(PresidentialHill.com)- According to a motion filed in federal court on Friday, five of the people called as witnesses in Special Counsel John Durham’s case against former Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann are invoking their Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination and refusing to cooperate with the special counsel’s office.
In the filing, Special Counsel Durham noted that one of the witnesses, identified as “Researcher-2” was granted immunity from prosecution in exchange for testimony but “at least five other witnesses” who were involved in the effort to link Donald Trump to Russia’s Alfa Bank have either invoked their right against self-incrimination or have indicated their plan to do so.
In the same filing, Durham revealed that the CIA had concluded in 2017 that the Alfa Bank data and the “Russian Phone Provider 1 data” were not “technically plausible” and did not “withstand technical scrutiny.” The CIA determined that the data “contained gaps” and conflicted with itself. What’s more, the data wasn’t machine/tool generated; it was “user-created.”
In other words, the supposed “evidence” Michael Sussmann presented to the FBI on behalf of the Clinton campaign had been completely discredited by the Central Intelligence Agency.
Durham’s filing also indicates that the government would like to introduce communications between the “Clinton Campaign leadership” and someone identified as “Campaign Lawyer-1.” That lawyer is widely believed to be Sussmann’s former Perkins Coie colleague Marc Elias.
It was Elias who, with money from both the DNC and Clinton Campaign, paid opposition research firm Fusion GPS to dig up dirt on Donald Trump. Fusion in turn hired former British spy Christopher Steele who concocted the discredited “dossier” on Trump.
Friday’s motion filed by Durham was in response to an effort by Sussmann’s defense and the Clinton campaign to withhold documents from evidence by claiming attorney-client privilege.
Sussmann was charged last year for lying to the FBI when he brought them the fraudulent Clinton-funded “evidence” linking Trump to the Russian Alfa Bank. On two separate occasions, Sussmann claimed that he was acting independently and not on behalf of a client, despite acting on behalf of the Clinton campaign.
