"It’s one thing to say allegations should be investigated, and they were.
Statements about Trump’s sexual activities were “jest”, he said.Ī lawyer for Danchenko had no immediate comment.Democratic congressman Adam Schiff, a longstanding advocate of Trump-Russia "collusion," insisted – in a clear reference to Danchenko – that those who lied to the FBI or Steele should be prosecuted and sent to jail if convicted. According to the justice department inspector general, Michael Horowitz, Danchenko told the bureau his work with sub-sources in Russia amounted to “hearsay” and “conversation had with friends over beers”. By doubling down on this they would be able to discredit the whole Russia investigation,” he said.ĭuring his interviews with the FBI, Danchenko appeared to downplay the reliability of his own information – a point seized upon by Republican commentators. “I think they thought I would be an easy target to discredit the dossier. It included claims – which he denies – he was a Russian spy. Speaking last year Danchenko said a campaign against him by leading Republicans was designed to deflect from the damaging Senate report. It laid out multiple contacts between Paul Manafort, Trump’s campaign manager who features in the dossier, and Konstantin Kilimnik, described as a Russian intelligence officer. The bipartisan report by the Senate intelligence committee was dismissive of Steele’s dossier, but corroborated key elements in it. The allegation would be “amusing”, he said, were it not for the fact that any covert FSB recording might be used for blackmail purposes. He said the “salacious” material in the dossier formed a small part of a 35-page document. He said he did not resile from explosive allegations that Trump may have been secretly filmed with sex workers during his Moscow trip. Speaking to the Guardian in October, Danchenko, who is based in Washington DC, defended his work on the dossier. In September cybersecurity lawyer, Michael Sussmann was also accused of lying to the FBI. Danchenko is the third person, and second in a two-month span, to face indictment with five separate counts on Thursday of lying. But so far the Biden administration has not tried to stop him. But the FBI investigation began independently from the dossier, after it emerged Moscow had hacked thousands of Democratic party emails.ĭemocrats believe Durham’s inquiries to be politically driven. It repeatedly cited the dossier as evidence that the FBI’s investigation into Trump’s relations with Russia was biased and unfair. Trump’s justice department claimed the former president was the victim of a witch-hunt.
The Kremlin had run a “sweeping and systemic” operation to help Trump win, Mueller said. But Mueller noted that there were multiple contacts in 2016 between Russian spies and Trump aides. In 2019, the special counsel Robert Mueller said no criminal wrongdoing had taken place between the Trump campaign and Moscow. He appears to have been credited by Danchenko with the claim that Trump watched sex workers perform “golden showers” by urinating on each other at the hotel. The FBI further accuses Danchenko of making up a conversation with Sergei Millian, a Russian American property broker with links to Trump, who appears in the dossier as “source D”. The executive’s information found its way into some of the dossier’s memos, a fact Danchenko allegedly concealed. These include over his dealings with an unnamed US PR executive with close links to the Democrats. The five-page indictment released on Thursday accuses Danchenko of lying repeatedly to the FBI when interviewed in 2017 – a criminal offense.
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