WASHINGTON — Two high-ranking employees of liberal billionaire George Soros’ Open Society Foundations held “confidential conversations” with the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton’s campaign team in 2016 to push the narrative of collusion between Russia and GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump, newly declassified intelligence files show.
The documents revealed that Leonard Benardo and Jeffrey Goldstein — Open Society’s regional director and senior policy adviser for Eurasia, respectively — held talks with then-DNC chairwoman Debbie Wasserman-Schultz in early 2016 about smearing Trump as well as distracting from the “growing scandal” surround Clinton’s “possible corruption” as secretary of state.
In a January 2016 memo, the Soros operatives discussed with Wasserman-Schultz the negative fallout from Clinton Foundation donors getting preferential access to Hillary and the “timely deletion of relevant data from mail servers.”
The year before, the former secretary of state had nixed more than 30,000 emails from a private server. The FBI confirmed in a subsequent investigation that the messages included “very sensitive, highly classified information,” but no charges were brought.
According to another memo, this one from March 2016, then-President Barack Obama didn’t want the controversy to “darken the final part of his presidency” and apparently tried to pressure his attorney general, Loretta Lynch, to meddle in then-FBI Director James Comey’s investigation of the Clinton emails.
“Barack Obama sanctioned the use of all administrative levers to remove possibly negative effects from the FBI investigation of cases related to the Clinton Foundation and the email correspondence in the State Department,” the memo declared.
As a result, the DNC saw the scandals’ threat to Clinton’s campaign as “minimal” and worked on developing a two-pronged counter-attack “focused on discrediting Trump through debates and propaganda activities” — with the help of “special services.”
Those included either the direct involvement of intelligence agencies or the use of a now-discredited dossier compiled by ex-MI6 spy Christopher Steele, alleging Russian leader Vladimir Putin had blackmail material on Trump.
At the time, the files also disclosed, Lynch was communicating with Clinton campaign political director Amanda Renteria and the Democratic candidate was in the process of discussing a plan with adviser Julianne Smith that Benardo described as “a long-term affair to demonize Putin and Trump.”
“HRC [Hillary Rodham Clinton] approved Julia’s idea about Trump and Russian hackers hampering U.S. elections,” a bombshell July 27, 2016, email from Benardo laid bare the plot. “That should distract people from her own missing emails. … The point is making the Russian play a U.S. domestic issue.”
Benardo currently serves as senior vice president at Open Society Foundations, which did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Goldstein’s current status is unclear
The memos and other intelligence files were handed over to the Obama FBI, and bureau deputy director Andrew McCabe shared them with senior officials at the Department of Justice — but the information implicating Clinton in the Russiagate scandal was never fully investigated.
Comey later told the Department of Justice’s Office of Inspector General he didn’t view the intelligence — which had been obtained by Russian hackers — as “credible.”
Former FBI General Counsel James Baker disagreed and told the DOJ OIG “how personally bothered he was” by Lynch’s interactions with Clinton’s campaign, adding that “he and other FBI executives had great concerns” about evidence in the memos implying Lynch would “use her position to make sure that Hillary Clinton was not prosecuted.”
Special counsel John Durham unearthed the stunning disclosures as part of a multi-year investigation into intelligence efforts surrounding the 2016 election and maintained in his assessment that the “Benardo emails were likely authentic.”
When Durham interviewed Benardo, the Open Society employee said “to the best of his recollection, he did not draft the emails.”
“The [Clinton] campaign might have wanted or expected the FBI or other agencies to aid that effort (‘put more oil into the fire’) by commencing a formal investigation of the DNC hack [by Russia],” Durham’s annex noted.
“The Office’s best assessment is that the … emails that purport to be from Benardo were ultimately a composite of several emails that were obtained through Russian intelligence hacking of the U.S.-based Think Tanks, including the Open Society Foundations, the Carnegie Endowment, and others.”
The CIA determined that the intelligence was also not “the product of Russian fabrications” as early as 2017.
The FBI received an investigative referral from the CIA related to the Clinton files after an Aug. 3, 2016, meeting at the White House at which Obama, Comey, then-CIA Director John Brennan, Vice President Joe Biden, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper were all present.
The information implicating Trump was still “disseminated through leading U.S. publications,” the intelligence files recounted, as part of “the first stage of the campaign” by Clinton associates “due to lack of direct evidence” of Trump’s purported collusion with Russia.
Attorney General Pam Bondi, CIA Director John Brennan and FBI Director Kash Patel approved the release of the files Thursday by Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa).
“Based on the Durham annex, the Obama FBI failed to adequately review and investigate intelligence reports showing the Clinton campaign may have been ginning up the fake Trump-Russia narrative for Clinton’s political gain, which was ultimately done through the Steele Dossier and other means,” Grassley said in a statement.
“These intelligence reports and related records, whether true or false, were buried for years. History will show that the Obama and Biden administration’s law enforcement and intelligence agencies were weaponized against President Trump,” he also said.
“This political weaponization has caused critical damage to our institutions and is one of the biggest political scandals and cover-ups in American history. The new Trump administration has a tremendous responsibility to the American people to fix the damage done and do so with maximum speed and transparency,.
Reps for Clinton did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
