Cogito Ergo Non Serviam
FBI Informant in Trump Campaign Protected America
The Trump administration has its knickers in a twist over its own allegations that the FBI planted a spy in the presidential campaign to subvert the effort to get a failed casino owner into the White House. The facts, of course, are quite different. There was at least one spy in the campaign, and the informant was a patriotic American who saw something and said something. If anything, the FBI was doing its job, and had it been working on the destruction of its campaign, the agency would have acted much differently.
Stefan A. Halper is the name of the informant, revealed in a number of media outlets. Professor Halper is a US citizen, and a former member of a few Republican administrations, starting with the presidency of Richard Nixon. He worked for Bush the Elder in his 1980 presidential campaign and wound up in the Reagan White House as Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Political-Military Affairs. He went into the private sector thereafter and academia. He has been paid more than a million dollars as a consultant to the US government. He has earned the State Department's Superior Honor Award, the Justice Department's Director's Award, and the Defense Department's Superior Honor Award. He is a Life Fellow at Magdalen College, Cambridge where he convened seminars for senior intelligence officers.
In the course of his seminars, he came into contact with former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn in 2014, Trump foreign policy advisers Carter Page in July 2016 and George Papadopoulos in September 2016. He also met with Sam Clovis, the Trump campaign co-chair, and offered his services as a foreign policy adviser. He was appalled at General Flynn's pro-Russian attitudes.
He met with Carter Page numerous times, and he would certainly have discovered the latter's pro-Russian views. "At the time, I never found his actions suspicious," Mr. Page told NBC News. "He never offered me one cent. Just 2 foreign policy scholars having some discussions. That's about all that I took it as."
He offer to work with Mr. Clovis may well have been a probe to see just how much Russian influence there was in the Trump campaign. And given the June 9, 2016, meeting in Trump Tower among the leadership of the Trump campaign and a few Russians under the Kremlin's roof, there was quite a bit. He may well have learned just how much after talking to Mr. Clovis.
As for Mr. Papadopoulos, Dr. Halper offered to pay him to discuss energy issues related to Turkey, Israel and Cyprus. These were within the former's area of expertise. NBC News stated, "Papadopoulos also told associates he was approached over LinkedIn in July 2016 by Sergei Millian, a Belorussian-American businessman who has claimed business ties to Trump, and who also has been named by The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post as a source for the notorious Christopher Steele dossier." Mr. Papadopoulos may well have mentioned Mr. Millian's contact to establish greater bona fides with Dr. Halper.
The right-wing fantasy that the FBI had him infiltrate the campaign falls to pieces when one considers the FBI actions in October 2016. Director James Comey announced that Hillary Clinton's campaign was back under investigation over emails. He did not say, "The Trump campaign is full of Russian sympathizers," which would have been the play had the agency been out to destroy the Republican candidate's organization and campaign. It didn't happen that way.
Like Mr. Steele, Dr. Halper noticed a great deal of Russian influence on the Trump campaign and reported it to the FBI. That is what everyone in the Trump campaign should have done when contacted by Russians. Instead, they went to meetings and never reported them on their security clearance forms. That says all one needs to know.
© Copyright 2018 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Ubuntu Linux.
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