{"id":1393205,"date":"2022-03-22T07:45:43","date_gmt":"2022-03-22T11:45:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1393205"},"modified":"2022-03-22T07:45:46","modified_gmt":"2022-03-22T11:45:46","slug":"stephan-halper-was-yet-another-hack-peddling-the-russia-collusion-hoax","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/stephan-halper-was-yet-another-hack-peddling-the-russia-collusion-hoax\/","title":{"rendered":"Stephan Halper Was Yet Another Hack Peddling the Russia-Collusion Hoax"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"float:left\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">20<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fstephan-halper-was-yet-another-hack-peddling-the-russia-collusion-hoax%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1393205&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div><\/div>\n<p>Nearly six years have passed since Hillary Clinton and her cronies <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2022\/03\/18\/spygate-101-a-primer-on-the-russia-collusion-hoaxs-years-long-plot-to-take-down-trump\/\">launched<\/a> their plot to frame Donald Trump as a co-conspirator of Russia to distract Americans from Clinton\u2019s scandals. Since then, by bits and pieces, the public has learned of Clinton\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2022\/02\/21\/4-special-counsel-revelations-tying-spygate-to-hillary-clintons-campaign\/\">role<\/a> in peddling the Russia collusion hoax to both the press and intelligence agencies.<\/p>\n<p>While there is still much to uncover, a recent expos\u00e9 of the man the FBI tapped as the key Confidential Human Source (CHS) in investigating the Trump campaign confirmed Spygate\u2019s method of operation: creating mythical men on whose deceitful shoulders the media and the FBI then stood.<\/p>\n<p>While Stefan Halper\u2019s name and the monikers used to identify him in government reports\u2014\u201cSource 2,\u201d or merely \u201cCHS\u201d\u2014appeared regularly in reporting unraveling the Russia collusion hoax, only lately did Halper\u2019s history undergo a thorough vetting. In a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.realclearpolitics.com\/2022\/03\/08\/stefan_halper_longtime_zelig_of_us_scandals_564727.html\">recent article<\/a>, Real Clear Investigations\u2019 Mark Hemingway traced Halper\u2019s history through archived documents and interviews with associates. He uncovered two themes girding Halper\u2019s parallel careers of government informant and Cambridge academic.<\/p>\n<h2 id=\"stefan-halper-s-recipe-for-success\">Stefan <strong>Halper\u2019s Recipe for Success<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>From his earliest days in government until his retreat from Cambridge University following his outing as a player in the Russian collusion hoax, Halper advanced his professional persona, decade upon decade, by taking creative license with his credentials and exploiting his connections. Puffery appeared in both Halper\u2019s public biography and resumes reviewed by Real Clear Investigations, leaving unanswered the question of whether Halper ever obtained the Ph.D. he claimed later allowed him to reinvent himself as an academic at Cambridge.<\/p>\n<p>Before then, Halper appeared to muddle through a variety of low-level jobs in the federal government, until the mid-1970s. That\u2019s when Halper\u2019s career received a boost when he married Sibyl Cline, the daughter of the well-respected Ray S. Cline.<\/p>\n<p>The senior Cline, who held top intelligence positions with the federal government since the second world war, reportedly arranged for the Ronald Reagan State Department to hire Halper. During the Reagan administration, Halper became close to, among others, Oliver North, but after the Iran-Contra scandal and some time in banking and D.C. think tanks, Halper transitioned to academia. He became a professor at Cambridge University in 2001, where three years later he would claim a second Ph.D.<\/p>\n<p>In addition to the political and other connections Halper accumulated during his 30 years in the D.C. bubble, once at Cambridge, Halper expanded his network across the Atlantic. Halper became cozy with three other <a href=\"https:\/\/taibbi.substack.com\/p\/the-spies-who-hijacked-america?s=r\">characters<\/a> who later played roles\u2014some prominent\u2014in the Russia collusion hoax. These included Richard Dearlove, the former chief of the British intelligence service MI6; Christopher Andrew, the official historian for the domestic intelligence agency, MI5; and Christopher Steele, who worked under Dearlove at MI6.<\/p>\n<h2 id=\"highly-useful-connections\"><strong>Highly Useful Connections<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>While at Cambridge, the reinvented Halper leveraged his professorship, profiting to the tune of nearly $1 million by writing research papers of questionable worth for the U.S. Department of Defense. Halper added to his wallet by serving as a CHS for the FBI from 2008 until January 2011, when the FBI dropped him for aggressiveness toward a handling agent over a fee dispute. Two months later, the FBI reopened Halper as a CHS, giving him a stern warning that this was his last opportunity with the bureau.<\/p>\n<p>Beyond these money-making ventures that kept Halper connected with players at the DOD and FBI, the academic apparently stayed close to elite members of the American media, including David Ignatius, the foreign affairs columnist for The Washington Post. According to Steven Schrage, who <a href=\"https:\/\/taibbi.substack.com\/p\/the-spies-who-hijacked-america?s=r\">completed<\/a> his Cambridge Ph.D. under Halper\u2019s supervision, \u201cHalper knew Ignatius for decades\u201d and \u201cbragged\u2019 that \u201cIgnatius was his press contact.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Another Cambridge student, the Russian-born U.K. historian Svetlana Lokhova who was later sold as a Russian \u201choney pot,\u201d likewise connected Halper to Ignatius. Lokhova\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/thefdrlst.wpengine.com\/2019\/11\/04\/scoop-cia-fbi-informant-was-washington-post-source-for-russiagate-smears\/\">told<\/a>\u00a0The Federalist that in May 2018, shortly after Halper was outed as a CIA and FBI informant, she spoke with Ignatius, and when she \u201cregistered surprise about Halper\u2019s role\u201d as a CHS, that prompted Ignatius to say he \u201calways found Halper reliable as a source.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>These connections all later proved key to advancing the Russia collusion hoax, but it was Halper\u2019s role as a Cambridge academic that cemented his insertion into the scandal. As a faculty member at the British university, Halper participated in seminars and conferences, including the mid-July 2016 Cambridge University <a href=\"https:\/\/thefdrlst.wpengine.com\/2020\/01\/08\/exclusive-carter-page-interview-raises-new-questions-about-inaccuracy-laden-ig-report\/\">conference<\/a> at which Halper first met then-Trump campaign advisor Carter Page.<\/p>\n<h2 id=\"enter-2016-campaign\"><strong>Enter: 2016 Campaign<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>While initially Halper seemed uninterested in the young Trump advisor, that suddenly changed after Dearlove arrived at the conference and spoke privately with Halper. According to the conference <a href=\"https:\/\/taibbi.substack.com\/p\/the-spies-who-hijacked-america?s=r\">organizer<\/a>, Halper suddenly \u201cseemed desperately interested in isolating, cornering, and ingratiating himself to Page and promoting him\u00ad\u00ad\u00adself to the Trump campaign.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Hillary Clinton surrogate Madeline Albright also attended the conference, <a href=\"https:\/\/taibbi.substack.com\/p\/the-spies-who-hijacked-america?s=r\">serving<\/a> as a keynote speaker. While there, Albright attended a small, private dinner with Halper. Then, just days after the Cambridge conference ended, Albright\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/story\/2016\/07\/dnc-2016-madeleine-albright-226261\">proclaimed<\/a>\u00a0that \u201cVladimir Putin wants Donald Trump to defeat Hillary Clinton.\u201d The Clinton booster added that \u201cRussia was likely behind the hack of the Democratic National Committee\u2019s emails.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>That Albright began peddling the Russia collusion hoax in late July 2016, not long after leaving Halper\u2019s side, seems suspect given that earlier that month Halper had forecast a similar approach to defeating Trump during a Cambridge lecture series on \u201cthe phenomenon which is \u2018Trump\u2019s maverick candidacy.\u2019\u201d At the time, Halper told his audience that \u201cthe deficits in Clinton\u2019s campaign\u201d <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2020\/01\/09\/new-details-about-meeting-fbi-source-suggest-carter-page-was-set-up\/\">left<\/a> the election \u201calmost too close to call.\u201d \u201cIf the media focuses on Clinton, she will lose, whereas if they continue to focus on Trump, he will lose,\u201d Halper predicted.<\/p>\n<h2 id=\"worming-into-trump-campaign-connections\"><strong>Worming Into Trump Campaign Connections<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>Two weeks later, the FBI launched the Crossfire Hurricane investigation into the Trump campaign. Soon after that, Halper\u2019s long-time handler, Stephen Somma, visited Halper at his home to request his assistance. According to Somma, he proposed meeting with Halper because Halper \u201chad been affiliated with national political campaigns since the early 1970s,\u201d while Somma \u201clacked a basic understanding of simple issues, for example what the role of a \u2018foreign policy advisor\u2019 entails.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>During Somma\u2019s August 11, 2016, visit with Halper, the FBI handler asked Halper whether he knew George Papadopoulos, who then was serving as a Trump campaign advisor. Halper didn\u2019t, but agreed to speak with Papadopoulos.<\/p>\n<p>Halper then volunteered that he knew a second foreign policy advisor, Page, and asked whether Somma and his team had any interest in Page. Halper also told Somma he \u201chad known Trump\u2019s then campaign manager, [Paul] Manafort, for a number of years and that he had been previously acquainted with Michael Flynn.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Halper\u2019s claim to know Flynn proved another unsupported boast. He nonetheless <a href=\"https:\/\/justthenews.com\/sites\/default\/files\/2021-02\/Halper%20Source%20Documents_final.pdf\">told<\/a> Somma and the other members of the Crossfire Hurricane team of an \u201cincident\u201d he supposedly witnessed at Cambridge involving Flynn. According to Halper, after Flynn spoke to a small group over dinner and drinks at Cambridge, another attendee, the Russian-born Svetlana Lokhova, \u201csurprised everyone\u201d and jumped in Flynn\u2019s cab, then left with Flynn to London. Halper added that he was \u201csuspicious of Lokhova\u201d because of her Russian connections.<\/p>\n<p>However, contrary to Halper\u2019s tale, Flynn had <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2020\/06\/22\/whats-inside-grassleys-letter-demanding-more-on-deep-states-role-in-spygate\/\">never<\/a> met Halper and Halper had not attended the Cambridge gathering at which both Flynn and Lokhova were guests. Halper\u2019s claim that Lokhova left with Flynn also proved false. Nonetheless, press reports later repeated the story and suggested Flynn had been compromised by the unnamed Russian student. Lokhova would later sue Halper for defamation, pinning him as the source of the false reports.<\/p>\n<p>Somma and others, however, seemed unaware of Halper\u2019s fabrication. They couldn\u2019t believe their \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.justice.gov\/storage\/120919-examination.pdf\">luck<\/a>\u201d that Halper supposedly knew three of the four subjects of Crossfire Hurricane. So, over the ensuing weeks, Halper would wear a wire and question Papadopoulos, Page, and even the co-chair of the Trump campaign, Sam Clovis.<\/p>\n<h2 id=\"fabricating-an-excuse-to-spy-on-trump-s-campaign\"><strong>Fabricating an Excuse to Spy on Trump\u2019s Campaign<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>That Halper could arrange a meeting with one of Trump\u2019s top campaign officials mere months before the November election is a testament to Halper\u2019s 50 years of political schmoozing and ladder climbing\u2014further confirmed when Clovis proceeded to have an unguarded hour-long chat with Halper discussing details about Trump\u2019s strategy to defeat Hillary.<\/p>\n<p>Halper came away from these meetings with nothing of import to the investigation into Trump\u2019s supposed collusion with Russia. Nonetheless, the FBI referenced Halper and portions of his wired conversations with Page in the four <a href=\"https:\/\/int.nyt.com\/data\/documenthelper\/95-carter-page-fisa-documents-foia-release\/full\/optimized.pdf\">FISA applications<\/a> that resulted in the FBI illegally surveilling Page. Omitted from the FISA applications, however, were comments Page made to Halper that conflicted with portions of the Steele dossier.<\/p>\n<p>While the FBI used only minor details acquired by Halper in the FISA applications, Halper\u2019s cross-continental connections with the intelligence communities, political players, and the press, likely advanced the Russia collusion hoax in ways still fully unknown. This likelihood seems strong when one considers how, when the Spygate scandal began to unravel, the same media that had peddled the Russia collusion hoax began a public relations campaign for the players behind the plot, including Halper.<\/p>\n<h2 id=\"running-cover-for-spies\"><strong>Running Cover for Spies<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>At first, the press presented the unidentified Halper as \u201can American academic\u201d and as \u201can informant\u201d or \u201csource\u201d whose anonymity had to be preserved to safeguard him. To bolster his credentials, the reporting stressed Halper\u2019s position as a professor, highlighted his longtime work for both the FBI and CIA, and cast him as an informant who \u201caided the Russia investigation both before and after special counsel\u00a0<a href=\"denied:javascript:void(0);\">Robert S. Mueller III<\/a>\u2018s appointment.\u201d Then, in a transparent attempt to paint the still-unnamed Halper as a selflessness patriot, the media <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2018\/05\/18\/us\/politics\/trump-fbi-informant-russia-investigation.html\">focused<\/a> on the \u201cgreat risks\u201d informants take \u201cwhen working for intelligence services.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>After he was outed, the Russia-hoax team continued to highlight Halper\u2019s position as a \u201cCambridge professor\u201d and long-time CHS to preserve the myth of a respected academic and dedicated and reliable informant. The Washington Post ran a puff <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/politics\/who-is-stefan-a-halper-the-fbi-source-who-assisted-the-russia-investigation\/2018\/05\/21\/22c46caa-5d42-11e8-9ee3-49d6d4814c4c_story.html\">piece<\/a> on Halper soon after his name became public, telling its audience \u201cHalper\u2019s connections to the intelligence world have been present throughout his career and at Cambridge, where he ran an intelligence seminar that brought together past and present intelligence officials.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Post continued its gushing profile by highlighting Halper\u2019s collaboration with Dearlove, the former head of Britain\u2019s foreign intelligence service, and their sponsorship of a \u201cseminar that drew Michael Flynn, then director of the Defense Intelligence Agency,\u201d to attend. Also stressed was Halper\u2019s academic work, with the Post noting that Halper had taught \u201cinternational affairs and American studies at Cambridge from 2001 until 2015, when he stepped down with the honorary title of emeritus senior fellow of the Centre of International Studies, . . .\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The remainder of the article then unquestioningly parroted much of Halper\u2019s resume, before quoting an unnamed U.S. government official saying of Halper: \u201cHe thinks well. He writes critically. And he knows a lot of people whose insights he can tap for us as well.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>However, as Real Clear Investigations revealed in its expos\u00e9 on Halper, he held neither the academic cachet nor the gravitas a seasoned informant might. But what Halper lacked in pedigree, he compensated for with his arsenal of connections that allowed him to whisper into the right ears just what the listener wanted to hear. <\/p>\n<p>In this respect, Halper proves no different than Steele or <a href=\"https:\/\/www.realclearinvestigations.com\/2022\/02\/17\/checkered_past_of_fbi_cyber_contractor_who_spied_on_trump_817234.html\">Rodney Joffe<\/a>: They are all mythical men, molded by the Clinton campaign, the media, and those complicit in the government to sell the tale of Trump colluding with Russia. In reality, though, they aren\u2019t the James Bond, Jack Ryan, and Jason Bourne that we were sold\u2014they are the Three Stooges with better agents.<\/p>\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator\" \/>\n<p>\n  Margot Cleveland is a senior contributor to The Federalist. She is also a contributor to National Review Online, the Washington Examiner, Aleteia, and Townhall.com, and has been published in the Wall Street Journal and USA Today. <\/p>\n<p>Cleveland is a lawyer and a graduate of the Notre Dame Law School, where she earned the Hoynes Prize\u2014the law school\u2019s highest honor. She later served for nearly 25 years as a permanent law clerk for a federal appellate judge on the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. Cleveland is a former full-time university faculty member and now teaches as an adjunct from time to time. <\/p>\n<p>As a stay-at-home homeschooling mom of a young son with cystic fibrosis, Cleveland frequently writes on cultural issues related to parenting and special-needs children. Cleveland is on Twitter at @ProfMJCleveland. The views expressed here are those of Cleveland in her private capacity.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Nearly six years have passed since Hillary Clinton and her cronies launched their plot to frame Donald Trump as a co-conspirator of Russia to distract Americans from Clinton\u2019s scandals. Since<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":489,"featured_media":2315279,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1393205","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1393205","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/489"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1393205"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1393205\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2315279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1393205"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1393205"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1393205"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}