Auten, Danchenko and the Investigation of the 2016 U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee Report on the Case of a High-Relevance Witness
The dynamic was not normal because it was the first witness. And at times, while Durham personally questioned the witness, he strayed from the narrow case against Danchenko and focused more on the FBI’s mistakes in 2016 as it investigated then-candidate Donald Trump.
Later, Durham tried to get Auten to agree that the FBI was more alarmed about Papadopoulos’ ties to the Middle East than his ties to Russia. Auten wouldn’t go there and called it a “both/and” situation. The spat did not have anything to do with the false statements.
Auten was recommended for suspension by the FBI internal auditors, it was brought up by Durham. The recommendation is under appeal, according to Auten. The prosecutor seemed to have impeached his own witnesses by bringing up their past misdeeds as a way to attack their credibility.
The situation changed when Auten was cross-examined by the defense. The previous testimony of Auten to the Justice Department inspector general and to the Senate Judiciary Committee was one of the things that the lawyers for Danchenko highlighted.
Danchenko’s defense attorney, Danny Onorato, asked Auten in court on Wednesday if that was still his belief today, and Auten answered in the affirmative, adding, “I stand by my testimony.”
The defense elicited testimony indicating that Durham cherry-tacked material from a memo written by Auten, when there wasculpatory information on the next page.
After Onorato was over, Durham went back for a last round of questioning. Durham and Auten sparred for over an hour. Durham sounded angry at times, and many of Auten’s responses were not in line with his narrative.
Durham said that he was going to be suspended because he wouldn’t admit his involvement in the Foreign Intelligence surveillance Act.
A Study of John Durham, the Special Counsel Investigating Donald Trump’s 2016 Campaign, and a Report on the Report to the Attorney General Merrick Garland
The special counsel then rebuked Auten for saying earlier that George Papadopoulos was a “high-level adviser” to Trump’s 2016 campaign. The model UN experience that Papadopoulos used on his resume was accurate, as he was just 28 years old at the time.
“Did you guys even bother to go look at the phone records?” Durham mentioned the records of one of Danchenko’s possible sources. “Did you guys even bother to look at the travel records?”
The FBI was prepared to accept Steele’s claims and include them in the warrant applications, according to Durham. The trial has shown that the FBI recycled Steele’s material, even though their efforts to corroborate his work fell flat.
CNN has reported that Durham’s investigation is now in its final stages as his team finishes up its written report, which will be sent to Attorney General Merrick Garland. The attorney general and other top Justice Department officials will make a decision on how much of the report is public. Garland has previously said he wants to release “as much as possible.”
John Durham, the special counsel investigating potential misconduct in the Trump-Russia probe, has spent nearly $6.5 million on his inquiry, including $2 million this year, according to financial documents released Friday by the Justice Department.
The spending this year was over $1 million for salaries and benefits. The documents show that Durham’s office also spent more than $220,000 on travel, more than $600,000 on contractual services such as IT support, and more than $100,000 on rent.