Mueller's Lies About George Papadopolous by Larry C Johnson

This article provides a comprehensive presentation of facts and an analysis that demonstrates the disengenuity and dishonestly of the Mueller Report with respect to George Papadopolous.

The Papadopolous saga begins on page 1 on of the Mueller report:

In late July 2016, soon after WikiLeaks's first release of stolen documents, a foreign government contacted the FBI about a May 2016 encounter with Trump Campaign foreign policy advisor George Papadopoulos. Papadopoulos had suggested to a representative of that foreign government that the Trump Campaign had received indications from the Russian government that it could assist the Campaign through the anonymous release of information damaging to

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton. That information prompted the FBI on July 31, 2016, to open an investigation into whether individuals associated with the Trump Campaign were coordinating with the Russian government in its interference activities.

The claim that Papadopoulos had information from a source representing Russia is demonstrably false. As I noted in my previous article, Special Counsel Mueller--Disingenuous and Dishonest, the FBI was going after the Trump team as early as September 2015. Let’s take a look at George Papadopolous’ account: ( The following are excerpts from: George Papadopolous. “Deep State Target.” Apple Books. https://books.apple.com/us/book/deep-state-target/id1446495998)

“I really like Energy Stream, but three months into the job, I am approached by a man named Nagi Khalid Idris who offers me a position at the London Centre of International Law Practice.

Idris is an interesting figure. As it turns out, he is the first in a handful of interesting figures I am about to meet. A Sudanese-born UK citizen, he’s the founder of EN Education Group Limited — an education consultancy operation that’s core business seems to be placing students from Arab countries in international settings. ” (p. 50)

“I really like Energy Stream, but three months into the job, I am approached by a man named Nagi Khalid Idriswho offers me a position at the London Centre of International Law Practice.

Idris is an interesting figure. As it turns out, he is the first in a handful of interesting figures I am about to meet. A Sudanese-born UK citizen, he’s the founder of EN Education Group Limited — an education consultancy operation that’s core business seems to be placing students from Arab countries in international settings. ” (p. 61)

“I really like Energy Stream, but three months into the job, I am approached by a man named Nagi Khalid Idris who offers me a position at the London Centre of International Law Practice.

Idris is an interesting figure. As it turns out, he is the first in a handful of interesting figures I am about to meet. A Sudanese-born UK citizen, he’s the founder of EN Education Group Limited — an education consultancy operation that’s core business seems to be placing students from Arab countries in international settings. ” (p. 62)

The next day, . . . . “Nagi comes by my office again. His attitude has suddenly changed. It’s a night-and-day difference. He starts telling me that there is someone I have to meet, a very important person who will be “very useful to me during my time with Trump. I remember Nagi telling me, “He’s a man who knows many people.” Then he insists I join him at a conference at Link Campus University in Rome.

And he calls in a director with the LCILP whom I’ve never laid eyes on.

“You have to meet her,” he tells me while we wait. “Her name is Arvinder Sambei. She’s setting up our team at the conference, and she can help arrange the introduction.” (pp 64-65)

“[Nagi] keeps at me, insisting I had to go to Rome. “It’s a three-day conference. It will help you with Trump.”

“After that session, I’m sitting in a conference room when Nagi Idris approaches. At his side is a well-dressed man in his mid-fifties.

“George,” Nagi says. “This is Professor Joseph Mifsud, and you should talk.”

Joseph Mifsud is the man Nagi had planned for me to meet, the man Nagi had asked Arvinder Sambei to contact, and the man Nagi had portrayed as a major player, a guy with diplomatic experience and “extensive contacts. A man, in other words, who can change my life.

It turns out Mifsud has a PhD in Education from Queen’s University, Belfast, which isn’t exactly what I’d expect from a guy reputed to be politically connected. But Mifsud spins himself as a worldly insider, a guy with an I-have-connections-everywhere arrogance. He offsets that by flashing warmth and interest in me. He asks about my background. He asks if I have Russian contacts. I shake my head.

“I heard you have connections,” I say. “And that you might be able to help me with the campaign.”

“Oh yes, absolutely. Let’s talk tonight. Let’s go to dinner.” (pp. 70-71)

[At dinner] “Mifsud says: “I’m going introduce you to everyone and set up a meeting between Trump and Putin.”

“That’s an excellent idea,” I say. “You really think it can be arranged?”

“Oh, yes. I can do it.”

“That would be amazing.” (p. 74)

“Mifsud emails me a few days later when I’m back in London to tell me he wants to introduce me to somebody very important. When am I available?

I respond with some possible dates. Then I head to the LCILP offices where I run into Nagi Idris. He’s very excited. He tells me I’m going to meet Putin’s niece. That Mifsud knows her and is going to introduce us.” (p. 75)

“The lunch is booked for March 24 at the Grange Holborn Hotel,. . . . “When I get there, Mifsud is waiting for me in the lobby with an attractive, fashionably dressed young woman with dirty blonde hair at his side. He introduces her as Olga Vinogradova.” (p. 76)

“Mifsud sells her hard. “Olga is going to be your inside woman to Moscow. She knows everyone.” He tells me she was a former official at the Russian Ministry of Trade. Then he waxes on about introducing me to the Russian ambassador in London.” (p. 77)

“on April 12, “Olga” writes: “I have already alerted my personal links to our conversation and your request. The embassy in London is very much aware of this. As mentioned, we are all very excited by the possibility of a good relationship with Mr. Trump. The Russian Federation would love to welcome him once his candidature would be officially announced.”

So I have no choice but to hurry up and wait. I communicate this back to the campaign managers, primarily Stephen Miller.” (p. 101)

“Then Mifsud returns from the Valdai conference. On April 26 we meet for breakfast at the Andaz Hotel, near Liverpool Street Station, one of the busiest train stations in London. He’s in an excellent mood and claims he met with high-level Russian government officials. But once again, he’s very short on specifics. This is becoming a real pattern with Mifsud. He hasn’t offered any names besides Timofeev. Then, he leans across the table in a conspiratorial manner. The Russians have “dirt” on Hillary Clinton, he tells me. “Emails of Clinton,” he says. “They have thousands of emails.” (p. 104)

[In early May 2016] “two military attachés at the US embassy in London, Terrence Dudley and Gregory Baker, reach out to me to set up a meeting. ”

(NOTE—this meeting comes in the wake of controversial comments Papadopolous made to a reporter criticizing UK Prime Minister Cameron). (p. 117).

“They take me to a private club known far and wide as The Rag—the same place we hosted the 2015 Energy Stream Conference. Its real name is The Army and Navy Club” (p. 117)

“They spare no expense during our meeting, dropping at least $500. They ask me what I’m doing in London.” (p.118)

“IT’S A WET, ugly London evening on May 10, 2016, when I go meet Erika Thompson and her boss, Australian High Commissioner Alexander Downer.” (p. 125)

“Downer is oozing aggression by comparison. After our introduction, the first thing he says is, “Tell your boss he needs to leave my friend David Cameron alone, and you should leave him alone too.’” (p. 127)

“Downer starts talking: He tells me he’s connected to a British security firm called Hakluyt. He boasts about being a board member and that the firm has a great presence in London and close ties to the Obama administration. “We advise many governments,” he says.” (p. 128)

“And then something happens.

Or more accurately, Downer later claims something happens.

In his version of events, he asks me a question about Russia and Trump.

I then tell him that the Russians have a surprise or some damaging material related to Hillary Clinton.

I have no memory of this. None. Zero. Nada.” (p. 130)

The Papadopolous account reveals several things. First, George is an earnest but naïve young man. He did not realize he was being set up.

Second, George’s multiple emails to Corey Lewandowski were intercepted by both GCHQ and the NSA. It is clear now, with the benefit of hindsight, that these communications were transmitted as SIGINT Intelligence Reports. Investigation by Attorney Bill Barr will show that these reports were “unmasked.”

Third, the people who brokered the contacts with Mifsud—Nagi and Arvinder Sambei—have ties to British and US intelligence organizations and the FBI.

Arvinder Sambei’s ties, for example, are reported by Disobedient Media:

“Mifsud and Papadopoulos’s co-director Arvinder Sambei was also the former FBI British counsel working 9/11 cases for Robert Mueller. She also runs a consultancy which deals with Special Investigative Measure (SIMs) which is just a posh description for covert espionage and evidence gathering. She has worked for major intelligence and national law agencies in the past. She wore two hats as a director of London Centre and a consultant for the Global Center on Cooperative Security (GCCS), a counter-terrorism think tank which is sponsored by the Australia, Canada, UK and US governments. Alexander Downer’s former Chief of Staff while at the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade now works for the Global Center. Mifsud was also due to meet with Australian private intelligence figures in Adelaide in March 2016. So. Australia is certainly a major focus for the investigation.” 

Sambei’s critical role in introducing Papadopolous to Joseph Mifsud is not, in my view, a mere coincidence.

Joseph Mifsud bears all the hallmarks of an MI-6 intelligence asset (please refer to my previous article, Special Counsel Mueller: Disingenuous and Dishonest. Introducing Papadopolous to Mifsud is a classic humint covert action. In this case the plan was to select an individual—a naïve, inexperienced eager soul--who had access to the Trump campaign, who could be fed compromising information and put into an incriminating situations that would feed the concocted meme that the Trump campaign was colluding with the Russians.

The entire concept of working with the Russians and having Trump meet with Putin was a meme introduced and encouraged by Joseph Mifsud. George Papadopolous was an unwitting, albeit eager, patsy.

Then we have Alexander Downer. He is closely tied to the Clintons. Bill and Alexander signed a deal that produced millions of dollars for the Clinton Foundation. Downer, despite his credentials and pedigree, was not an honest actor. I believe that he was engaged in a pre-planned political dirty trick, to feed the lie that the Trump campaign was working with the Russians to “steal” Hillary’s emails.

Remember. The critical meeting with Downer took place while the Russians were ostensibly hacking the DNC. This is not a tin-foil hatted conspiracy theory. The facts are clear.

Comments

[jjc]

The Report is silent on the issue of who or what was Mifsud's source leading to his remark that Russia had thousands of Clinton emails. Mifsud apparently told Papadopoulos this information came from high-level Russian contacts. Since the delivery of this information to a Trump staffer was supposedly the trigger for a determined counter-intelligence operation, it's hard to understand why there is no clarification on what motivated Mifsud to say what he said. The FBI interviewed him, presumedly the topic was addressed: "who in Russia told you about the emails?" In fact, the transmission of this information during the Papadopoulos-Mifsud March meeting was cited by Mueller in indictment documents as of primary importance.

[Mad Max_22]

This is one of my fundamental problems with the FBI's handling of the "Russian" collusion investigation from its very inception, from both standpoints, counter intelligence and criminal. With regard to Mifsud's information, in order for the FBI to develop it from both standpoints, there was no need to bring, should I write entrap, Papadopolis or any other official from the Trump campaign into the operation. Mifsud was the most direct path into the so called Russian operation, and a UCA should have been introduced through Mifsud to further the case if one were even needed. Mifsud himself should have been wired to develop the case - furthermore he should have been much more thoroughly wrung out with respect to these so called Russian sources. This criticism applies as well, perhaps more so, to the Bureau's handling of Halper, what were they paying him for anyway; and again, most critically, to the Bureau's handling of Steele. It is incomprehensible that the Bureau would use the Steele "source" information in a FISC affidavit without demanding from Steele the identities of his reputed sources so they could be vetted for their credibility and reliability and not mask these most important affidavit attestations by avering to Steele's reliability in prior, but dissimilar, cases. The best interpretation I can give to it is that there was some crazy inchoate design to steer the Russians towards the real target, the Trump campaign.
And shame on Mueller and his band of partisans. Every criticism of the Bureau above can be laid directly on them. Mueller could have wrapped up his Russsian collusion investigation in three months with 10% of the resources by going directly at Mifsud, Halper, Steele, and probably Brennan. Just tell me who your "sources" were gentleman, your supposedly Russian sources? What did they tell you, who, where, when, and why? But then there really was no need at all for a Special Counsel. But for that recognition to have set in, the Bureau would have had to recognize that it had been played; and there was nobody at home big enough to make that recognition.

[blue peacock]

Some argue that Mifsud, Halper, Downer & Steele were orchestrated by US, British & Aussie intelligence as well as the FBI to trap Trump campaign officials in planted scenarios of association with Russians to buttress the Russia collusion narrative.

If Trump & Barr want to get to the bottom of this conspiracy they will need to find out who ran these guys? IMO. that should be very straightforward if they really do want that info.

[Mad Max_22]

You are absolutely correct in saying they will need to find out who specifically ran these guys and who was supervising them. This should have been Mueller's first order of business, appraising and not just assuming there was a fact basis to support that a) Russian intelligence services were attempting to penetrate the Trump campaign and b) that Trump officials had either initiated the contacts or were predisposed to cooperate with those services in violaion of specific US laws. The most direct, and the proper, approach would have been to use the sources against the presumptive Russian operatives and not to use them to bait a Trump official into thinking that there were unnamed "Russians" who wanted to help Trump by presenting him with a politically generic open ended scheme.
Another thing that irks me is the targeting of Carter Page for the FISC surveillance. Carter Page had previously provided the Bureau significant help in a case involving Russia. I have seen nothing to indicate that Carter Page was given the opportunity to explain what looks and smells like garbage that was used to justify the elsur. What? You have a guy who has helped you and gone on the record to help you and you don't give him an opportunity to explain what amounts to anonymous information that is tarbrushing him? You better have a damn good reason for that, and I don't see one.
Don't be surprised when the names come out, if the names come out, we haven't seen them before.

[Ligurio]

"will need to find out who specifically ran these guys and who was supervising them."

That's not so hard: GCHQ chief Robert Hannigan and Director of CIA John Brennan.

Woodward has all but named Brennan explicitly as the most powerful visible driver of the conspiracy stateside.

[blue peacock]

I'm not optimistic that anyone including Trump will make any effort to get to the bottom of it all. In fact I believe the reality will be that it will all be swept under the rug. There will of course be all kinds of noise that we have a serious investigation ongoing and can't really talk about it and Trump will of course keep tweeting. And the fully invested Democrats and the media will have a new pony to ride. The pony du jour seems to be obstruction.

[Ptab]

Well i’ll Be a monkeys uncle - have I stumbled into LJ’s underground? Glad to find you Sir. Hope u r well & healthy

[turcopolier]

Yes, I allow Johnson to post here since his return from Costa Rica.

[Ptab]

Then I thank YOU for offering him the soapbox - I was a regular lurker at his last site until he went dark. I wish you all nothing but great success peace
Permission to go to shore Sir ?

[Joe100]

WOW! Larry Johnson (VIA SST) makes the big time - a Trump tweet (4:04 AM this morning) cited Larry Johnson (obviously via SST) about UK spying for the Obama administration on Trump's 2016 campaign!

You may need to go into hiding again!

But someone in or close to the White House must be following SST...

[turcopolier]

A number of authors on SST have been developing the case for UK conspiracy against Trump for years. Where were you?

[Joe100]

I have been following SST's development of this case and everything else on SST for many years. My point above (not artfully presented) was that SSTs coverage of the plausible UK role in Trump campaign spying is now being cited by Trump and that this suggests someone who matters in the White House is following SST.

[akaPatience]

I think Trump's tweet was in response to an interview of Larry Johnson that appeared on OANN.

[DLC]

I come to this site often to check my own impressions of the current state of politics and international issues. I was a long-time follower of L.J. before he came to this site. I always found his analysis trustworthy.

It's so sad that I can't say that in regard to most of our politicians and many of our "public servants."

Between the MSM and the NeoCon-leaning Fox News, I am so glad to have this site to come to every now and then. I wish I had a site to go to in regard to state and local politics. My county is doing its best to counter the craziness that has taken over our Capitol in CO now that we have a Gov. Polis. Marijuana everywhere and now a threat of firearm confiscations. I'm thinking we may end up with a real Western shootout soon. My county of Weld once before thought seriously about seceding from the state after too many Californians had come to "Californicate" our state We are being squeezed by the Denver-Boulder area that has now joined with the Boulder "wannabe" city of Fort Collins in an effort to turn our long-time red county blue. Heck, our latest big scandal was a librarian bringing in a transgender female cross dresser to talk to pre-school children. It's turning into a surreal world, for sure.

At least this site gives me a chance to read sane analysis.