Mueller gathered evidence suggesting DNC, Clinton camp created Russia collusion story
Special Counsel Robert Mueller's office gathered evidence suggesting that Hillary Clinton's campaign and the Democratic National Committee launched a political "smear job" in spring 2016 tying Donald Trump to Russia collusion through the lobbying work of his campaign chairman Paul Manafort in Ukraine, according to memos that were excluded from the prosecutor's final report.
The evidence, reviewed by Just the News, includes information obtained by State Department officials from a trusted Ukrainian source, a private investigator's report, and an email exchange suggesting Tony Podesta — a Manafort business associate and brother of Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta — tried at one point to slow down the opposition research project.
The evidence — which is additional to records showing the law firm for the Clinton campaign and the DNC funded the infamous "Steele dossier" given to the FBI — was never mentioned in last year's vast, two-volume Mueller Report, which concluded that no Americans colluded with Russia to influence the 2016 election.
The newly surfaced evidence bolsters separate intelligence reporting that Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe made public recently showing the Obama CIA also believed Clinton's campaign had launched a political dirty trick to "vilify" Trump on Russia in an effort to distract from her own controversies.
"We did have evidence to show that early collusion allegations against Trump and Manafort were created or propagated by people who either worked for the DNC or the Clinton campaign, including some efforts that went beyond the Steele dossier," a person with direct knowledge of the Mueller probe told Just the News.
The person spoke only on condition of anonymity because the person did not have permission to speak to the news media.
Asked why the Mueller report did not mention the Clinton campaign tactics, the source answered: "Our job was to report on and prosecute crimes, not write an essay on how political opposition research was conducted by the two parties."
Unredacted emails and other documents gathered by Mueller's team suggest the earliest hint of the Democrats' Russia collusion smear campaign emerged in a May 2016 email exchange between Democratic super-lobbyist Tony Podesta and Manafort's lead business manager in Ukraine, Rick Gates, who also worked as a deputy campaign manager for the Trump campaign. The thread appeared under the subject line: "DNC and Paul Manafort."
Though on opposite sides of the political spectrum, Tony Podesta, Manafort and Gates worked together on lobbying and political consulting projects related to Ukraine's Party of Regions and former President Viktor Yanukovych, who was ousted from power in 2014.
"Last Friday APAC had a meeting at DNC organized by their ethnic outreach office, presenting Democratic Party strategies for presidential elections," Gates emailed Tony Podesta on May 17, 2016. "One of the subjects was a smear campaign against Paul Manafort, which will be launched in a couple of days. The head of the ethnic outreach is of Ukrainian descent and has connections in Ukraine.
"She was able to produce documents linking Manafort to Moscow during his time as adviser to Victor Yanukowych (cq), ousted former Ukrainian president. They will try to link Donald Trump to Putin through Manafort's engagement and money trail of over [a] billion dollars. This was a formal presentation on the part of DNC — I am trying to obtain an audio tape from the meeting. I just wanted to share this with you to make you aware before they start."
Tony Podesta responded by asking what APAC was and Gates wrote back: "You will love this one … the American Polish Advisory Council."
A few days later, Podesta reported back to Gates in a May 23, 2016 email: "Think I slowed this down."
Other documents show how Gates and Manafort got a first-hand account of what happened at the APAC event with Chalupa from an official with the Polish lobby.
In an interview, Gates confirmed to Just the News that the email exchanges occurred and said that Podesta eventually disclosed to the Manafort team that the DNC's lead figure on the opposition research campaign targeting Trump was a Ukrainian-American woman and DNC contractor named Alexandra Chalupa.
Gates, who later pled guilty to financial crimes and became a cooperating witness in the Mueller probe, added that he was questioned by the prosecutor's team about Chalupa's work and his contacts with Podesta.
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