Volume V: The Steele Dossier, at Last, Starting Page 846

 

So, after finding a "grave counter intelligence threat" from Paul Manafort's association with a Russian spy and secretly providing him information; after discussing Roger Stone acting as a conduit between the campaign and Wikileaks; after mentioning a strange suggestion by the Miss Universe president that the Trump Tower meeting with Russians was initiated when the Russians offered "emails from the Democrats and dirt on Hillary;" after finding evidence that George Papadopoulos was a useful idiot; and after finding what looks very much like evidence of criminal intent by the campaign when they told an informal agent scouring the dark web for e-mails:

I talked to Steve who will compel you to turn over to us all 30,000 emails you located and referred to Wikileaks. BB wants to publish them first. We do not give a rats ass what happens to you and will turn you over the the (sic) Feds for prosecution if you do not comply.

After all that, the Senate Intelligence Committee turns to the Steele Dossier on page 846 and finds it to be a total dud.  To be clear, just because the Committee found the Steele Dossier to be a dud does not mean that they considered it unimportant.  Volume V devotes about 84 pages to the Steele Dossier.  By way of comparison, that is less than the 142 pages devoted to Paul Manafort, less than the 140 pages devoted to the Trump Tower meeting, about the same as the 88 pages devoted to Roger Stone, more that the 62 pages devoted to George Papadopoulos, and much more than the 10 pages devoted to scouring the dark web.

 In general, the Committee found that the Steele Dossier contained dubious material, and that the FBI seriously exaggerated Steele's value as a source.*  Steele declined to be interviewed in person, but submitted written answers.  There is some discussion about the reliability of Steele's sub-sources, much of it (unsurprisingly) blacked out.  Discussion of possible disinformation is also largely blacked out. It also stressed (pp. 881-886) that Steele also did work for Oleg Deripaska, the oligarch who Manafort owed large amounts of money to, that Deripaska is likely to have become aware of what Steele was doing, and that may have been a source of disinformation.  There is no mention in the dossier of Deripaska's business ties to Manafort, or of Deripaska at all.  Steele and Fusion GPS also did work for Natalia Veselnitskaya, although they were apparently not aware that she met with the Trump campaign, nor did Veselnitskaya even know of Steele's existence.  

Most of what Volume V has to say about Steele's association with the FBI is old news, having already been discussed at length by the Office of Inspector General.  The Committee confirms that Steele was attempting to contact the FBI before it opened its investigation of the Trump campaign, but did not actually contact the investigating team until well after. It also confirms Steele's leak to Mother Jones and firing as a result.  Like the Inspector General, Volume V finds that Steele was not as reliable a source as claimed, that the FBI did not investigate him thoroughly enough before using his information to obtain a FISA warrant, and Steele continued to convey information to the FBI through the back door after he was fired, and other intelligence agencies distrust of Steele's materials.

What the Committee did reveal that was new was that Steele's reports, or at least notes summarizing the reports, were circulated in the upper echelons of the State Department, including to Secretary John Kerry.  The number of people in government who knew at least something about Steele's reports an did not leak them is a convincing refutation of any claims of a "deep state" plot against Trump.

Marc Elias

Also new were the report's discussion about Steele's relationship with the DNC.  I found the revelations rather disturbing -- not because the DNC as knowingly doing something improper, but because of the extraordinary lengths DNC personnel went to not to know what was going on.  It suggests that they knew the whole business was shady.  It is not news that Fusion GPS was originally hired by Trump's primary opponents to research his business background for shady dealings (pp 856-857). Owner Glenn Simpson apparently found enough to convince him that Trump should not be President.  When it became clear the Trump had the nomination secured, Simpson decided that, rather than let his services go to waste, he should offer them to the DNC, knowing that the DNC would pass any such information to the Clinton campaign (p. 857).  The DNC did not hire Fusion GPS directly but acted through its law firm, Perkins Coie, which acted through Marc Elias. This is apparently a routine practice and done to create an attorney-client privilege for any materials (pp. 857-858). Elias knows more about election law than anyone else in the country, and presumably knows how to stay within the letter of the law.  The whole business nonetheless feels profoundly sleazy.  Elias apparently thought so as well -- he hired a lawyer when the Committee wanted to interview him and answered only through counsel.

The original plan was simply to investigate Trump's business background and look for dishonest dealings (p. 858). When Simpson suggested looking into Russia ties, Elias was eager, not because he suspected any ties between the campaign and Russia, but simply because he assumed that all business dealings in Russia be thoroughly corrupt (p. 861). Simpson hired Steele in May or June, 2016 to look into Trump's business dealings (p. 862).  Recall that the first sign of any Russian involvement in the campaign was on June 14, 2016 when the Russians were found to have hacked the DNC.  Steele delivered his first memo on June 20, 2016 (pp. 864-864).  That was the one with the sex tape being used for blackmail.  Simpson said, first, that this came as a complete surprise, and that in the clear light of hindsight, maybe he should have discounted it (p. 864).

Then there is the whole disturbing issue of who knew what -- or rather, who was at pains not to know what.  Simpson did not tell Elias that he was passing information on to the FBI.  Elias knew that Fusion has hired an overseas contractor, he refrained from asking any details and denied knowing that the contractor was providing non-public information (pp. 859-860).  Fusion GPS gave Elias weekly briefings, sometime the original documents and sometimes summaries (p 860).  Elias gave the Clinton campaign oral briefings, but generally refrained from putting anything in writing (p. 860).  The Committee was unable to determine how much information in the dossier was passed on to the DNC and the Clinton campaign (p. 860).  The campaign definitely did not receive the memos, and did not learn about Steele or the dossier until Buzz Feed published it (pp. 858-859).  The media appear to have known more about the dossier than the campaign (and refrained from publishing).  DNC Chair Donna Brazile apparently received a call from the press in November asking if she knew M1-6 was on their payroll.  Brazile asked Elias, who said, "You don't have to know."  Brazile did not inquire further (p. 859).

All in all, one comes away with the impression that Elias' actions, though not illegal, were at least irregular, and that he was doing his best to protect the DNC, the Clinton campaign, and even himself from knowledge that could be damaging.

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*And now, given recent developments regarding Alexander Smirnov, maybe it is time for the FBI to reconsider how it assesses source reliability.  I recognize that they need to use disreputable people to get close the the disreputable organizations they are spying on, but there needs to be a way to take disreputability into account.