Court filing alleges tech lawyer lied to FBI about working for Clinton campaign

HUNT VALLEY, Md. — A new court filing last Friday sparked fresh accusations and debate surrounding the Trump-Russia probe.

Former President Donald Trump says it proves his 2016 presidential campaign was spied on by Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign.

Defense lawyers are saying it’s just an attempt to politicize the case and drum up negative press.

It’s either what some are calling illegal "spying in a scandal worse than Watergate” or simply a potential legal conflict of interest that can’t be prosecuted.

The recent uproar stems from special counsel John Durham submitting a court filing last Friday — a “motion to inquire into potential conflicts of interest.”

But it starts with Durham being tasked with investigating the origins and possible misconduct by the government in the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential campaign, and if it had any ties to the Trump campaign.

This followed Trump’s claims the probe — conducted by special prosecutor Robert Mueller — was a “witch hunt” and a “deep state” conspiracy.

Mueller’s final report found no proof of Trump colluding with Russia but did lead to several convictions of senior Trump advisers for misleading investigators about contacting Russian officials. Several Russian citizens were indicted as well. Trump pardoned many of his former advisers later and called for an investigation into the investigation.

Three years later, Durham hasn’t come up with any cases against high-ranking government officials. He’s brought criminal action against three people — Kevin Clinesmith, a former low-level FBI attorney who pleaded guilty to doctoring an email used to obtain surveillance on the Trump campaign, and Igor Danchenko, who pleaded not guilty to making false statements to the FBI.

Michael Sussmann is the third. Sussmann is a cybersecurity lawyer who represented the Clinton campaign in 2016. That year, he reportedly met with the FBI about concerns of a potential connection between the digital servers of the Trump Organization and the Russia-based Alfa Bank — meaning contact between Trump and Russia that was being probed. Investigators said his concerns were unfounded.

Despite the connection being nonexistent, last September Durham accused Sussmann of lying to the FBI during that meeting by saying he wasn’t representing anyone with his concerns, that he was just coming forward as a “good citizen,” when he was allegedly doing so on behalf of the Clinton campaign. Sussmann pleaded not guilty and vowed to fight the charges.

In this Nov. 30, 2017, file photo, the J. Edgar Hoover FBI building in Washington Lawyers for a former FBI lawyer who pleaded guilty to altering an email during the Trump-Russia investigation "made a grievous mistake" but should be spared prison time and given probation instead. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster, File)

The filing Friday went into more detail, alleging that Sussmann actually billed the Clinton campaign for his work with the FBI bringing the concerns forward.

Furthermore, another tech executive — who Durham didn’t name but was identified by the New York Times as Rodney Joffe — allegedly exploited his access to computer data at the Trump White House to find “derogatory information” about the president, by looking at what computers and servers the White House servers were in contact with.

According to the filing, Joffe shared information from the servers at the Executive Office of the President, two buildings owned by Trump in New York and other locations, with Sussmann — saying they were all connected with internet addresses affiliated with a Russian mobile phone provider.

Durham is not charging Joffe with a crime or accusing him of wrongdoing.

A representative for Joffe responded to the filing, saying, Joffe “is an apolitical internet security expert with decades of service to the U.S. government who has never worked for a political party, and who legally provided access to DNS data obtained from a private client that separately was providing DNS services to the Executive Office of the President.”

In this April 25, 2006 file photo, U.S. Attorney John Durham speaks to reporters on the steps of U.S. District Court in New Haven, Conn. (AP Photo/Bob Child, File)

Then, Sussmann passed that information along to the CIA in 2017 with his concerns, saying it “demonstrated that Trump and/or his associates were using supposedly rare, Russian-made wireless phones in the vicinity of the White House and other locations.” Durham’s filing states that there’s no support for these allegations.

Sussmann is scheduled to go to trial on the false statement charges this May. He requested the dismissal of the case against him, referring to the single criminal count as “a case of extraordinary prosecutorial overreach.”

In his 29-page motion to dismiss, he wrote, “Allowing this case to go forward would risk criminalizing ordinary conduct, raise First Amendment concerns, dissuade honest citizens from coming forward with tips, and chill the advocacy of lawyers who interact with the government.”

His argument claims that he was just coming forward with concerning information and wanted to see it through, and it had nothing to do with the Clinton campaign.

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton speaks during a campaign event Sunday, July 26, 2015, at Iowa State University in Ames, Iowa. (AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall)

His lawyers responded to Durham’s filing Monday with a cross-motion to strike much of it, writing:

Unfortunately, the Special Counsel has done more than simply file a document identifying potential conflicts of interest. Rather, the Special Counsel has again made a filing in this case that unnecessarily includes prejudicial — and false — allegations that are irrelevant to his motion and to the charged offense, and are plainly intended to politicize this case, inflame media coverage and taint the jury pool."

Also in the response, the lawyers poke what they say are two holes in Durham’s filing. The first is that Sussmann passed along the information to the CIA when Barack Obama was still president, not Trump. The second is that his meeting with the CIA occurred after the 2016 election and Trump was inaugurated, “at a time when the Clinton campaign had effectively ceased to exist.”

Sussmann’s lawyers pointed to media reports that they say purported a “vast conspiracy” that the Clinton campaign paid Sussmann to “infiltrate” Trump Tower — wording that is not included in the Durham filing — and that Trump’s campaign was “spied on.” They specifically cite articles from Fox News, the New York Post, the Washington Examiner and Breitbart News.

Trump has loudly condemned the content of the filing, saying it’s exposing the “crime of the century” and “coming up with things far bigger than anybody thought possible.”

This is a scandal far greater in scope and magnitude than Watergate and those who were involved in and knew about this spying operation should be subject to criminal prosecution,” Trump said. “In a stronger period of time in our country, this crime would have been punishable by death. In addition, reparations should be paid to those in our country who have been damaged by this.

The former president is now calling for the Department of Justice to declassify the rest of the records related to the original Trump-Russia probe. Some Republicans in Congress are siding with Trump, such as Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, saying Durham’s filing brings “real evidence of the wrongdoing and cover-up.”

Sen. Mike Braun, R-Ind., said he’d rather Durham’s probe be “slow and methodical” to get to the essence of what really happened.

This, to me, even though it’s being dismissed by the other side as being a conspiracy theory, not having any merit, if you let it flow into its current extension, who knows where that goes?” he said. “If it goes no further than what it is currently, there’s a lot to be gleaned from it, but it looks like a lot more may come out of it.”

A group of 46 Republican senators wrote a letter to the Department of Justice Wednesday, saying Durham must have prosecutorial independence and all the resources necessary to complete his investigation into the Russian probe. They asked Attorney General Merrick Garland for a guarantee that his work can continue.

Attorney General Merrick Garland looks at a monitor showing Justice Department employees as he finishes speaking at the Department of Justice in Washington, Wednesday, Jan. 5, 2022, in advance of the one year anniversary of the attack on the U.S. Capitol. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster, Pool)

Those findings include the highly concerning, and potentially criminal, manipulation and exploitation of federal law enforcement resources to target American citizens, including a presidential candidate, based upon fabricated evidence that had been procured and disseminated by individuals closely connected with a rival political campaign,” the letter said.

Clinton shot back against the allegations on Twitter, writing, “Trump & Fox are desperately spinning up a fake scandal to distract from his real ones. So it’s a day that ends in Y. The more his misdeeds are exposed, the more they lie.”

Others have pointed out that even if Sussmann’s conduct was illegal, the statute of limitations — five years — appears to be up for prosecution.

Exceptions can be made for evidence that exists in a foreign country, but a court would have to approve a request to override the statute of limitations. And Durham’s filing doesn’t directly allege that the conduct surrounding the data itself was illegal — just that he lied to the FBI.

In addition, legal experts question the strength of Durham’s case in that there’s only one witness to the alleged lie relayed to the FBI, and that witness has given varying accounts of the situation.

What’s next for the probe and Sussmann is unclear, but he is faced with convincing a judge to toss out his case, and his first arguments are due Friday.