Not “Low-Level”: The Kevin Clinesmith Cover-Up

Kevin Clinesmith is the former FBI lawyer whose lies played a critical role in securing a spy warrant on Trump campaign advisor Carter Page. To date, he remains the only person held accountable for any part of the Russiagate abuses—but even that amounted to nothing more than a slap on the wrist from, unironically, Judge James Boasberg, who’s recently made headlines for his overt anti-Trump activism. (Those two facts are not unrelated.)

When it became public in 2020 that Clinesmith had doctored evidence submitted to the FISA court, the media rushed to minimize the story. We were told he was just a “low-level” FBI lawyer who made a one-off mistake. But we always knew that wasn’t true. And now, thanks to the recently released Russiagate binder, we finally see the full extent of the lie: Clinesmith was a central figure in the Crossfire Hurricane operation—deeply embedded in every major development of the FBI’s Trump-Russia hoax. Not just the FISA warrant, which would have been bad enough.

When Clinesmith pleaded guilty to altering a CIA email that was used in the Carter Page FISA application, legacy media outlets snapped into action. The New York Times, Washington Post, CNN, ABC, Bloomberg, The Hill, Politico, and others immediately described him as a “low-level FBI lawyer.” A simple search of his name paired with that phrase turns up dozens of articles, all pushing the same talking point. It was clearly coordinated—and clearly false.

The recently released Russiagate binder includes documents previously released only in redacted form. This time, Clinesmith’s name is fully visible, and it appears constantly.