House Republicans led by Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., plan to make criminal referrals on members of Robert Mueller’s special counsel team, alleging they lied to a court about former Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos.
As John Solomon reported Monday on his news site Just the News, newly declassified FBI memos directly conflict with court filings in which Mueller’s team asked a federal judge to send Papadopoulos to prison.
Papadopoulos — who pleaded guilty to making false statements to FBI agents about his contacts with figures purportedly tied to Russia who had “dirt” on Hillary Clinton —Â contends he was entrapped by various government intelligence agencies to justify FBI surveillance of the Trump campaign.
Nunes told Solomon in a podcast to air Tuesday that his team has been poring over FBI documents, including witness reports known as 302s, and has found evidence that contradicts claims Mueller’s team made to courts and to Congress.
“We’re now going through these 302s, and we’re going to be making criminal referrals on the Mueller dossier team, the people that put this Mueller report together,” Nunes said in an interview with “John Solomon Reports.”
Nunes said the FBI interview memos of Papadopoulos show the onetime Trump adviser offered to help the bureau locate a key figure in the case, European professor Joseph Mifsud.
But Mueller’s prosecutors portrayed Papdopoulos as trying to thwart the investigation.
The new FBI memos, said Nunes, provide “our first evidence of the Mueller team lying to the court.”
“It a lie. It’s a total lie,” the lawmaker said, referring to the Mueller team’s claim that Papadopoulos tried to hinder efforts to locate and question Mifsud.
“I always assumed that Papadopolis probably was helpful. I mean, he’s kind of alluded to that, that he offered to be helpful, but we had never seen the actual 302s,” Nunes said.
Nunes said he hopes John Durham, the U.S. attorney appointed by Attorney General William Barr to investigate the origins of the Trump-Russia probe, will address the conduct of Mueller’s team.
The congressman pointed out that the Russia probe relied on the political opposition research “dossier” of Russian propaganda funded by the Hillary Clinton campaign.
“The only question that we don’t know is at what point did the Clinton dirty operation merge with the FBI?” he said. “And it’s something only Durham can get to the bottom of.
See Rep. Devin Nunes interview earlier this month with the Fox Business Network’s Lou Dobbs in which the congressman said corruption by Mueller’s team would be revealed in the coming weeks:
‘Omitted’ information
Solomon noted in his report Monday that the key Mueller prosecutor in the Papadopoulos case was Aaron Zelinsky, who recently resigned from the Roger Stone case over a dispute with Attorney General Barr over the length of prison time Stone deserved.
Zelinsky signed a sentencing memo in August 2018 seeking prison time for Papadopoulos. The prosecutors alleged Papadopoulos hindered their ability to question or arrest the European professor Joseph Mifsud while he was in the United States in February 2017.
However, Solomon reported, FBI 302 reports detailing agent interviews with Papadopoulos show he supplied information in a Feb. 10, 2017, interview that possibly would have enabled investigators to detain or arrest Mifsud.
Prosecutors claimed Papadopoulos lied about when he started advising Trump’s campaign and when he learned from Mifsud that Russia may have “dirt” on Hillary Clinton in the form of emails.
Mifsud did not leave Washington until the day after his Feb. 10, 2017, interview. Solomon said Papadopoulos’ information should have enabled investigators to confront Mifsud with conflicting testimony “on a point of critical importance to the stated purpose of the Russia collusion investigation before the professor’s departure.”
But the information was not mentioned in the Mueller team’s original statement of offense, filed Oct. 5, 2017, nor its later sentencing recommendation.
Solomon pointed out that in contrast, the documents portray Papadopoulos as trying to thwart the investigation.
The sentencing memo signed by Zelinksy said Papadopoulos’ “false statements were intended to harm the investigation, and did so.”
His “lies negatively affected the FBI’s Russia investigation and prevented the FBI from effectively identifying and confronting witnesses in a timely fashion,” the prosecutors said.
But the FBI interview memos show Papadopoulos expressed willingness to help the bureau locate Mifsud even before Feb. 10, 2017.
In a Feb. 1, 2017 interview, Papadopoulos told agents he “could potentially meet with Mifsud” during a planned trip to London. And he said Mifsud “had recently reached out to him” and “indicated that he may be traveling to Washington, DC in February 2017.”
And the former Trump adviser “provided that Mifsud recently reached out to him via email, and advised that he was in Washington, DC at the time of this interview.”
All of that information was missing from key court documents.
Solomon said the Justice Department did not respond to queries asking why the information Papadopoulos gave the FBI, his offer of assistance and his testimony contradicting Mifsud were omitted.
