Durham Exposes New Links To Clinton Campaign in Creation of Russian Collusion Scandal
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
“ To my good friend … A Great Democrat .” Those words written to a Russian figure in Moscow, inside a copy of a Hillary Clinton autobiography, may be the defining line of special counsel John Durham ’s investigation. The message reportedly was written by Charles Dolan, a close Clinton adviser and campaign regular whom news reports identify as the mysterious “PR-Executive 1” in the latest Durham indictment, this time of Igor Danchenko .
Danchenko, 43, was a key figure in the compilation of the infamous Steele dossier that led to the now discredited investigation of alleged collusion between the Trump campaign and the Russian government during the 2016 presidential race. But Danchenko, a Russian emigre living in the U.S., seems unlikely to be the Durham investigation’s apex defendant. In fact, Durham describes him at points more like a shill than a spy, an “investigator” who was fed what to report by Clinton operatives such as Dolan .
Durham is known as a methodical, apolitical and unrelenting prosecutor . Thus far, his work seems to betray a belief that the FBI got played by the Clinton campaign to investigate the Trump team. The question is whether Durham really wants to indict just the figurative tail if he can get the whole dog — a question that now may weigh heavily on a number of Washington figures, just as it did following Durham’s indictment in September of Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann .
Danchenko’s indictment on five counts of lying to the FBI serves two obvious purposes. First, these counts — with a possible five years in prison on each — are enough to concentrate the mind of any defendant about possibly flipping for the prosecution. Second, indicting Danchenko “hoists the wretch” for potential targets to see and consider that there but for the grace of God — and Durham — go they.
The background details of Durham’s three indictments so far have assembled an impressive list of “great Democrats” who contributed directly or indirectly to the creation of the Russia collusion scandal. Indeed, the collusion case increasingly is taking on a type of “Murder on the Orient Express” feel, in which all of the suspects may turn out to be culprits. While the statute of limitations may protect some, Durham has shown that he can use the crime of lying to federal investigators (18 U.S.C. 1001) as a handy alternative. Targets must admit to prior misconduct or face a new charge.
Thus, Durham clearly seems to be making a meticulous case that the Steele dossier was a political hit job orchestrated by Clinton operatives. His latest indictment connects Danchenko to several intriguing figures and groups that, in turn, relate to the Clinton campaign.
Former British spy Christopher Steele himself has been extensively interviewed by investigators over the years — a long record that comes with inherent risks of contradictions. Notably, Steele recently defended his dossier in a bizarre interview. While admitting that it might have been used by Russian intelligence for disinformation, he stood by the accounts of its most sensational details, such as former President Trump ’s “golden shower tape,” despite Durham’s findings to the contrary.
The role of former General Counsel of the Clinton campaign was featured in yet another Durham indictment. Elias ’ former partner and Clinton lawyer, Michael Sussmann, was just indicted by Durham . Both Elias and Sussmann did this work through the law firm Perkins Coie, which has strong ties to the Democratic Party. Like Sussmann, Elias was accused for lying about the role of the Clinton campaign in the Russian scandal. Specifically, New York Times reporters accused Elias and the campaign of denying that the dossier was funded by the Clinton campaign. He later sat next to campaign chair John Podesta when he also reportedly denied the connection. It is not clear if Durham believes that Elias lied to investigators or engaged in other criminal conduct in his key role in the scandal.
Dolan is the latest direct connection between the campaign and the infamous Steele dossier to surface in Durham’s investigation. Dolan had close ties not only to the Clintons but to the Russians as well; he and the public relations firm where he worked had represented the Russian government and registered as foreign agents for Russia .
Durham alleges that it was Dolan, not Russian sources, who gave Danchenko key allegations to put into the Steele dossier, including some of its most salacious claims. Dolan is described as traveling to Moscow to meet with Russian officials who were paying his firm. The connection is notable because American intelligence believed that sources used in the dossier were, in fact, Russian agents and that the dossier may have been a vehicle for Russian intelligence to spread misinformation. However, Dolan reportedly admitted to “fabricating” facts given to Danchenko. Dolan’s attorney now describes him as a “witness” in the investigation .
Danchenko worked for several years at the Brookings Institution , a leading liberal think tank in Washington, as an analyst in Russian and Eurasian affairs — and, as a result, Brookings features prominently in this latest indictment. Around 2010, another Brookings employee had introduced Danchenko to Steele, who subsequently retained him as a contract investigator. ( Brookings has become something of a common denominator for many of the figures discussed in indictments and recent stories related to the Russian collusion scandal).
Steele testified in London in a 2019 defamation suit that he had disclosed some of his dossier’s details to Strobe Talbott, then the president of Brookings. Talbott had his own longstanding Clinton ties. Among those, he was an ambassador-at-large and a deputy secretary of state under President Clinton; when Hillary Clinton was secretary of State, Talbott was named chairman of the State Department’s foreign affairs advisory board.
Then there is Hillary Clinton herself. Steele also has testified that it was his understanding that Clinton was aware of his work and the development of the dossier. Yet during the campaign and long afterward, Clinton never admitted that her campaign funded the dossier, despite media and congressional inquiries about that fact. No less an official than campaign chairman John Podesta denied any connection in testimony before Congress.
More importantly, before the Steele dossier was given to the FBI and the press, then-CIA Director John Brennan briefed former President Obama on Clinton’s alleged “plan” to tie candidate Trump to Russia as “a means of distracting the public from her use of a private email server.”
Now, with Danchenko’s indictment, Dolan’s name has been added to a seemingly growing array of Clinton associates whom Durham has referenced in the development of the Russia collusion scandal.
Again, it is not known whether Durham has suspicions or evidence of criminal conduct against anyone else beyond Danchenko. But many other figures are at least likely to feature greatly in the conclusions of the special counsel’s final investigative report if many of the details of the indictments to date are any indication.
One thing is clear, though: Too many “great Democrats” keep popping up in Durham’s investigation.
Jonathan Turley is the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University.
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"However, Dolan reportedly admitted to “fabricating” facts given to Danchenko. Dolan’s attorney now describes him as a “witness” in the investigation ."
We may now be entering the stage where the low-hanging fruit is ready to deal.
I expect some unexpected "bombshells" to explode next year....leading up to the midterms
We've been waiting on those "bombshells" to explode for a long time now . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Exactly what do you think the DOJ has found on the Clintons? It's been over 20 years since Whitewater, numerous investigations, no results, yet you are still waiting on what...exactly?
And yet, Trump's Justice Department had four years and they came up with bupkiss, too...
Biden's DOJ? LMAO
The one where they got Sessions out of the way? It looks like we are just finding the truth now.
I think the nation is learning a lot.
Whatever happened to that little pedophile Sessions?
Trump's DOJ had 4 years, what did they come up with????
And if you'd read my comment, you'd know that I wasn't either.
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The 1st investigation of the Clinton's was Whitewater, 20 - 30 years ago. Since then they have been investigated by congressional republicans off an on almost continuously. And the results of all these investigations has been NOTHING.
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Disputing it, no, but you were confused and asked about my usage of it.
I'm talking over the last 20 - 30 years, and you respond with something that is less than 1 year old? Plus isn't Durham still investigating something about the Clintons? Or at least pretending to?
Who appointed Durham?
You know that Durham WORKS for the Biden DOJ now right Vic?
By 'they' you must mean Trump because Trump FIRED Sessions.
Then why did you ask, and I quote " why is it in YOUR post? ". If you weren't confused in the least, why would you ask about it???
I have my doubts.
Are you now trying to claim that the Clintons have NOT been under investigation, off and on, since Whitewater?
Was it Biden or Garland??? Or are you too afraid to state who, because in undercuts your claim?
Trump fired Sessions a long time after, as you know. Sessions had failed to mention two routine and uneventful meetings he held with ambassador Kislyak when Sessions was a Senator. For that grave sin, the media suggested Sessions was a Russian spy. And yet, rather than mock the idea, many dumb ass Republicans called on him to recuse himself from the oversight of the Department of Justice's Russia investigation, which he did. That opened the door for Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein to appoint a special counsel to probe the Russia collusion story. Rosenstein aimed to please democrats.
That will now be going into the history books.
After WHAT Vic? Perhaps you should review the thread and the comment that YOU replied to.
Oh, so by 'they' you mean Republicans. Got ya.
So then logic would lead us to believe that Durham aims to please Republicans.
I think its a safe guess that there the suspicions and evidence is there and Durham is looking into each and every one of them.
As Howie Carr might say "foul play is suspected."
I would support releasing her to attend Bill's funeral when he finally croaks. Then she goes back to prison next to El Chapo and the Unibomber.
New York Post came out with a nice editorial with a nice timeline detailing how dishonest the media was in promoting these Clinton concocted lies. :
Russiagate has fallen apart, with special counsel John Durham exposing the notorious Steele Dossier as a collection of lies and made-up stories. But you wouldn’t know it by reading most of the media, which have mostly ignored the story.
More importantly, they haven’t faced up to their own part in pushing this witch hunt. Relying on one anonymous source — ex-British spy Christopher Steele — they spun a supposed conspiracy between Donald Trump and Russia. But they never revealed the fact that Steele was being paid by Hillary Clinton’s campaign for opposition research, and they never examined Steele’s sources, who were unreliable or nonexistent.
Here’s how the media amplified Steele’s baseless claims to create hysteria. None of these stories have been updated, no corrections have been made.
Just seeded it.
The NY Post - LOL! The equivalent of the National Enquirer. LOL!
Former Trump-era State Department spokesperson Morgan Ortagus on Tuesday questioned Rep. Adam Schiff's credibility after his past promotion of the infamous Steele dossier.
In her second day on the panel of ABC’s "The View," Ortagus confronted the California Democrat about his support of a 2016 document containing allegations of Donald Trump’s supposed ties to Russia — the key source of which has been indicted for lying.
It will be fun watching the left try to spin all this when the shit really starts hitting the fan.
We'll all need to pick up extra popcorn
We're not the ones spinning.
We've been waiting how many years for that shit to hit the fan?
LOL!
Whenever spineless dip shit Republicans find themselves floundering and needing to deflect from something they immediately suggest another Clinton investigation. They've been doing it for nearly 30 years now. What's funny is that after literally dozens and dozens of investigations they've only been able to prove the former President lied about getting a blowjob. Sure, their own President paid nearly half a million during his run for President to keep two porn stars from talking about how he fucked them while his 3rd wife was home with their new baby, but damn that Bill Clinton! Well done you guys! Go ahead and give yourselves a pat on the back! /s
Lol .... yeah, Republicans are the ones floundering right now.
Hilarious!
Ya it is the gqp/gop/republicans who are floundering!