Real Clear Investigation’s (RCI) Paul Sperry has revealed the name of the young man he believes is the Ukraine “whistleblower.” If true, and Sperry makes an extremely compelling case, I suppose he is no longer a whistleblower. A better description might be “person of interest.”
Apparently, all of Washington has known his name for quite some time. I first heard his name as one of three possibilities a couple of weeks ago. And last weekend, an OANN report revealed his identity. His name is Eric Ciaramella (pronounced char-a-MEL-ah). He is a 33-year-old CIA analyst who once worked for (drumroll please)…former CIA Director John Brennan.
Sperry wrote a detailed piece about Ciaramella which can be viewed here.
Excerpts from Sperry’s report:
* Ciaramella is a registered Democrat held over from the Obama White House, previously worked with former Vice President Joe Biden and former CIA Director John Brennan, a vocal critic of Trump who helped initiate the Russia “collusion” investigation of the Trump campaign during the 2016 election.
* Ciaramella left his National Security Council posting in the White House’s West Wing in mid-2017 amid concerns about negative leaks to the media. He has since returned to CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia.
* “He was accused of working against Trump and leaking against Trump,” said a former NSC official.
* Earlier this year, Schiff recruited two of Ciaramella’s closest allies at the NSC — both whom were also Obama holdovers — to join his committee staff. He hired one, Sean Misko, in August — the same month the whistleblower complaint was filed.
* A CIA officer specializing in Russia and Ukraine, Ciaramella was detailed over to the National Security Council from the agency in the summer of 2015, working under Susan Rice, President Obama’s National Security adviser. He also worked closely with the former Vice President.
* Former White House officials said Ciaramella worked on Ukrainian policy issues for Biden in 2015 and 2016, when the vice president was President Obama’s “point man” for Ukraine. A Yale graduate, Ciaramella is said to speak Russian and Ukrainian, as well as Arabic. He had been assigned to the NSC by Brennan…He was held over into the Trump administration, and headed the Ukraine desk at the NSC, eventually transitioning into the West Wing, until June 2017.
* Federal records show that Biden’s office invited Ciaramella to an October 2016 state luncheon the vice president hosted for Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi. Other guests included Brennan, as well as then-FBI Director James Comey and then-National Intelligence Director James Clapper…Several U.S. officials told RCI that the invitation that was extended to Ciaramella, a relatively low-level GS-13 federal employee, was unusual and signaled he was politically connected inside the Obama White House.
* “He was moved over to the front office” to temporarily fill a vacancy, said a former White House official, where he “saw everything, read everything.”…The official added that it soon became clear among NSC staff that Ciaramella opposed the new Republican president’s foreign policies. “My recollection of Eric is that he was very smart and very passionate, particularly about Ukraine and Russia. That was his thing – Ukraine,” he said. “He didn’t exactly hide his passion with respect to what he thought was the right thing to do with Ukraine and Russia, and his views were at odds with the president’s policies.”
* Ciaramella worked with a Democratic National Committee operative who dug up dirt on the Trump campaign during the 2016 election, inviting her into the White House for meetings, former White House colleagues said. The operative, Alexandra Chalupa, a Ukrainian-American who supported Hillary Clinton, led an effort to link the Republican campaign to the Russian government. “He knows her. He had her in the White House,” said one former co-worker, who requested anonymity to discuss the sensitive matter.
The Washington Examiner’s Steven Nelson contacted Ciaramella’s attorney’s office on Wednesday after Sperry’s report was published. Their spokesperson refused to confirm or deny if Ciaramella was the whistleblower.
No comments:
Post a Comment