Guardian: FBI Asked For Warrant to Monitor Trump Aides

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We now know that the FBI considered the evidence of ties between Russia and the Trump team to be credible enough to investigate. Julian Borger reports on where this led:

The Guardian has learned that the FBI applied for a warrant from the foreign intelligence surveillance (Fisa) court over the summer in order to monitor four members of the Trump team suspected of irregular contacts with Russian officials. The Fisa court turned down the application asking FBI counter-intelligence investigators to narrow its focus. According to one report, the FBI was finally granted a warrant in October, but that has not been confirmed, and it is not clear whether any warrant led to a full investigation.

The Twitter reaction to this has mostly been: Oh, so now the FISA court finally turns down a warrant request. Yeesh.

And sure, this is sort of ironic considering the FISA court’s 99 percent rate of approving warrants. But there’s also a serious point to be made here. This was a warrant targeting four specific people, so the court treated it like a normal warrant. That meant rejecting it if it didn’t provide enough evidence to form probable cause. However, when a warrant is broad-based and applies to thousands or millions of people, the FISA court seems to adopt an entirely different standard. Just demonstrate a vague national security need and you’re good to go.

That’s the irony. The more people that are targeted in a warrant, the less seriously the FISA court seems to take it.

And while we’re on the topic of Trump and Russia, it’s worth pointing out that the original reporting of the dossier on Russian ties to Trump noted that there were some errors in it. Since then, we’ve learned of at least one more error. That’s perfectly normal. This is very, very raw human intelligence, and even if it comes from a reliable source it wouldn’t be surprising if two-thirds of it was wrong. That’s why raw intel is never released publicly. The job of the intelligence community is to figure out which third of it—if any—is right, and then to pursue it further.

So don’t worry about the fact that several parts of the report have been debunked and more will be in the future. What we’re waiting for is to find out if any parts of the report are true. It’s probably going to be a good long time before we know that for sure.

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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