Those 51 Lying Spies Trump Left Out in the Cold

Their smokescreen changed the course of history.

By Tim Donner Jan 27, 2025 @ Liberty Nation News, Tags: Articles, Opinion, Politics

 

Election interference has a long history in American politics. From distorted TV ads to foreign countries with their own agendas – and hardly just Russia – many corrupt politicians and bad actors have attempted to put their thumbs on the scale over the years to sway low-information voters. But you would be hard-pressed to find a more consequential or flagrantly dishonest episode of electoral sabotage than the 51 members of the intelligence community who all but stated outright that the Hunter Biden laptop was a product of Russian interference in the heat of the 2020 election.

Without investigating the laptop on their own and admitting, “We do not know if the emails [on the laptop] . . . are genuine or not,” they stated in a letter released to the media that it “has the classic earmarks of a Russian information operation.” Joe Biden then used the ludicrous letter to deflect questions – while never denying it was real – and effectively immunizing himself in a debate with Trump three days after the letter was released.

Post-election polls revealed that if the majority of voters who were kept unaware by the pro-Biden media of the devastating contents of the laptop had known about it when they cast their ballots, Donald Trump would have won that election. Of course, Hunter Biden himself and even The New York Times were eventually forced to admit that the information on the laptop was genuine – but not until long after the election when Joe Biden was safely ensconced in the White House.

Four years later and just one day after beginning the second term he was denied in 2020, President Trump retaliated by stripping the infamous 51 of their top-secret security clearances. This will serve the dual purpose of punishing Trump-deranged ex-CIA Directors John Brennan and Leon Panetta and former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, among others. It assures that they will no longer have access to intelligence information they have proven all too eager to access in attempting to destroy the 45th-turned-47th president. And while many other deep-state intelligence operatives will undoubtedly take up the mantle of trying to scandalize Trump, the most prominent and high-ranking anti-Trump characters in the intelligence community have now been disgraced and their credibility shot.

Sabotage by Antony Blinken and Legacy Media

Antony Blinken, far more effective in forming a smokescreen to protect his future boss than he was as Biden’s feckless secretary of state, was the one who convinced the infamous 51 to sign the letter. It is, of course, reasonable to posit that Blinken was promised the high-ranking position he was granted in return for doing Biden’s dirty work. One wonders if Blinken will eventually experience the wrath of the 47th president just as the lying spies did.

Kick Back and Ditch the Matrix

But Blinken and the 51 could not whitewash the story by themselves. Essentially the entirety of the legacy media buried coverage of the scandalous revelations on the laptop in the waning days of the 2020 campaign. News outlets headlined the letter while all but ignoring the entirely credible details of the story unearthed by Miranda Devine of the New York Post on October 19, 2020, two weeks before Election Day, and later detailed in Devine’s best-selling book, Laptop From Hell. Social media was also prominent in the coverup. The Post was banned from posting on Twitter, now X, which claimed without evidence that the story was based on “hacked materials.”

One of the chief culprits in burying the story, we now know, was the left-wing platform Politico, the first site to promote the letter from the 51 with the headline, “Hunter Biden story is Russian disinfo, dozens of former intel officials say.” On a recent podcast entitled Somebody’s Gotta Win, ex-Politico staffer Marc Caputo revealed to host Tara Palmeri the lengths to which the platform went to protect Biden:

“I was covering Biden at the time, and I remember coming to my editor and saying, ‘Hey, we need to write about the Hunter Biden laptop.’ And I was told this came from on high at Politico: Don’t write about the laptop, don’t talk about the laptop, don’t tweet about the laptop. And the only thing Politico wound up writing was that piece that called it disinformation, which charitably could be called misinformation, at the least.”

Unsurprisingly, Caputo further revealed that his coverage of the tax and gun charges on which Hunter Biden was found guilty and for which he was later pardoned by his father, were also buried by the editors at Politico.

Lying Spies Sticking to Their Story

In 2023, the Post sought responses from the 51 now-defrocked officials when the authenticity of the laptop was no longer in question. 47 did not respond. The four that did refused to admit they did anything dishonest or wrong. Clapper responded with, “I stand by the statement made AT THE TIME (caps his) … I think sounding such a cautionary note AT THE TIME was appropriate.”  Emile Nakhleh, former director of CIA’s Political Islam Strategic Analysis Program, stated, “I have not seen any information since [signing the letter] that would alter the decision behind signing the letter.” Russ Travers, former National Counterterrorism Center acting director, wrote, “I spent 25 years as a Soviet/Russian analyst. Given the context of what the Russians were doing at the time … I considered the cautionary warning to be prudent.”

Don Hepburn, former national security executive, did not even bother to defend his actions, instead descending into full denial even after the laptop’s authenticity had been confirmed by everyone involved: “My position has not changed any. I believe the Russians made a huge effort to alter the course of the election . . . The Russians are masters of blending truth and fiction and making something feel incredibly real when it’s not. Nothing I have seen really changes my opinion. I can’t tell you what part is real and what part is fake, but the thesis still stands for me, that it was a media influence hit job.”

Russia Cubed

Russia, Russia, Russia. That was the defensive mantra of Trump as deep state actors advanced the story that Trump colluded with Putin to steal the 2016 election. When no evidence was found after two years of “investigation,” it did not stop the perpetrators of the hoax, as they went to the well again with their letter fingering Russia – again.  It always defied logic that Russians would attempt to tilt the election in favor of Trump when they undoubtedly concluded that they could roll the already enfeebled Biden, which is exactly what they did months after he took office. When Biden refused to respond to the buildup of the Russian military along the Ukrainian border, and stated publicly that he would not respond in the event of a “minor incursion,” all hell broke loose. More than a million Ukrainians and Russians have now lost their lives in a grinding ground war promising no victor.

When the history of the Trump era is written in the years ahead, it will – or should – prominently include the treachery of 51 lying spies who, instead of acting covertly as in their job descriptions, advanced a bold-faced lie in public that changed the course of history. And they did so with the aid and comfort of legacy media more than willing to serve as flacks in the grand plan to take Trump down at any cost, and for good. We can be all but certain that none of them expected what would happen four years later, on November 5, 2024.

~

Liberty Nation does not endorse candidates, campaigns, or legislation, and this presentation is no endorsement.

Read More From Tim Donner Senior Political Analyst

Trump on Day One: "Cry Havoc and Let Slip the Dogs of War"

Donald Trump Keeps 46 Promises and Counting on Day One, Thrilling Republicans

By Rich Kozlovich

Starting with Harry Truman, I've seen 13 Presidents (counting Trump only once) in my life, and the First Lady of each.  I think I can say hands down, Melania is clearly the classiest of them all, including Jackie Kennedy.  Smart, speaks multiple languages, has amazing taste, and she showed it at her husband's inauguration.  

The last time she was first lady the jealous women in the Pravda media ranted asking why she always wore high heels.   That's easy to answer.  For the same reason Billy Graham wore five hundred dollar suits, he looked good in them, and so she wears high heels because she looks good in high heels.  

Talk about hitting the ground running, there's never been such a first day for a President as this.  Impressive, inspiring, and fresh air comes flowing into Washington dispelling the fumes of the leftist fever swamps.  

The Rick McDowell had this to say about his inauguration speech:

The inauguration speech was far-reaching, multifaceted, only slightly retrospective, and emphasized what an opportunity we have before us. After the obligatory humbling of the current state of the federal government, the rest was optimism and American to the core. Everything made sense. Border security even with military involvement and potential controversial acts; energy independence and exportation of energy as a key driver of economic growth; a return to sanity in meritocracy and ending government-manufactured racial and gender division; the acknowledgement of our success as a country mainly through American entrepreneurship, not government action.

The media must really be fuming.  After four years of evasions, coverups, lies, and insane irrational totally incomprehensible blather from Biden, Kamala, and Karine Jean-Pierre, Trump took questions from the media while signing a stack of executive orders, including pardons for J6 prisoners.  Striking contrast between Biden and Trump.  They actually understood what was being said. Imagine that.  

• Trump Signs Flurry of Executive Orders in Front of Live Audience: The First Struck a Blow to Biden's Legacy

During his inauguration speech he threw down the gauntlet.  From now on the federal government was going to protect women's rights.   From now on the official policy of the federal government will be there are only two genders, male and female.  Remarkable.  And unlike Ketanji Brown Jackson, Trump didn't even need a degree in biology to come to that conclusion.  Riley Gaines called Donald Trump a ‘true champion for women", and has ended federal funding for sex changes.

1. He's renaming Mt. McKinley Mt. McKinley.  
2. He's serious about the Panama Canal to prevent China's efforts to take control of it.  
3. The rule of law is back, no more lawfare.
4. An end to government censorship.
5. A massive release of, classified government documents including documents regarding the assassinations of JFK, RFK, and MLK.  

So, guess this pretty much establishes who is the ultimate classifying authority in the United States, and pretty much demonstrates the corruption behind the Mar-a-Lago raid. 

All of which was called out to all the bad guys, right to their faces.  "They were all sitting there. Bush was there, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, all of them were there."  As Mike McDaniel noted:

this was one of the great moments in American history was watching the faces of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris as Trump listed the damages they’ve inflicted on us, and what he’s going to do to repair them.......The misery of Democrats/socialist/communists (D/s/cs) like Chuck Schumer, who had to keep at least a more or less neutral facial expression, was delicious. At least he didn’t look demon-possessed as he usually does........

Let the Purges Begin

Trump Revokes Security Clearances of 51 Ex-Intelligence Officials who declared the Hunter Biden laptop was actually just Russian propaganda.  They lied, they knew they were lying, Biden knew it was a lie, the media knew it was a lie, and it's now known that lie was organized by Secretary of State Tony Blinkin. Who, as far as I can tell, has not received a preemptive pardon. 

  Trump's order states:

“This fabrication of the imprimatur of the Intelligence Community to suppress information essential to the American people during a Presidential election is an egregious breach of trust reminiscent of a third world country"..

Retired Gen. Michael Hayden was stripped of his clearance, and John Bolton was stripped of his Secret Service detail and his clearance was revoked for using classified information in his memoir that was:

“rife with sensitive information drawn from his time in government, posing a grave risk that undermined a President's ability to ask for and receive candid information .....on matters of national security from their staff."  

I wouldn't be surprised if Bolton faces criminal charges over this. And why would Bolton still have a Secret Service detail?  I'm now wondering how many have these taxpayer funded services. 

Marco Rubio was the first Trump nominee to be confirmed, and Trump is making sure all these far left types who worked against him in his first term won't be there to prevent Rubio from carrying out his polices due to their "notoriously recalcitrant, hidebound" resistance to Trump's policies, and the ability of Rubio to build a solid team without traitors working in their midst. They were expected to "resign no later than noon on Monday." 

And this isn't just the State Department, Trump signed an Executive Order to fire top career federal managers more quickly.  He's just not going to tolerate "managers who fail to follow or implement his policies."  He's also withdrawing from the World Health Organization, a vile component of the UN, and Trump Vows Sanctions Over ICC’s Anti-Semitic Actions.  After that Poland, who was going to honor the ICC's arrest warrant for Netanyahu, decided maybe that wasn't such a good idea after all. The ICC is a corrupt sham institution if there ever was one.   Globalist tyrants...... here come the dogs of war.

The Purge of the Top Brass in the Military Has Begun:

 

There were reports that the Trump administration was mulling a ‘warrior panel’ to purge the military of the woke brass. The president signed a slate of executive orders to rid the government of federal DEI programs, secure the border, and get America back on track to greatness. We’re not even two days into the Trump presidency, and he’s already firing people..........  One of the first officers to go is the commandant for the United States Coast Guard, who was fired for pushing DEI nonsense and failing to help secure the border.

Trump appointed Matthew Lohmeier, a former Lt. Col. who was fired for his anti-Marxist views to be undersecretary of the Air Force, and it's clear far more changes are going to hit the Pentagon, and they know it.  General Milley portrait removed from Pentagon hours after Trump sworn in.  The same butt kissing, self promoting people who groveled before this DEI racist nitwit are now trying to distance themselves from him.  He's reinstating service members who refused the shot and forced out of the military by Biden and Austin, and with back pay; saying: 

‘Our armed forces will be freed to focus on their sole mission: defeating America’s enemies’........

Trump Fires Immigration Judges as Border Security Becomes a Top Priority - One way to do that is to shore up the legal backbone by having quality immigration judges, which the president wasted no time in reshaping. He fired a slew of them today. Immigration judges are the gatekeepers to asylum requests. The president would like new ones.......

Let the Deportations Begin '

On Monday Border Czar Tom Homan made this administration's intentions clear saying: Deportations Start Tomorrow:

Look the president’s been clear that, right out of the gate, we’re going to concentrate on public safety threats and national security threats. So, I can’t believe that any elected politician — I don’t care what party you’re from, why would you not want public safety threats out of your communities? That’s your number one responsibility as an elected official is the protection of your communities.

•  Donald Trump to End ‘Birthright Citizenship’ via Executive Order
• ACLU sues over Trump cancelling birthright citizenship.

Sen. Ernst: GOP Securing Border, Closing Loopholes to Prevent Illegal Alien Crime - Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA) in a statement to Breitbart News said that Republicans are passing the Laken Riley Act and Sarah’s Law to close loopholes that prevent illegal aliens criminals from facing justice.  More than two-thirds of senators voted to approve the Laken Riley Act on Monday, with 12 Senate Democrats voting for the legislation.

Trump has shut down the CBP One border app, and announcing he’s "putting troops on the border and declaring cartels foreign terrorist organizations in the same speech was no coincidence", and is prepared to invoke ‘Alien Enemies Act’ to deal with this invasion of migrants and drug cartels, and all these leftist Latin American governments are all in a lather over the "threat" of mass deportations, expressing concern about:

“protecting the human rights of migrants, preventing abuse and mistreatment, managing regular, safe and orderly migration from a humanitarian perspective.”

Remarkable.  None of that seemed to bother them when they were being abused in their own countries, and abused badly while they were traveling across their borders to get to America. Interesting moral code they have....which is none.   

The Impact

I've stated over and over again big corporations are at best leaky vessels as allies.  They're like Ph.D.'s and Military Officers.  They advance by going along to get along, now all of a sudden leaders of corporations have had a "Road to Damascus" epiphany, and are abandoning, DEI, and Climate Programs.

 After years of applying the progressive environmental, social, and governance (ESG) ideological framework to their corporations, executives appear to now be realizing that these programs could be driving their companies into a legal and financial wall......Companies that have announced they are canceling or dialing back their diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs include Meta, Walmart, Ford, McDonald’s, Harley-Davidson, John Deere, Tractor Supply Company, Lowe’s, Molson Coors, Nissan, Toyota, and Stanley Black & Decker.....Goldman Sachs, Citigroup, Wells Fargo, JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, and Morgan Stanley—dropped out of the U.N.-sponsored Net-Zero Banking Alliance.  

On Jan. 13, the Net Zero Asset Managers initiative (NZAMi) announced that it would suspend its activities after investor giant BlackRock announced its withdrawal from the club on Jan. 9. These departures followed in the wake of half of the members of the Net-Zero Insurance Alliance quitting that organization in 2023.......“ESG and DEI are both on death watch.....” 

As Davos 2025 reacts to Trump tack, EU chief leads defense against climate change, as Trump is going to DRILL, BABY, DRILL, declaring a national energy emergency creating "directives and actions designed to animate his “Unleash American Energy” agenda."  He's going to collect tariffs, and he's abandoned the Paris Treaty for the second time. 

 My friend Dr. Jay Lehr, who has passed, had a lot to do with that during Trump's first term.  He would be pleased to know Trump is continuing that battle, and he's going to "refill the Strategic Petroleum Reserve again was a beautiful and well-deserved slap at Biden", and he called Liz Chaney a crying lunatic.  What's not to like?

Winning the election is merely winning a battle, winning the war requires winning many battles.  The Democrats and their RINO helpers have done incalculable damage to America over the last thirty five years since Reagan.  During the 20th century there were only three conservative presidents, Warren G. Harding, who died during his first term, succeeded by Calvin Coolidge, who I consider the best President in the 20th century, and Ronald Reagan.  That was eight conservative years versus ninety two years of "progressive" to openly socialist rule.  Going forward add another twenty to that versus four with Trump.  That's 110 years of progressive corrosion and corruption versus twelve years trying to repair that corruption.  The next four years will be a daily battle for Trump but he and I are the same age, 78, so he has nothing to lose and understands it will take more than four years to fix things, so he will go all out no matter the costs.  

One more thing.  Trump has been called an narcissist, a lot, and even by conservative writers, and I will admit, I've agreed..... in the past..... but after watching what he's endured, I have to ask:  What narcissist would go through all the horrible things they've done to him and his family over the last eight years?  I'm no longer convinced he's a narcissist.  I think it's supreme self confidence, and a sincere belief if he's not there to fix America, it won't be fixed.  And I agree.

Former CIA Boss: Not Sorry I Tried to Discredit Hunter Biden Laptop

Disinformation is OK when it serves a political purpose, apparently.

ByGraham J Noble  October 17, 2023 @ Liberty Nation News

During an Oct. 13 Fox News interview, former CIA Director Leon Panetta tried to play the game of plausible deniability regarding his role in a disinformation effort relating to the infamous laptop belonging to Hunter Biden. When asked if he regretted signing the now-discredited letter claiming that the material recovered from the laptop bore “all the classic earmarks of a Russian information operation,” Panetta ducked and dodged. He was one of 51 Intelligence Community (IC) officials and former officials who signed that letter. The man who helped bring them together has since admitted they had no proof the laptop was a Russian operation and that his intention was to help elect Joe Biden to the White House. Panetta remains unrepentant even though he is now unable to defend the false claim under which he put his name.

The US and Global Response

The letter in question contained nothing to support its central premise that the Russians had likely planted the laptop or had somehow manipulated or falsified information contained on it. In fact, the IC officials even stated that “we do not have evidence of Russian involvement.” The signatories were presumably relying on the idea that their collective decades of experience in the intelligence business would place their allegation beyond dispute. Thus, they would have successfully discredited a story that may very well have altered the outcome of the 2020 presidential election.

The Hunter Biden Disinformation Campaign

Not too long after the disputed election, the Russian disinformation story fell apart. Several left-leaning media outlets eventually verified that the Hunter Biden laptop was the genuine article, containing real and incriminating evidence of his questionable overseas business activities.

Hunter Biden (Photo by Celal Gunes/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)

While giving testimony on Capitol Hill, one of the letter’s architects, former CIA officer Michael Morell, revealed that his primary aim was “to help” Vice President Biden “because I wanted him to win the election.”

Panetta, who is also a former secretary of defense, told Fox’s Bret Baier that he had been concerned about Russia’s efforts to influence a US election. “Frankly,” Panetta told Baier, “I haven’t seen any evidence from any intelligence agency that that was not the case.” The Intelligence Community has produced no evidence that Russia’s relatively insignificant efforts to interfere in US elections have yielded any measurable results. If he was being honest, this veteran of Democrat administrations would have also noted this fact.

Intelligence agencies did not even find evidence that Russian disinformation had any effect on American voters in 2016.

Russia Derangement Syndrome?

Leon Panetta (Photo by Scott Varley/MediaNews Group/Torrance Daily Breeze via Getty Images)

This is where the plausible deniability came in. Panetta was not about to admit he signed that letter knowing that the claim it made was unfounded. “You don’t think that [the laptop] was real?” Baier asked him. “I think that disinformation is involved here,” Panetta evaded. “I think Russian disinformation is part of what we’re seeing everywhere.” He went on, “No, I don’t have any regrets about not trusting the Russians.” It was a cop-out, so to speak. Rather than implicate himself in the plot to discredit the Hunter Biden laptop story – and rather than admit that he shouldn’t have put his name to that letter – Panetta merely made some vague claims about Russian activities that cannot be quantified in any way. His hands are clean, he implied, because the Russians have been known to do this kind of thing, we believe.

The governments of several First World countries, along with the United Nations, have made a big deal about disinformation and how it poses a practically existential threat to democracy. Yet, some of these same governments have been the chief purveyors. The letter signed by many of the most senior IC officials like Panetta was disinformation, clearly. It contained an allegation about the Hunter Biden laptop that was based on no evidence and that later turned out to be untrue. Surely, that would fall under the heading of textbook disinformation. While politicians and intelligence officials bemoan the dire consequences of foreign disinformation efforts on American elections, voters might want to consider the deceptive influence those same people are wielding with their own disinformation campaigns.

 

Read More From Graham J Noble

Who Are the 9 Secret Intel Officials Who Signed on to the Hunter Biden Laptop Disinfo Letter “Who Cannot Be Named Publicly”

by Jim Hoft May. 8, 2023

During the second presidential debate in 2020, Joe Biden and hack reporter Kristen Welker teamed up against President Trump. At one point, Joe Biden interrupted Welker for his planned response to the Hunter Biden Laptop from Hell scandal. Joe Biden told the audience 50 intelligence leaders signed a letter saying the laptop was “Russian propaganda.”

 

The 51 spies who lied openly to the American public.

The intel leaders all lied. They knew it was a lie. Joe Biden knew it was a lie. The media knew this was a lie! And now we know that the Biden Campaign and current Secretary of State Tony Blinken organized this massive lie. The laptop was real and EVERY SINGLE INTEL ‘EXPERT’ who signed that letter knew it was real! They have never apologized. Here is the full letter signed by 51 intelligence officials who lied to the American public about Hunter Biden’s laptop being a Russian disinformation operation. They ALL knew this was a lie...........To Read More....

U.S. Intelligence Community Has a New ‘Disinformation’ Center - Republicans worry the center will be used to stifle speech.  The Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) has stood up a new office to oversee the intelligence community’s efforts to combat “disinformation” and foreign influence campaigns in the United States, Director Avril Haines announced Thursday........The center will be focused on “foreign malign influence” aimed at U.S. elections but also at “public opinion within the United States,” according to the law that established the FMIC..........

 

Directly from the Deep State to you May 10, 2023 — Scott Johnson - Rep. Jim Jordan’s Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government is set to release its report on the letter of the Deep State 51 today. The Federalist’s Sean Davis obtained a copy of the report and previews it here. The invaluable Miranda Devine devotes a New York Post column to the findings here. The Daily Mail has more here.  Among the report’s findings: The CIA fast-tracked approval of the letter and solicited at least one of the 51 signatures on it. James Clapper contributed the letter’s key formulation to the letter. We can see from the revision that former CIA Acting Director Michael Morell was making it up as he went along in his service to the Biden presidential campaign. He wanted the job of CIA Director that badly. I declare the Morell/Biden operation the dirtiest trick in American political history...........There is more to come. What we have learned so far strongly suggests that the CIA should join the FBI on the ash heap of history........