed of CIA, FBI, and NSA experts that Special Counsel Durham suggested was formed due to the Clinton plan intelligence. (FN 405)

The fusion cell included FBI agent Peter Strzok who attended a meeting with CIA officials on August 4th, and later received the CIA’s referral on the Clinton plan. On August 5th Strzok texted Lisa Page that the meeting went well other than “[Liz’s] quote “the White House is running this”.”

Sleuth News has confirmed that CIA official to be Elizabeth Vogt, who worked as part of Brennan’s fusion cell. The Obama administration had just been briefed on Clinton’s plans to manufacture a smear campaign against Donald Trump and the Strzok text messages suggest the administration seized control of investigative efforts.

Post-election, Sleuth News sources allege that President Obama ordered Brennan to oversee the Intelligence Community Assessment and support a Russian interference narrative, and to also exclude any contradictory pieces of information, which would have included materials the CIA had obtained relating to the Clinton plan intelligence.

The highly classified Clinton plan memorandums threaten to materially alter the narrative about the DNC hack and raise new questions about the information available to the FBI and intelligence agencies at the start of Crossfire Hurricane. The American government had sufficient information to suggest the Steele dossier and other allegations were the product of a smear campaign orchestrated by Hillary Clinton. Despite failing to corroborate the claims, and with full knowledge that Clinton may have been manufacturing them, they still proceeded to launch an investigation into Donald Trump and his associates, consistent with the assertions made in secret Clinton plan intelligence documents.

In the coming days, Sleuth News will return to the DNC hack attribution as information continues to develop on several fronts, suggesting the existence of a criminal conspiracy.