In what Breitbart Executive Chairman, Stephen K. Bannon, referred to as a “stunning” and “breath-taking” course of events, Jeff Gerth of Propublica came on Breitbart News Sunday to discuss his recent article detailing how an ex-Hillary Clinton aide crafted a secret spying network in the lead up to the Benghazi terror attack and corresponded with Clinton via her private email account.
Longtime Clinton advisor Sidney Blumenthal’s hacked emails exposed the massive spy network, Breitbart News reported on Sunday.
Bannon asked Gerth, “Have you ever in your investigations, and you’re stretch as a two time Pulitzer Prize winner investigative journalist for the paper of record in this country, have you ever seen anything in your professional career like this?” Gerth answered by reminding Bannon that he has been doing this for forty years and that there were two instances in which this reminds him.
He said that the Hillary email/spy network episode draws some parallels “with the stuff that came out in Iran-Contra with Richard Secord and other people who were out operating… in Nicaragua with the Contras.” He added that it reminded him also of a story that he investigated on CIA operative and business tycoon, Edwin Wilson, who went to prison for selling arms to Libya back in the late 70’s.
Significantly, Gerth agreed with Breitbart’s Executive Chairman’s characterization that these events were pivotal political “firestorms.” The Propublica writer recounted that “Ed Wilson went to jail for decades, and some of the people, of course, in the Nicaraguan Contra situation, either went to jail or were convicted and got pardoned.”
Gerth, a former New York Times reporter, explained to Bannon, who hosts BNS airing on Sirius XM Patriot radio channel 125, that Blumenthal’s emails to the former Secretary of State were compromised two years ago by a hacker, code named Guccifer, in Romania. The sensitive information directed to her private email account, involved detailed reports on the worsening political and security climate in Libya starting in 2012, as well as other national security activity.
Gawker turned up the hacked emails some two years ago but didn’t do much with them. After the Hillary email secret server bomb dropped in early March, Gawker asked Gerth to help them sift through the hacked emails.
The journalist observed that these emails were “clearly written by intelligence professionals.” Blumenthal served as a conduit and “was relaying” the emails to Clinton, Gerth maintains. “We were able to determine in at least one case, and therefore probably in most of these cases, they were written by a CIA top covert official named Tyler Drumheller.”
Gerth said that “there was actual human intelligence sources inside of Libya, for example, who were gathering information and passing it on through this channel. Ultimately winding up in Secretary Clinton’s email account.”
Despite the plethora of detailed emails obtained by Gawker, Gerth says that it a “tiny percentage” of what was going on in Libya. “We are really at the mercy of the hacker and what he chose to take a screen shot of two years ago,” he emphasized.