"We knew some of it was right, and we suspected some of it may never be provable." A sordid conspiracyĬhristopher Steele penned his reports between June and December of 2016 for a law firm that represented Democrats and the campaign of party nominee Hillary Clinton. "It was credible reporting," Steele told Stephanopoulos. Now, nearly five years after his report became public, Steele has broken his silence to defend his name, his credibility, and the dossier that captured the world's attention. Through all the cacophony of political rhetoric and cable news punditry, one notable voice has been missing: Steele's. contacts - between Trump campaign officials and individuals having ties to the Russian government." And, proof emerged that the Trump Organization had been discussing a real estate deal in Moscow during the campaign.Īll were findings that had been signaled, at least broadly, in Steele's work.Ĭloistered in his London home and his firm's office, Steele has never responded to his critics in public. Investigators determined there had been "numerous links - i.e. The Mueller probe found that Russia had been making efforts to meddle in the 2016 campaign, and that Trump campaign members and surrogates had promoted and retweeted Russian-produced political content alleging voter fraud and criminal activity on the part of Hillary Clinton. Yet in many ways, the dossier proved prescient. "Raw intelligence in the sense that what we sent over was the initial findings." "Bearing in mind, this was raw intelligence," said Chris Burrows, Steele's partner in the private investigative firm Orbis Business Intelligence. And it never got any traction because no one could nail anything in it down," said Barry Meier, author of "Spooked: The Trump Dossier, Black Cube, and the Rise of Private Spies," and a vocal critic of Steele's. "Everyone with whom the dossier was shared sent reporters out, tried to confirm the basic allegations within it. Over time, journalists and experts from both sides of the political aisle grew increasingly skeptical about the dossier's claims, noting that despite deep investigation by Special Counsel Robert Mueller's team and others, many of Steele's allegations have never been verified, and some have been debunked. Trump and his allies immediately lashed out at the allegations laid out in the dossier, calling it "fake news" and "phony stuff." The president's detractors embraced it, using it to buttress growing suspicions about what they saw as Trump's odd infatuation with Russian President Vladimir Putin. But the real-world implications of its claims, even though unproven, exacerbated an already fraught moment in American history. The salacious mix of sex, spies, and scandal made for an irresistible political drama. The dossier's contents, laid out in 17 memos, upended Washington and quickly ricocheted across the globe after BuzzFeed News published the bombshell reports in early 2017 - 10 days before Donald Trump was sworn into office. "Out of the Shadows: The Man Behind the Steele Dossier" is available Monday, October 18, on Hulu. "I stand by the work we did, the sources that we had, and the professionalism which we applied to it," Steele said in a wide-ranging exclusive interview with ABC News' George Stephanopoulos about how he gathered his intelligence, and the life-altering events that ensued after his work and identity were made public. WASHINGTON - Retired British spy Christopher Steele is stepping out of the shadows to discuss his so-called "Steele dossier" for the first time publicly, describing his efforts as apolitical and defending his decision to include the most explosive and criticized claims about Donald Trump contained in his controversial 2016 report.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |