@nycsouthpaw seems to have confused two different kinds of inquiries or investigations.

Operation Crossfire Hurricane (a “collusion” investigation) was always ABOUT Trump (among others). It had to be, because OCH was about campaign collusion, and it was TRUMP’s campaign! TWEET.

At an early date, OCH did have as TARGETS four campaign associates (but not Trump): Manafort, Page, Flynn, and Papadopoulos. These four were investigated AS TARGETS because there were reasonable grounds to think that they were operating as Russian AGENTS.

But OCH wasn’t just about them, and the FBI’s investigation didn’t start being ABOUT Trump only when it was BROADENED to investigate Trump the way it had been investigating Manafort, Page, Flynn, and Papadopoulos as possible Russian agents.

There was ALWAYS the question of Trump campaign complicity (conspiracy, collusion). But a conspiracy is an arrangement between two parties on an equal footing. However, a foreign agent is a compromised individual who is handled or controlled. It’s not an equal partnership.

What happened after Comey was fired is that the FBI felt it had probable cause for investigating Trump as being so compromised (with sexual, financial, or campaign kompromat) that he was forced, whether he wanted to or not, to operate in Russia’s interests, not ours.

That is all that happened after the Comey firing — but it’s a big difference.

For one thing, once there is probable cause to open an investigation into an individual as a possible foreign agent, then there are grounds for applying for a FISA warrant (as had happened with at least Manafort and Page).

In fact, Frank Figliuzzi, a former Assistant Director for Counterintelligence at the FBI, has said today that it is virtually certain that the FBI had signals intercepts confirming that Trump was by then operating as a Russian agent when it made Trump, in effect, a target.