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  Horowitz Report Chapter 7 Section III

      III. FISA Renewal Application No. 3 (June 29, 2017)
      see https://www.justice.gov/storage/120919-examination.pdf
Narrative
III. FISA Renewal Application No. 3( lune 29, 2017)

On June 29, 2017, a day before FISA coverage on Carter Page was going to expire, and at the request of the FBI, the Department filed an application with the FISC requesting an additional 90 days of FISA coverage targeting Carter Page. A FISC judge reviewed and issues resulting in an additional 90 days of electronic surveillance- targeting Carter Page from June 29, 2017 to September 22, 2017.

A. Investigative Developments and Decision to Seek FISA Renewal

After the second renewal of FISA authority, the FBI continued its FISA collection of communications and other evidence pertaining to Carter Page. In addition, available documents indicate that one of the focuses of the Carter Page investigation at this time was obtaining his financial records. NYFO sought compulsory legal process in April 2017 for banking and financial records for Carter Page and his company, Global Energy Capital, as well as information relating to two encrypted online applications, one of which Page utilized on his cell phone. Documents reflect that agents also conducted multiple interviews of individuals associated with Carter Page.

Case Agent 6 told us, and documents reflect, that despite the ongoing investigation, the team did not expect to renew the Carter Page FISA before Renewal Application No. 2 's authority expired on June 30. Case Agent 6 said that the FISA collection the FBI had received during the second renewal period was not yielding any new information. The OGC Attorney told us that when the FBI was considering whether to seek further FISA authority following Renewal Application No. 2, the FISA was" starting to go dark.'' During one of the March 2017 interviews, Page told Case Agent 1 and Case Agent 6 that he believed he was under surveillance and the agents did not believe continued surveillance would provide any relevant information. Case Agent 6 said

SSA 5 and SSA 2 said that further investigation yielded previously unknown locations that they believed could provide information of investigative value, and they decided to seek another renewal. Specifically, SSA 5 and Case Agent 6 told us, and documents reflect, that

B. Preparation and Approval of Renewal Application No. 3

1. Draft Renewal Application

Case Agent 6 assisted the 01 Attorney in the preparation of Renewal Application No. 3. Emails reflect that Case Agent 6 and the 01 Attorney exchanged information on recent investigative findings and relevant FISA collections for the draft of Renewal Application No. 3. On June 16, the 01 Attorney emailed the OGC Attorney and Case Agent 6 the first draft of Renewal Application No. 3 for their review. On June 18, Case Agent 6 responded to the email by providing answers to the remaining questions in the draft application. Emails reflect that on June 19, the Supervisory Intel Analyst and SSA 2 received a copy of the renewal draft from Case Agent 6 for review; however, the Supervisory Intel Analyst did not recall reviewing the renewal application. SSA 2 said he had no comments, and we found no documentation indicating one way or the other.

The statement of facts in the third renewal application contained the same information used to support probable cause as in Renewal Application No. 2. This included the assessment that post-election, the FBI believed that the Russian government would continue efforts to use U.S. persons, such as Carter Page, to covertly influence U.S. foreign policy and support Russia 's perception management efforts. In addition, Renewal Application No. 3 advised the court of recent investigative results, including:

• A June 2017 interview by the FBI of an individual closely tied to the President of the New Economic School in Moscow who stated that Carter Page was selected to give a commencement speech in July 2016 because he was candidate Trump 's" Russia-guy.'' This individual also told the FBI that while in Russia in July 2016, Carter Page was picked up in a chauffeured car and it was rumored he met with Igor Sechin. However, the FD-302 documenting this interview, which was included in the Woods File for Renewal Application No. 3, does not contain any reference to a chauffeured car picking up Carter Page. We were unable to locate any document or information in the Woods File that supported this assertion.

• A June 2017 interview by the FBI of a different individual closely tied to the New Economic School in Moscow who told investigators that he did not think it likely that Carter Page and Sechin met during Page 's visit to Moscow in July 2016. The FBI assessed that, because this individual was unaware of a meeting that Carter Page had with a different Russian official while in Moscow in July 2016, the individual did not know about all the meetings that Page had while in Moscow in July 2016, and the FBI assessed that, based on the rumored meeting between Page and Sechin described in the prior bullet point, Page likely met with Sechin prior to the time that Page joined this individual at the New Economic School;

• A statement by Carter Page during a March 30 interview with the FBI about the loss and destruction of his cell phone at the same time media reports were discussing the FBI 's possible investigation of Page.

• Carter Page 's meetings with media outlets, which the FBI assessed may have been undertaken to promote his theories on U.S. foreign policy and refute claims of involvement with the Russian government 's efforts to influence the 2016 U.S. election. The FBI believed Page was instructed by Russian officials to deny in the media Russian involvement with the election.

The application also stated the following:

Additionally, based on Page 's history of willingness to assist Russian IOs, which as discussed above the FBI believes began as early as 2007..., and his comment to the FBI that he believes he is" on the[ SVR] books,'' the FBI believes that Page remains favorable to future RIS taskings.

Steele 's source characterization statement, reliance on Steele 's reporting, and the information concerning the positions and access of Steele 's sub-sources remained the same as in Renewal Application No. 2. The short description of the FBI 's January 2017 interview with Steele 's Prima Sub-source also remained the same. Renewal Application No. 3 also added

In support of probable cause, the FBI added statements Carter Page made during his first consensually monitored meeting with an FBI CHS in August 2016( summarized in Chapter Ten). These statements included Page 's response to a reference to" the 1980 October Surprise,'' where Page stated that there would be a" different October Surprise'' this year and later stated that" well I want to have the conspiracy theory about the, uh, the Ru- the next email dump with these, uh, 33 thousand, you know.'' In the application, the FBI assessed that these statements, along with other evidence, indicated that Page was aware of the pending leak of DNC emails. As previously described in Chapter Five, none of the applications advised the court of other statements Page made during this meeting, including that he had" literally never met'' Manafort, had" never said one word to him,'' and that Manafort had not responded to any of Carter Page 's emails.

As described in Chapter Five, we found that information about the August 2016 meeting was not included in any of the three prior FISA applications because it was not shared with the 01 Attorney until on or about June 20, 2017, when Case Agent 6 sent the 01 Attorney a 163-page document containing the statements made by Carter Page during the meeting. The 01 Attorney told us that he used the 163-page document to accurately quote Page 's statements concerning the" October Surprise'' in the final renewal application but that the 01 Attorney did not read the other aspects of the document and that the case agent did not flag for him the statements Page made about Manafort. The 01 Attorney told us that these statements, which were available to the FBI before the first application, should have been flagged by the FBI for inclusion in the FISA applications at that time because the statements were relevant to the court 's assessment of the allegations concerning Manafort using Page as an intermediary with Russia. Case Agent 6 told us that he did not know that Page made the statement about Manafort because the August 2016 meeting took place before he was assigned to the investigation. He said that the reason he knew about the" October Surprise'' statements in the document was that he had heard about them from Case Agent 1 and did a word search to find the specific discussion on that topic. Case Agent 6 further told us that he added the" October Surprise'' statements in consultation with the 01 Attorney after the 01 Attorney asked him if there was other information in the case file that would help support probable cause.

Case Agent 1 assisted in the preparation of the first application and told us that he did not recall why he did not include the" October Surprise'' statements in the first application. He told us that he remembered that he thought it was an" odd exchange'' between Page and the CHS at the time, and he said may have thought that it would have been difficult to convey to the court what Page 's words meant.

Similar to the previous applications, Renewal Application No. 3 did not advise the court of information provided to the FBI in August 2016 regarding Carter Page 's relationship with another U.S. government agency and information Page had shared with the other agency about his contacts with Russian intelligence officers, contacts that overlapped with facts asserted in the FISA application. This was so even though the FBI re-engaged with the other U.S. government agency in June 2017, following interviews that Page gave to news outlets in April and May 2017 during which Page stated that he had assisted the USIC in the past. SSA 2, who was to be the affiant for the third renewal and had been the affiant for the first two renewals, told us that he wanted a definitive answer as to whether Page had ever been a source for the other U.S. government agency before the final renewal application because he was concerned that Page could claim that he had been acting on behalf of the U.S. government in engaging with certain Russians. As we describe in Chapter Eight, this led to interactions between the FBI OGC Attorney and a liaison from the other U.S. government agency, who reconfirmed the information that the other agency had provided to the FBI in August 2016 that Page did have a prior relationship with that other agency. However, for reasons we detail in Chapter Eight, that information was not accurately provided to either SSA 2 or 01 by the OGC Attorney and was therefore not included in the third renewal application. 2. Review and Approval Process

As with Renewal Application Nos. 1 and 2, Baker told us he did not review Renewal Application No. 3. Baker told us that he questioned whether it was worthwhile to seek another renewal because Carter Page was no longer using the facilities the FBI was monitoring, and that from a management perspective, an additional renewal was not worth the expenditure of resources. Baker recalled discussions about whether the FISA was still productive and providing any foreign intelligence, but the decision was made to continue with the renewal because there was still an opportunity to obtain foreign intelligence information. Anderson did not recall whether she reviewed the third renewal application, and we found no evidence that anyone else in OGC above the OGC Unit Chief level did so.

On June 21, the 01 Unit Chief sent the 01 Attorney, Case Agent 6, and the OGC Attorney questions after reviewing the draft application. The 01 Unit Chief 's questions focused on whether there were updates to assessments from the prior renewals. On June 22, following email communications with Case Agent 6 to finalize the edits and questions from the 01 Unit Chief, the 01 Attorney emailed the read copy to Evans, Sanz-Rexach, the Deputy Operations Section Chief, and Case Agent 6. The 01 managers and Evans told us that they did not recall their feedback, and Evans said he was not sure whether he reviewed this final application before it was filed.

On June 23, the same day the read copy was submitted to the court, Evans emailed Gauhar the application for ODAG 's review. Unlike the read copy for the three prior Carter Page FISA applications, we found no information indicating that ODAG received and approved the read copy in advance of 01 filing it with the court. With Renewal Application No. 3, it appears NSD followed the more typical practice of submitting the application to ODAG shortly before the DAG approved and signed the final application. 3. Feedback from the FISC, Completion of the Final Renewal Application and Woods Procedures, and FBI Director Certification

On June 28, the 01 Attorney advised Evans, Sanz-Rexach, and Ol 's Deputy Operations Section Chief that, based on the read copy, the judge would approve Renewal Application No. 3. According to the 01 Attorney 's email to his supervisors, the judge" believed there was enough to let us go one more time and he will approve without a hearing.'' The 01 Attorney told the OIG that the words," let us go one more time'' were his words and not the words of the judge. He said that he was not trying to imply that the judge said that the court would not approve another renewal. Before the court 's feedback, the 01 Unit Chief" signed out'' the cert copy of the application and cert memo to the FBI, so that the FBI could complete the Woods Procedures. Emails reflect that a few additional minor edits were made to the cert copy after the read copy was filed and prior to the completion of the Woods Procedures.

Case Agent 7 was a relatively new FBI special agent who was responsible for compiling the supporting documentation into a Woods File and performing the field office database checks on Carter Page and the accuracy review of each fact asserted in the FISA application. Case Agent 7 told us that he had been assigned to assist in the Carter Page investigation sometime in spring 2017. Case Agent 7 was responsible for confirming that the file contained appropriate documentation for the factual assertions in the FISA application. Case Agent 7 told us that when he conducted the factual accuracy review on Renewal Application No. 3, he reviewed every fact to re-verify the accuracy of factual assertions carried over from prior applications and made sure every factual assertion had appropriate documentation in the Woods File. During the Woods process, Case Agent 6 and Case Agent 7, identified some documents that were missing from the Woods File, and added them in order to provide support for the pertinent factual assertions in Renewal Application No. 3. After Case Agent 7 completed the Woods process, he signed the Woods Form and gave the Woods Form and Woods File to SSA 5, who was Case Agent 7 's supervisor in NYFO. SSA 5 told us he made sure every factual assertion in the application had a supporting document in the Woods File. SSA 5 signed the Woods Form on June 27, affirming the verification and documentation of each factual assertion in the application, and then sent the FISA application package containing the Woods Form, cert copy, and cert memo to the Headquarters Program Manager assigned the responsibility of signing the final application, as the affiant, under oath that the factual information was true and correct.

As with the prior renewal applications, the Headquarters Program Manager assigned as the affiant for the final renewal application was SSA 2. SSA 2 told us that he believed he reviewed the newly added information in the renewal. In addition, SSA 2 said that as the affiant, it was his practice to review the Woods form to make sure it was completed by the case agent and an SSA before signing off on the application and submitting it to an OGC attorney( as described in Chapter Two, the Woods Procedures did not require the affiant to review the Woods File, only the case agent and his or her supervisor). SSA 2 told us that he believed everything in the application was true and correct. SSA 2 signed the affidavit affirming under penalty of perjury that the information in the package was true and correct. He then submitted the FISA application package to the OGC Attorney for legal review.

The OGC Attorney, who had participated in the drafting process and was familiar with the content of the application, told us that he reviewed the Woods Form with the Headquarters Program Manager. After the OGC Attorney confirmed that all of the Woods Procedures had been completed, he signed the cert memo below the OI Unit Chief 's signature and submitted the package to OGC Unit Chief 2 who was assigned to perform the supervisory legal review.

OGC Unit Chief 2 told us that he could not recall whether he read Renewal Application No. 3 in its entirety or just the probable cause portion. He said that his general practice is to rely upon the cert memo 's description, and if something" triggers'' his inclination to go further, he will read some or all of the application. OGC Unit Chief 2 told us that he was sure he reviewed the cert memo and Woods Form and, based on those documents, determined that the application package was complete, all the steps of the Woods Procedures were represented to have been taken, the probable cause standard was met, and there were no outstanding issues. He then signed the cert memo, signifying that the application was ready for certification and for submission to the FBI Director.

Then Acting Director McCabe signed Renewal Application No. 3 on June 28, certifying that the information sought was foreign intelligence information that could not reasonably be obtained by normal investigative techniques and was necessary to protect the United States against clandestine intelligence activities. McCabe told us that he did not recall whether he reviewed the entire FISA application package or whether he relied primarily upon the cert memo and his familiarity with the Carter Page investigation before he made the required certification. He told us that he understood at the time he signed the application that the FBI, Department, and FISC were comfortable with the application such that it was not" a great stretch'' for him to sign the certification.

4. DAG Oral Briefing and Approval

On April 26, 2017, Rod Rosenstein was confirmed as the Deputy Attorney General. Gauhar remained the Associate Deputy Attorney General( ADAG) responsible for ODAG 's national security portfolio and told us that she worked primarily with Crowell to complete the ODAG review of Renewal Application No. 3. Crowell told us he read the application but relied on Gauhar and NSD to advise Rosenstein on this application.

Shortly after he was sworn in as DAG, Rosenstein received briefings about the Crossfire Hurricane investigation. Rosenstein told us that, as a result, he was more familiar with the facts of the case than is typical for FISA applications. Rosenstein received a copy of the application in advance of NSD 's oral briefing, and told us he" would have looked through it.'' Although he could not recall whether he reviewed the application in its entirety, he recalled reading enough to understand the substance of the allegations involved.

Rosenstein told us that he had reviewed FISA applications almost every day after his confirmation, and he believed Renewal Application No. 3 was" above average'' in terms of the justification for the continued coverage in the renewal. He said that he was in a different position than those who considered the previous applications because by the time he received the application, many different Department officials had approved the prior ones and three different federal judges had found probable cause. He also said he had a conversation with Boente about the application in which Boente expressed the view that a DAG should not refuse to sign a FISA application that establishes probable cause, and when there is a legitimate basis for conducting the investigation, just because it could end up becoming" politically embarrassing'' at some later point. Further, Rosenstein told us that he did not view the application as being" particularly sensitive'' when he received it in June 2017 because at that time the campaign was over, and Carter Page did not have any connection to the Trump Administration.

On June 29, Ol 's Deputy Operations Section Chief provided a briefing on the June renewal application to Rosenstein, and, according to Gauhar, Rosenstein brought his copy of Renewal Application No. 3 to the briefing. Gauhar and the Deputy Operations Section Chief did not recall any significant questions during the briefing about the renewal. However, Rosenstein told us that he recalled raising a question( at this briefing or immediately before it) about whether continued FISA coverage was going to produce useful information given that the FISA coverage targeting Carter Page had been leaked to the media. He said that he remembered being told that this renewal would likely be the last one unless new evidence was uncovered. On June 29, Rosenstein signed the application, and the application was submitted to the FISC the same day. By his signature, and as stated in the application, Rosenstein found that the application satisfied the criteria and requirements of the FISA and approved its filing with the court.

s. Final Orders

The final FISA application included proposed orders, which were signed by FISC Judge Raymond J. Dearie, on June 29, 2017. According to NSD, the judge signed the final orders, as proposed by the government in their entirety, without holding a hearing.

The primary order and warrant stated that the court found, based upon the facts submitted in the verified application, that there was probable cause to believe that Russia is a foreign power and that Carter Page was an agent of Russia under 50 U.S.C. § 1801 b E. The court also found that, court authorized the requested electronic surveillance for 90 days and necessary to effectuate the electronic surveillance authorized by the court.

Approximately 1 year after this final FISA application, in July 2018, NSD submitted a letter to the FISC, advising the court of certain factual omissions in the Carter Page FISA applications that came to NSD 's attention after the last renewal application was filed. In the next chapter we describe this compliance letter to the FISC and the omissions detailed in it, as well as other instances, not known to NSD at the time but identified by the OIG during this review, in which factual assertions relied upon in the three Carter Page renewal applications were inaccurate, incomplete, or unsupported by appropriate documentation, based upon information in the FBl 's possession at the time the applications were filed.
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