In typical Washington fashion, when there is a major decision made that the “Deep State” wants to go away as quietly as possible, the details are released just before a major holiday. Such was the case with the unbelievable plea deal reached with Imran Awan, a Pakistani-American dual citizen who has been linked to a major spy ring on Capitol Hill. According to an article in the Washington Post on 04 July, 2018, “it’s part of an agreement with prosecutors, Imran Awan pleaded guilty to a relatively minor offense unrelated to his work on Capitol Hill, making a false statement on a loan application.” It went on to state, “the government has uncovered no evidence,” including stealing equipment or illegally accessing or transferring information, prosecutors wrote in an 11-page plea agreement signed on 3 July, 2018. Therefore, everybody gets to “walk free” including the 44 Democratic Representatives who employed the Awan family, even including their main sponsor, Debbie Wasserman Schultz.
Hill staffers who had intimate knowledge of what the family was doing were never interviewed
The Post goes on to suggest that after an 18-month supposedly thorough investigation, the allegations against the Awan family are unfounded. They fail to point out that Hill staffers who had intimate knowledge of what the family was doing were never interviewed. Further, we don’t know if Imran Awan or any of his family members and associates were placed under oath when interviewed or were the beneficiaries of the same procedures used for the Hillary Clinton compromised-server investigation and the investigation into Anthony Weiner’s laptop, which held classified and even “special access” material.
If you have been following the case, to say you were “stunned” by the plea deal would be an understatement. Based on the facts known about Imran Awan and his family’s work on Capitol Hill for 44 Democratic Congressional Representatives, it is more than a stretch to support the plea agreement. According to many articles by Luke Rosiak of the Daily Caller News Foundation (DCNF), the House Office of the Inspector General (IG) claimed in 2016 that the Awan family logged into members’ servers that they had no business accessing, in some cases even after they had been fired.
Further, it was alleged that the Awan family ordered equipment, sometimes shipped to their residence, using falsified invoices to make it easier for equipment to disappear, and then took measures to cover their tracks. The most blatant incident of possible obstruction came after the IG determined that the House Democratic Caucus server was the focus of multiple security breaches. Remarkably, the entire server was stolen!
Imran’s entire family and a few associates were on the House payroll ostensibly working as IT administrators
Imran’s entire family and a few associates were on the House payroll ostensibly working as IT administrators until they were banned on 02 February, 2017. They collected a total of $7 million dollars in salary even though some had no background in IT matters. Further, there are indications that some were “fake employees.” For example, Rao Abbas, whose most recent job experience was at a McDonald’s, where he got fired, appeared on the payroll of a number of House members soon after Awan owed him money. Imagine that!
In April 2017, months after Awan was banned from the House computer network, a midnight security sweep of the House buildings by the staff found that he had left a laptop with the username “RepDWS” in a phone booth along with a note that said “attorney-client privilege,” according to a Capitol Police report. Brazenly, Debbie Wasserman Schultz threatened the Capitol Hill Police Chief during a budget hearing with “consequences” if he didn’t return the laptop, which was being held as evidence. Schultz then hired an outside lawyer to try to block prosecutors from accessing it and paid him with campaign funds.
What’s equally shocking was that neither Imran nor his family members and associates were subjected to background checks. They were all exempted! It would appear to be a clear violation of House policy. Every one of the 44 House Democrats who hired them chose to exempt them from required background checks. This represents an incredible lapse of security procedure as this IT gang could read all the emails and files of these House Democrats, many of whom served on the House Foreign Affairs and Intelligence Committees.
Imran nor his family members and associates were subjected to background checks.
Even though the House Security policy requires background checks, there is a loophole allowing House members to simply say on required forms for background checks that another member vouched for them!
The Awan family, with essentially no oversight, were out of control. According to the House report of 20 September, 2016, shortly before the Presidential election, members of the Awan family were logging into servers of members they didn’t even work for, using the Congressional Member’s personal username, uploading data off the House network and trying to obscure their unauthorized entry.
The lack of concern regarding matters of national security by certain House Members is more than troubling. The House did not take away the Awan’s network access until nearly a year after suspicious activity was uncovered. An IG report of September 2016 indicates they logged into servers of offices they did not work for thousands of times even after the House was warned that the “server was being used for nefarious purpose” and/or removal of information. Where did all this information go, much of which was certainly classified? With the Awan’s Pakistani connections, it is not a stretch to connect the information flow to the Pakistani Intelligence Services, and possibly to China.
Clearly, the Awan family repeatedly accessed unauthorized classified data, but the DOJ prosecutors could find no such evidence. It defies logic and common sense. There has to be much more to this story. This is more than incompetence, it borders on criminal cover-up and must serve as a clear wake-up call for the President to have a “Midnight Massacre,” meaning a complete housecleaning. The top management of the DOJ, including the FBI, must be replaced asap.
This article was originally published by the Canada Free Press.
The views expressed in CCNS member articles are not necessarily the views or positions of the entire CCNS. They are the views of the authors, who are members of the CCNS.
