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--:-- John Bickley: This episode is brought to you by LifeLock. Between two-factor authentication, strong passwords, and a VPN, you try to be in control of how your info is protected. But many other places also have it, and they might not be as careful. That's why LifeLock monitors hundreds of millions of data points a second for threats. If your identity is stolen, they'll fix it. Guaranteed or your money back. Save up to 40% your first year. Visit LifeLock.com slash podcast for 40% off. Terms apply.
--:-- John Bickley: New information from federal investigators alleges that Hillary Clinton campaign operatives illegally spied on President Trump in an attempt to prove Russian collusion. What we've learned is that there were spying operations going on both to the Trump campaign and then when President Trump became president, they continued to spy on him at the executive office of president. As federal charges are announced, we'll talk about who's behind the alleged spying operation and how President Trump is responding to the revelations. I'm John Bickley with Georgia Howe. It's Monday, February 14th. That's right, Valentine's Day. And this is Morning Wire.
--:-- John Bickley: For more than two weeks now, the Freedom Convoy has been protesting social restrictions and vaccine mandates in Canada. We speak to one of the organizers of the massive protest about why thousands are pushing back against Justin Trudeau's government. And as U.S. officials sound the alarm over what they say is an imminent Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Nord Stream 2 pipeline takes on increased significance. We'll discuss the crucial role the pipeline plays in the conflict. Thanks for waking up at Morning Wire. Stay tuned. We have the news you need to know.
--:-- John Bickley: This show is sponsored by Naturally It's Clean. When it comes to cleaning your home, you want a cleaning product that is safe, effective, and affordable. Naturally It's Clean provides the most effective hospital-grade cleaning products for your home while reducing the use of harmful chemicals. They're secret, powerful plant-based enzymes, nature's solution to cleaning. Today, you can receive 15% off your essential four-pack at naturallyitsclean.com slash morningwire when you use the promo code WIRE. That's naturallyitsclean.com promo code WIRE.
--:-- John Bickley: New documents from the federal government shine more light on the origins of the discredited Russia collusion narrative. Investigators now say operatives paid by the Clinton campaign illegally spied on President Trump in an attempt to gather derogatory information. Now, one of those alleged operatives is facing federal charges. Here with more is Daily Wire's Cabot Phillips. So, Cabot, there's a lot to go through here, and some of it's potentially explosive.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Yeah, it is. First, give us some background. So throughout his presidency, Donald Trump insisted that the Russian collusion narrative was a hoax and that he was illegally spied on by operatives paid by the Clinton campaign. And it now appears the federal government agrees with that assessment.
--:-- John Bickley: These latest developments stem from a meeting that a lawyer named Michael Sussman had with the FBI back in 2016, just two months before Election Day. It was here that he presented supposed evidence tying Donald Trump and his campaign to a Kremlin-linked bank. Saying Trump had created a, quote, covert communications channel with Russia.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Now, during that meeting, the FBI asked Sussman if he was presenting the supposed evidence on behalf of a client, obviously to make sure there weren't conflicts of interest, and Sussman said he was not. Well, according to the charges, that was a lie. He was presenting the information on behalf of two clients, and one of those clients was the Hillary Clinton campaign.
--:-- John Bickley: So Durham says that this so evidence of collusion was being provided by a Clinton campaign operative who then lied about his connections with the campaign Exactly yeah And now Durham says he was working with cyber researchers and employees from multiple internet companies including an influential tech executive to compile this supposed evidence
--:-- Cabot Phillips: All right, so he's working with a tech executive. What do we know about this individual? So we don't know the name yet. Federal documents so far just refer to them as Tech Executive One. But the FBI is alleging that Sussman worked with this executive to obtain internet data from Trump in some sketchy ways.
--:-- John Bickley: These documents are pretty explosive. According to the filing, and I'm quoting here, Tech Executive One exploited his access to non-public and or proprietary internet data and, quote, also enlisted the assistance of researchers at a U.S.-based university who were receiving and analyzing large amounts of internet data as part of a government contract.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: The special counsel alleges that this tech executive, and again, quoting, tasked these researchers to mine internet data to establish an inference and narrative tying then-candidate Trump to Russia in hopes of, quote, pleasing certain VIPs, including the Clinton campaign.
--:-- John Bickley: So they basically wanted to dig up dirt on Trump to make it look like he was working with Russia. It's exactly what they were doing. And how did they go about doing that? Well, here's where it gets even shadier. According to Special Counsel Durham, they, quote, infiltrated data from Trump Tower and Trump's private residence during the campaign.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: But even more shockingly, according to the DOJ, after the campaign, the filing alleges they hacked into the executive office of the president. In other words, the White House. So accessing data from the White House.
--:-- John Bickley: Well, how so? Well, the tech executives company had a contract with the White House and housed all of their data on exclusive servers. They then allegedly used that position to compromise the servers and comb the private data to, quote, with the purpose of gathering derogatory information about Donald Trump.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: The supposed information found on these White House servers was then shared with Clinton's lawyer, Sussman, who then allegedly presented it to a separate government agency in 2017. But according to federal investigators, they found, quote, no support for allegations of Russian collusion from within that data.
--:-- John Bickley: Wow. So not surprisingly, President Trump has responded to these new developments over the weekend. Tell us about that.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Yeah, he views these latest developments as even more vindication for what he's been claiming all along, that he never colluded with Russia and that he was illegally spied on. He issued a statement saying the scandal was worse than Watergate and, quote, provides indisputable evidence that my campaign and presidency were spied on by operatives paid by the Hillary Clinton campaign in an effort to develop a completely fabricated connection to Russia.
--:-- John Bickley: He later called for criminal charges against everyone involved. And as things currently stand, there's a good chance that those do end up happening. Yeah, well, we'll see what happens with these serious charges and what moves the DOJ makes next.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Cabot, thanks for the reporting.
--:-- John Bickley: Anytime. That's Daily Wire's Cabot Phillips.
--:-- John Bickley: Coming up, we talk to one of the organizers of the Freedom Convoy. This show is sponsored by Tessa Mays. Looking for a great way to bring amazing flavor to your meals? Tessa Mays is the number one organic salad dressing company in the country because they put quality and flavor above all else. Founded by three brothers with their mom's recipe, Tessa Mays has changed the standard for great tasting healthy dressings. Go to TessaMays.com. That's T-E-S-S-E-M-A-E-S.com and use promo code WIRE to check out all of their amazing products and join the Tessa Mays family today. Use promo code WIRE to get 20% off your purchase.
--:-- John Bickley: Despite threats of military intervention and banks freezing their donation accounts, a massive group of Canadian truckers is continuing to protest COVID restrictions. Known as the Freedom Convoy the truckers have been camped out on Parliament Hill in Ottawa for more than two weeks The group is now sparking copycat demonstrations in other countries like France New Zealand and the U Daily Wire reporter Megan Basham spoke with one of the convoy's volunteer leaders, David Paisley, about what's happening on the ground and what demands they have for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
--:-- Megan Basham: So, Megan, there's been a lot of debate about how to characterize these protesters. Some news outlets have referred to them as right-wing extremists. How do they respond to that?
--:-- David Paisley: Well, they think it's a case of obvious media bias.
--:-- Megan Basham: So the source I spoke with, David Paisley, has been with the original Western Convoy since this protest started in late January. Now, each major thoroughfare has what they call a street captain, and that's someone organizing supplies and communicating with all of those groups offering support. Paisley is one of those leaders.
--:-- David Paisley: Let the event speak for itself. There's been over two weeks, hundreds of thousands of people coming through here. And you know that if something significantly violent happened, then the media would have plastered that across the world.
--:-- Megan Basham: The media is hunting for a story. I've never heard of, you know, an extremist terrorist organization that sets up bouncy castles for the kids.
--:-- David Paisley: There's also been a lot of conflicting media reports about what exactly this protest stands for. And Paisley was very clear with me that it's about coronavirus restrictions, including those vaccine mandates, mask mandates and lockdowns.
--:-- Megan Basham: He said they want to make sure the government never assumes that much power again.
--:-- David Paisley: I would like an end to all mandates. So things that cause people to lose their jobs and force people to take a vaccine. It should be their freedom to choose to do so or not. That is a bare minimum of what people are going to be satisfied with. But beyond that, assurances that these freedoms cannot be simply grabbed away whenever it's convenient.
--:-- Megan Basham: Now, I think a lot of people tend to be sympathetic with the trucker's position, but they're not happy about the supply chain being disrupted on these major bridges from the U.S. into Canada.
--:-- David Paisley: Right, yes. And I did ask Paisley about that, and here's what he told me.
--:-- Megan Basham: I certainly also understand the frustrations with the supply chain. I would say, however, that it does seem a little rich that these statements come in from, for example, Doug Ford. You know, businesses are being affected by this. And the irony is we have all come together from across this country because businesses were being shut down.
--:-- David Paisley: So like John mentioned, we're now seeing copycat protests cropping up in other countries. How do the Canadian truckers feel about that?
--:-- Megan Basham: Well, they sound very encouraged by that news. As you can imagine, they feel like they've become a positive symbol for freedom around the world.
--:-- David Paisley: It gets me teary-eyed every time I see it on the news. And to see the Canadian flag waved in places around the world as once again a symbol for freedom.
--:-- Megan Basham: Well, they're definitely having an impact.
--:-- David Paisley: Megan, thanks for bringing us this perspective on the ground.
--:-- Megan Basham: Yeah, absolutely. My pleasure.
--:-- John Bickley: That was Daily Wire entertainment reporter Megan Basham.
--:-- John Bickley: With the Russian military now surrounding Ukraine from Crimea in the south to Belarus in the north, The U.S. announced Friday it will withdraw all American nationals and will soon be sending troops to Poland in preparation for a Russian invasion of Ukraine. Meanwhile the president of Ukraine has actually cautioned against panic and has even asked to see which intel the U is relying on in determining that an invasion is imminent A major factor in the Russia conflict continues to be the Nord Stream 2 pipeline which has recently been completed. Once commissioned, the pipeline will transport natural gas from Russia to Germany, further increasing Germany's reliance on Russia for energy. The pipeline is currently awaiting approval from Germany and the EU. Here to discuss the significance of the pipeline is Daily Wire's Ian Howarth. So Ian, what does the Nord Stream 2 have to do with this current situation in Ukraine?
--:-- Ian Howarth: Well, this all comes down to the efforts by the Trump administration and to a lesser extent the Biden administration to try and use the pipeline as leverage against Russia. Now, Europe gets around 40% of its natural gas from Russia, and the Nord Stream 2 pipeline would increase supply while also reducing costs, which could empower Russia in terms of energy production and therefore give them more influence over European politics.
--:-- John Bickley: The Trump administration openly opposed the construction of the pipeline, having targeted Nord Stream 2 with sanctions legislation on three occasions because they feared it would be used as a geopolitical weapon. But despite supposedly opposing the Project 2, the Biden administration decided not to sanction the company in charge of construction in May 2021.
--:-- Ian Howarth: Instead, they looked to sanction some smaller related entities as well as imposing what critics saw as watered-down measures. In July, the U.S. reached a compromise deal with Germany, which allowed the project to move forward without further sanctions, and then construction was completed in September.
--:-- John Bickley: So now if we flash forward to more recent times, last week President Biden said that he would shut down the pipeline if Russia invaded Ukraine. If Russia invades, then there will be no longer a Nord Stream 2. We will bring an end to it. And German Chancellor Schultz, who spoke with Biden last week, said that they would follow the same steps if there was an invasion. But neither have made it clear how this would be achieved, especially now that construction is complete.
--:-- Ian Howarth: And this is all while leaders in Ukraine are insisting that the pipeline between Germany and Russia should never open. Europe does not need this pipeline. So it's 100% politically motivated project. And if your question is whether this pipeline should be turned on ever, our answer is no.
--:-- John Bickley: So now we're in a situation where the Nord Stream 2 pipeline is leveraged for both sides in some way or another, but the U.S. is in a weaker position than they had been prior to construction being completed.
--:-- Ian Howarth: In an interview with Fox Business, former President Donald Trump said that the current strategy to threaten closure of the pipeline wouldn't even be needed if Biden had just followed his administration's policy. I stopped it, but I stopped it differently. I stopped it with the threat of tariffs and with various other things, and it was stopped. It was dead.
--:-- John Bickley: And so now that construction's complete, what's next? Well, in reality, it means that if the Nord Stream 2 pipeline is going to play a part in de-escalating tensions, it'll be in the form of financial sanctions against the pipeline. But given that the German chancellor has been a supporter of the pipeline for a long time, and the fact that Germany largely relies on Russian energy, the idea that the pipeline can simply be shut down if Russia does invade might be far more complicated than either side is letting on.
--:-- Ian Howarth: Hmm. Well, Ian, thanks so much for explaining all that.
--:-- John Bickley: Thanks, Georgia. That's Daily Wire's Ian Howarth.
--:-- John Bickley: If you liked this episode and are interested in hearing more, subscribe to Morning Wire and give us a five-star review. That's all the time we've got this morning. Thanks for waking up with us. We'll be back tomorrow with the news you need to know. If you liked this podcast, subscribe to our Morning Wire newsletter. Use code MORNINGWIRE to try a Reader's Pass membership and get your first month for only 99 cents.
