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Aug. 16, 2021 - Epoch Times
24:37
New DOJ Letter Sheds Light on Durham Probe; Exclusive Interviews With Former AG, DNI | Facts Matter
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Good evening.
Two days ago, over in Florida, 17 people were arrested in an undercover sting operation that was focused on child sexual exploitation.
And among those 17, there were three employees of Walt Disney World.
Meanwhile, the Department of Justice just released an update on the Durham report.
And in order to figure out what this actually meant, we went over to Texas and we had a chance to interview Matt Whitaker, who is the former Attorney General, Rick Grinnell, who is the former DNI, as well as Matt Gaetz.
And lastly, over in Pennsylvania, newly uncovered government documents show that the University of Pittsburgh received millions of federal tax dollars in order to fund their human fetal organ harvesting project, which included getting organs from viable and full-term babies.
Let's go through it all together.
This is your daily Facts Matter update, and I'm your host, Roman, from the Epoch Times.
And now let's begin today's discussion over in Pennsylvania.
But actually, just before we do, as a super quick aside, right there at the very top of the description box is a link to Epoch TV, which is our brand new no-censorship video platform where you can find all of the awesome Epoch Times video programs, like The Larry Elder Show, American Thought Leaders, Crossroads with Joshua Phillip, China in Focus, Life and Times...
And of course, on there is our show, Facts Matter, and we publish exclusive episodes only on Epic TV that, frankly, due to the censorship here on YouTube, we don't feel comfortable publishing on this platform.
So again, the link to Epic TV will be right there at the top of the description box.
I hope you check it out.
And now let's really move on over to Pittsburgh.
According to newly released government documents, millions of federal tax dollars have been spent as a part of an effort to create a one-stop fetal tissue shop at the University of Pittsburgh.
Let me just repeat that.
According to these documents, which came from the Department of Health and Human Services, nearly $3 million in federal tax funding went to the University of Pittsburgh since the year 2015.
And it was spent in order to create a tissue hub for human fetal tissue ranging from 6 to 42 weeks of gestation.
And for your reference, by the way, a full-term pregnancy is 40 weeks, typically.
And so their research included full-term babies.
Now Judicial Watch, which is a non-profit watchdog group, they're the ones who actually released these documents, here's a statement from their president on what they actually found.
These documents show taxpayer money is being used to turn the University of Pittsburgh into a one-stop human fetal tissue shop, from procuring the tissue from elective abortions, subdividing the human remains, to distributing and shipping the harvested tissue.
According to these documents, which were acquired by Judicial Watch through a FOIA request, through a Freedom of Information Act request, this project over at the University of Pittsburgh, it was aiming to develop a pipeline to acquire quality control as well as to distribute fetal tissues as well as organs.
And in one of these documents, the university says that they have been And as disturbing as that may sound to you, There is also a racial component to it as well.
Because according to the funding proposal that the school gave to the federal government, they included a racial target for these body parts.
That's right, they included a racial target for aborted babies.
Here's how the Judicial Watch president described the findings within that proposal.
The University of Pittsburgh proposal also included a racial target for harvesting of human fetal parts.
Of its planned aborted subjects, the University of Pittsburgh desired 50% to be minority fetuses.
The proposal suggests that the subjects be diverse because Pittsburgh is diverse.
The US Census Bureau shows the city of Pittsburgh is close to 70% white.
Now, a spokesperson for the university responded to these findings and justified their research this way.
This grant-supported research is to find new therapies for diseases of the kidneys, bladder, and urinary systems, which are a leading cause of organ failure.
By providing a central hub for researchers across the country, this program allowed scientists across the country to access tissue necessary to tackle this growing public health concern.
Researchers have no part in any decisions as to the timing, method, or procedures used to terminate the pregnancy.
All tissue is obtained in compliance with the Pennsylvania Abortion Control Act as noted in the grant.
Now, the timing of the release of these documents is quite interesting.
They were released just a few months after Javier Becerra, who is the new Secretary of Health and Human Services, after he ended the Trump era regulations which limited fetal research on tissue like this.
In fact, back in April, the NIH, which is the National Institute of Health, they said that they would end both a ban on research funded by the NIH using fetal tissue procured from elective abortions and regulations requiring prior ethical review on such studies.
Meaning, in plain English, that research on aborted baby parts is once again now allowed, and then ethical reviews prior to such research is no longer required.
In fact, here's specifically what the statement from the NIH said back in April.
NIH reminds the community of expectations to obtain informed consent from the donor for any NIH-funded research using human fetal tissue and of continued obligations to conduct such research only in accord with any applicable federal, state, or local laws and regulations.
Now, if you'd like to read more about these findings, including these newly released government documents, I'll throw all of that into the description box below this video so you can read at your own leisure.
And now, before we move on over and discuss the recent update in regards to the Durham report, I would like to take a quick moment and introduce our sponsor for today's episode, and I'll do so from the sound booth.
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Now Roman in the studio, back to you.
And now let's talk a bit about John Durham.
If you remember, during the 2016 election, the FBI engaged in something that they internally dubbed Operation Crossfire Hurricane.
That was their codename for a counterintelligence operation that they were running against the Trump campaign and some of its associates.
Basically, it was what's colloquially known as the Trump-Russia probe, or Spygate.
However, the investigation was riddled with errors.
The Mueller report found that there was no actual evidence of Russian collusion, and the question remains, to this day, as to whether the spying was actually properly predicated.
Because, once again, to this day, no one has really been held accountable for what happened, and the whole operation remains clouded in mystery.
Now, the only person who is still investigating this whole thing is John Durham, who is assigned to lead this investigation as a special counsel by William Barr.
However, even though he has been investigating this matter for about two and a half years now, we have not heard much from him.
In fact, over all this time, he has only brought forth one criminal referral against a single FBI lawyer for altering an email.
Now, this radio silence from John Durham has caused President Trump to recently make this statement.
And so, following that statement from President Trump, two Republican senators reached out to the Department of Justice and they asked for an update into the investigation.
That was back in June.
And the Department of Justice just responded to them with this letter right here.
In fact, let's go through some of the relevant parts together.
It says, quote, And so to pause here for a moment,
this confirms that the investigation is still in fact ongoing, and according to what they say at least, is being conducted independently of DOJ officials.
Now the letter then goes on to say that once the report is released, it will likely be made public, meaning that it won't just stay within the department, and once it actually comes out, common plebs like you and me will likely have access to it.
And so given that this was pretty much all the letter actually said, I took a great opportunity while I was down in Texas, and I sat down with three people.
I sat down with Matt Whitaker, who is the former acting attorney general under President Trump.
I sat down with Rick Grinnell, who is the former acting director of national intelligence under President Trump.
And I sat down with Matt Gaetz, who is a congressman from Florida, and I asked them to give us some insight into the Durham investigation.
And here's what they said.
I know John Durham, and I worked with John Durham while I was in the Trump administration.
He was a U.S. attorney in Connecticut, and we had him do an investigation unrelated to sort of the crossfire hurricane and all of the Russia collusion fable.
What I know about what John's doing is he's trying to get to the origins of how it all started, to look at the predication.
The IG looked at the predication, said it was flimsy, but there was something there.
And I could never understand, while I was Attorney General, kind of what actually...
It was the piece that started it.
And if the predication obviously was the dossier, that obviously was all false and could easily be dispelled without much effort at the end of the day if you look at all the allegations, salacious and non-salacious, whether it's the Carter Page stuff or whatever.
And so, you know, I think peeling back that onion is what John is doing and seeing every step of the way the decisions that were made were those kind of reasonable and necessary or were laws broken by individuals and then holding those individuals accountable.
It's sad to think that in Our country, in the United States of America, that we would have FBI officials that knew that the Steele dossier was part of the DNC-Hillary Clinton opposition research dump.
Largely, if not almost all, untrue.
The FBI were told Specifically from sources that the Steele dossier was not true.
And yet, they continued.
The leadership of the FBI continued down this road.
They didn't share that information with the courts.
They were not transparent with the courts.
And I think that people need to be held to account.
It is unacceptable to have the weaponization of government agencies against political opponents.
And that's exactly what happened.
Yeah.
What's going on with the counter-investigation?
Because, I mean, Bob Mueller and John Durham, essentially, they have the same title now, right?
Special Counsel.
They're both Special Counsel.
But it seems like when Bob Mueller was conducting his investigation, there were regular updates, there were regular leaks.
Well, with John Durham, it seems like it's a veritable ghost town.
Do you know anything about what's happening?
Well, I certainly like the fact that there are no leaks because I think that while our appetite to find out what's going on is high, we should not be having leaks.
There shouldn't be individuals spinning through partial information outcomes.
I like the fact that there hasn't been leaks, but it's now lingering.
It's been too long.
And delayed justice means sometimes no justice.
I just sense that once the Biden administration took over, that they've kind of swept it under the rug.
That John is no longer the U.S. Attorney in Connecticut.
He's probably been denied resources.
But he's going to have to speak to that.
And if you don't have the resources to conduct a massive investigation, to travel where you need to travel, to have the agents do the interviews they need to do, it just grinds everything to a halt.
And so my fear is that it's just gonna wither on the vine because Merrick Garland and the Biden administration has no interest in really actually getting to the bottom of that and holding people accountable.
I think that's sad for America.
I think that shouldn't be the way it should be.
If the Department of Justice and individuals in the Department of Justice make bad decisions, make illegal decisions or whatever, there should be an accountability.
The American people should know what happened, why it happened, and be able to judge for themselves.
And if the laws haven't been broken, then that should be explained how something so invasive that ultimately led to the appointment of a special counsel, the harassment of a U.S. president, We're ended up turning into nothing.
You know, that should be explained to the American people.
So from your perspective, from having, you know, been not only inside the department, but running the department, how is it...
So you said that they might wither in the vine and they don't have the resources.
But it seems like Mueller was the special counsel under a Republican administration, but he was given the resources.
So why is it the case?
What kind of mechanism is in place that would deny the...
Well, I mean, ultimately, it's up to the discretion of the attorney general.
And before I was ever in the Trump administration, I was a CNN contributor.
I don't admit that very often.
But one of the things that I suggested is that, you know, if, you know, the attorney general or the deputy attorney general, you know, wanted to, you know, slow down the Mueller investigation or, you know, you could obviously you could reduce the budget.
Instead, I mean, it was given, what, 30, 40 million dollars to conduct that investigation for, you know, That turned into a 400-page report that demonstrated that the president hadn't done anything wrong.
So they're just withholding funds maybe because there's not a public awareness of what's happening and they don't feel that fire under the feet?
Yeah, again, because it all gets down to the fourth estate.
It all gets down to the media and the lack of real accountability for Democrat administrations.
You know, when presidential candidates are asked what kind of, you know, what flavor, their favorite flavor ice cream, instead of, you know, really pressing issues, when they, you know, really aren't as tough on China and Russia as the Trump administration was, you know, when these kind of things are obfuscated or ignored or otherwise not, you know, brought to light, I mean, you know, it creates a false narrative.
And we live in this world of just this complete false narratives that are created by the media.
We've contact traced just about every American as a result of coronavirus.
I'd love it if somebody would contact trace Durham and figure out where he's been and what he's been up to because we saw the law violated and I think that it will happen again without a doubt if we don't bring the people to account who misused our national security infrastructure for politics.
You know, we actually spoke with Matt Whitaker, and he suggested that the Attorney General could actually reduce the budget of John Durham to the point where the investigation could die in the vines.
Do you have any insight into what's going on there?
Well, I don't think there's anyone at the Biden Justice Department who thinks that the way they're going to move up in the world and get the next promotion is by resourcing the Durham investigation or really any investigation into the deep state and the unity of purpose that we've seen between the deep state and I don't think there's anyone at the Biden Justice Department who thinks that the way they're
I mean, what what the Russia hoax and really the Ukrainian sequel showed us is that there is this echo chamber where the FBI, the DOJ will leak a lie.
Additional evidence, you know, and innuendo will be embroidered onto that lie.
And then it will be forever utilized as a basis to target people whose politics they disagree with or who are their critics.
That's what happened to Trump.
And undeniably, it will happen again if we don't exercise greater oversight.
By the way, if you would like to check out any of those interviews in full, I'll be publishing them all over on Epic TV within the next few days.
And so you can check them out over there.
Again, the link will be right there at the top of the description box.
Also, we here at the Epoch Times spent several weeks digging through all of the publicly available information about what John Durham has been up to, and we put together this timeline, which gives you a step-by-step breakdown of what we know thus far.
Because even though the Durham report has yet to be released, there are a ton of clues which allow us to get a glimpse into what is actually happening behind the scenes.
And these clues include things like statements that were made by William Barr, John Brennan, and Bob Mueller.
It includes memos, reports, and emails from the Justice Department.
And it also includes subpoenas, which give us a glimpse into where the investigation is actually going.
I mean, the whole thing is still very mysterious, but what we did was we took all the facts that we can gather, we put them into chronological order, and then we put it all into a giant timeline so you can get a sense for what is actually happening.
In fact, I'll throw a link to that timeline into the description box below this video so you can go deeper whenever you'd like.
And all I ask in return is that you smash that like button.
Because it goes without saying that videos that are like this talking honestly, openly, and transparently about what is happening in this world are routinely censored by big tech giants like YouTube.
However, when you smash that like button, you are forcing the YouTube algorithm to share this video out to potentially thousands of more people, letting the truth be known far and wide.
And now let's move on over to Missouri.
Two days ago, the governor of Missouri announced that he has issued a full pardon to the McCloskeys.
Now, if you don't remember, Mark and Patricia McCloskey were the couple who became famous when they stood their ground and defended their St.
Louis home with their guns against activists who were walking through their private gated neighborhood.
And in case you don't know, earlier this year, after going through a lot of legal back and forth, the McCloskeys ultimately pleaded guilty to several misdemeanor charges.
In terms of what those misdemeanors actually were, Mark McCloskey, who is a lawyer by trade, he pleaded guilty to a classy misdemeanor of fourth-degree assault, while his wife, Patricia McCloskey, pleaded guilty to a Class A misdemeanor of second-degree harassment.
They were ordered to pay the maximum fines of $2,750, respectively.
Now, in explaining why they actually pled guilty, Mark McCloskey went on Newsmax and he said this.
Prosecutors dropped all the felony charges, all the gun charges, and charged me with a crime that said I purposely placed other people in apprehension of imminent fear of physical injury.
And by God, I did it.
That's what the Second Amendment was there for, and I couldn't say no to that one.
We save the city of St.
Louis at the expense of pursuing this nonsense, and then we'll move forward.
However, as of two days ago, the governor of Missouri has pardoned the couple of all charges.
And actually, this pardon has been a long time coming, as the governor actually said this all the way back in July of last year.
They had every right to protect their property, their home, just like any of us would.
If you had a mob coming towards you, whether they tore down a gate or not, when they come on your property, they don't have a right to do that in an aggressive manner.
People have a right to protect themselves, their families, their property.
And now in terms of the next steps for the McCloskeys, well, Mark is running for a seat over at the U.S. Senate.
And we here at the Epoch Times, we actually got a chance to speak with Mark McCloskey, and here's how he described his decision to run.
When Roy Blunt announced he was not going to run for re-election, people started asking whether or not I had an interest in it.
You know, I've been a lifelong Republican, but I've never had any particular desire to run for office.
In fact, if you asked me a year ago today what I wanted most in the world, I'd say for the world to leave me the heck alone.
I like peace and comfort, but the world chose differently.
I didn't think that having three to five hundred angry rioters break down my gate was a good thing, but maybe in the long run it will turn out that way.
If you'd like to read more about the McCloskey case, including this new pardon that they received from the governor, all those links will be down there in the description box below this video for you to check out.
And now let's move on over to Florida.
It was just announced two days ago that 17 people were arrested in an undercover sting operation focused on child sexual exploitation.
And among those 17 who were arrested, there were three employees of Walt Disney World.
Now, this sting operation took place over the course of six days, and it was dubbed Operation Child Protector.
And during this operation, law enforcement officers posed themselves as children on social media platforms, on mobile apps, as well as on dating sites in order to suss out potential predators who prey on children.
According to a statement that was made by the Sheriff of Polk County, he described the suspects, the ones who were caught, as...
Most of the 17 people who were arrested were from Central Florida, except for one man who was from California.
And the suspects, they ranged in age between 26 and 47 years of age.
In terms of the methodology, the suspects were led to an undercover location where they thought they were meeting up with a child in order to engage in sexual activity.
And six of the men brought condoms with them.
Several of the men were actually grooming kids prior to the actual meeting as well.
In fact, here's what the sheriff said on that front.
Some of these suspects transmitted pornographic images while grooming and soliciting the children online, and they were appropriately charged for that as well.
Now, as I mentioned earlier, three of the suspects were current employees of World Disney World.
Two of them were custodians, and another one was a lifeguard.
And they were all caught trying to solicit sex from a 13-year-old child.
Furthermore, the sheriff said that one of the suspects was HIV positive.
Here's what he said.
Did you hear what I'm telling you?
He's HIV positive.
He showed up to have unprotected sex with what he thought was a child, with a little girl.
Fortunately, our detectives were there instead of a 13-year-old child.
Now, the suspects, they have been charged with traveling to meet a minor for sex, attempted lewd battery, use of a computer to seduce a child, unlawful use of a two-way communication device, and transmission of material that's harmful to children.
If you'd like to know the details of each individual and the charges that are levied against them, I'll throw the link to the Polk County Sheriff's website down in the description box below this video for you to check out.
And lastly, as we've already mentioned in several previous episodes, on the very same day that Joe Biden was sworn into office, coincidentally, YouTube made the unilateral decision to demonetize our program.
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They essentially snuffed out our ability to monetize our content.
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