What In Fact Was Strzok's "Insurance Policy"?

Perhaps the most intriguing text among the thousands of exchanges between Peter Strzok and Lisa Page was this one:

[I]n a text from August 15, 2016, Strzok tells Page: “I want to believe the path you threw out for consideration in Andy’s office” – an apparent reference to Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe – “that there’s no way he gets elected – but I’m afraid we can’t take that risk. It’s like an insurance policy in the unlikely event you die before you’re 40 … . ” Page does not appear to have responded, according to records reviewed by CNN.

The standard interpretation of Strzok's language is this:

Lots of folks on the right are suggesting that “insurance policy” is some opaque and sinister Deep State code for black ops in the event of a Trump victory.

. . . Give me a break. Read the text again.

Strzok was reacting to the argument that there was no point getting worked up because Trump was bound to lose.

Except that August 15, 2016 was just two weeks after Strzok opened Operation Crossfire Hurricane into "whether individuals associated with Trump's presidential campaign were coordinating, wittingly or unwittingly, with the Russian government's efforts to interfere in the 2016 U.S. presidential election". This shifted the FBI's focus from Hillary's e-mail server, a legitimate concern that they ultimately minimized, to "Russian collusion", which was pure fabrication aimed at Trump.

The "insurance policy" wasn't just the confidence that Trump would lose in November, it was to put in place an active plan to remove him from office, via either impeachment for treason or removal via the 25th Amendment, based on the idea that he was a Russian agent. This isn't just me suddenly going all conspiracy-theory; CIA Director Ratclffe said the same thing last night:

During this week’s broadcast of Fox News Channel’s “Sunday Night in America,” CIA Director John Ratcliffe offered remarks on the release of the Durham Annex, tied to the so-called Russia-gate “hoax.”

“Well, Trey, think about that, that there was Intelligence from foreign Intelligence services, that one U.S. presidential candidate was trying to frame another candidate for treason, claiming that he was an agent of a foreign power, an agent of Russia, and that Intelligence was never shared with you or I, as members of Congressional Oversight Committees on Intelligence. And you know, but for the good fortune of me being able to find John Brennan’s notes and declassify that, that secret may have been hidden forever, but I was able to provide that to John Durham, and you see some of that in his annex that was declassified this week.”

". . . So before all of this started, Trey, what we did know is this, that on July 31, 2016 the FBI did something as shocking as it was unprecedented,” he continued. “They opened a criminal investigation into a nominee for president, a candidate for president, . . . But what you learned in John Brennan’s annex this week was six days before that, Russian Intelligence predicted that’s exactly what would happen, that there was a Hillary Clinton plan, and that the FBI would pour oil on the fire of a firestorm that would consume the country for the next three years.”

Lert's take one example of how this plan was implemented. It's been tickling my spidey sense for a while, the plot to entrap National Security Adviser-designate Michael Flynn during the transition.

As part of the larger “Crossfire Hurricane” investigation into Russia’s efforts to interfere in the 2016 presidential campaign and possible involvement by persons in the Trump campaign, . . . the FBI opened a specific counterintelligence investigation concerning Flynn (“Crossfire Razor”) on August 16, 2016. The Flynn investigation was based upon “an articulable factual basis that [he] may wittingly or unwittingly be involved in activity on behalf of the Russian Federation which may constitute a federal crime or threat to the national security.” That, in turn, was predicated upon an assessment of “reliable” lead information, including that Flynn had been a foreign policy adviser to Trump since February 2016; that he “had ties to various state-affiliated entities of the Russian Federation”; that he traveled to Russia in December 2015; and that he had an active TS/SCI security clearance.

Considering the "Crossfire Razor" investigation was opened a day after "Crossfire Hurricane", it appears that Strzok et al thought Flynn was a major path to reach Trump himself. But they worked on it from August 2016 onward; Trump won the election, and it doesn't look like they could come up with anything. At the same link,

A draft memorandum dated January 4, 2017, apparently prepared for approval by FBI agent Joe Pientka, would have closed the Flynn investigation because it “did not yield any information on which to predicate further investigative efforts.” The memo added that the investigation would be subject to possible reopening if “new information” came to light.

However, on December 29, 2016, the outgoing Obama administration announced sanctions on Russia bssed on claims that Russia had hacked the election. These claims were spurious, as outlined in the Durham annex.

The Obama administration on Thursday announced its retaliation for Russian efforts to interfere with the US presidential election, ordering sweeping new sanctions that included the expulsion of 35 Russians.

. . . In Moscow, a Putin spokesman said Russia regretted the new sanctions and would consider retaliatory measures.

Diplomatic expulsions are normally met with exactly reciprocal action. In this case, however, Moscow may pause for thought. With Trump, who has spoken positively about Russia and Vladimir Putin, just three weeks away from the White House, Russia may feel it is inadvisable to kick out 35 US diplomats.

Flynn then discussed these actions in one of a series of phone calls with Russian diplomat Sergey Kislyak, who was serving as an intermediary with Russian President Putin. It's worth noting that these calls were enitrely appropriate, as Flynn was the incoming National Security Adviser, even though he was technically a private citizen, but the Obama administration had disrupted ordinary Russia-US relations with its expulsions and sanctions just weeks before Trump's inauguration. Flynn's effort was clearly to head off a Russian overreaction.

Flynn was supposedly scrutinized at the time for potentially violating the Logan Act, an obscure law dealing with conversations with foreign adversaries.

But Flynn’s allies have long maintained that his conversations were legitimate and he was lured into a “perjury trap” by the FBI.

In fact, the FBI was investigating Flynn for violsting the Logan Act with these calls, although there has never been a successful prosecution under the Logan Act.

On January 22, 2017, The Wall Street Journal reported that Flynn was under investigation by U.S. counterintelligence agents for his communications with Russian officials.

. . . In January 2017, then-FBI director James Comey decided to send FBI agents to interview Flynn. Knowing Flynn had asked ambassador Kislyak to ensure that Russia would not respond harshly to U.S. sanctions, and also that Flynn had told Mike Pence and Chief of Staff Reince Priebus he had not made this request, Comey decided that Flynn needed to be investigated to make sure he was not acting under Russian influence. Comey asked for Flynn to be called directly to arrange the meeting, instead of following the usual protocol of attempting to arrange a meeting with Flynn through the White House counsel's office. Comey would later state that the usual protocol would have been expected "in an administration where the rhythm of the context between the FBI and the White House was more established".

. . . Then-deputy FBI director Andrew McCabe called Flynn on January 24, asking him to meet two FBI counterintelligence agents; Flynn agreed. McCabe also asked if Flynn wanted a lawyer present, to which Flynn said no. The two agents, FBI Deputy Assistant Director of Counterespionage Division Peter Strzok and FBI agent Joe Pientka, met Flynn at his office later that day. Before the meeting, McCabe, Strzok and Pientka considered whether to remind Flynn beforehand that lying to the FBI during an interview was a crime, but decided against it because "they wanted Flynn to be relaxed, and they were concerned that giving warning might adversely affect the rapport," according to a statement later put out by Flynn's lawyers, based on internal FBI documents.

Flynn's replies to specific questions from the agents about his calls to Kislyak, according to the link, were vague, amounting to "Not really. I don't remember." However, the FBI group decided this amounted to lying to federal agents and sent this up the chain of command:

Based on the results of the FBI interview, Acting Attorney General Sally Yates made an "urgent" request to meet with newly-appointed White House Counsel Don McGahn. She met with him on January 26 and again on January 27. She informed McGahn that Flynn was "compromised" and possibly open to blackmail by the Russians. Yates told McGahn that Flynn had misled Pence and other administration officials about the nature of his conversation with the Russian ambassador.

In the wake of this, Flynn was pushed out as National Security Adviser in February, with the public explanation that he had lied to Vice President Mike Pence about the call. However, it isn't entirely clear that Flynn ever talked directly to Pence about this. Flynn's most recent version of events is this, as I laid out here on Juy 23:

Yeah. And if you read—yeah. And I lay this out in my book as well. Mike Pence—was he a dupe? Was he unwitting? Mike Pence was used. No doubt, no doubt. Because there’s another piece of evidence that I’m waiting to see come out. And I’ve asked, and I’ve basically demanded that it comes out. And we know this is a really critical piece of evidence.

Sally Yates and Mary McCord, who was head of the National Security Division for the Department of Justice—Sally Yates was the acting Attorney General—went over to the White House like two or three days prior to me having to be resigned and me being fired on the 13th of February. I think it was the date.

So Mike Pence, Reince Priebus are in the Situation Room in the White House, and Mary McCord, Andy McCabe is the other name, and Sally Yates was the third name that came and briefed Mike Pence on a document. And Mike Pence—he had Reince Priebus call me up while they were all together. And he said, “I just reviewed this document. The document shows that you talked about sanctions”—something I never talked about, ever.

It's worth pointing out that descriptions of this episode also involve roles by both Reince Priebus and Sean Spicer, who had repeated assertions that Flynn hadn't discussed sanctions with Kislyak, but the actual circumstances seem to be uncertain at best. Sally Yates had apparently already resigned as Acting Attorney General prior to this meeting, for reasons never made completely clear, but was apparently still on the job. Sean Spicer resigned as Press Secretary on July 21; Priebus resigned as Chief of Staff on July 28. Oddly, on July 27, Peter Strzok was removed from the Mueller investigation, but this was kept quiet until December of that year.

It’s long been gospel in the Russia probe: When special counsel Robert Mueller learned of the inflammatory anti-Trump text messages FBI agent Peter Strzok sent, he immediately removed him from his team.

But in a newly released [May 2020] transcript of a December 2017 interview, former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe told lawmakers that he’s the one who made the call to oust Strzok from the probe, worrying that Strzok’s involvement could taint the special counsel’s work.

In a closed-door interview with the House Judiciary and Oversight committees, McCabe said he learned of Strzok’s text messages on July 27, 2017, and made a quick decision.

“I made the decision to remove him from the investigation that evening,” McCabe said at the time.

“That very day you decided to remove him?” Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) asked.

“I came back from my meeting with the inspector general. I met with a very small group of my fellow leaders. We discussed Peter’s reassignment, and we discussed where we would place him,” McCabe replied.

He was apparenty placed in a job without duties in Human Resources. McCabe himself was fired by then-Attorney General Sessions on March 16, 2020, but his entire tenure as Deputy FBI Director and then Acting Director had been dogged by allegations of conflict of interest with the Clinton Foundation.

Here's what we know. There was a successful effort to push Michael Flynn out as National Security Adviser early in the Trump administration, but that really appears to have given Trump a heads-up, probably from people like Devin Nunes, on what was really going on, because Trump seems rather quickly to have begun to make changes, the first of which was made public when he fired James Comey on May 9, but this was followed by other terminations and reassignments in July. Yates, whether coincidentally or not, had already resigned before the February meeting with Pence.

What did Trump know about concrete plans to push him out, either for treason via impeachment, or via the 25th Amendment, in late winter and spring of 2016, using claims that he was a Russian agent? It's hard to avoid speculating that the meeting of McCabe, Yates, McCord, Pence, and Priebus on February 13 was at minimum an attempt to groom Priebus, as Trump's Chief of Staff, and Pence, as Vice President, for a try at a 25th Amendment removal based on the idea that Trump was a Russian agent. At least this failed, even if it succereded in pushing Flynn out, and it resulted in removal of what Trunp must already have known were key players. (Pence's position was unknown, but he could not have been fired, having been separately elected to constitutional office as vice president. Certainly Trump never considered him as a runniong mate in 2024.)

This says to me that the current Trump team in the FBI, CIA, and Office of the Director of National Intelligence know a great deal more than they're letting on, because the Trump team has known a lot of this since his first term. In fact, it's no coincidence that people like Patel, Ratcliffe, and Nunes, who had been part of congressional investigations in the first term, are on the team now. It also suggests that they're a lot closer to prosecution than anyone on the outside now thinks.