Remarks of Deputy Attorney General Jeffrey A. Rosen on Malign Foreign Influence in U.S. Elections Presented at Center for Strategic and International Studies Washington, DC ~ Wednesday, August 26, 2020

[Dan Warnick + 6,100]

Here is an excellent series of thoughts, perceptions, mis-perceptions, actions and reactions, or actions not requiring reactions.  In other words, Politics.  Good to step back from time to time and break down our own thoughts and beliefs and how they may best be applied.  Or how it may be best to "keep the powder dry" for a bit longer...

This particular set of thoughts were laid out for consideration on 24 August of this year, by Deputy Attorney General of The U.S. DOJ, Jeffrey A. Roser

Remarks of Deputy Attorney General Jeffrey A. Rosen on Malign Foreign Influence in U.S. Elections Presented at Center for Strategic and International Studies

Washington, DC

 ~ 

Wednesday, August 26, 2020

Remarks as Prepared for Delivery

Thank you for hosting me today.  What I want to talk about is malign foreign influence in U.S. elections.  Now this might surprise some people, but 2020 happens to be a federal election year.  So I want to start with some good news, which is that our election infrastructure — things like our polling places and printed ballots — have been well-protected and that protection has improved over the last three years.  With regard to the most recent 2018 midterm elections,  DHS and DOJ jointly found no evidence that foreign actors had “any material impact on the integrity or security of election infrastructure or political/campaign infrastructure used in the 2018 midterm elections for the United States Congress.”  Likewise, as the Senate Committee on Intelligence has reported, there is no evidence that any vote totals were altered or changed by any foreign actors in the 2016 Presidential election.

Watch Deputy Attorney General Rosen's remarks

But interference with infrastructure is not our only concern.  We are also concerned about another threat, known as malign foreign influence.  The key word is “influence.”  Much of the time that is disguised propaganda.  Other times, it is using pressure tactics on influential people.  It can also take the form of hacking and disclosing private emails or phone messages.  It comes in many different forms, all designed to influence how Americans think about issues and cast their votes.  There are good lists of these on the FBI and ODNI websites.

We cannot escape the reality that the opportunities for malign foreign influence in our elections are far-flung, so it remains a challenge for Americans as voters.  That didn’t end in 2016.  But it didn’t begin in 2016, either.  Malign foreign influence efforts have been a longstanding concern in American elections, and that historical context can teach us some lessons.  I’d like to use these remarks first to discuss some of this historical context, then to offer a few comparisons with what we’ve seen more recently, and finally to share a little advice we can borrow from our predecessors.

I think it helps to clarify a few definitions to describe what we mean by “malign foreign influence,” as opposed to what we might consider legitimate diplomacy or candid expressions of legitimate national interests that all nations share with each other.  One definition that’s easiest to remember is the 3 C’s framework: coercive, covert, or corrupt activities by foreign governments to influence U.S. policies, political sentiment, or public discourse, or to interfere in our political processes themselves.  Under this framework, we recognize that foreign governments often have preferences about U.S. policies or the outcomes of our elections.  Sometimes those preferences are expressed openly.  Our government sometimes has open preferences about other countries, too.  When those preferences are open and attributable, no one is deceived or misled. 

But we are concerned when those preferences manifest themselves through malign foreign influence activities that are coercive, covert, or corrupt, whether the aim is specifically to influence our elections, or to influence policymaking and public discourse more broadly.

          Historical Context

1. Coercive Activities

One thing that has not been much noted in recent years is that malign foreign influence in our elections has been a concern since the Founding of our Republic.  Using the 3C’s framework, I want to start with coercive activities. 

Going all the way back in 1787, when the Founders were debating the merits of “our new Constitution,” Thomas Jefferson told John Adams that he was “apprehensive of foreign interference, intrigue, influence.”  Adams too worried that “as often as elections happen, the danger of foreign influence recurs.”  Nine years later, the two squared off in the first contested presidential election in American history.

The election of 1796 occurred while Britain and revolutionary France were locked in war.  Adams favored the Washington Administration’s pro-British trade policy, while Jefferson favored the French Republic.  A few months before the election, in his famous farewell address, President George Washington issued a stern public warning: “Against the insidious wiles of foreign influence (I conjure you to believe me, fellow-citizens) the jealousy of a free people ought to be constantly awake ….” 

Nonetheless, France tried to exert its influence.  The French minister to the United States, Pierre-Auguste Adet, told his superiors that he could “get out the vote for a man devoted to France.”  He suggested that France should “adopt measures that will cause the merchants to fear for their property, and to make them see the need to place at the head of the government a man whose known character would inspire confidence in the [French] Republic.”  On the eve of the election, Adet sent the U.S. Secretary of State a series of letters effectively threatening that France would begin to seize American merchant ships and trigger war unless Jefferson were elected.  Adet had them published in the Philadelphia Aurora, one of the most widely circulated and partisan newspapers of the era.

The public threats, however, backfired.  Adams “suspect[ed] they will have a contrary effect, from what he intended.”  He was right; Jefferson’s confidante James Madison soon reported that Adet’s action was an “electioneering maneuver” that could risk “a perpetual alienation” of the United States and France.  Jefferson’s supporters disowned “this interference” in the election, while Adams’ supporters resented it as an attempt to coerce the voters, “and their exertions against the candidate Mr. Adet was understood to favor were the more determined and the more vigorous.”  Jefferson ultimately lost by three electoral votes.

Adams did not forget the risk that France’s attempted coercion posed.  In his inaugural address, he implored the American people never to “lose sight of the danger” that foreign influence, whether “by flattery or menaces, by fraud or violence, by terror, intrigue, or venality,” presents to our “free, fair, virtuous, and independent elections.”  The next year, Jefferson, too, objected to France’s continuing coercive efforts to stir up American partisanship, telling Madison that the efforts were “very unworthy of a great nation.”  He felt that they contributed to a mistaken presumption that Jefferson’s supporters’ “first passion” was “an attachment to France, and hatred to” Adams’s party, rather than what American voters’ passion really was: “the love of their country.”

2. Covert or Deceptive Activities

Continued HERE.

[Ward Smith + 6,615]

Quote

By the mid-1990’s, that again became important when the People’s Republic of China (PRC), “undertook a covert program to influence the U.S. political process through political donations, and other means, during the 1996 election cycle.”  Over Beijing’s strenuous objection, Taiwan’s President was granted a visa in 1995 to speak at his alma mater, Cornell University, after Congress passed resolutions supporting the trip.  The PRC then implemented a plan to influence the U.S. political process to be more favorable toward pro-Beijing policies by making campaign donations through middlemen who could provide access to, and seek to influence, candidates and elected officials at all levels of government.  The Justice Department prosecuted a number of the middlemen who were involved, and a 1999 Congressional report identified the PRC conduct as “a serious threat to our national security.”

Who was the president in 1999? Who stayed in the "Lincoln bedroom"? Who pushed for China to get most favored nation trade status? Who entered office "dirt poor" and left a near billionaire (actual billionaire when you add in the "foundation" billions).

Edited December 15, 2020 by Ward Smith

[Roch + 537]

Question: 

Atty Gen Barr leaves office next week. Does he assign Special Prosecuted to investigate Hunter Biden and the suspected Biden family graft ?

Doubt it Barr doesn't have the stomach for it .

But is Barr resigning early enough to allow acting Atty Gen Rosen to establish Special Prosecuted ?  

Or is this just going to be ignored and die.  The U.S. is becoming more and more a totalitarian state every day.  

No Republic.

No Justice.

The term "The People's Government" is now just a fairy tale.

 

Edited December 15, 2020 by Roch

[Roch + 537]

27 minutes ago, Roch said:

 

But is Barr resigning early enough to allow acting Atty Gen Rosen to establish Special Prosecuted ?  

 

 

If Trump's Rosen establishes a Special Prosecutor in the eleventh hour can Joe Biden terminate the Special Prosecutor for any reason or even no reason as President ?

Edited December 15, 2020 by Roch

[Eyes Wide Open + 3,539]

7 minutes ago, Roch said:

If Trump's Rosen establishes a Special Prosecutor in the eleventh hour can Joe Biden terminate the Special Prosecutor for any reason or even no reason as President ?

I do believe the Senate is making a grab for control of this investigation. There are so many moving parts to this it almost defies imagination.

[Roch + 537]

7 hours ago, Eyes Wide Open said:

I do believe the Senate is making a grab for control of this investigation. There are so many moving parts to this it almost defies imagination.

Yes

That's if the Democrats do not take both Georgia Senate seats.

Do you trust the integrity of U.S. elections.  Many don't. 

Also, if the Hunter investigation heats up Joe will just pardon him.  Nobody will care.  The Media won't even report it. 

Edited December 16, 2020 by Roch

[Ward Smith + 6,615]

2 hours ago, Roch said:

If Trump's Rosen establishes a Special Prosecutor in the eleventh hour can Joe Biden terminate the Special Prosecutor for any reason or even no reason as President ?

Yes the president can fire the special investigator. Trump of course was told that he couldn't. Only later, when he found out he could have did they fess up that it was legal but had bad "optics". Versus, say, the bad optics of 3 years of presidency under the cloud of an investigation that went nowhere, found no crime, cost $50 million and scared away the kind of people Trump needed in his administration to set the country right. For every cabinet member willing to take the heat, there were dozens at least who were not. 

[Dan Warnick + 6,100]

1 hour ago, Roch said:

The Media won't even report it.

Propaganda departments are not required to "report" anything.  🙈🙉🙊

FWIW, fellas, we will learn, along with the rest of the world, what the next step or phase of this show is to be, and how it's going to impact who occupies 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue for the next 4 years.  Sit back and enjoy whatever show unfolds.  It won't be as bad as they'd have us believe, and by the same token it won't be as good either.

[Ward Smith + 6,615]

Given the opportunity to actually testify, you'll all soon know what I already know, which is how Adjudication was used to fraudulently misrepresent ballots.

The video I previously posted showed an election worker demonstrating this massive security flaw in the voting systems. 94% of the ballots going to adjudication is astonishingly bad, but the MSM paid no attention, because they were paid not to. 

[Roch + 537]

China owns Joe Biden and nobody cares.

Carlson shows a video where Chinese professor discussed how China now has influence in the core of U.S. government. The Chinese have taken down the video last week.  

Must watch video :

https://video.foxnews.com/v/6214769762001#sp=show-clips 

Senator Johnson China groomed Hunter Biden just like they did with Swalwell

https://www.breitbart.com/clips/2020/12/16/johnson-china-was-grooming-hunter-just-like-they-did-with-swalwell/

The U.S. Finance Oligarchs (Hedge Funds, Investment Banks, Private Equity) and Big Tech Oligarchs (Google, Facebook, Twitter) now choose the President.  They have gaslighting down to a science.  It seems a majority of the U.S. are quite gullible and very malleable.  

Biden rewards them by giving them positions in his administration and transition team.   They protected Joe now Joe will protect them. 

The political elite a making millions as complacent and willing participants.

Biden Clan now worth tens of millions

PELOSI

Nancy Pelosi's husband has major business dealings with China

FEINSTEIN

Dianne Feinstein's husband has major business dealings with China. She also had a Chinese spy as an intern in her office for 20 years. 

SWALWELL

Eric Swalwell had a Chinese spy in his bed and a Chinese spy as an intern.  Swalwell father and brother continued to contact Chinese spy Fang Fang up until last week.  Someone please check to see if his father and brother are deep in business with China. I bet they do. 

These Pols represent the people. That's funny. 

This year's election was the biggest con in U.S. history.  

JOE , HUNTER , JAMES 

(1) Joe and Jill Biden reported $13 million in speaking fees (pay to play ?) in 2017 as he prepared to announce Presidential run. (2) Who paid Joe millions to speak ? ? ?  Joe listed $3 million in assets when started to run. Where did all the money go ? ? ?  

Joe and Jill set up two Sub S Corporations to shield the income.  The avoided paying approx $800,000 in federal SSI and other benefit taxes.  Probably left the millions in the Sub S so they show no income.  

Is that legal ?

Joe's brother James and son Hunter set up many Corporations and Hedge Funds.  Did they give Joe shares in their Hedge Funds ?  As long as Joe does not cash out the Hedge Fund shares it DOES NOT SHOW UP AS INCOME ! 

NBA , Hollywood ,  Big Tech , WallStreet and Democrats all making millions and billions selling out the U.S. working folks and U.S. businesses.  

Delaware Federal Prosecutors investigating Hunter and James Biden.  

Why haven't they questioned Hunter ? 

Why haven't they questioned James Bulger ?

Why haven't they questioned Joe ? 

YOU CAN'T LIE TO THE FEDS. ITS A CRIME.

Once Joe is President he can't be questioned or charged while in office.

Once Joe is in office he can pardon Hunter and James.

A Brave New World.

An Orwellian United States.  

A one party totalitarian United States ? 

Senator Johnson the ONLY one in Congress , Justice Dept , FBI , Media with balls.  

Except for Trump.

Edited December 22, 2020 by Roch

[Boat + 1,315]

20 hours ago, Ward Smith said:

Who was the president in 1999? Who stayed in the "Lincoln bedroom"? Who pushed for China to get most favored nation trade status? Who entered office "dirt poor" and left a near billionaire (actual billionaire when you add in the "foundation" billions).

You fear mongers forget that trying to influence other nations by corrosive methods is business as usual for most large countries including the US. So bla, bla, bla. The US has developed many allies that turned to enemies. Some enemies have turned to friends. So, yea, any country has to continually adjust on the fly. Get over it. Why not campaign for transparency and limit the power of government without citizen knowledge.

[Boat + 1,315]

This sudden China hate forgets its roots and involvement by multiple presidents going back to Nixon. And of course all the congresses that pressed engagement. Ask Ross Perot who we should point the finger at. The public accepted what big money wanted and now you gripe about the result. 
The perception this new crop of Republicans wants you to believe is it was the other guys fault and not theirs. Lol just more Trump like disinformation.

This trade with the world started in earnest after WWII. For the most part it has worked out. It’s just the last few years China in mainly rhetoric has turned into a more destabilizing force. But we all know they have always been authoritarian. This is not new news. 
As I have said before, 9 of 10 China largest trading partners are the US and allies, the other being Russia. As a group China had no power against that group if they chose to use their trading power as a group. All the rest of this China hate bs is meaningless chatter.

Edited December 16, 2020 by Boat

[Roch + 537]

China grooms Hunter Biden 

 

https://www.breitbart.com/clips/2020/12/16/johnson-china-was-grooming-hunter-just-like-they-did-with-swalwell/

All this will just go away.

The Democrats will win the two Georgia Senate seats.  The polls show Republican candidates have less then 1% lead.  Then factor in 2% to 3% mail-in ballot voter fraud and Democrats easily win.

With one party rule, Social media censorship and Joe Biden President we will never hear about China again.

Edited December 17, 2020 by Roch

[Rob Plant + 2,616]

Dems celebrating the Biden "win"