Month: March 2019

A group of top House Republicans is asking the Justice Department for details of an investigation into the FBI’s handling of the Hillary Clinton and Trump-Russia probes that is being conducted by U.S. Attorney John Huber.

In a letter sent Monday, the Republicans pressed Huber, the U.S. attorney for Utah, for details about witnesses and documents reviewed as part of the investigation.

Almost no details have emerged about Huber’s investigation since he was appointed in March 2018 by then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions to investigate the FBI’s handling of the politically-charged investigations of Clinton and Trump.

Sessions appointed Huber as a compromise to Republican pressure to appoint a special counsel to investigate the FBI’s investigation of the Trump campaign.

“During the course of our extensive investigation we have interviewed more than a dozen current and former DOJ and FBI personnel, and were surprised to hear none of these potentially informative witnesses testified to speaking with you,” Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan, Georgia Rep. Doug Collins and North Carolina Rep. Mark Meadows wrote to Huber.

Republicans have accused the FBI and Justice Department of misleading the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court in applications for surveillance warrants against former Trump campaign aide Carter Page. The FBI relied heavily on the unverified Steele dossier to obtain four warrants against Page.

Jordan, Collins and Meadows are asking Huber to identify which witnesses he has interviewed as part of his investigation. They are also asking for details of the number of documents that have been reviewed in the investigation, including the number of Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act applications.

The American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) sued the Trump administration Monday for “essential” government employees being “forced” to work without pay.

Many federal employees designated as “essential” personnel are working through the government shutdown but may miss regular paychecks until Congress and President Donald Trump agree on a spending package.

The AFGE suit, brought on behalf of two federal prison workers, asserts that “forcing” federal employees to work through the shutdown without regular paychecks is “inhumane” and illegal.

“Approximately 420,000 federal employees are continuing to work, but don’t know when they will get their next paychecks,” Heidi Burakiewicz, a partner at the law firm of Kalijarvi, Chuzi, Newman & Fitch, said in a statement. “These employees still need to pay childcare expenses, buy gas, and incur other expenses to go to work every day and yet, they are not getting paid. It is a blatant violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act.”

Kalijarvi, Chuzi, Newman & Fitch is the law firm representing AFGE.

The federal government went into a partial shutdown on Dec. 22, 2018, and has continued into the new year. Republicans and Democrats are fighting over funding for Trump’s $5.7 billion wall along the border with Mexico, which the president says is necessary to stem the flow of illegal immigration into the U.S.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, who is leading the Democratic resistance to funding the border wall, has called Trump’s proposal “expensive and ineffective” and promised to kill and bill that would fund it.

The Supreme Court announced Tuesday that it will allow President Donald Trump to temporarily enforce an order barring transgender individuals from serving in the military.

As is typical of orders of this nature, the Court gave no reason for its decision, though Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor, and Elena Kagan noted their dissent.

The Trump administration first petitioned the Supreme Court to decide directly on the legality of the trans-soldiers ban, after federal trial judges in California, Washington, D.C. and Washington state issued orders prohibiting its enforcement. The plaintiffs in those lawsuits argue the policy violates a range of constitutional rights including the First Amendment, equal protection, and due process.

The government said the Court’s intervention was necessary because the lower court decision “require the military to maintain a policy that, in its own professional judgment, risks undermining readiness, disrupting unit cohesion, and weakening military effectiveness and lethality.”

Subsequent to that request, the Department of Justice filed a second petition proposing an alternative: in the event the Court denied the first request, the administration suggested that the justices allow enforcement of the ban while litigation continues in the lower courts. The Court granted that request Tuesday.

The president abruptly announced on Twitter that the military would not permit trans personnel to serve in the military. Thereafter, former Defense Secretary James Mattis convened a panel of military experts to conduct an independent review of the subject. Their findings served as the basis of Mattis’ February 2018 memo which implemented Trump’s request.

That memo provides that individuals with a history of gender dysphoria — a clinical term referring to anxiety triggered by the conflict between one’s biological sex and the gender with which they identify — may enlist provided they are willing to serve in their biological sex and have not suffered gender dysphoria for a continuous three year period prior to recruitment. Active personnel who are diagnosed with gender dysphoria may continue to serve provided they do so in their biological sex.

This is breaking news. This post will be updated

DONNA, Texas – U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Office of Field Operations (OFO) officers intercepted a substantial amount of methamphetamine with an estimated street value of more than $3,000,000 in two enforcement actions over a four-day span.

“I applaud the CBP officers for these two exceptional narcotic interceptions as they illustrate the multilayered enforcement effected by CBP,” said Port Director Walter Weaver, Progreso Port of Entry. “Intercepting illegal drugs from entering the United States and keeping them from finding their way to the streets of our communities remains one of CBP’s top priorities.”

The first seizure occurred on Saturday, Mar. 16, when CBP officers assigned to the Donna International Crossing referred a 1999 Ford F-150 driven by a 40-year-old female Mexican citizen from Rio Bravo, Tamaulipas, Mexico, for a secondary examination.  In secondary, a physical inspection by CBP officers led to the discovery of 38 packages containing over 77 pounds of alleged methamphetamine concealed within the vehicle.

The second seizure occurred on Tuesday, Mar. 19, when a CBP officer referred a 1997 Ford F-150 driven by a 22-year-old male U.S. citizen from McAllen, Texas, and his 18-year-old brother, also of McAllen, Texas for a secondary inspection. Upon a non-intrusive imaging examination and physical inspection, CBP officers discovered 39 packages containing 78.66 pounds of alleged methamphetamine concealed within the vehicle.

The combined narcotics have an estimated street value of $3,123,477.

CBP OFO seized the narcotics and vehicles.  The drivers and occupant from both interceptions were arrested and the cases were turned over to the custody of Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) special agents for further investigation. For more information about CBP, please click on the attached link.

Post-election Federal Election Commission (FEC) filings released on Thursday reveal that Democratic Rep. Robert “Beto” O’Rourke burned through almost all of the record-breaking $80 million he raised while campaigning to unseat Republican Sen. Ted Cruz.

The Beto For Texas campaign had just over $475,000 remaining of cash on hand in the reporting period ending three weeks after the midterm election, according to FEC records. O’Rourke ended with a staggering $80.3 million raised during the 2018 election cycle, compared to Cruz’s much lower, but still respectable $38.9 million.

O’Rourke received more campaign contributions in one quarter than any Senate candidate in American history. In the 3rd quarter of 2018, the El Paso congressman raised $38.1 million. Comparatively, Cruz raised $12.4 million which placed him as the third highest fundraiser of the 2018 candidates for Senate.

O’Rourke revealed in October that he wouldn’t be sharing any of the cash he amassed with the other Democrats in tight races, telling reporters that he must “honor the commitment” to the people who donated specifically to his race. The exchange sparked more speculation of presidential ambitions since it’s commonly contended that there is no use to having leftover campaign money if one loses the election.

However, the Beto For Texas campaign maintained that it would not have trouble spending the excessive cash reserves. In addition to millions spent on TV ads and Google advertisements, O’Rourke also had to finance the Democratic infrastructure. Since Democrats have not been competitive in statewide races in Texas for decades, his campaign had to virtually build an entire field program from the ground up. At a cost of approximately $3 million per month, O’Rourke had been able to employ several hundred people to work out of 10 permanent and 70 temporary offices.

During the last quarter alone, it was revealed O’Rourke’s campaign had been paying a consulting firm almost $18 million despite repeatedly declaring that the campaign would not use any consultants.

Cruz ultimately defeated O’Rourke and retained his seat as the junior U.S. senator from Texas.

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WASHINGTON – Criminal investigations, business audits and arrests by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) special agents and auditors surged in fiscal year 2018 compared to the previous year, following a commitment made by the agency in late 2017 to step up its worksite enforcement efforts across the country.

“Reducing illegal employment helps build another layer of border security, and reduces the continuum of crime that illegal labor facilitates, from the human smuggling networks that facilitate illegal border crossings to the associated collateral crimes, like identity theft, document and benefit fraud and worker exploitation,” said HSI Executive Associate Director Derek N. Benner.

In fiscal year 2018, HSI opened 6,848 worksite investigations compared to 1,691 in FY17; initiated 5,981 I-9 audits compared to 1,360; and made 779 criminal and 1,525 administrative worksite-related arrests compared to 139 and 172, respectively; all of these categories surged by 300 to 750 percent over the previous fiscal year.

“Employers who use an illegal workforce as part of their business model put businesses that do follow the law at a competitive disadvantage,” said Benner. “HSI is committed to upholding the laws that govern worksite enforcement. These laws help protect jobs for U.S. citizens and others who are lawfully employed, reduce the incentive of illegal migration, eliminate unfair competitive advantages for companies that hire an illegal workforce, and ultimately help strengthen public safety and national security.”

Criminal indictments and convictions remained at a steady level compared to previous years, but those numbers are also expected to rise due to many ongoing investigations, which can take months to years to fully develop, according to HSI. In fiscal year 2018, HSI saw 72 managers indicted compared to 71 in FY17, and 49 managers convicted in FY18 versus 55 in FY17.

Several high-profile enforcement actions also took place in 2018, including:

• In April, HSI executed a federal search warrant at a slaughterhouse in Bean Station, Tennessee, and arrested 104 aliens on immigration violations. In September, the owner of the company pleaded guilty in federal court to tax fraud, wire fraud and employing illegal aliens. He faces various prison time and fines when he is sentenced early next year, and he has also agreed to pay $1.4 million in restitution before his sentencing.
• In August, HSI executed a series of criminal arrest warrants for 17 individuals connected to an alleged criminal conspiracy to exploit illegal alien laborers for profit, fraud, wire fraud and money laundering, and served search warrants for worksite violations at agricultural firms in Nebraska, Minnesota and Nevada. The ongoing criminal investigation is being coordinated with the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Nebraska.
• In August, HSI executed criminal search warrants at trailer manufacturer in Sumner, Texas, and arrested 160 people on immigration violations, many who were using stolen identities of U.S. citizens. The ongoing criminal investigation is being coordinated with U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Texas.

Businesses were ordered to pay more than $10.2 million in judicial fines, forfeitures and restitutions in FY18 including a Texas business that agreed to forfeit more than $5.5 million and perform remedial measures and an Oklahoma business that agreed to pay more than $1 million. HSI also levied businesses another $10.2 million in civil penalties in FY18.

In FY17, there were $97.6 million in judicial forfeitures, fines and restitution, including one company whose financial penalties represented the largest payment ever levied in an immigration case and another $9.8 million in civil fines FY17.

HSI’s worksite enforcement strategy continues to focus on the criminal prosecution of employers who knowingly break the law, and the use of I-9 audits and civil fines to encourage compliance with the law.

The Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA) of 1986 requires employers to verify the identity and work eligibility of all individuals they hire, and to document that information using the Employment Eligibility Verification Form I-9. ICE uses the I-9 inspection program to promote compliance with the law, part of a comprehensive strategy to address and deter illegal employment. Inspections are one of the most powerful tools the federal government uses to ensure that businesses are complying with U.S. employment laws.

HSI’s worksite enforcement strategy includes leveraging the agency’s other investigative disciplines, since worksite investigations can often involve additional criminal activity, such as alien smuggling, human trafficking, money laundering, document fraud, worker exploitation and/or substandard wage and working conditions.

HSI uses a three-prong approach to worksite enforcement: Compliance, through I-9 inspections, civil fines and referrals for debarment; enforcement, through the criminal arrest of employers and administrative arrest of unauthorized workers; and outreach, through the ICE Mutual Agreement between Government and Employers, or IMAGE program, to instill a culture of compliance and accountability.

• A federal court is keeping documents justifying an FBI raid on a reportedly recognized whistleblower secret.
• Attorneys and whistleblower advocates say the court should disclose whether prosecutors told the judge that Dennis Cain was a whistleblower.
• Cain reportedly gave documents pertaining to the Clinton Foundation and Uranium One to a presidentially appointed watchdog before the raid.

A federal court refused to unseal government documents that permitted the FBI to raid the home of a reportedly recognized whistleblower who, according to his lawyer, delivered documents pertaining to the Clinton Foundation and Uranium One to a presidentially appointed watchdog.

The U.S. District Court of Maryland’s Chief Magistrate Judge Beth P. Gesner, a Clinton appointee, also sealed her justification for keeping the documents secret in a single-page Dec. 20 order.

On Nov. 15, federal Magistrate Judge Stephanie Gallagher authorized the raid on Dennis Cain’s Union Bridge, Maryland, home. She sealed the government documents justifying it.

The Daily Caller News Foundation asked Gallagher on Nov. 29 to unseal the documents, noting that Cain’s attorney has said his client, a former employee of an FBI contractor, is a recognized whistleblower. The documents should be released in light of “an urgent public interest” surrounding the case, TheDCNF wrote.

Attorneys and experts who defend government whistleblowers told TheDCNF the court should disclose whether prosecutors told Gallagher that Cain was a protected whistleblower under the Intelligence Community Whistleblower Protection Act.

Cain enjoyed his whistleblower status as early as last summer when he handed over documents to Department of Justice Inspector General Michael Horowitz, according to Cain’s lawyer, Michael Socarras. Horowitz instructed a top aide to personally hand-deliver the documents to the House and Senate intelligence committees, the attorney said.

The documents reportedly show that federal officials failed to investigate potential criminal activity regarding the Clinton Foundation and Rostam, the Russian company that purchased Uranium One.

On Nov. 19, however, Cain was confronted with 16 FBI agents who entered and rummaged through his home for six hours, according to Socarras. Cain informed the lead FBI agent that he was a protected whistleblower, but the raid commenced, anyway.

Cain has not been charged with any crime. The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia is handling the case with Karen Seifert assigned as the prosecutor assigned to the case, according to Cain’s criminal defense lawyer, Nina Ginsberg.

Maryland U.S. Attorney Robert Hur opposed TheDCNF’s initial request to unseal the documents. In a Dec. 6 letter, Hur told the court doing so “would seriously jeopardize the integrity of the ongoing investigation.”

His letter, which was also sent to TheDCNF, said nothing about the merits of the government’s case or why the raid was warranted. His specific arguments remain under seal.

TheDCNF subsequently told Gallagher in a Dec. 12 letter: “We wish to narrow our request to obtain any documents presented by the government that informed the judge of Mr. Cain’s status as a whistleblower.”

“It seems the Justice Department should be able to address [TheDCNF’s] more narrowly tailored request without compromising the investigation,” the director for investigations at the nonpartisan government watchdog group the Project on Government Oversight, Nick Schwellenbach, told TheDCNF. “Revealing whether the court was informed of his protected disclosures, on its own, doesn’t seem to compromise anything.”

And Mark Zaid, an attorney who has defended government whistleblowers in national security cases, told TheDCNF: “It would be interesting to know if the judge was aware this person had invoked whistleblower status.”

Kel McClanahan, an attorney who represents government whistleblowers and is the executive director of National Security Counselors, told TheDCNF: “Should the judge have considered that he was a whistleblower and they were looking for whistleblower stuff? Yes.”

McClanahan added that government officials could face punishment if they hid information from the magistrate.

“Hiding the ball can be considered sanctionable conduct because there’s duty to what’s called ‘candor to the court,’” he told TheDCNF. He said Judge Gallagher could eventually rule that the Department of Justice “‘did not demonstrate complete candor to the court.’ It doesn’t affect her conduct. It affects the DOJ’s conduct.”

The National Security Counselors is a Washington, D.C., nonprofit law firm that specializes in national security, information and privacy law. It often represents intelligence community employees and contractors.

Zaid told TheDCNF the FBI should have halted its search after Cain informed the lead agent he was a whistleblower.

“It’s common, unfortunately, I see that they don’t,” Zaid said. “So as a current matter of law and policy, what the FBI did was sadly routine. I had it happen to my clients as well. I find it pretty pathetic.”

“From a policy perspective, [Cain] should be applauded for what he was trying to do,” he continued.

McClanahan told TheDCNF: “It’s a matter of personal preference on the part of the DOJ attorney who argued it and the FBI agents on any given day about how much information to give to a judge. They probably included the bare minimum.”

“What they may not have included was information that they have should have provided,” he continued. “So they are basically rolling the dice.”

Sen. Chuck Grassley, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, asked FBI Director Christopher Wray in a Nov. 30 letter whether the bureau was “aware at the time of the raid that Mr. Cain had made what appeared to be lawful disclosures to the Inspector General? If so, was the FBI aware that these disclosures were passed to the House and Senate Intelligence Committees, per the [whistleblower act]?”

Grassley gave Wray until Dec.12 to respond. The FBI has not yet replied, according to the Iowa Republican’s office.

Grassley has been a dogged Senate champion of government whistleblower rights. He announced the establishment of the bipartisan Senate Whistleblower Protection Caucus in 2015 to raise awareness of the need for adequate protections against retaliation for whistleblowers.

• Emails obtained through a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit show that Fusion GPS founder Glenn Simpson was in contact with a State Department official on the day before the publication of a news article based on information from Christopher Steele
• The September 2016 email shows Simpson was desperate to make contact with Jonathan Winer, a longtime associate of then-Sec. of State John Kerry
• Winer has been confirmed as a source for an article published the following day. That article, written by journalist Michael Isikoff, was the first to publicize Steele’s claims about Trump campaign adviser Carter Page

One of the co-founders of the opposition research firm that commissioned the Steele dossier was in contact with a State Department official in the days before a news article was published laying out allegations contained in the salacious anti-Trump report.

Emails obtained by The Daily Caller News Foundation show that Glenn Simpson, an executive at Fusion GPS, contacted Jonathan Winer, who then served as State’s special envoy for Libya, on Sept. 19 and Sept. 22, 2016. That was days ahead of the publication of a Yahoo! News article that was the first story to cite information gathered by Christopher Steele, the former British spy who authored the dossier.

Winer, a longtime aide to former Sec. of State John Kerry, was a source for that article, which laid out Steele’s allegations about Carter Page, a former Trump campaign adviser who would become the target of FBI surveillance.

The emails, which were obtained through a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed on TheDCNF’s behalf by Judicial Watch, show for the first time that Simpson had direct contact with a State Department official.

The emails do not mention the dossier or Steele, but they do show that Simpson was desperate to speak with Winer, a Democratic attorney who also served in the State Department during the Clinton administration.

Simpson, a former Wall Street Journal reporter, sent an email on Sept. 19, 2016 asking Winer if he was in town.

“For a couple of hours,” Winer replied.

Simpson contacted Winer again on Sept. 22, 2016, asking: “Can u ring…Asap?”

“Will try…Can this await 11am?” Winer responded.

“Not really but it is quick,” said Simpson.

Email exchange between Glenn Simpson and Jonathan Winer

The emails do not indicate whether Simpson and Winer spoke or met. Winer did not respond to a request for comment. But a day after the final email exchange, Yahoo’s Michael Isikoff reported that federal law enforcement agencies were investigating Page over possible contacts he had with two Kremlin insiders, Igor Sechin and Igor Diveykin.

Isikoff would reveal in a book published with co-author David Corn that Winer vouched for Steele as part of his reporting for the Sept. 23, 2016 article. Winer was also a source for an article that Corn published on Oct. 31, 2016, for Mother Jones that anonymously quoted Steele.

It was not known until 2017 that Steele was a source for Isikoff. Prior to that, it was widely believed that Isikoff’s report independently confirmed allegations made in the dossier.

Page, an energy consultant, has long denied Steele’s claims, saying that he has never met Sechin or Diveykin.

The FBI relied heavily on Steele’s dossier in four Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrants against Page. Isikoff’s article was also cited in the applications, though the FBI did not disclose that the report was based on information provided by Steele.

Congressional investigators have looked into Winer and the State Department’s role in handling the Steele information and other intelligence used in the FBI investigation of the Trump campaign. Republicans have long been puzzled over information that flowed through Foggy Bottom prior to making its way to FBI investigators.

Victoria Nuland, who served as Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs, approved a July 5, 2016 meeting between FBI agent Michael Gaeta and Steele in Rome. Fusion GPS had hired Steele just weeks earlier to investigate Donald Trump’s possible ties to Russia. The ex-MI6 officer wrote his first of 17 dossier memos on June 20, 2016. That document alleged that the Kremlin had blackmail material on Trump.

The new emails raise the possibility that Simpson made contact with Winer as part of Fusion GPS’s media outreach operation. Fusion was paid $1 million by the law firm for the Clinton campaign and DNC to compile anti-Trump dirt and disseminate it to the press.

Through Fusion, Steele met with Isikoff, Corn, and reporters from The New York Times, Washington Post, CNN, and New Yorker.

Winer has publicly acknowledged his interactions with Steele, but he has not addressed his contacts with Simpson.

In an opinion piece at The Washington Post on Feb. 8, 2018, Winer said that he has known Steele since 2009, when Steele left MI6 to form his private intelligence firm, Orbis Business Intelligence.

Steele provided Winer with more than 100 reports based on intelligence he picked up on behalf of his private clients. Winer shared many of those reports with other State Department officials, including Nuland and Kerry.

Judicial Watch is representing TheDCNF in a lawsuit seeking those reports from Steele and Winer and Nuland’s communications regarding the dossier.

Winer wrote that Steele told him about his Trump-related investigation in Summer 2016. And in September 2016, the pair met in Washington, D.C. There, Steele showed Winer memos from his dossier. Winer prepared a two-page summary of that information and shared it with others at State.

Nuland told the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence on June 20, 2018 that Steele met with State Department officials in October 2016.

Winer also handled another dossier on Trump that matched up with some of the salacious claims made in Steele’s report.

Sidney Blumenthal, the notorious Clinton crony, gave Winer a dossier on Trump that had been compiled by his and fellow Clinton insider, Cody Shearer.

The so-called Shearer memo contains some of the same salacious allegations about Trump’s activities in Moscow. Winer has acknowledged that he gave the Shearer memo to Steele, who in turn provided it to the FBI.

The State Department has previously declined comment on Winer’s activities. He is now a senior adviser to APCO Worldwide, a global public relations firm.

Democratic California Sen. Kamala Harris refuted two of her potential 2020 presidential primary challengers on Wednesday when she stated that she does not agree with their acceptance of open borders.

“No, I believe that we need border security,” Harris told “The Daily Show’s” Trevor Noah when asked how she felt about former Texas Rep. Beto O’Rourke’s call to remove the already standing wall along the U.S.-Mexico border.

“We need smart border security. We can’t have open borders, we need to have border security, all nations do,” she continued. “All nations define their borders, but we should not have a policy and perspective that is grounded in keeping people out for the sake of this nationalistic kind of thing this president is trying to push.”

O’Rourke has long argued against a border wall, despite still claiming to be against open borders. Following President Donald Trump’s executive order in September to erect an 18-foot steel bollard wall to replace the existing pedestrian fencing in El Paso, Texas, the Democrat called the existing chain-link fence “bad enough.”

The failed senatorial candidate later revealed to MSNBC’s Chris Hayes that if he could snap his fingers and make his home town of El Paso’s border wall disappear, he “absolutely” would. O’Rourke insisted in the past that the way to improve border safety and security is to “ensure that we are maximizing the potential from everyone … [and] treating each other with respect and dignity” and referred to Trump’s wall as an “expression of our smallness, our meanness, our fear to the rest of the world.”

Democratic New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, who launched a presidential exploratory committee in January, signaled her support for tearing down the existing barrier on the border when she was confronted with O’Rourke’s position.

“Well, I’d have to ask folks in that part of the of the country to see whether the fencing that exists today is helpful or unhelpful,” Gillibrand replied in February when asked about O’Rourke’s comments. “But, you know, Democrats are not afraid of national security or border security.”

“And [the wall] is a hateful message. I mean [Trump’s] trying to create a picture of division and hate and derision. And that’s what I’m so offended by — the fact that he’s fused this kind of racism in, ‎in his words and actions is just troubling,” she continued. “So, I could look at it and see which part he means and why and if it makes sense I could support it.”

Neither Gillibrand nor O’Rourke have officially entered the 2020 presidential race.

• Snopes refused to correct an inaccurate fact-check calling it “unproven” that American Indian activist Nathan Phillips falsely claimed to be a Vietnam veteran.
• It’s a proven fact that Phillips falsely claimed to be a Vietnam veteran.
• Both Facebook and Google give Snopes preferential treatment on their platforms.

Snopes, a left-leaning fact-checking website given preferential treatment by both Facebook and Google, flubbed its fact-check of American Indian activist Nathan Phillips’ false claim of being a Vietnam veteran.

Phillips shot to national attention after a viral confrontation between him and a group of high school boys from Covington Catholic high school. Phillips, with the help of credulous national media outlets, said the boys mobbed and racially harassed him as he tried to leave the Indigenous People’s March. Video evidence debunked Phillips’s account.

In addition to botching the details of the confrontation, media outlets also inaccurately reported that Phillips is a Vietnam veteran.

Phillips described himself in interviews as a “Vietnam-times veteran” and groups affiliated with him told The New York Times that he fought in Vietnam. Phillips explicitly claimed in a 2018 Facebook video that he was a Vietnam veteran who served “in theater.”

Military records show that Phillips never deployed to Vietnam, though his military service did include a long stint as a refrigerator technician.

Snopes’s fact-check incorrectly labeled it “unproven” that Phillips had falsely claimed to be a Vietnam veteran. Snopes declined to change its misleading ruling despite definitive video evidence of Phillips doing exactly that.

Both Facebook and Google give Snopes preferential treatment on their platforms, though Snopes has struggledwithaccuracy in the past

Google placed Snopes’s misleading fact-check at the top of their search results about Phillips’s Vietnam claims.

Google promotes misleading Snopes fact check

Facebook also placed Snopes’ inaccurate fact-check at the top of search results about Phillips’s non-existent Vietnam deployment. A blue “Fact-Checker” badge accompanies the post, lending Facebook’s credibility to the inaccurate fact-check.

Facebook elevates misleading Snopes fact-check Screenshot/Facebook.com

An emailed statement from Snopes emphasized that Phillips didn’t explicitly say in recent interviews that he was a Vietnam veteran and used more nuanced language like “Vietnam-times veteran.”

In an update, Snopes questioned whether Phillips “deliberately” portrayed himself as a Vietnam veteran.

“It’s difficult to determine at this point whether Phillips has deliberately misrepresented the nature of his service, whether he has been so vague and ambiguous in many of his descriptions (unintentionally or otherwise) that misinterpretations have entered his narrative, or whether he has tried to be accurate but may have just occasionally slipped up in his many, many hours of conversation and sometimes neglected to include the qualifiers about his service that he has used in many other videos and press interviews,” Snopes wrote in an update to the fact-check.

But Snopes wasn’t fact-checking whether Phillips “deliberately misrepresented” his record. Snopes was fact-checking the question: “Did Nathan Phillips Falsely Claim He Was A Vietnam Veteran?” It’s a fact that Phillips falsely claimed he was a Vietnam veteran.

This isn’t the first time that Facebook and Google’s partnerships with Snopes have resulted in the tech giants amplifying misinformation.

In December, Snopes botched its fact-check of a viral meme that was mocked within political circles for spreading false information. Snopes claimed the meme was accurate.