A bombshell new CIA review of the 2016 Intelligence Community Assessment [ICA] on Russian Election Interference” was conducted by career professionals at the CIA’s Directorate of Analysis and was commissioned by CIA Director John Ratcliffe in May. The review found that the Obama administration’s spy agencies’ assessment that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election to help Donald Trump was deliberately corrupted by then-CIA Director John Brennan, FBI Director James Comey and Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, who were “excessively involved” in its drafting, and rushed its completion in a “chaotic,” “atypical” and “markedly unconventional” process that raised questions of a “potential political motive.” Further, Brennan’s decision to include the discredited Steele dossier, over the objections of the CIA’s most senior Russia experts, “undermined the credibility” of the assessment. The Steele Dossier was found to have been financed by Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign.

This is hardly a surprise. I probably wrote more about Russia-gate than any other subject. Much better writers, such as Robert Parry, Yves Smith, Aaron Mate, Glenn Greenwald, Ian Welsh, Matt Taibbi and Caitlin Johnstone, all called bullshit early and often.

But now it’s official.

If you’ll remember from the wayback machine, Russia-gate cast Trump’s 2016 victory as the product of a Kremlin plot, setting off the all consuming Russia frenzy that engulfed his presidency and further poisoned Washington-Moscow relations. The FBI launched a surveillance operation against the Trump campaign based on unverified opposition research. Ultimately, Russia-gate was an unprecedented intrusion by the deep state not only into the electoral process, but into the foreign policy of an elected president. Russia-gate roped Trump into a much more hawkish stance against Russia and in the process turbo-charged the Ukrainian proxy war still raging today.

Ultimately, Russia-gate was a brutally effective psy-op, one that transformed liberals into rabid cold-warriors cheering on the CIA and FBI, while sabotaging Trump’s efforts at diplomacy with Russia. These intelligence agencies interfered in domestic politics in a successful effort to radically influence foreign policy narratives.

The idea that America is ruled by a secret government of deep state intelligence agencies like the CIA and FBI is a right-wing conspiracy theory, the media has said for the last decade. Journalists at outlets such as The New York Times, The Washington Post, CNN, and NPR have portrayed claims about a “deep state” as paranoid fabrications pushed by Donald Trump and his MAGA supporters to discredit legitimate government institutions. They insisted that accusations of political bias or covert influence by agencies like the CIA or FBI had no basis in fact and served only to inflame public distrust.

Yet the hits keep coming.

In parallel with the report on Russia-gate comes news that there was no Epstein client list. There were no tapes of powerful men having sex with underage girls, and furthermore, Epstein wasn’t murdered in his cell, he simply committed suicide. This week, the Department of Justice and Federal Bureau of Investigation released a memo closing the case. The agencies had concluded, notwithstanding widespread suspicions, that Epstein hadn’t blackmailed any prominent people. Additionally, they had determined that “no further disclosure would be appropriate or warranted,” the memo said. 

Nothing to see here, move along.

Despite Trump’s campaign promises to dismantle the deep state and hold elites accountable, his administration now appears to be protecting the same intelligence and law enforcement networks it once condemned. You don’t have to be a conspiracy theorist to conclude the fix is in. Senior Trump officials, including Bondi, Patel, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, and FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino, all have promised total transparency on Epstein. Instead, we get insults to our intelligence and a memo that reads like a cover-up.

Strong evidence suggests that Epstein was part of a sex blackmail operation tied to intelligence agencies, probably US intelligence and Mossad working together. Epstein’s mansions were wired with cameras, and the powerful men who “visited” were captured on tape having sex. Visitor logs show that William Burns, who served as CIA Director under President Biden, visited Epstein’s New York townhouse multiple times. The Wall Street Journal reported those visits in 2023 based on Epstein’s private calendar. In 2017, Alex Acosta, the Justice Department official who gave Epstein his 2008 plea deal, told Trump transition officials that he was told to back off Epstein because he “belonged to intelligence.” The Justice Department later admitted that all eleven months of Acosta’s emails from that period had disappeared.

It appears that the Trump wants the Epstein case disappeared too. Unfortunately, there’s that little nagging detail of Attorney General Pam Bondi admitting to the existence of the Epstein sex tapes. Bondi also has not only acknowledged that Epstein had a client list but said in February that it was in her possession. After Fox News host John Roberts asked if the DOJ would be “releasing a list of Jeffrey Epstein’s clients,” Bondi answered, “It’s sitting on my desk right now to review.”

This failure to follow through seriously undermines Trump’s explicit commitments to reform and shine light on the deep state. This is not just about Epstein. The Trump administration has not been particularly transparent about much else. It’s weird but the Trump administration has released very little, even on issues where transparency would appear to be in its political interest. The administration has kept classified large volumes of material related to COVID origins, the FBI’s role in Russia-gate, and the suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop story.

I have read that Trump’s election proves that we don’t have a deep state because they failed to stop him but I think the opposite and that they simply have him under their control. It is thus hard not to conclude that we really do have a deep state, with an intelligence community that continues to operate in violation of the constitutional system of checks and balances by evading meaningful congressional oversight. If the Trump administration fails to act, it will confirm the fear that even the most populist and combative president can be captured or neutralized by the very system he vowed to dismantle. And Trump will lose much of the legitimacy he gained by surviving and overcoming the law-fare, censorship, and weaponization of the deep state against him.

Think about it. No one powerful suffered any real consequences for Russia-gate. Ghislaine Maxwell is the only one in jail due to the Epstein affair. Similarly, none of Epstein’s elite male clients have faced real consequences. There was a trial, but no victim was asked to identify who abused them. There was no investigation into allegations of intelligence connections.

Ask yourself why. It’s because the real system isn’t broken. It’s working exactly as designed. These scandals aren’t isolated. They’re systemic. This is how control works at the highest levels.

Face it.

The deep state won.