Why The Special Counsel Needs To Fight For More Spygate Docs, Stat
Part 1 of 3
Special Counsel John Durham’s prosecution of Igor Danchenko, the Russian national who served as Christopher Steele’s primary sub-source, will soon heat up—maybe as early as next week, if prosecutors are wise and return to the grand jury to obtain the documents the Hillary Clinton campaign wrongfully withheld based on attorney-client privilege. Those documents will likely reveal Fusion GPS peddled Danchenko’s lies directly to reporters.
The jury’s acquittal of former Clinton campaign attorney Michael Sussmann after less than a day of deliberations represented a setback to Durham’s three-year investigation of the Russia collusion hoax. Americans nonetheless learned much from the prosecution, including that Hillary Clinton held personal responsibilityfor the peddling of the Alfa Bank conspiracy theory and that, post-Donald Trump, the FBI and legacy media remain corrupt.
The special counsel team also learned a valuable lesson from the court’s rulings on the admissibility of documents withheld from the grand jury based on the Clinton campaign’s assertion of attorney-client privilege: Don’t wait until trial to challenge the improperly withheld documents.
Given the breakneck speed of the Sussmann prosecution, it is to be expected that, following Tuesday’s acquittal, the special counsel team regroups for a few days. But by Monday, their focus should turn to their prosecution of Danchenko.
Background on the Danchenko Case
In November 2021, the special counsel indicted Danchenko on five counts, charging him “with lying to the FBI during the agents’ questioning of him related to his role as Christopher Steele’s ‘Primary Sub-Source’ for the notorious dossier that enabled Obama administration surveillance of the Trump campaign.”
Over 39 pages, the speaking indictment revealed how Danchenko first met Steele in 2010. He was introduced to the former MI6 spy by Steele’s longtime friend, Fiona Hill, who knew Danchenko from their work at the Brookings Institute. Since then, Steele’s London-based firm, Orbis Business Intelligence, hired Danchenko for contract work related to Russia research.
In 2016, the Clinton campaign, through its law firm Perkins Coie, hired the U.S.-based research firm Fusion GPS. In turn, Fusion GPS hired Orbis and Steele to investigate the Trump campaign and any connections to Russia. Steele then contacted Danchenko, a Russian national, eventually relying heavily on Danchenko’s supposed “intel” in crafting the numerous memorandum that later became known as the Steele dossier, and referring to Danchenko throughout as “Primary Sub-Source 1.”
A Tissue of Lies
Danchenko, according to the special counsel’s indictment, lied extensively when providing Steele his supposed intel. The indictment also says one of Danchenko’s “sources,” Charles Dolan, Jr., who has long-time connections to the Clintons and the Democrat Party, lied to Danchenko.
Dolan was named in the indictment merely as “PR Executive-1.” According to the indictment, Dolan lied to Danchenko when he told Danchenko a “GOP friend” had told him that Paul Manafort had been forced to resign from the Trump campaign because of allegations connecting Manafort to Ukraine. While Dolan later admitted to the FBI that he had no such “GOP friend” and that he had instead gleaned this information from press reports, Dolan’s fabrication appeared in the Steele dossier thanks to Danchenko’s lies.
Yet when the FBI questioned Danchenko on June 15, 2017, according to the indictment, Danchenko “denied to agents of the FBI that he had spoken with [Dolan] about any material contained in the [Steele dossier].” That lie formed Count I of the special counsel’s charges against Danchenko…
https://thefederalist.com/2022/06/03/why-the-special-counsel-needs-to-fight-for-more-spygate-documents-stat/