Senate to examine financial records of firm behind notorious Trump-Russia dossier
The US House Intelligence Committee has reached agreement to obtain the bank records of the Washington-based research firm Fusion GPS, responsible for the infamous Trump-Moscow collusion dossier which has reportedly been partly funded by the Clinton campaign.
The congressional panel will get access to Fusion GPS bank account records as part of its investigation into alleged Russian meddling in the 2016 election, Jack Langer, a spokesman for House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, said in a statement Saturday.
On Friday, a federal judge had given an unnamed bank more time to respond to the Committee’s subpoena to Fusion GPS, AP reported.
Earlier, Republican-funded journalism website, The Washington Free Beacon, confirmed it has been paying Fusion GPS from the fall of 2015 to the spring of 2016 for research on then presidential candidate Donald Trump. However, the website insisted the enquiry had no Russian angle at that time.
Nevertheless, alleged collusion between Trump and the Russians became the focus of the research after it was then taken over by the Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee (DNC) later last spring, and handed over to former British spy Christopher Steele to drive forward.
“During the 2016 election cycle we retained Fusion GPS to provide research on multiple candidates in the Republican presidential primary, just as we retained other firms to assist in our research into Hillary Clinton,” The Washington Free Beacon editor-in-chief Matthew Continetti and chairman Michael Goldfarb said in a written statement.
“The Free Beacon had no knowledge of or connection to the Steele dossier, did not pay for the dossier, and never had contact with, knowledge of, or provided payment for any work performed by Christopher Steele,” they emphasized.
Langer said Saturday that ”the Beacon has agreed to cooperate with the House Intelligence Committee to help the Committee verify” that the outlet had no connection to Steele’s dossier.
READ MORE: Trump says Hillary Clinton was the one who colluded with Russia
Earlier in the week, reports emerged that the Clinton campaign and the DNC continued financing Fusion GPS’s research on Trump. Research that was eventually filled with unsubstantiated claims of links and deals between Moscow and the Trump campaign, after a Republican source – later revealed as the Free Beacon – had given up on the project.
READ MORE: Why the ‘Steele Dossier’ on Trump-Russia collusion is a total nothingburger
A Washington Post report Tuesday alleged that Marc Elias, a lawyer representing Hillary for America and the DNC, retained Fusion GPS in April 2016 to continue research into Trump's alleged coordination with Russia. This funding reportedly continued until October, days before the election.
