Paul Sperry: Ex-DOJ Official and Wife Had Bigger Roles in Dossier Than Known
Reposted by johnkassnews.com with permission from RealClearInvestigations.com. You may view the original article here.
by Paul Sperry, RealClearInvestigations
May 16, 2023
While it’s bad enough the debunked dossier the FBI used to spy on the Trump campaign was paid for by the Clinton campaign and authored by a foreign FBI informant and his carousing researcher, the newly released report of Special Counsel John Durham strongly suggests a top Justice Department official and his wife had an early hand in shaping the political rumor sheet.
Bruce Ohr, above, and wife Nellie, top. AP
According to the 306-page report, former Justice Department prosecutor Bruce Ohr’s wife Nellie Ohr first plowed the ground for the dossier with a series of research reports she wrote for Fusion GPS, the D.C.-based opposition research firm the Clinton campaign commissioned to dig up dirt on Trump and Russia.
Obtained by Durham, her reports zeroed in on Sergei Millian and his connections to Russia and Trump, falsely portraying him as a key intermediary between the Kremlin and the Republican candidate. They would later provide the foundation for the dossier’s many fictions.
“Fusion GPS records demonstrate that Nellie Ohr first identified Millian,” Durham states in his report. “All told, Ohr prepared at least 12 reports that discussed Sergei Millian.”
She wrote her first Millian report in April 2016, the month before Fusion GPS hired former British intelligence officer Christopher Steele to put his imprimatur as a supposed former “spy” and “Russian insider” on the dossier.
“This report was prepared just ten days after Fusion GPS was retained by [Clinton campaign law firm] Perkins Coie to conduct opposition research on Trump,” the Durham Report states, “and prior to Steele being retained by Fusion GPS.”
Sergei Millian: Never a dossier source. sergeimillian.com
Durham suggests Nellie Ohr planted the seeds of sourcing for the most explosive allegations leveled by the dossier against Trump, including the oft-cited notion that he and his campaign were engaged in a “well-developed conspiracy of cooperation” with the Kremlin. The dossier attributed this, falsely, to Millian. Durham found that the Belarusian-American realtor was never a source for the dossier and was simply invented as one, along with the allegations attributed to him.
In fact, Durham says that Millian initially wasn’t even on the radar of Steele and his dossier “collector” Igor Danchenko, a former Brookings Institution analyst who’s admitted much of the information he provided Steele was alcohol-lubricated gossip. Millian was called to their attention by Nellie Ohr, who the prosecutor said “implicated” Millian through her own reports. Durham suggests Steele and Danchenko merely followed her leads.
Igor Danchenko: Tracked leads on Millian from Nellie Ohr within “approximately one week” of Fusion GPS retaining Steele for the dossier. AP
Meanwhile, the prosecutor added, Bruce Ohr, an anti-Trump Democrat, pushed his wife’s reports that cited Millian — 12 in all — onto the Crossfire Hurricane team at FBI headquarters that was investigating Trump and his campaign for possible espionage. Agents used her reports as a source of corroboration for the Steele reports they received in the summer and fall of 2016, even though it was circular reporting.
“The reports prepared by Ohr and others at Fusion GPS were ultimately provided to Crossfire Hurricane investigators by Ohr’s husband, Bruce Ohr,” according to the Durham Report.
Durham notes that Danchenko was tracking leads on Millian from Nellie Ohr within “approximately one week” of Fusion GPS retaining Steele to compile the dossier. He concludes that this “strongly supports the inference that Fusion GPS directed Steele to pursue Millian.”
In other words, Steele was not the catalyst behind the dossier’s central claims. Rather, it was Clinton’s contractor Fusion GPS — but more specifically, the wife of a senior DOJ official who worked for Fusion. So the FBI wasn’t really investigating “Crown reporting,” as officials referred to Steele’s dossier, implying it was British intelligence. More accurately, it was investigating information from inside its own department that was laundered through Steele and his dossier.
On page 97 of their book, “Crime in Progress,” Fusion GPS co-founders Glenn Simpson and Peter Fritsch maintained that it was Steele who identified Millian as “one of the key intermediaries between Trump and the Russians.” Durham’s report shatters their claim.
The special counsel also found that Simpson worked with Bruce Ohr to pressure the FBI to investigate the dossier allegations.
On Aug. 22, 2016, Simpson asked Ohr to call him. About an hour later, Ohr emailed the FBI agent handling Steele as an informant to, as he said, “check in.” Ohr and the agent, Michael Gaeta, spoke over the phone on Aug. 24. During their call, Ohr inquired if the FBI was going to do anything with the dossier reports that Steele had passed along to Gaeta in July. In response, Gaeta “told Ohr that a group at FBI headquarters was working on them,” according to the Durham report. This undercuts the official FBI timeline of when HQ first received the dossier. For years, the bureau has insisted it did not receive the reports until a month later — Sept. 19, 2016.
The Ohrs also appear to have directly influenced the dossier and the FBI’s investigation. Both Bruce and Nellie Ohr, who previously worked for the CIA, met with Steele in Washington at a critical time. Emails reveal that on July 30, 2016 — the day before the FBI formally opened its overarching case against Trump, codenamed “Crossfire Hurricane” — the couple sat down with Steele and an unidentified “associate” of his at the Mayflower Hotel in D.C. to compare notes — Nellie and Steele literally passed pieces of papers back and forth — regarding their research into “suspicions that Russian government figures were supporting the candidacy of Donald Trump.” After their breakfast, Bruce Ohr reportedly contacted then-deputy FBI director Andrew McCabe to relay their concerns.
Fusion GPS also pitched the press the false narrative that Millian was a key intermediary between Trump and Russia. For example, on June 27, 2016, Fritsch sent an email to Franklin Foer, a reporter at Slate magazine, stating “this dude is key” and claiming “he is clearly kgb.”The next month, Simpson reached out to ABC News producer Matthew Mosk about Millian. Mosk emailed Simpson and reported back that he was “making arrangements to interview Millian on camera” and that he and Simpson “should chat.” On July 29, 2016, Millian ultimately was interviewed by Brian Ross, formerly of ABC News, who asked Millian whether he was a Russian spy.
On Sept. 13, 2016, Mosk emailed Simpson and asked, “What’s the most official thing we have showing Millian tied to Trump? That would make it hard for the Trump org to disavow Millian?”
Ross later left ABC after being suspended for erroneous reporting on Russiagate, while Mosk has moved to CBS News.
Throughout the summer and fall of 2016, Fusion GPS also promoted to the Washington media the false allegation the Trump campaign maintained a secret hotline to Moscow through Russia-based Alfa Bank. In an attempt to tie Millian to the Alfa Bank allegations, Durham found that Fusion GPS sought the assistance of Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann, who in turn contacted D.C. tech executive Rodney Joffe to determine if Millian had any ties to Alfa Bank.
On Aug. 20, 2016, Joffe emailed federal computer contractors at Georgia Tech a document titled “birdsnest-1.pdf’ that contained “known associates” of Trump. Included in the attached document was a description of Millian along with his past mailing addresses; various email addresses; websites; and IP addresses that were associated with him. Joffe, who was recently fired as an FBI informant, described Millian as “the most likely intermediary” between Trump and Russia.
On Sept. 27, 2016, Simpson and Fritsch emailed IP “look-up” information for one of Millian’s websites to then-New York Times reporter Eric Lichtblau, whom Fusion was pressuring to write a story about the Trump-Alfa Bank allegations. In the email, Fritsch pointed out that “Alfa” was the website service provider for Millian’s website. However, Durham determined that the relevant IP information did not indicate that “Alfa Bank” was the service provider, but rather Alfa Telecom — a Lebanese-based telecom company, which appears to have no affiliation with Alfa Bank.
Fusion GPS and Steele also provided the substance of the Alfa Bank allegations to Bruce Ohr, the DOJ official, who passed the false tip on to the FBI. The Crossfire Hurricane team used Ohr as a conduit to continue to receive information from Steele about Trump throughout 2017, even after the FBI had to terminate Steele as an informant for leaking information about its investigation to the media.
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Comments 19
Our compromised leaders at Justice and the FBI got away with everything. Our supine media, with the notable exceptions of Miranda Devine, Kimberly Strossell, Matt Taibbi, John Kass and a very few others,
opened the hen house to the wolves. The Durham Report is now in the hands of American citizens.
Let’s see if voters remain as snivelingly supine as our Fourth Estate.
They don’t care. It’s so early in the game that the people will forget primarily since the media is owned. We as a nation are screwed.
They totally disagree with the report and the media kisses their butts.
I have so totally lost any respect that I had for the FBI. As a USN Vietnam veteran, I saw so much BS that went on, and even now you can see all the lies that they told.Sad, isn’t it?
“They don’t care.”
They don’t HAVE to – they know there will be no adverse consequences.
“Let’s see if voters remain as snivelingly supine as our Fourth Estate.”
Even if they are not, I don’t believe it matters. With election season replacing election day, the left and its useful-idiot minions are able to legally negate their will, as expressed at the ballot box.
It’s quite simple, Trump asked questions about where the money was going. It’s become apparent to me; POTUS is merely a figurehead, a stooge, there to sign the checks. Obama was an affirmative action hire, a black mascot for Wall Street if you will. GWB was a similar stooge. Cheney and Rumsfeld made all the big policy decisions.
That’s why Trump had to go. I dislike him, but besides a horrible personality, he wasn’t the worst by far. He was not the patsy they wanted. They selected him to run against HRC, and he stunned them and beat an elitist corporate being.
Democrats are complete frauds, even Sanders. He waited until they lost the House to propose Medicare For All. They did nothing on abortion or gun control when they had the chance as well. They neglect American citizen s who are homeless in favor of illegal aliens and Ukraine.
Republicans are similar. They do nothing but bloviate and fundraise too.
I bet Trump would do some form of public option and raise min wage before Biden would. All you have to do mis pay him off and butter him up, feed his ego.
That’s how pathetic the Dems are.
I suppose these types of accounts are useful to have as documented examples of Democrats’, the Political Class’s, and the deep state’s utter and complete corruption, but if there will be no legal consequences (and for Democrats, there never are), it begs the question, what’s the point?
Even if the subject of a Grand Jury indictment is brought to trial, the judge stacks the deck against the prosecution such that an acquittal is all but certain.
Democrats can run roughshod over the Bill of Rights, break as many laws as they like, and violate the civil liberties of theit political enemies with impunity in their mission to establish themselves as a ruling class, not subject to the will of legal voters.
Their brazen “fortification” (read as, theft) of the 2020 election is proof.
If we had a real Attorney General instead of another democratic “Wing Man”, these criminals would be prosecuted.
The Clinton’s and Obama backers wrecked lives, destroyed families and bankrupted people in their pursuit of power and money. The subservient press was and is still complicit in supporting the democrats.
The FBI leadership committed multiple
FISA abuses, misled judges, lied and changed wording on official reports.
Yet the main stream press ignores the story.
UNBELIEVABLE!
I think that the new FBI headquarters should be moved from D.C. to Boise.
At least they would have to do the plotting to overturn elections away from the nations capitol.
“The subservient press was and is still complicit in supporting the democrats.”
The ‘press’ went in the tank for Kennedy during the 1960 election and have never come out.
They now use their ‘Freedom of the press’ to cover-up criminal acts and otherwise protect the Swamp and their henchmen (and women).
Yes! Boise! At least their clandestine dinners wouldn’t be at DC prices.
Hasn’t most of the political insanity (evil?) since 2016 been triggered by mainstream media moderators who promoted Trump with maximum air time in the 2016 debates, as they believed he would be the most easily beatable candidate in that election? That may have been the case if he had been running against anyone but Hillary.
John,
Great piece. It saddens me as a Vietnam Veteran of the USN that our Government has sunk so low.
They are disgusting. Waiting for more truth to come out about the Jan 6 hearings and what they didn’t tell us about the FBI and what they did to push it all.
So, what have we learned thus far? That the deep state is still alive and working to undermine our government agencies at all levels. Imagine this – one man – Trump, caused all these agencies, FBI, CIA, DOJ, IRS, to lose their minds in an effort to sink his election and/or nomination. One man! Why? Because he’s an outsider, he’s not part of the swamp, and these enemies of the state will fight tooth and nail to maintain their status quo. Trump is a boat rocker and is not beholding to them, so he must be eliminated using any means at their disposal. Watch as the dems continue to smear and defame him the closer we get to next year. Oh, and by the way, you may want to be out of town during the Dem convention in Chicago next August. It’s not going to be pretty, as the new mayor tightens his grip and releases social workers to fight crime instead of cops! Stupid is as stupid does!!!
After how many millions of dollars spent on this report there will probably be committees appointed to verify Durham’s investigation but I’m sure no one will be prosecuted or sentenced for their crimes!
Wow. This, Hunter, the laptop, Big Guy, money transfers, all of this is a lot to sort out. I need a bigger brain. They all have to be thankful for the two-tiered justice system.
The whole scheme is so damn sick. I can only assume that with enough hate, greed and money you can destroy anyone.
It makes me sad for everyone in the USA. We are just suckers for so many of the politicians and bureaucrats; especially the bureaucrats.
We need to take the money out of government service and politics to the furthest extent we can.
Fauci and his minions have received royalties and honoraria for Covid vax and other “vaccines” and “medications”. This is corrupt.
Our Congress and our Supreme Court judges it seems, take money directly from individuals and businesses with legal proceedings and votes they will be casting that can benefit them. This is a gross ethical lapse, and is ripe for corruption and fraud.
The layers of double dealing, influence peddling, see the Bidens, and the like needs to stop. It’s not just the Bidens, it’s not totally illegal, but it has to stop.
My great hope is that with strict ethics laws, harsh penalties, term limits, public financing of campaigns, and more transparency in government, that some of this greed will be curtailed.
We also need to break up the monopolies and go back to local and regional governments in direct control and let the federal government concentrate on foreign policy, defense, and regulating interstate commerce.
Consolidation and corporatism has destroyed communities all over the US. There are only a handful of producers in any industry, there is little to no competition and that is as much responsible for our inflation problems as the excessive printing of money and the BS water in Ukraine.
Every “crisis”, problem, every sector of our society has been monetized, turned for profit, and has grifters attached.
This must stop.
Interesting information but besides the media, DOJ and Democrats perpetuating a false narrative you also have Republicans. After the 2016 election Republicans had the presidency and GOP majorities in the House and Senate. Instead of shutting things down Mueller was appointed as a special prosecutor. That move will go down as one of the worst CYA moves in political history.
No one trusts our government any more, and it’s sad. People should be held accountable, but it will be buried by the perpetrators’ friends; most likely the FBI, the CIA and the liberal Media. Trump is not the best role model for children and he may be a bit sleazy, but he is no Traitor. There is so much evil in the “Washington Swamp”, and this is just another example.
The FBI asserted its power to eliminate Richard M. Nixon in 1973. Ford and Carter were no threat to the bureaucrats. Reagon reined in the bureaus to some extent. Bush lost power when he agreed to raise taxes against his promise not to do so, Clinton and Bush II were no threat. Obama supported the bureaucrats and increased their power and approve the use of the FBI for political purposes, thereby encouraging them. Trump failed to act to remove the threat from the FBI and CIA, apparently too involved in trying to dodge their repetitive attacks. Now Biden uses the FBI in an attempt to destroy the opposition so that perpetual Democrat control will rule this country as an autocracy. For 50 years we have been controlled by the FBI and CIA bureaucrats, while the ultra wealthy buy power over the politicians and populous, and control the media to protect their bought politicians, with the the communist academia fomenting division to carry out the ultimate revolution. The next institution to be destroyed is the US Supreme Court, because the majority dare to buck the power structure. The Department of Justice and US Attorneys have been converted to pawns to be used by the powerful wealthy to promote their takeover and protect their politicians. The US has been sold to the ultra wealthy. Your sovereignty, liberty and freedom are gone, unless you wake up and pay attention.