Page

The story of Carter Page has added credence to the idea that the Justice Department has become politicized or as they say these days, lawfare Page was an oil industry consultant and foreign policy adviser to the 2016 Trump campaign. When Trump announced his run for president the FBI began investigating all of the people in the campaign who had ties to Russia meaning they had met with Russian officials. Page graduated from the Navel Academy and spent five years in the Navy as an intelligence officer. He later received a Phd from the University of London and his thesis was how countries made the transfer from communism to capitalism. Page founded his own firm where he worked in the Russian energy sector. In his work he became close friends with pro Russian business people and often wrote pro Russian articles. The FBI used FISA warrants to listen in on Page's conversations as early as 2014 more than two years before Trump decided to run. They not only listen to his private conversation during his time with Trump they issued a special warrant after he left Trump to read his saved emails believing there was probable cause that he was a Russian agent. In 2017 Page's name was in the now infamous Steele dossier and he was under investigation by the CIA, National Security Agency, Director of National Intelligence and Financial Crimes Enforcement Network. No evidence of a crime was uncovered. In 2017 the FBI received confirmation that Page was an operational contact that supplied the CIA with information about Russia. This report was then doctored by FBI attorney Clinesmith and used it to get warrants from the FISA court. Clinesmith pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 12 months in prison. In 2020 the Justice Department declared invalid two of the four surveillance warrant against Carter. Page was not convicted of any crime but the warrants against him were used to surveil other members of the Trump team. Over time the FBI had access to most of what the Trump team members were saying or emailing and in the end the Mueller investigation found no collusion. The ACLU was and is today very concerned about the FISA court which is still very active.