Enigma Surrounding Missing Binder: How, under Trump, a compilation of unfiltered Russian intelligence vanished

Enigma Surrounding Missing Binder:1st unfiltered Russian intelligence vanished

The enigma surrounding the missing binder How, under Trump, a compilation of unfiltered Russian intelligence vanished

 

 At the end of Donald Trump’s presidency, a binder containing highly classified material about Russian election meddling vanished, alarming intelligence officials that some of the most closely guarded national security secrets from the US and its allies might be compromised, sources familiar with the situation told CNN.

According to the sources, intelligence officials briefed Senate Intelligence Committee leaders last year about the missing materials and the government’s efforts to retrieve them because of the disappearance, which has not been previously reported.

It doesn’t seem like the missing intelligence has been discovered in the more than two years since Trump left office.

Within the binder was sources tell CNN that the US government’s assessment that Russian President Vladimir Putin attempted to help Trump win the 2016 election was based on raw intelligence that the US and its NATO allies gathered on Russians and Russian agents, including sources and methods.

The intelligence was so sensitive that only CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia, where lawmakers and congressional aides with top secret security clearances could review it, could examine it themselves in a locked safe.

During the latter days of Trump’s presidency, the binder was last observed at the White House.

In order to declassify a number of records pertaining to the FBI’s Russia investigation, the former president had ordered its delivery to that location. In the custody of the former White House chief of

Republican aides searched through the binder belonging to staff Mark Meadows, trying to redact the most private information so it could be declassified and made available to the public.

The binder, which was described as being 10 inches thick and holding reams of documents about the FBI’s “Crossfire Hurricane” investigation into the 2016 Trump campaign and Russia, included only a small portion of material related to Russian intelligence.

However, the most sensitive classified materials were the raw intelligence on Russia, and senior officials in the Trump administration made repeated attempts to prevent the former president from making the documents public.

A flurry of activity occurred in the last 48 hours of Trump’s presidency after he issued an order declassifying most of the binder’s contents the day before he left office.

 

Enigma Surrounding Missing Binder:1st unfiltered Russian intelligence vanished

Several copies of the redacted binder were produced inside the White House with the intention of distributing them to right-wing media outlets and Republicans in Congress throughout Washington.

Rather, copies that had been sent out at first were hastily retrieved because White House lawyers insisted on more redactions.

Meadows hurried to the Justice Department to hand-deliver a redacted copy for a final review just minutes before Joe Biden took office.

Despite Trump’s declassification order, the Justice Department has not yet made all of the documents public years later. More copies that were redacted to differing degrees ended up at the National Archives.

However, a copy of the binder containing the raw, classified intelligence went missing uncensored in the hectic final hours of the Trump administration.

The reasons behind its disappearance are still unknown in obscurity.

US officials have consistently refused to confirm that any intelligence was missing or to discuss government efforts to find the binder.

The US official familiar with the matter claims that the FBI did not specifically seek out Russian intelligence when it obtained a search warrant for the former president’s home last year, and that the binder was not one of the classified items discovered during the search of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort.

The indictment of Trump in June for the improper handling of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago makes no mention of the binder or the missing Russian intelligence.

Regarding the whereabouts of the binder, one theory has surfaced.

 

One of Meadows’ closest aides, Cassidy Hutchinson, testified before Congress and stated in her memoir that she

feels Meadows brought a copy of the binder home that hasn’t been edited. She claimed to have seen Meadows take it from the White House and that it had been kept in his safe.

According to transcripts made public last year, Hutchinson told the January 6 committee in closed-door testimony, “I am almost positive it went home with Mr. Meadows.”

However, Meadows’ attorney vehemently refutes any allegation that Meadows mismanaged any classified material while working at the White House, calling the notion that Meadows was accountable for any missing classified material “flat wrong.”

The requirements for handling classified material were something Mr. Meadows was well aware of and followed; any such material he handled or had in his possession was handled appropriately, and any indication that he is 

accountable for any misplaced binder or other classified material is blatantly incorrect,” Meadows’ counsel George Terwilliger told CNN in a statement.

Enigma Surrounding Missing Binder:1st unfiltered Russian intelligence vanished

“Anyone or any organization claiming that he is accountable for anything that has vanished lacks evidence and ought to proceed with extreme caution before leveling unfounded accusations.”

Trump’s allies have been pursuing the redacted binder in the years since he left office in order to make it publicly available.

Earlier this year, they filed lawsuits against the National Archives and the Justice Department. In addition, as they get ready to defend Trump against allegations arising from attempts to rig the 2020 election, his attorneys are now requesting access to the classified intelligence from the 2016 election assessment.

This narrative details the classified binder’s trip to the White House and the course of its investigation.

Cold after Trump took office, and the unanswered questions it raises are based on interviews with over a dozen people who are knowledgeable about the situation and who all asked to remain anonymous in order to talk about the delicate subject.

For this story, representatives from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, the National Archives, the FBI, and the CIA declined to comment. The Senate Intelligence Committee’s spokesperson opted not to comment.

Hutchinson’s attorney also declined to comment. A request for comment from a Trump spokesperson was not answered.

At the CIA, “a safe within a safe”

 

One of the most divisive battles then-President Trump fought behind the scenes has its roots in the missing binder.

Trump spent years in office despite strong opposition from his own national security officials attempting to have information about the FBI’s Russia investigation into his campaign declassified, which he claimed would support his allegations.

The history of the binder begins in 2018, when Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee, under the direction of Chairman Devin Nunes, put together a classified report in which they claimed that the Obama administration had falsified evidence to support their assessment that Putin had assisted Trump in the 2016 election.

This highly classified intelligence from 2016 was examined by the GOP report, which questioned the intelligence community’s “tradecraft” and concluded that Putin and Russia were trying to help Trump’s campaign.

In exchange for the committee bringing in a safe for its documents, which was subsequently placed inside a CIA vault, House Republicans struck a deal with the agency.

This arrangement prompted some officials to refer to it as a “safe within a safe” or a “turducken.”

Democratic and Republican sources diverged on the report’s main points.

The report argued that senior Obama administration officials skewed the intelligence community assessment to exclude intelligence indicating that Russia actually wanted Hillary Clinton to win in 2016 while overemphasizing the significance of intelligence indicating that Russia preferred Trump, according to GOP sources familiar with its details.

On the other hand, Democratic sources claim the Republican accusations were exaggerated.

According to one source, the intelligence cited in the report demonstrated that Russia was actively trying to influence Trump and win the election, which was the exact opposite of what Republicans were saying.

In 2020, the Democratic perspective was supported by the undermining Nunes’ claims, the Republican-led Senate Intelligence Committee declared that the 2016 assessment was a “sound intelligence product” and that analysts were not subject to political pressure to draw particular conclusions.

After leaving Congress to take the helm of Trump’s media empire, Nunes issued a statement in response to inquiries ridiculing CNN for emphasizing “secret Trump binders.”

Leaders in national security oppose the release of numerous documents related to the Russia investigation by Trump and his allies, including the 2018 report by Nunez.

However, fearing the exposure of sources and techniques, Trump’s national security advisors, chief among them CIA Director Gina Haspel, fiercely opposed the report’s and other Russia documents’ public release.

Haspel carried the disagreement with her throughout the Trump administration.

Trump revealed in private that he desired to obtain the GOP report. A person familiar with the conversation claims that during one exchange in October 2020, Trump recommended that he personally visit the CIA headquarters and demand access to it.

Ahead of the 2020 election, a few FBI and Russian-related documents and intelligence were declassified by acting Director of National Intelligence Richard Grenell and his successor, John Ratcliffe, both Trump administration intelligence officials. However, the House GOP report was kept under wraps.

After the election, as he pushed for the release of additional information regarding the Russia investigation, Trump thought about firing Haspel.

Enigma Surrounding Missing Binder:1st unfiltered Russian intelligence vanished

When the GOP report was being drafted in 2018, at least one Trump aide suggested Kash Patel, a former Nunes aide, to take Haspel’s place.

2019 saw Patel travel to serve on Trump’s National Security Council before taking over as acting defense secretary’s chief of staff in the latter months of his presidency.

According to people familiar with the situation, in December 2020, Ratcliffe and then-Attorney General William Barr collaborated to convince Trump against declassifying at least some of the intelligence pertaining to Russia, claiming that doing so would jeopardize national security.

Other current and former officials claim that after Barr left office, he and his office’s aides persisted in pressuring the FBI and other intelligence agencies to comply with Trump’s demands and release additional information.

Haspel, FBI Director Christopher Wray, and NSA Director Gen. Paul Nakasone once made the hurried trip to Capitol Hill to address congressional intelligence chiefs about their serious worries that Trump might make the information public, according to sources.

Enigmas reach the White House

Hutchinson testified before Congress on December 19, four days after Barr announced his resignation, Nunes met with Meadows at the White House to talk about declassifying records pertaining to the FBI’s investigation into the Trump campaign and Russia.

Sources claim that a copy of the GOP report was delivered to the White House eleven days later, along with a large binder full of documents about Russia and the FBI investigation.

When they arrived at the White House, Hutchinson told the committee on January 6 that she had signed the documents.

In the days that followed, Meadows spoke with then about the documents.-White House Counsel Pat hutchinson reported that Cipollini and Republican staffers from the House Intelligence Committee also met to review them.

According to Meadows’ book, which details his tenure as Trump’s chief of staff, Trump insisted on having the documents delivered to the White House.

“I reviewed each page personally to ensure that the President’s declassification would not unintentionally reveal sources and procedures,” he wrote.

The infamous dossier on Trump and Russia was written by Christopher Steele; the FBI had questionable foreign intelligence surveillance warrants on a Trump campaign adviser from 2017; FBI reports from a confidential human.

Source regarding the Russia investigation; and internal text messages from the FBI and DOJ were included in the binder along with the GOP report examining the intelligence on Russia and emails, in addition to other records.

She testified that Meadows kept the version of the binder Hutchinson signed in her office safe, with the exception of times when congressional staffers worked on it.

“He desired to hold onto that one tightly. According to Hutchinson, he didn’t want the January 6 committee to know about that particular incident.

I simply am aware, Mr. Meadows. I don’t think he knows how to operate a copy machine, but he wouldn’t have had that one copied unless he did it himself.

Hutchinson wrote about an incident in her book where Meadows asked her to get the binder and got upset when she told him it was in the safe.

“I instructed you to keep it in your line of sight. It ought to have been in the drawer in your desk,” Meadows informed her.

Enigma Surrounding Missing Binder:1st unfiltered Russian intelligence vanished

“Mark, this is not the place for classified documents in my desk drawer. It was kept in the lockbox. She said, “You have nothing to worry about,” according to Hutchinson.

More copies of the binder were produced at the White House after the committee assistants finished their suggested redactions, allowing it to be declassified and made public.

A disastrous launch
Top FBI officials, meanwhile, were working feverishly to safeguard the most critical information and minimize the harm caused by what they perceived to be insufficient redactions.

“Any additional declassification would expose sensitive methods of gathering intelligence, harm relationships with foreign partners, imperil the interests of the US Intelligence Community, and possibly violate court orders restricting the release of FISA data. (and) jeopardize sensitive human sources,” a senior FBI official penned to

Permitted to take the declassified records in a paper bag out of the White House.

Solomon’s lawyers stated in a court document last month that “Mr. Solomon’s staff began setting up a scanning operation for the complete set of documents to be released the next morning.”

“However, while they were setting up the equipment, a call came through from the White House requesting that the documents, which were still under embargo, be returned.

This was because the White House wanted to apply the Privacy Act to some additional redactions to unclassified information.”

According to Hutchinson’s book, on January 19, after 10:30 p.m., Cipollone instructed her to have Meadows get the binders that Solomon and a conservative columnist had received.

“The Hurricane binders from Crossfire are a total bust. They’re still containing a lot of sensitive data. According to Hutchinson, Cipollone informed her.

“The White House needs those binders returned.” As in, right now.”

According to Hutchinson, the documents were picked up by a Secret Service agent in a Whole Foods grocery bag and returned the following morning, on January 20.

“How soon can we deliver this to the DOJ?”

Meadows hurried to the Justice Department early on January 20, the last day of the Trump administration, to turn over a copy of the binder that Trump had ordered declassified for a last examination.

Hutchinson informed the committee that, at some point that morning, between 11 and 11:30 a.m., Meadows hurriedly left the White House to bring a copy of the binder to Department of Justice.

Hutchinson remembered Meadows asking, “How quickly can we get this to DOJ?” to his security detail.

In addition, Meadows presented a memo directing the Justice Department to review the majority of the declassified documents Trump had released for privacy purposes.

Enigma Surrounding Missing Binder:1st unfiltered Russian intelligence vanished

With the instruction that the Department expeditiously conduct a Privacy Act review under the standards that the Department of Justice would normally apply, redact material appropriately, and release the remaining material with redactions applied, Meadows wrote in the memo, “I am returning the bulk of the binder of declassified documents to the Department of Justice (including all that appear to have a potential to raise privacy concerns.”

In a court document, Solomon’s attorneys claim that Meadows “promised Mr. Solomon that the updated binder would be sent to him. But this never happened.

In her book, Hutchinson describes seeing Meadows enter his limo on January 19 with the “original Crossfire Hurricane binder tucked under his arm.”

This is in reference to the unredacted version of the binder.

“How in the hell is Mark handling the Crossfire Hurricane binder that hasn’t been redacted?” Hutchinson remembered wondering as Meadows sped off.

Hutchinson said that Meadows’ safe was gone when she took one last look inside it before leaving the White House.

Hutchinson told the January 6 committee, “I don’t think that would have been something that he would have destroyed.” It never left our office to travel internally, and it was never returned. It persisted most of the time in the office safe or in our safe.

Hutchinson’s story is disputed by Meadows’ lawyer Terwilliger, who claims that Meadows did not improperly handle any classified documents while working at the White House.

The search goes on.

There were several fronts in which the search for the binder persisted even after Trump left office.

Senate Intelligence Committee leaders were briefed by intelligence officials about the government’s efforts to retrieve the unredacted version of the binder containing raw Russian intelligence, sources told CNN, approximately a year after Trump left office.

Simultaneously, the declassified version of the binder that Meadows had brought to the Justice Department was being sought after by Trump’s allies.

Trump designated Patel and Solomon as his representatives to the National Archives, who had access rights to the records of the former president.

Email exchanges between Solomon and Patel that were included in their lawsuit demonstrated how they attempted to obtain access to the binder as soon as they were designated as Trump’s delegates.

In the final days of his presidency, the President issued an order declassifying a binder containing records related to the Russia investigation.

It’s roughly ten inches thick,” Solomon wrote to Gary Stern, general counsel of the Archives, in June 2022. “Every document that was declassified by his order and included in the binder should be duplicated, either digitally or on paper.”

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