Peter Strzok and his conspiracy theorizing lack all credibility

“And when I say that, I mean that they hold leverage over him that makes him incapable of placing the national interest, the national security ahead of his own,” claimed Strzok, who recently wrote a book about his role in the FBI’s investigation into Trump’s alleged ties to Russia.

“And I think when you take a look at the Trump financial enterprise, particularly its relationship with Russian, with Russian monies and potentially those related to organized crime and other elements, that those interactions have placed him in a position where the Russians have leverage over him and are able to influence his actions,” he said.

Strzok has no evidence to support this accusation, nor did he have any evidence to support the FISA warrant application that he authored at the end of July 2016, according to subsequent investigations by the Justice Department.

This shouldn’t come as a surprise. Strzok has no problem stretching the truth when it suits him. Take, for example, his new book. In it, he mixes up the genesis of the FBI’s Trump-Russia investigation to make it seem more reputable than it really was. When asked by the Washington Examiner why he distorted the timeline of events, Strzok admitted, “So, I got that wrong,” and then proceeded to blame the federal government for barring his access to confidential material. Strzok then tried to downplay his book’s falsehood, calling it a “little error.”

Little errors like this one were riddled throughout Strzok’s work on Crossfire Hurricane. The FISA warrant application to monitor Trump campaign associate Carter Page, which Strzok authored, contained at least 17 errors or omissions, according to Inspector General Michael Horowitz. These errors were so widespread that the FBI has had to overhaul its entire FISA warrant application process.

Yet Strzok claimed last week that there was nothing “improper” about the FBI’s investigation into Page, and he once again tried to downplay these errors as “mistakes.”

“I don’t think at all that it’s anything improper. You get people who are overworked, who make mistakes, and don’t get me wrong, inexcusable mistakes,” Strzok told CBS News last week.

Yet another error: When writing his book, Strzok conveniently forgot about his text with former FBI lawyer Lisa Page. She texted to Strzok, “[Trump’s] not ever going to become president, right?” He replied: “No. No he won’t. We’ll stop it.” Of that exchange, Horowitz concluded that “the messages raised serious questions about the propriety of any investigative decisions in which Strzok and Page played a role.”

But in his book, Strzok claims, “To this day I still do not remember writing” that text. Of course he doesn’t.

And let’s not forget about Strzok’s role in obtaining the Steele dossier, which served as the basis for the rest of the FBI’s investigation into alleged Russian collusion. It was Strzok who made the decision to use former British spy Christopher Steele as a source in Crossfire Hurricane, even though recently declassified documents revealed that he questioned Steele’s reliability. In his notes, Strzok wrote that “recent interviews and investigations … reveal Steele may not be in a position to judge the reliability of his sub-source network.”

That same sub-source network openly dismissed Steele’s findings as inaccurate during interviews with the FBI, according to these documents. But the FBI used Steele’s dossier anyway, despite the fact that it lacked corroboration.

Suffice to say, Strzok is an unreliable, dishonest, bad-faith actor whose track record speaks for itself. He lied in 2016 because he didn’t want Trump to become president, and he’s lying now because he wants to sell some books. Simply put, he is in no position to make accusations against Trump — not now and not ever. And the media outlets entertaining him should keep that in mind.