FBI Director James Comey is facing a new scandal over the handling of Donald Trump’s Russian dossier, leading to charges the FBI tried to cover up the information. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)
In a stunning revelation, reported today in British newspapers, ex-MI6 agent Christoper Steele was so disturbed by the information he uncovered on Trump, he passed on his finding to the FBI and to British and American intelligence agencies.
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But to his horror, the FBI failed to follow up or take action on the information, which also was provided by others, according to London’s Independent newspaper, citing unnamed sources.
Steele believed the FBI was engaging in a cover-up to protect Trump, blocking a thorough inquiry into his findings before the election. Instead the FBI zealously pursued Democrat Hillary Clinton over her private email server.
The FBI’s rogue campaign against Clinton culminated 11 days before the election when FBI Director James Comey violated U.S. Justice Department protocols and tradition by informing Congress the agency was reopening the email investigation.
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Meanwhile, the FBI sat on its hands while Russian hackers stole hundreds of private emails from the Democratic National Committee and Clinton Campaign Chairman John Podesta.
The emails were funneled to Wikileaks, which published them online in timed releases during the election to do the utmost damage to Clinton’s campaign. Trump repeatedly cited the emails during speeches with hyperbolic claims.
Rogue FBI agents also leaked confidential information from investigations during President Bill Clinton’s administration in the 1990s, in an effort to damage her campaign.
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The efforts amounted to an unprecedented level of corruption it what is supposed to be the nation’s elite law enforcement agency.
But its failure to investigate Trump’s Russia dossier marks a new level of malfeasance and dereliction of duty.
Steele, who has been vilified by right-wing propaganda sites, appears to have acted responsibly with the information he uncovered, even to the point of working without pay to uncover as much as he could, according to The Independent.
Steele’s Washington colleague, Glenn Simpson, a former Wall Street Journal reporter, was equally horrified by the information Steele turned up and also worked on the Trump case, without getting paid. He now runs his own firm, Fusion GPS.
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Fusion GPS was the firm initially hired by Trump’s Republican opponents to conduct “opposition research” on the president-elect. In June 2016, Steele was hired to add his expertise.
Democrats picked up the intelligence effort after Trump won the Republican primary in July, according to sources.
Steele made his first contact with the FBI the same month. He reported in a memo that Trump and his campaign team had agreed to divert attention from Russia’s intervention in the Ukraine, in exchange for information and intelligence on Clinton and her campaign.
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Within days, Trump said he would recognize Moscow’s illegal annexation of the Crimean peninsula. His campaign officials also forced the Republican Party to drop a plank in its platform promising military assistance to the Ukrainian government, then fighting separatist rebels sponsored by Russia.
Trump called on the Kremlin to hack Hillary Clinton’s emails the same day he advocated recognition of the Kremlin’s actions in Crimea.
The FBI, however, failed to follow up, according to the agent. Steele passed on more information to the FBI in September.
After Trump’s surprise election victory, Steele and Johnson continued working on the dossier, hoping their findings would be fully investigated.
The matter may have ended there. But last week, BuzzFeed, an online news Web site, published Steele’s dossier in full. The site has been vilified as well by right wing propaganda sites and the some so-called mainstream media outlets.
But in hindsight, BuzzFeed’s actions have been the catalyst to finally give the disturbing allegations against Trump a full airing.
The American public is owed nothing less.