Who actually authored 'whistleblower' report?

Fred Fleitz:

I am troubled by the complaint and wonder how an intelligence officer could file it over something a president said to a foreign leader. How could this be an intelligence matter?

It appears likely to me that this so-called whistleblower was pursuing a political agenda.

I am very familiar with transcripts of presidential phone calls since I edited and processed dozens of them when I worked for the NSC. I also know a lot about intelligence whistleblowers from my time with the CIA.

My suspicions grew this morning when I saw the declassified whistleblowing complaint. It appears to be written by a law professor and includes legal references and detailed footnotes. It also has an unusual legalistic reference on how this complaint should be classified.

From my experience, such an extremely polished whistleblowing complaint is unheard of. This document looks as if this leaker had outside help, possibly from congressional members or staff.

Moreover, it looks like more than a coincidence that this complaint surfaced and was directed to the House Intelligence Committee just after Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), an outspoken opponent of President Trump, expressed numerous complaints in August 2019 accusing President Trump of abusing aid to Ukraine to hurt Joe Biden. This includes an August 28 tweet that closely resembled the whistleblowing complaint.

House Republicans need to ask the whistleblower under oath whether he spoke to the press or Congress about his complaint.

Also very concerning to me is how the complaint indicates intelligence officers and possibly other federal employees are violating the rules governing presidential phone calls with foreign leaders.

The content and transcripts of these calls are highly restricted. The whistleblower makes clear in his complaint that he did not listen to a call in question, nor did he read the transcript — he was told about the call by others. If true, intelligence officers have grossly violated the rules as well as the trust placed on them to protect this sensitive information.
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These people need to be found and brought to justice.  Much of the hearsay in the report has already been discredited and that that hasn't does not look like the President did anything wrong.

Law professor William Jacobson says:

If CIA or other intelligence operatives are using their access to sensitive information in order to interfere in our political process, then that is a lot more frightening than a President raising the widely-reported corruption of his political opponent with the president of the country where the alleged corruption took place.

When the so-called Whistleblower Complaint was released this morning, my first impression was that this was a very professionally-done document, likely crafted by a lawyer.


It looks like a lawyer letter. It’s very legalistic in many parts, cites to statutes and executive orders, and is heavily footnoted. It attempts to bring together evidence from disparate sources, including public news reports. It is, in every sense, a closing argument or brief in support of a position by someone who did not actually participate in the events about which he or she is writing.

The document does not at all read like we would expect a whistleblower complaint to read — alerting the appropriate authority to facts the whistleblower has learned and leaving the legal conclusions to those authorities.
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Why is this guy trying to stay anonymous?  There is some evidence that he is someone with a political bias.  Did he get helpt from Adam Schiff to write this garbage?