Attorney General William Barr says he is unable to rule out the possibility that the so-called Steele dossier was part of a disinformation campaign carried out by the Russians.
During a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Wednesday, Barr said he is “concerned about it” and is investigating the matter.
The dossier was compiled by British ex-spy Christopher Steele at the behest of Fusion GPS, an opposition research firm that was being funded by the Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee through the Perkins Coie law firm. Steele’s dossier was based on sources Steele says were close to the Kremlin and was filled with salacious and unverified allegations. The dossier was circulated within both the media and the federal government and was used in Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act applications to justify the surveillance of a former member of the Trump campaign, Carter Page.
Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, brought the matter up with Barr, saying that “Steele, of course, was a former British intelligence officer hired to do opposition research by the Hillary Clinton campaign on her political adversaries, including President Trump, or candidate Trump at that time.”
Cornyn asked Barr point blank: “How do we know that the Steele dossier is not itself evidence of Russian disinformation campaign knowing what we know now that basically the allegations made were second hand, hearsay, or unverified? Can we state with confidence the Steele dossier was not part of the Russian disinformation campaign?”
Barr said he couldn’t rule out the possibility. “I can’t state that with confidence and it’s one of the areas that I’m reviewing. I’m concerned about it and I don’t think it’s entirely speculative,” he said.
Special counsel Robert Mueller’s report already confirmed that the Internet Research Agency, a Russian troll farm, carried out disinformation activities on social media meant to interfere with the 2016 election. Mueller further stated that GRU, Russia’s military intelligence, carried out cyberattacks against the Clinton campaign and the DNC and provided the hacked emails to WikiLeaks for distribution.
“I called what bullshit the dossier was a year and a half ago … It’s likely FSB [the successor agency to the KGB] disinformation,” former CIA Moscow station chief Daniel Hoffman recently told the Washington Examiner.
By January 2017, some FBI agents trying to verify the dossier’s allegations had reportedly concluded that some of the dossier’s contents may have been based upon “rumors and hearsay” which were “passed from source to source,” perhaps even originating as “Russian disinformation.”
Watergate journalist Bob Woodward has been calling Steele’s dossier “garbage” for more than two years. And Michael Isikoff, the chief investigative correspondent for Yahoo News whose September 2016 news article based on the dossier was used in FISA applications, recently said the media should have shown “more skepticism” over Steele’s dossier, which he described as “thirdhand stuff.”
Mueller’s Russia report, released last month, undercut some of the most scandalous allegations included in the dossier. He found that Cohen “had never traveled to Prague,” as Steele’s research had alleged. Mueller also found no criminal collusion between President Trump or any of his associates and Russia. Steele’s dossier alleged there was a high-level conspiracy between Trump and the Kremlin.
The dossier’s biggest claims appeared to be knocked down by Mueller, who said that, despite the Russian government’s extensive election interference efforts, “the investigation did not establish that members of the Trump campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities.”
Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz is now investigating FISA abuse. Horowitz is reportedly focusing on Steele, but Steele has declined to cooperate with the probe. Barr has said the investigation might wrap up this month.
Beyond the investigation into whether the Steele dossier was part of a Russian disinformation operation, Barr also said the Department of Justice itself is looking into the origins of the Trump-Russia investigation, the conduct of the investigators involved at the FBI and Justice Department, and criminal leaks to the media.
