Newly declassified and publicly released documents show that the FBI opened an investigation against then-candidate Donald Trump just days before giving Trump and members of his team their first intelligence briefing. Moreover, the documents show that the FBI agents used the briefing as a pretext to gather information on Trump and Michael Flynn, and to “actively listen for topics or questions” from Trump “regarding the Russian Federation.”

Tellingly, as The Federalist’s Sean Davis notes, “The August 17, 2016 meeting came the day after the FBI opened a formal counterintelligence investigation against Flynn and just two days after FBI counterintelligence official Peter Strzok texted his former lover, FBI attorney Lisa Page, about an ‘insurance policy’ he had designed to keep Trump from becoming president.”

Power Line’s Scott Johnson observes, “The newly declassified documents further the biggest scandal in American political history, though you’d never know it from the silence of the media organs that brought us the Russia hoax over the past four years. They too are part of the scandal.”

We hope John Durham’s criminal investigation findings come out soon.