The Nunes memo (formally titled Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act Abuses at the Department of Justice and the Federal Bureau of Investigation) is a four-page memorandum written for U.S. Representative Devin Nunes by his staff and released to the public by the Republican-controlled House Intelligence Committee on February 2, 2018. The memo alleges that the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) "may have relied on politically motivated or questionable sources" to obtain a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant in October 2016 and in three subsequent renewals on Trump adviser Carter Page in the early phases of the FBI's investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections.
Nunes was the chairman of the committee at the time and was a supporter of FISA surveillance extension. Former Trump campaign CEO and chief strategist Steve Bannon has described Nunes as Trump's second-strongest ally in Congress. In April 2017, Nunes stepped aside from chairing the House Intelligence Committee's Russia investigation while the House Ethics Committee conducted an inquiry into whether Nunes had violated applicable ethics rules with respect to his apparent secret coordination with White House officials. The Ethics Committee investigation ended in December 2017, after following consultation with experts, it determined that the information Rep. Devin Nunes shared was not classified.
Republican legislators who favored public release of the memo argued that the memo presents evidence that a group of politically biased FBI employees abused the FISA warrant process for the purpose of undermining the Donald Trump presidency. These congressmen alleged that there was excessive and improper dependence on the Steele dossier, which was funded in part by the Clinton campaign and Democratic National Committee, when the Justice Department applied to the FISA court to conduct electronic surveillance on former Trump campaign aide Carter Page. Political allies of Donald Trump attempted to use the memo to pivot attention away from the Special Counsel investigation of the Trump presidential campaign's role in Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections. Prior to release of the memo, news media reported that Trump told his associates that release of the memo would discredit the investigation.
A social media campaign, under the hashtag #ReleaseTheMemo, emerged in mid-January 2018 to publicly release the memo despite some of its classified contents. The Alliance for Securing Democracy's Hamilton 68 project reported that Russian-linked bots on Twitter helped spread the hashtag. Twitter stated it found no significant Russian activity connected to the hashtag. Trump approved release of the Republican document over the objections of the FBI and the U.S. Intelligence Community. The FBI issued a rare statement expressing "grave concerns" about factual omissions and the accuracy of the memo.
Inspector General Horowitz's December 2019 report identified 17 "significant errors or omissions" in the FBI's FISA applications, though it found no evidence that political bias motivated the investigation's opening. The Columbia Journalism Review characterized the IG report as having "confirmed" the memo's "allegations of abuse," while Lawfare assessed that the memo "turns out to have been correct on important points" regarding FISA errors, though its claim that the investigation was politically motivated was not substantiated.
Within Congress, anticipation of the release of the memo sparked controversy, mainly along political lines. House Republicans released the memo on February 2, 2018. Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee prepared a classified 10 page rebuttal of claims in the Nunes memo, which was initially blocked for release. After the Nunes memo was released to the public, the House Intelligence Committee voted unanimously to release the Democrats' memo. On February 9, Trump blocked release of the Democrats' memo, saying the committee should redact classified and sensitive material before releasing it to the public. A redacted version of the Democratic memo was ultimately released on February 24.
Contents The memo states that a FISA warrant on Carter Page was sought and obtained on October 21, 2016, and that there were three subsequent 90-day renewals. The memo notes that FISA submissions are classified information.
The memo "raise[s] concern as to the legitimacy and legality" of the FISA application process relating to Page, and that probable cause was not made in the warrant application. It makes five main points:
First, the memo stated that the Steele dossier "formed an essential part of the Carter Page FISA application"; the DOJ Inspector General Michael E. Horowitz later found that the dossier "played a central and essential role" in the decision to seek the surveillance warrant. The memo asserted that Christopher Steele was paid $160,000 by the Democratic National Committee and the Clinton campaign. The payments were made through intermediaries: Perkins Coie, which represented the DNC and Clinton campaign, paid Fusion GPS $1.02 million in fees and expenses, $168,000 of which Fusion GPS paid to Steele's firm Orbis to produce the dossier. In 2022, the Federal Election Commission fined the Clinton campaign $8,000 and the DNC $105,000 for misreporting these payments as "legal services" rather than opposition research.
The memo also alleged that information about the payment was not disclosed in the initial October 2016 FISA application or subsequent renewals. However, the FBI's application for a FISA warrant did describe, in a footnote, the origins and political background of the funders of the dossier, a fact conceded by Nunes and other Republican leaders on February 5, after the memo's release.
Second, the memo alleges that the FISA application relied "extensively" on a Yahoo! News report from September 2016 by Michael Isikoff, which referenced Page's July 2016 trip to Moscow and used information from Steele. It asserts that the article was "derived from information leaked by Steele himself to Yahoo News". Isikoff responded that the information he received from Steele was information the FBI already had. The Inspector General later found that the FBI told the FISA court it "did not believe" Steele was the source for the Yahoo article, based on the FBI's assurance that Steele was "a professional" who would not leak; however, Steele had in fact briefed Yahoo News at Fusion GPS's direction.
Third, the memo accuses Steele of being biased against the candidacy of Donald Trump, stating he was "desperate" and "passionate" that Trump would lose. It goes on to say Bruce Ohr knew about this bias and that it was not reflected in the FISA applications. Ohr was not assigned to counterintelligence matters and was not thought to have played a direct role in obtaining the warrants. The Inspector General later found that Ohr met with the Crossfire Hurricane team 13 times, passing information from Steele after the FBI had terminated Steele as a source, and referred Ohr's conduct to the Department's Office of Professional Responsibility.
Fourth, the memo quotes Bill Priestap saying that the corroboration efforts of the Steele dossier were in their "infancy" in October 2016 during the FISA application. The memo further alleges that Andrew McCabe testified that "no surveillance warrant would have been sought from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) without the Steele dossier information". Representative Eric Swalwell alleged the memo "misquoted" McCabe's testimony, which was given in private. The IG later concluded that the Steele dossier played "a central and essential role" in the FBI's decision to seek the FISA order.
The memo also confirms that the trigger that started the FBI investigation into potential collusion between Trump's campaign and the Russians was not the Steele dossier, but rather the comments made by Trump adviser George Papadopoulos, who told an Australian diplomat in May 2016 that the Russians possessed "dirt" on Hillary Clinton in the form of hacked emails. That confirmation contradicts earlier claims by some that the investigation had been triggered by the Steele dossier. The memo notes that Papadopoulos is mentioned in the Page FISA application, and says "there is no evidence of any cooperation or conspiracy between Page and Papadopoulos". It also says the FBI's Russia investigation was opened nearly three months before the FISA surveillance application in late July 2016 by Peter Strzok, who is accused of having "a clear bias against Trump and in favor of Clinton".
The memo also shows that the FISA warrant on Page was renewed three times. In each instance, the FBI had to show the signing judge that the warrant had merit. News accounts in 2017 indicated that because of the nature of his ties to Russia, Page had been under FBI scrutiny and had already been the subject of a FISA warrant in 2014, at least two years before the Trump campaign.
Finally, the memo asserts that former FBI Director James Comey testified to Congress that the Steele dossier was "salacious and unverified". However, Comey's prepared remarks show that he was referring specifically to "some personally sensitive aspects" of the dossier, not the entire dossier.
Background
The memo was produced by a small group of House Republicans and staff, led by Devin Nunes, as part of an investigation into how the FBI used the Steele dossier. Democratic committee members were not informed about the investigation into the FBI or the preparation of the memo. Democrats alleged this violated committee Rule 9(a), which requires investigations be conducted "only if approved by the chair in consultation with the ranking minority member"; Nunes's spokesman stated the process was "absolutely procedurally sound and in accordance with House and committee rules".
Adam Schiff, the ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, said "The chairman never bothered to go read these underlying materials. After months and months of making this argument that the FBI and DOJ are involved in some sort of conspiracy, he didn't even bother to read the materials himself." Nunes admitted he did not read the applications for surveillance warrants, explaining that under a DOJ agreement limiting review to one member, he delegated it to Rep. Trey Gowdy, a former federal prosecutor, who shared his notes with the committee.
Nunes had previously recused himself from the committee's investigation into Russia's interference in U.S. elections due to a House ethics investigation into Nunes' coordination with the Trump administration. The House Ethics Committee stated that "Nunes may have made unauthorized disclosures of classified information, in violation of House Rules, law, regulations, or other standards of conduct" (the Ethics Committee stated the investigation ended after classification experts in the intelligence community determined the information Nunes disclosed was not classified; three anonymous sources told The Atlantic the panel was unable to review the relevant classified information) However, after offering to step aside from the investigation into Russian interference, Nunes began what Fusion GPS characterized as a "parallel" investigation. Democrats alleged its purpose was to undermine the Russia investigation; Republicans said the goal was to investigate what they characterized as "FISA abuse" by the FBI and DOJ.
Since January 18, 2018, a growing number of Republicans began calling for the release of the memo.