News analysis
Months before Hillary Clinton declared her presidential candidacy, the FBI learned from a well-placed source that a foreign government planned to send an operative to donate to the Clinton campaign in order to gain influence if the former secretary of state triumphed in the upcoming 2016 election.
The bureau opened an investigation, but an application for a warrant to surveil the foreign operative sat in limbo at a field office for four months. An FBI agent told investigators with special counsel John Durham’s office that “everyone was super more careful” and “scared with the big name.” The higher-ups in the bureau said they didn’t want a presidential candidate to end up on tape, even if the chances were remote. The surveillance warrant was eventually approved under the condition that Clinton and other officials and candidates would be briefed and warned about the foreign national….