The story was about to explode, as newspapers and television networks raced to implicate Trump as an agent of Russia who had stolen the election from Clinton. The witch hunt was on. It would encumber his presidency from the outset, impair his ability to govern, and torment him with false accusations for the next two years. Congress would investigate and harass. Comey’s FBI would scrutinize his every action. A special counsel would pick up the baton and launch an unwarranted probe laden with unfairness. And the mainstream media would convict Trump in the court of public opinion on an almost daily basis. Treason would be the stated and unstated truncheon that would haunt the president until the day Robert Mueller would reveal that there was no evidence of a “collusion conspiracy.”
It is nearly impossible to conceive how two nefarious people, Steele and Simpson, could hold a nation and a presidency hostage for more than two long years over nothing more than a conjured hoax. They had assistance, to be sure. Funding by Clinton’s campaign and Democrats nourished the con. Unscrupulous officials at the FBI and DOJ drove it to excess, abusing their powers and defiling the rule of law. Journalists became witting and fervent partners throughout the witch hunt. They never flagged in their devotion to destroy Trump and undo his election.
No, the “Dossier” Was Never “Mostly True”
One of the most prominent and enduring falsehoods promoted by the mainstream media in their “collusion” narrative was that the “dossier” was mostly true. That was a constant refrain for more than two years. It was a clever sleight of hand by journalists who became deeply invested in the story that Trump had conspired with Russia to unduly influence the presidential election. It turned out that the only portions of the “dossier” that were true were not at all related to Trump campaign “collusion” but gleaned from readily available records and public reporting. The parts alleging a Trump-Russia conspiracy were false. Yet the media could never admit that they’d been played. They yearned for the “dossier” to be true in all respects, so they kept repeating the “mostly true” mantra in print and on television as if saying it was so somehow made it so.
BuzzFeed, which was the first to print Steele’s memos in their entirety in January 2017, was especially committed to justifying what it had done. The website was severely criticized for publishing the outlandish allegations that had not been verified. Nearly two years later, in December 2018, BuzzFeed’s editor in chief, Ben Smith, gave an interview to Vanity Fair. The magazine shrewdly cherry-picked one of Smith’s isolated remarks and adopted it for the article’s bold headline, “ ‘The Broad Outline of What Steele Was Writing Is Unquestionably True.’ ”140 However, if you dig through both the story and the attached transcribed interview, that brief declaration by Smith is the only comment he made about the purported veracity of the “dossier.” He offered nothing more. He furnished no explanation of what was “unquestionably true” and provided no evidence to back up his assertion. The article’s author, Joe Pompeo (who presumably posed the questions), did not bother to ask the natural and inevitable question “What exactly in the dossier is ‘unquestionably true’?” His complete lack of curiosity suggests that Pompeo himself had accepted the document as the equivalent of gospel written in stone. Hence, readers were left with the distinct impression that Steele’s document must be true. Period. No challenge was made, and no criticism was offered. It was simply recognized and sanctioned on faith alone.
Consistently on CNN, MSNBC, and several broadcast networks, anchors and reporters repeated the theme that the “dossier” was mostly true. So did their guests. Ex–CIA director John Brennan and former director of national intelligence James Clapper, both of whom had served under Obama, were particularly adept at leveling the fiction without enumerating details. That extended to their print interviews, as well.
In a question-and-answer session with Salon that was picked up by other news outlets, Clapper proclaimed, “Some of what was in the dossier was actually corroborated—but separately—in our intelligence community assessment, from other sources that we were confident in.”141 He tendered no explanation of what parts had been corroborated. Instead, he claimed, “We did not use the dossier as a source for the intelligence community assessment, that’s point one.”142 Later he added, “As time has gone on more and more of it has been corroborated, but I can’t actually give you a percentage.”143
That may be the most important moment in the entire mass delusion. How could the average citizen, watching the media frenzy, figure out what had actually happened? The easiest answer was to listen to what the former head of intelligence said, and here he was saying that intelligence agents looked into it and most of it was true. If Trump had personally coordinated with KGB hackers to break into voting machines, that was what you would have expected Clapper to say.
Clapper’s contention that the “dossier” was never used as part of the intelligence community assessment (ICA) report issued in January 2019 was repeated by Brennan when he told Congress, under oath, that the document was “not in any way used as the basis for the intelligence community’s assessment” that Moscow had interfered in the election for the benefit of Trump.144 However, Brennan and Clapper were spinning a deception. A prominent colleague contradicted them and produced documents as proof that they were not telling the truth. In a classified letter to Congress, National Security Agency director Michael Rogers disclosed that the uncorroborated document “did factor into the ICA” report.145 Rogers confirmed to the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee that a summary of Steele’s document had even been added as an appendix to a draft version of the ICA that had contributed to its final analysis.146 Having been caught in a falsehood, Clapper then repudiated his earlier statement by telling CNN that “some” of the “dossier” had been used for the intelligence assessment report. Was Clapper lying in his first statement or his second statement? Brennan continued to deny all of it, the contrary evidence notwithstanding.
None of that seemed to concern CNN. The network hired Clapper as a “national security analyst.”147 His pal Brennan was retained as a paid “intelligence analyst” for MSNBC and NBC News.148 The two superspooks launched an all-out attack on Trump, exploiting their new television platforms to advance the toxic fiction that the president was a secret Russian asset who had “colluded” with Putin. It didn’t matter to CNN that a House Intelligence Committee report determined that it had been Clapper who had leaked news of the phony “dossier” to the network before Trump had ever taken office.149
At first, Clapper lied during his private testimony with congressional investigators by “flatly denying” the leak. He eventually confessed to the committee that he had told CNN host Jake Tapper about the “dossier” in early January 2016.150 Ironically, Clapper persisted in publicly condemning the leaking of information while he covertly leaked to other news organizations beyond CNN.151 The network didn’t care about its new hire’s culpability or the false and sleazy document he had propagated. It happily collected a prestigious award for its Clapper-fed report on what turned out to be a nonexistent conspiracy with Moscow. Nor did it matter to NBC/MSNBC that Brennan had been the instrumental “instigator” of the Russian hoax and had delivered less-than-honest testimony before Congress on numerous subjects. He was allowed to use its TV pulpit to condemn Trump with every appearance and freely accuse the president of a death penalty offense, treason. The humiliating level of media malpractice in the age of Trump will be explored in depth in a later chapter of this book.
The persistent fairy tale that the “dossier” was “mostly true” is one of the more confounding aspects of the entire Trump-Russia faux scandal. The media, as well as Democrats, routinely pointed to select parts of Steele’s memos as justification for their assertion. An example of this is a January 2019 online story by CNN, published two months before the special counsel ended its probe, which told its readers and viewers that “many of the allegations that form the bulk of the intelligence memos have held up over time, or have proven to be at leas
t partially true.”152 The network then explained what parts were true or “partially true.” It turned out that all of those earth-shattering parts were simply a restatement by Steele of what had already been a matter of public record before Steele ever composed his memos. In other words, the ex–British spy mined old information and sold it as new. He appears to have gathered some of it from the internet, newspapers, or television stories. The CNN story is worth examining because it proves the point and is illustrative of what other journalists contended. The reporters identified four sections of the “dossier” that they claimed were true.
First, CNN cited Steele’s claim that there had been “Russian meddling in the 2016 election.” Yes, that is an obvious truth. But it has been true for decades and well chronicled and documented by various intelligence agencies throughout the years, as noted in the ICA report.153 An intelligence agent such as Steele would have been well aware of that. The Russians have attempted to sow discord in Western elections in much the same way that the US government has spread false information to influence elections in other nations of the world.154 It is a frequent practice. There is nothing new in this. It’s old news. Yet the media sold it as a stunning revelation. But Steele added a new dimension to it by claiming that Trump had been involved in the Russian interference. There was no evidence of it when the “dossier” was written, nor is there any evidence of it now.
Second, CNN repeated Steele’s claim that there had been “secret contacts between Trump’s team and Russians” during the campaign, adding that they had involved “at least 16 Trump associates.” The genesis of that yarn came from a February 14, 2017, story in the New York Times that cited unnamed officials as its source.155 McCabe reportedly shot down the story, stating “It’s total bullshit . . . it’s not true.”156 Comey told Congress under oath that the article “in the main, was not true.”157 Yet the media did not care that the FBI had debunked it. Journalists continued to perpetuate the fiction without attempting to establish even a semblance of balance by reporting that there had actually been more known contacts between the Hillary Clinton campaign and Russians.158 The mainstream media largely ignored evidence from the Ukrainian Embassy that during the 2016 campaign a contractor for the Democratic National Committee “solicited dirt on Donald Trump’s campaign chairman and even tried to enlist the country’s president to help” in an effort to boost Clinton’s chances against her opponent.159
Both Republicans and Democrats had numerous conversations with Russian officials before and during the campaign. Many of them were public knowledge, while others were not. So what? Foreign policy is always a relevant election issue, and no law is violated by engaging in constitutionally protected speech. This includes discussions or communications with foreigners and foreign governments. Absent some evidence of a conspiracy to defraud an election, it is not a crime to meet or talk with a Russian. Once again, Steele’s “dossier” took otherwise legal and permissive “contacts” and contorted them into a plot to rig the presidential election result. Proof of such a scheme never emerged. Steele’s account of it was nothing more than a fiction that was then exaggerated and animated by the media.
Third, CNN recited Steele’s claim of “Trump’s real estate dealings in Russia.” No real estate “deals” were ever consummated by Trump, despite periodic efforts to explore potential development projects and licensing agreements in both Moscow and Saint Petersburg in an effort to expand the Trump brand. Dating back to 1987, before the fall of the Soviet Union, Trump had begun scouting prospective partners and government permission to discuss the construction of hotels, office buildings, and mixed-use commercial and residential towers.160 He had made several visits to Russia. The ventures were often publicized and well known. That was likely how Steele gained the information. From time to time, plans were drawn and discussions were held. However, nothing ever came to fruition. A year before the presidential election, Trump signed a “letter of intent” to discuss the construction of a Trump tower along the Moscow River.161 As before, the talks ended without an agreement in mid-2016. No contracts were signed, and nothing was built or licensed. Given the worldwide presence of Trump Organization projects, it would have been extraordinary if he had not at least explored the idea of a real estate venture in Russia. Simply put, there was nothing illegal or nefarious in a real estate developer seeking developments in real estate. But the media ran with it as evidence of “collusion.”
Finally, CNN regurgitated Steele’s claim that retired army general Michael Flynn, who later became an adviser to Trump, had traveled to Moscow in December 2015 to deliver a paid speech to a state-run news organization called Russia Today (RT). That was most certainly true. A businessman and private citizen at the time who was entitled to earn an income, Flynn nevertheless met with Pentagon officials before the speech to make them aware of his upcoming visit, and he debriefed them upon his return.162 But Flynn was not alone in his sojourn to Russia. Jill Stein, who became the 2016 Green Party presidential nominee, also attended the dinner.163 They were both seated at a table with Putin. Photographs were taken, and the event received some publicity. Steele seems to have incorporated that public information into his “dossier” and contorted it into some kind of an odious criminal enterprise. It was not.
The only truthful information in Steele’s “dossier” was derived from preexisting and inconsequential public information that could easily have been obtained by almost anyone. Moreover, none of the so-called truths implicated Trump or his campaign in wrongdoing or a grand conspiracy to steal the presidential election. Yet the media gave sustenance to Steele’s document by misrepresenting that it was “mostly true.” They implied that “collusion” must be true because noncollusion statements were true. Steele had been clever; he had carefully woven a handful of true statements into his many untruthful memos. In the alternative, he had been spoon-fed a combination of lies and truths by sources in Moscow. This is a typical tactic employed by Russian intelligence operatives in covert actions. By mixing truths with untruths, “it encourages you to believe the falsehoods,” according to Daniel Hoffman, a former CIA station chief.164 Had journalists been honest and forthright, they would have said, “None of the collusion allegations in the Steele dossier has been corroborated or proven true.” That they did not do.
The media practice of vouching for the credibility of Steele’s “dossier” continued up through, and including, the day Attorney General William Barr revealed, “The Special Counsel’s investigation did not find that the Trump campaign or anyone associated with it conspired or coordinated with Russia in its efforts to influence the 2016 U.S. presidential election.”165 Suddenly journalists stopped arguing that the “dossier” was “mostly true.” They pretended that the “collusion” narrative driven by Steele’s document had never happened and that they had never been complicit in advancing its many false stories.
Those in the US intelligence community who had been the chief proponents of the “dossier” suddenly became deathly allergic to it. In his tiresome book, the tired James Clapper dismissed it as “a collection of seventeen ‘pseudo-intelligence’ reports created by a private company, which I first learned about from John Brennan.”166 Hmm. Then why did Clapper leak it to the media in January 2017? Is he now blaming Brennan? Is he trying to erase or redact his own role in peddling a phony document that created a national nightmare? The answer is yes.
For his part, Brennan now pretends he knew all along that the “dossier” was inauthentic. Yet for more than two years he championed the document as evidence of Trump-Russia “collusion” and accused the president of treason. He even insisted that the “dossier” be included in the classified intelligence community report on Russian interference.167 Then came the special counsel report. In a Jekyll-Hyde transformation, the sheepish Brennan conceded, “I don’t know if I received bad information, but I think I suspected there was more than there actually was.”168 That’s quite a metamorphosis for a guy who had enthusiastically endorsed the “dossier
” and who had been quoted as saying that “it was in line” with his own CIA sources, in which he “had great confidence.”169 Really? What sources? Steele and Simpson? Clinton?
And then there is James Comey. He did not hesitate to exploit the “dossier” to fuel the launch of the Trump-Russia investigation. He later admitted to the president and Congress that he had known it was “unverified.” But that had not stopped him from representing to a court that it had been “verified” in order to obtain a warrant to spy on the campaign. This will be explored at length in the next chapter.
Former federal prosecutor Andrew McCarthy observed that none of that prevented Trump’s enemies from making the document, funded by the Clinton campaign and Democrats, the centerpiece of their drive to frame him:
By any objective measure, Steele’s dossier is a shoddy piece of work. Its stories are preposterous—the “pee tape,” the grandiose Trump-Russia espionage conspiracy, the closely coordinating Trump emissaries who turned out not even to know each other, the trips and meetings that never happened, the hub of conspiratorial activity that did not actually exist.170
The “collusion” narrative was a conspiracy in and of itself, fabricated as a political instrument and then weaponized by unscrupulous government officials. Attorney General William Barr likened their actions to those of the ancient Praetorian Guard, an elite unit established to protect Roman emperors but that instead often plotted to overthrow them:
Republics have fallen because of Praetorian Guard mentality where government officials get very arrogant, they identify the national interest with their own political preferences and they feel that anyone who has a different opinion, you know, is somehow an enemy of the state. And you know, there is that tendency that they know better. . . . That can easily translate into essentially supervening the will of the majority and getting your own way as a government official.171
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