Democrats who touted the discredited Steele Dossier as evidence of former President Donald Trump’s corruption have quickly become aggrieved that an FBI source who provided apparently false information about Hunter Biden, Joe Biden and a Ukrainian energy company may be a Russian intelligence asset.
Numerous Democrats promoted the Steele dossier — a document sourced by an FBI informant once suspected of being a Russian spy detailing numerous debunked claims about Russia compromising and colluding with Trump — and it effectively sparked a federal investigation into the Trump campaign that stretched well into his presidency. Now that the Department of Justice (DOJ) has stated the FBI source behind claims alleging Hunter Biden and Joe Biden engaged in corrupt activity with Burisma maintained contact with high-level Russian intelligence officers, many of those same Democrats are suddenly outraged.
In a legal filing describing Alexander Smirnov — who was arrested for lying to the FBI on Feb. 14 — as a flight risk, special counsel David Weiss and his team stated that Smirnov told them during an interview that he had met numerous times with unnamed Russians near the end of 2023, including a senior member of a Russian foreign intelligence service. Smirnov told the FBI in 2020 that Burisma executives arranged $5 million payments to both Hunter Biden and Joe Biden while the latter was in charge of Ukraine policy for the Obama administration to protect the company’s interests, a piece of information that would have contradicted Joe Biden’s claims he was uninvolved in his son’s business dealings. (RELATED: ‘Absurd And Childish’: Dems Chastised Ex-Hunter Biden Associate During Closed-Door Interview)
FBI Agent Quit Crossfire Hurricane Team After His Effort To Validate Christopher Steele Was Shut Down https://t.co/bJK0D2xAuf
— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) January 19, 2021
The FBI recorded Smirnov’s allegations about Burisma and alleged payments to Joe and Hunter Biden in 2020 in a FD-1023 form, a type of document used by agents to organize raw intelligence provided by informants without passing judgement as to the information’s veracity.
Democratic Rep. Dan Goldman of New York, whom House Democrats appointed to be senior advisor and director of investigations for the House Intelligence Committee during the first set of impeachment proceedings against Trump in 2019, has made his views clear. Goldman claimed in 2021 that “the Trump administration withheld evidence that definitively proves collusion” and that “there is no longer any doubt about collusion” between Trump and Russia, after stating in 2020 that “there not only was evidence of collusion but there was, in fact, collusion.”
“Wittingly or unwittingly, House Republicans have been acting as an agent or asset of Russian intelligence for Vladimir Putin. This whole Burisma thing was debunked during the first impeachment investigation in 2019 by numerous, numerous witnesses, all of whom, experts on Ukraine and Russia,” Goldman said during a Thursday evening appearance on CNN. And now, this FD-1023 materializes from a purported conversation in 2020 that is treated as gospel by the Republicans. And I would like to know whether or not Senator Grassley, who had a copy of this 1023 before the FBI ever gave it, or (House Oversight and Accountability Committee) Chairman Comer, or (House Judiciary Committee) Chairman Jordan, all of whom were singing the praises of the information provided by this source had any idea whether or not it was completely bogus and was in fact a plant by Russian intelligence, which has been trying to meddle, somewhat successfully, in our elections since 2016.” (RELATED: The Media’s Russia ‘Bombshells’ Look Even Worse Now That Mueller Found No Collusion)
Democratic California Reps. Adam Schiff and Eric Swalwell stand during a press conference at the U.S. Capitol Building on January 25, 2023 in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)
While the FD-1023 may be discredited as a result of Smirnov’s alleged dishonesty, it does not have bearing on the credibility of testimonies delivered by several former Hunter Biden business associates, the contents of Hunter Biden’s laptop, a web of bank records and shell companies or details about business dealings in other countries — including China, Romania and Kazakhstan — that congressional investigators have uncovered during their impeachment probe targeting Joe Biden.
The Daily Caller News Foundation authenticated an email from the laptop in October 2020, which showed a Burisma executive discussing an introduction to then-Vice President Joe Biden.
“This is all part of a propaganda and disinformation campaign by Russia attempting to help Donald Trump,” House Oversight and Accountability Committee Ranking Member Jamie Raskin said on CNN Tuesday evening, referencing the explosive claims made about Smirnov in a legal filing unsealed Tuesday. “When we point out the clear contours of this story, our colleagues just start chanting ‘Russia hoax, Russia hoax!’ Well, what’s the hoax? … It seems to me like the most likely hoax is Donald Trump, who’s been manipulated by Putin for a long time, or is certainly in love with Vladimir Putin.” (RELATED: Former DOJ Official Confronts MSNBC Host Over Network’s Overhyped Russiagate Coverage)
Democratic New York Rep. Dan Goldman speaks with Democratic Maryland Rep. Jamie Raskin during a news conference about Republican efforts to open an impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden, outside the U.S. Capitol on December 13, 2023 in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images)
Special counsel Robert Mueller’s years-long investigation into the Trump campaign and Russia found no evidence of collusion between the two.
Raskin previously promoted the contents of the Steele dossier, which was funded by the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, and assertions that Russia had compromised Trump as legitimate.
“The apparent victor in the 2016 electoral college contest may be a Russian asset, stooge, dupe or agent, but we must stand together against Putin’s puppet,” Raskin wrote in a July 2018 post to X, formerly Twitter.
“Trump’s policies are made in Russia,” Raskin wrote in a July 2017 post. “The (Trump) administration stops at nothing to cover up the Russian connection and its lies about it,” he wrote in a March 2017 post.
Raskin is not the only Democrat to have changed his tune about the veracity of information provided to the FBI by shady sources after defending the Steele dossier. (RELATED: Musk Straight Up Calls Russia Conspiracy ‘Elaborate Hoax’ Staged By Clinton)
Christopher Steele, The Ex-British Spy Who Tried To Influence The US Election, Wants UK To Beef Up Its Foreign Influence Laws https://t.co/1KrJo7Ad7F
— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) March 12, 2021
“There you have it. James Comer and Jim Jordan have been doing the work of Russia’s intelligence service,” Democratic California Rep. Eric Swalwell wrote in a Thursday post to X, responding to a report from The New Republic outlining the latest allegations against Smirnov. Swalwell called on Comer to resign from Congress on Friday morning because Comer previously promoted Smirnov’s claims to substantiate the impeachment inquiry into Joe Biden.
Swalwell previously stated that Trump and his inner circle were “compromised” in a X post from 2017, and he asserted in 2018 that the House Intelligence Committee “unearthed evidence of collusion and [Republicans were] seeking to bury it” and that it was “pretty clear [Trump] colluded with Russia.”
Democratic California Rep. Adam Schiff was among the leading purveyors of the Steele dossier’s since-debunked contents, repeatedly appearing on television programs to assert that Trump and Russia had colluded and that ample evidence existed to support that conclusion. Schiff does not appear to have weighed in on the latest revelations about Smirnov’s credibility as he is in the middle of a run for a Senate seat.
The offices of Schiff, Goldman, Raskin and Swalwell did not respond immediately to requests for comment.
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