In a long-awaited release that sent ripples through Washington on Monday, the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI) has declassified closed-door 2019 transcripts from briefings with then-Intelligence Community Inspector General (ICIG) Michael Atkinson. The documents, withheld from the public for over seven years, reveal critical details about the anonymous “whistleblower” whose complaint about President Trump’s phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky triggered Trump’s first impeachment – details that directly contradict the narrative of a neutral, non-partisan civil servant acting in good faith.

What the Transcripts Reveal

According to the newly public records:

  • The whistleblower was a registered Democrat who disclosed having a “prior professional relationship with one of the Democratic Presidential candidates” for the 2020 election (widely understood in context to reference then-former Vice President Joe Biden, given the whistleblower’s known Ukraine policy background).
  • Despite this, ICIG Atkinson told Congress in a 2019 briefing: “I did not find the complainant (whistleblower) was biased.” He relied almost exclusively on the whistleblower’s own self-disclosure.
  • The whistleblower had met with staff from the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI) – then chaired by Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) – before filing the official complaint with the ICIG on August 12, 2019.
  • Timeline: Trump’s July 25, 2019, phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy occurred just 18 days before the complaint was filed. During that window, the whistleblower had undisclosed contacts with Schiff’s committee.
  • On the official “urgent concern” disclosure form, the whistleblower did not check the box acknowledging contact with congressional intelligence committees. When pressed by then-Rep. John Ratcliffe (R-TX, now CIA Director), Atkinson confirmed: “The whistleblower did not disclose to you that he or she had contact with HPSCI?” Atkinson replied: “The answer to that is yes. The answer to that is yes.”

These details are laid out verbatim in the declassified pages Herridge posted, complete with highlighted exchanges from the October 2019 closed-door session.

In short, we now have official, on-the-record confirmation of long-standing Republican concerns that the impeachment process was politicized from the outset. They show an ICIG who accepted the whistleblower’s self-assessment of impartiality at face value, even after learning of partisan ties and unreported congressional contacts – facts that were blacked out or minimized in earlier public handling of the case.

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/buried-7-years-declassified-transcripts-blow-trump-impeachment-story

AND

President Trump just scored TOTAL VINDICATION: Newly declassified docs from Tulsi Gabbard prove the 2019 impeachment was faked by a DEMOCRAT who knew it was fake “In so many different ways, the election was rigged, the 2020 election was rigged. We’ve found that out. What you just said is just a piece of that. It’s a big piece, but minor, relatively speaking compared to what they did. They cheated on the election.” “They cheated on the vote. And they cheated in every way possible.”

https://x.com/EricLDaugh/status/2043735135967748587