As part of a follow-up investigation into the mysterious communication between servers in Trump Tower and Alfa Bank, Dexter Filkins at the New Yorker dropped this bombshell: the New York Times was told by the FBI about an investigation into possible collusion with Russia to influence the election in September, 2016, and chose to do nothing with the information:
As Lichtblau wrote a draft of an article for the Times, Max’s lawyer contacted the F.B.I. to alert agents that a story about Trump would be running in a national publication, and to pass along the data. A few days later, an F.B.I. official called Lichtblau and asked him to come to the Bureau’s headquarters, in Washington, D.C.
At the meeting, in late September, 2016, a roomful of officials told Lichtblau that they were looking into potential Russian interference in the election. According to a source who was briefed on the investigation, the Bureau had intelligence from informants suggesting a possible connection between the Trump Organization and Russian banks, but no data. The information from Max’s group could be a significant advance. “The F.B.I. was looking for people in the United States who were helping Russia to influence the election,” the source said. “It was very important to the Bureau. It was urgent.”
The F.B.I. officials asked Lichtblau to delay publishing his story, saying that releasing the news could jeopardize their investigation. As the story sat, Dean Baquet, the Times’ executive editor, decided that it would not suffice to report the existence of computer contacts without knowing their purpose. Lichtblau disagreed, arguing that his story contained important news: that the F.B.I. had opened a counterintelligence investigation into Russian contacts with Trump’s aides. “It was a really tense debate,” Baquet told me. “If I were the reporter, I would have wanted to run it, too. It felt like there was something there.” But, with the election looming, Baquet thought that he could not publish the story without being more confident in its conclusions.
The FBI didn’t tell the Times not to mention the investigation. They chose not to publish it.
How differently might things have turned out if the country had known about this investigation in September? Even if Comey launched his “October surprise,” journalists would have had at least several weeks in which to report on the Trump inquiry.
The rest of the story is fascinating in its own right. But this part of it has me steamed 😠