Filling in Some Schiff Memo Redactions

Margot Cleveland recently pointed out that the Adam Schiff memo on Carter Page FISA Application (October, 2016) contained details from the original FISA application that were not recorded in the very heavily redacted version FISA Application itself.

Cleveland sensibly and acidly observed that, if the FBI had information that the "dirt" conversation took place in "late April" prior to their January 2017 interview with Papadopoulos, there is that much less basis for their whinging complaint that Papadopoulos' supposed misrepresentations about timing (of the "dirt conversation") impeded their investigation in the slightest. The purpose of the present article is to lay some groundwork for analysis further refuting Mueller's complaining.

Cleveland observed that the Adam Schiff memo contained an important vignette on Papadopoulos, showing that, at the time of the FISA Application (Oct 2016), the FBI already had information placing the "dirt" conversation in "late April 2016":

While Schiff’s memo redacted what Papadopoulos revealed, it expressly stated that the “individuals linked to Russia” informed Papadopoulos in late April 2016 of those details and that they “took interest in Papadopoulos as a Trump campaign foreign policy adviser.”

The Schiff memo was also redacted, but its redactions are not as severe as the FISA Application itself. Here is a screenshot of the paragraph which was cited by Prof Cleveland:

The Schiff memo appears to be written in Times New Roman fontsize 11 and is closely replicated using left and right margins of 1.1" and 1.18" respectively, as shown below:

The first redaction in this paragraph occurs in the phrase "FBI initiated its counterintelligence investigation on July 31, 2016, after receiving information xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx". The last letter of this first redaction is almost certainly a t.

We know that Crossfire Hurricane was opened on July 31 after the FBI received information from US diplomat Elizabeth Dibble, but before Peter Strzok interviewed Ambassador Downer on Aug 2 or 3. To accommodate a last letter of t, the phrase "from an Australian diplomat" is too long, but the phrase "from an American diplomat" is consistent with known facts and fits nicely into the redaction, as shown below:

Another candidate word ending in t would be "government", but "diplomat" seems to fit better.

The first word on the fourth line has six letters, but the fit is sensitive to the word. "Downer" is too narrow, as are "Dibble" and "source". "London" fits just right. Working backwards to a phrase that both fits and makes sense in the context. the phrase "to a senior diplomat in London" is consistent with known facts and fits nicely into the second redaction. We also looked at "to an allied diplomat in London" but redaction fit was not quite as good.

The subordinate clause in the candidate second sentence - "George Papadopoulos revealed to a senior diplomat in London that individuals linked to Russia, who took interest in Papadopoulos as a Trump campaign foreign policy adviser, informed him in late April 2016 that Russia...", does not appear to be consistent with Papadopoulos telling Downer about Mifsud. The precise turn of phrase also seems odd in Papadopoulos' voice, leading me to wonder whether some extra details/shading were added by the FBI through assumption, a topic that I'll discuss separately.

Note: many of the suggestions in this post are from Hans Mahncke. We bounced interpolations back and forth through today.

Note: @UndercoverHuber drew my attention to his excellent prior thread covering some of these topics, including prior identification of London as redaction of fourth line.