DOJ failed to establish probable cause for FISA warrants granted when Comey was in charge

Daily Wire:
The Department of Justice says that the FBI under disgraced former Director James Comey should have discontinued its secret surveillance on a member of the Trump campaign during the 2016 election because it had “insufficient predication to establish probable cause.”

“Thanks in large part to the work of the Office of the Inspector General, U.S. Department of Justice, the Court has received notice of material misstatements and omissions in the applications filed by the government in the above-captioned dockets,” the letter stated. “DOJ assesses that with respect to the applications in Docket Numbers 17-375 and 17-679, ‘if not earlier, there was insufficient predication to establish probable cause to believe that [Carter] Page was acting as an agent of a foreign power.'”

Reuters reporter Brad Heath highlighted the newly declassified letter that the DOJ sent the secret court in December, writing: “This is a big deal. The Justice Department is conceding that two of the four FISA applications it used to conduct surveillance of former Trump campaign aide Carter Page were not lawful, and it’s not defending the legality of its other two applications.”

“The government further reports that the FBI has agreed ‘to sequester all collection the FBI acquired pursuant to the Court’s authorizations in the above-listed four docket numbers targeting [Carter] Page pending further review of the OIG Report and the outcome of related investigations and any litigation,'” the letter continued. “The government has not described what steps are involved-in-such sequestration or when it will be completed. It has, however, undertaken to ‘provide an update to the Court when the FBI completes the sequestration’ and to ‘update the Court on the disposition of the sequestered collection at the conclusion of related investigations and any litigation.’ To date, no such update has been received.”

“The Court understands the government to have concluded, in view of the material misstatements and omissions, that the Court’s authorizations in Docket Numbers 17-375 and 17- 679 were not valid,” the letter added. “The government apparently does not take a position on the validity of the authorizations in Docket Numbers 16-1182 and 17-52, but intends to sequester information acquired pursuant to those dockets in the same manner as information acquired pursuant to the subsequent dockets.”

Last month, the Department of Justice Inspector General’s (IG) report highlighted a total of 17 “inaccuracies and omissions” that were made by the FBI in applying for FISA applications to surveil the Trump campaign.
...
If any of the material gathered under these FISA warrants led to the prosecution of any of the people associated with the Trump campaign those prosecutions should probably be overturned.  Since the warrants covered not only Page but anyone he communicated with and those who communicated with that person this could have a broad impact.   I think it is a correct ruling.  I would still like to see what discipline or prosecution is forthcoming for those responsible for misleading the court.

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