From Substack reader C. M. Cobb:

“Looks like the White House servers were not hacked but rather Joffe was given access. By whom? I think that person plus the receiver of the info should be worried.”

This just happens to be what we were planning on addressing next — the “sensitive arrangement” that enabled Rodney Joffe, former Senior Vice President of Neustar, to infiltrate the White House computer servers.

(Note: speaking of Neustar, it was acquired in December, 2021, by TransUnion for $3.1 billion. No small potatoes.)

“A Sensitive Arrangement”

Take a look at the wording of Durham’s report: Joffe “had come to access and maintain dedicated servers for the EOP [Executive Office of the President] as part of a sensitive arrangement whereby it provided DNS [domain name system] resolution services to the EOP.” They “exploited this arrangement by mining the EOP’s DNS traffic and other data for the purpose of gathering derogatory information about President Trump.”

This is what spies do. To do it, they either have to have inside help or else successfully compromise someone, likely through some combination of blackmail and/or threats. In other words, the “sensitive arrangement” might have been a matter of friendly cooperation within an anti-Trump cabal, or possibly was “an offer you can’t refuse.” How Joffe managed to achieve this very underhanded “sensitive arrangement” is no doubt under investigation.

The CIA was also involved. As Jerry Dunleavy reported this weekend for the Washington Examiner, “Durham said Friday that Sussmann, at a meeting in February, 2017, [EDITORIAL NOTE: AFTER TRUMP WAS IN THE WHITE HOUSE] ‘provided an updated set of allegations — including the Russian Bank – 1 data and additional allegations relating to Trump’ to another U.S. government agency dubbed ‘Agency – 2,’ which is reportedly the CIA.”

During his CIA meeting, Sussmann allegedly “provided data which he claimed reflected purportedly suspicious DNS lookups by these entities of internet protocol addresses affiliated with a Russian mobile phone provider,” claiming that this showed “Trump and/or his associates” were using “rare, Russian-made wireless phones in the vicinity of the White House and other locations.” Durham said this claim was “highly misleading or outright false” and explained why.

According to Durham, the so-called “sensitive arrangement” with Joffe started in July of 2016. (Crossfire Hurricane was opened at the end of July.) Kash Patel, lead investigator for Devin Nunes’ House Intelligence Committee, did use the word “hack” to describe what was done: “Per the pleading, the government will also show that Joffe, at the direction of Sussmann/Elias and the Clinton campaign, exploited proprietary data, to hack Trump Tower and the Eisenhower Executive Office Building (EEOB), which Sussmann later relayed to U.S. agencies in the hopes of having them launch investigations of President Trump.”

Who Encouraged Espionage?

As Tucker Carlson reported Monday, Joffe, a pro-Hillary activist from South Africa who assembled a team of cyber researchers from Georgia Tech, said in emails that he wanted Hillary to win because she “had promised him a job as a top cybersecurity officer in the U.S. government.” Durham said Joffe “tasked those researchers to mine Internet data to establish ‘an inference’ and ‘narrative’ tying then-candidate Trump to Russia.”

Here’s a link to Tucker’s monologue, worthwhile especially for the clip between Trump and Hillary during their 2016 debate. In a way that seems ridiculous in light of current revelations, she plays it to the hilt:

It’s pretty clear…that you encouraged espionage against our people, that you are willing to spout the Putin line, sign up for his wish list, break up NATO, do whatever he wants you to do, and that you continue to get help from him because he has a very clear favorite in this race.

Brother. Let’s see, who was it who “encouraged espionage?” Hint: not Trump. And it’s hard to imagine this real espionage wasn’t done without the knowledge and direction of Hillary Clinton. Here she was talking about the so-called espionage against the DNC, the “hacking” of their servers, but we know even that was made up. There’s still no evidence Russia did that.

Uncovering the Scope and Depravity of the Operation

As politicized as the intel community is, two recent appointees as Director of National Intelligence were definitely not part of the swamp: Ric Grenell and John Ratcliffe. Ratcliffe says there’s “enough evidence” to bring charges against “quite a few” people associated with the origin of the bogus Trump-Russia investigation. Ratcliffe himself even informed Durham that Clinton’s lawyers might have hacked Trump’s servers to fabricate a story that distracted from her own email scandal. And Obama and Biden both knew, Ratcliffe told FOX News’ Bill Hemmer on Monday, because then-CIA Director John Brennan briefed them on it.

An update from FOX News is consistent, saying more people are cooperating and going before Durham’s grand jury than has previously been reported.

Lee Smith, author of The Plot Against the President, also appeared on Tucker’s show, saying,

…The idea that the Oval Office and other important offices in the White House were under surveillance by political operatives is extraordinary. It’s shocking — and I’m talking to people who were investigating this on the Hill for several years, and they’re shocked.

We’re finally starting to understand the scope and depravity of this operation, he said, and “it’s terrible for the country.”

So, what was the impetus for Durham’s filing last Friday? He was asking the presiding judge to inquire into potential conflicts of interest arising from Sussmann’s representation by the law firm Latham & Watkins, as these could be relevant at trial. Latham has previously represented both Sussmann and Perkins Coie over issues Durham said might become relevant, and also “maintained professional and/or personal relationships with individuals who could be witnesses in these proceedings.” (Sussmann has reportedly waived any concern.) More on this law firm to come.

“The Tip of the Iceberg”

Finally, Margot Cleveland at The Federalist has perhaps the definitive breakdown — for now — of what Durham might have in store for those guilty of a spying and frame-up operation against Trump. Again, John Ratcliffe and Ric Grenell, both former Directors of National Intelligence, knew what the Democrats were up to and apparently helped point Durham in the right direction. Grenell tweeted that “some Democrats knew” about the plan for Joffe to monitor Trump’s White House Internet and “let it go.”

Ratcliffe announced in October, after Sussmann was indicted, that he’d provided Durham with almost 1,000 pages of materials. He said then that Sussmann’s indictment was “the tip of the iceberg.”

Other than the New York Post and some conservative sites (like this one!), hardly anyone is covering what Rep. Elise Stefanik calls “the biggest criminal political corruption story of our lifetime.” (We’d love to be flies on the wall during their editorial meetings!) Asked about this, K. T. McFarland said that “it’s because all the other media was in on the con…They don’t want to have to be called before a grand jury and have to say where they got the fake story and why they continue to peddle it.”

We did find a report from NBC, downplaying the story’s significance and ending with a hilarious statement from Joffe’s spokesperson, calling him “apolitical.”

Better: The Daily Caller tells it without the unintentional humor.

Mike Huckabee is the former governor of Arkansas and longtime conservative commentator on issues in culture and current events. A New York Times best-selling author, he hosts the weekly talk show Huckabee on TBN. 

Originally published at MikeHuckabee.com. Reprinted with permission.