Fusion GPS Founders Write NYT Op-Ed Responding to Republicans ‘Selectively Leaking’ Info
After I post this, I'll post the Op-Ed this story came from.
The founders of Fusion GPS have written a New York Times op-ed criticizing Republicans for “selectively leak[ing]” details from their testimony.
Fusion GPS, famous for commissioning the infamous Steele dossier, has been in the news a lot over the past few months, but tonight Glenn Simpson and Peter Fritsch are saying they’re fed up with Republicans “chasing rabbits.”
Per their op-ed:Republicans have refused to release full transcripts of our firm’s testimony, even as they selectively leak details to media outlets on the far right. It’s time to share what our company told investigators.
We don’t believe the Steele dossier was the trigger for the F.B.I.’s investigation into Russian meddling. As we told the Senate Judiciary Committee in August, our sources said the dossier was taken so seriously because it corroborated reports the bureau had received from other sources, including one inside the Trump camp.
The intelligence committees have known for months that credible allegations of collusion between the Trump camp and Russia were pouring in from independent sources during the campaign. Yet lawmakers in the thrall of the president continue to wage a cynical campaign to portray us as the unwitting victims of Kremlin disinformation.They claim they told investigators to look into “the bank records of Deutsche Bank and others that were funding Mr. Trump’s businesses” but they appeared “uninterested in that tip.”
Simpson & Fritsch walk through a number of other matters they say they talked about in private before addressing Steele himself.They claim they didn’t tell him who they “were working for” and didn’t give him any “marching orders,” only to answer this: “Why did Mr. Trump repeatedly seek to do deals in a notoriously corrupt police state that most serious investors shun?”
Steele reportedly wanted to report what he found to the FBI, and this is what they say happened next:We did not discuss that decision with our clients, or anyone else. Instead, we deferred to Mr. Steele, a trusted friend and intelligence professional with a long history of working with law enforcement. We did not speak to the F.B.I. and haven’t since.
After the election, Mr. Steele decided to share his intelligence with Senator John McCain via an emissary. We helped him do that. The goal was to alert the United States national security community to an attack on our country by a hostile foreign power. We did not, however, share the dossier with BuzzFeed, which to our dismay published it last January.They conclude by calling on Congress to release the transcripts from Fusion GPS’ testimony. You can read the whole op-ed here.
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Oooops, it seems the Republicans in Congress have been caught withholding testimony from the public.