According to Michael Isikoff and David Corn’s new book “Russian Roulette: The Inside Story of Putin’s War on America and the Election of Donald Trump,” former British spy Christopher Steele and his business partner Christopher Burrows had a “heated exchange” over the dossier’s salacious allegations.
Daily Caller reports:
In his first memo for the dossier, dated June 20, 2016, Steele, a former MI6 officer, reported that a source inside Russia had received information that Trump took part in the tryst in 2013 while visiting Russia for the Miss Universe pageant. Steele’s source told him that the Russian government has used the video to blackmail Trump. […]
Steele’s business partner, Christopher Burrows, immediately questioned Steele’s report, according to the book.
“What the fuck!” Burrows said to Steele during what the authors describe as a heated exchange.
“Burrows feared Steele was sensationalizing his material,” the book reads, which reports that Burrows “later privately described the report as akin to preliminary intelligence reporting — information not analyzed, vetted, or ready for distribution.”
“This was not gospel. It was raw product,” Burrows would say.
Steele, who was tasked with compiling the ‘Trump dossier’ for opposition research firm Fusion GPS, has admitted in court that the discredited document contains “limited intelligence.”
Steele also admitted part of “his final December memo,” was unvetted.
“Such intelligence was not actively sought; it was merely received,” Steele added.
According to a recent WSJ report, the Obama Justice Department relied on information obtained by Steele, to spy on Trump campaign aide, Carter Page, during the final days of the 2016 presidential election.
Steele infamously compiled the discredited dossier detailing alleged sex acts performed by then-businessman Donald Trump inside a swanky Moscow hotel suite in 2013.
However, the veracity of the allegations didn’t stop Director of National Intelligence James Clapper from informing President Barack Obama of the “golden showers” claims during a Presidential Daily Briefing.
Mother Jones reports:
Near the time the spy chiefs briefed Trump on the intelligence community’s report on the Russian attack, Susan Rice, the national security adviser, encouraged Clapper during the daily intelligence briefing to tell Obama about the “golden showers” allegations. After Clapper did so, Obama turned to Rice and said, “Why am I hearing this?” The president was incredulous. He added, “What’s happening?” One participant in the meeting later said, “You don’t really expect to hear the term ‘golden showers’ in the President’s Daily Brief or that the guy who is going to become president may be a Manchurian candidate.”
