>>6405393 (pb)

This is actually very big news and brings another major name into play.

WILLIAM BARR MADE A MAJOR DISCLOSURE IN HIS SENATE HEARING THAT HARDLY ANYONE NOTICED

*Attorney General William Barr revealed during his Senate Judiciary Committee hearing that former Australian diplomat Alexander Downer was an FBI source for information about George Papadopoulos.

*The disclosure, which received little attention during Barr’s testimony, could now allow the public to force the government to reveal details about Downer’s role in the investigation.

*Downer’s role as the catalyst for the FBI’s probe has been revealed in press reports, but the U.S. government had not acknowledged it officially prior to Barr’s testimony.

In a little-noticed exchange during his Senate hearing Wednesday, Attorney General William Barr made a surprising disclosure that could allow the public and press to obtain sensitive details about the origins of the Trump-Russia probe.

During a back-and-forth with Democratic Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin, Barr identified Alexander Downer, a former Australian diplomat, as the FBI’s source for the information that sparked the bureau’s counterintelligence investigation into George Papadopoulos and other Trump campaign associates.

The federal government had not officially identified Downer as the source until Wednesday. His role in the investigation was publicly known, but only through press reports and his own statements to the media.

Federal agencies could deny requests for information about Downer and his role in the opening of “Crossfire Hurricane,” the FBI’s name for the counterintelligence investigation, without official confirmation from U.S. government officials.

That all changed on Wednesday, according to Bradley Moss, the deputy executive director of the James Madison Project, a transparency group that handles national security-related lawsuits.

https://dailycaller.com/2019/05/03/william-barr-alexander-downer/