The Obama administration made it clear to Project Cassandra leaders that it would not support a RICO case, even though tasdk force investigators spent years gathering evidence for it. Briefings for top White House and [[Justice Department]] officials that had been requested by [[Eric Holder]] never materialized. A top intelligence official blocked the inclusion of Project Cassandra’s memo on the Hezbollah drug threat from being included in Obama’s daily threat briefing. Project Cassandra agents stopped getting invitations to interagency meetings, including those of a top Obama transnational crime working group. Obama officials dropped Hezbollah from the formal list of groups targeted by a special White House initiative into transnational organized crime, which in turn effectively eliminated DEA’s broad legal authority to investigate it overseas. “Tampa was supposed to settle how everyone would have a seat at the table and what the national strategy is going to be, and how clearly law enforcement has role. And the opposite happened. We walked away with nothing," said Jack Riley, DEA’s chief of operations.<ref>https://www.politico.com/interactives/2017/obama-hezbollah-drug-trafficking-investigation/</ref> | The Obama administration made it clear to Project Cassandra leaders that it would not support a RICO case, even though tasdk force investigators spent years gathering evidence for it. Briefings for top White House and [[Justice Department]] officials that had been requested by [[Eric Holder]] never materialized. A top intelligence official blocked the inclusion of Project Cassandra’s memo on the Hezbollah drug threat from being included in Obama’s daily threat briefing. Project Cassandra agents stopped getting invitations to interagency meetings, including those of a top Obama transnational crime working group. Obama officials dropped Hezbollah from the formal list of groups targeted by a special White House initiative into transnational organized crime, which in turn effectively eliminated DEA’s broad legal authority to investigate it overseas. “Tampa was supposed to settle how everyone would have a seat at the table and what the national strategy is going to be, and how clearly law enforcement has role. And the opposite happened. We walked away with nothing," said Jack Riley, DEA’s chief of operations.<ref>https://www.politico.com/interactives/2017/obama-hezbollah-drug-trafficking-investigation/</ref> |