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https://lidblog.com/dossier-ukraine-connection/
But there is another point to be made about Weissmann’s role, now that we know Leshchenko was a source for Fusion GPS. Leshchenko’s involvement with Fusion serves to bolster the long-held suspicion that Fusion was behind the 11 April 2017 meeting between AP reporters and the FBI, at which the reporters told the FBI about Paul Manafort’s storage locker in northern Virginia.
The AP reporters referred very specifically to the storage locker holding material relating to the “black ledger.” (See here as well.) The purpose of their meeting was transparently to seed FBI agents with the information Leshchenko had alluded to in his presser in August 2016. The reporters dangled before the FBI the prospect of finding files full of evidence on shady payments and Ukrainian names in the Manafort storage locker.
In the two posts from last year, linked above, I summarized the case that the most likely sources of this information were Fusion GPS and Alexandra Chalupa. Now we know that the chief articulator of the “black ledger” narrative, Serhiy Leshchenko, was acting as a source for Fusion GPS in 2016.
The Weissmann link is especially important for two reasons. First, Weissmann was receiving the special updates from Bruce Ohr, who was a conduit for the Fusion GPS information, in 2016 and early 2017. Second, Weissmann arranged the 11 April 2017 meeting.
His arrangement of the meeting, in fact,t annoyed the FBI at the time, according to other sources in the Bureau. The move was considered high-handed, as it was done without prior consultation. Weissmann was present at the meeting, and it appears that he directed the interchange at key points, prompting elements of the discussion that would have cued the FBI to search particular overseas banking connections for information on Manafort.
Moreover, it appears that the 11 April meeting took place in connection with what Peter Strzok referred to as a “media leak strategy,” seemingly involving the investigation of the two Trump associates specifically named in the dossier, Paul Manafort and Carter Page. Weissmann having an active role in that effort would be problematic in and of itself.
Ending dot: Weissmann lands at Mueller’s side
The final dot in the straight line lands us at the Mueller probe, where Weissmann has been serving as Mueller’s deputy. In other words, little more than a month after arranging a meeting at which AP reporters passed the FBI information about Manafort that smelled strongly of Leshchenko, and probably came from Fusion GPS – which was still being paid by Democratic donors to do oppo research on Trump’s associates – Weissmann became part of the special counsel staff.
In case it isn’t clear, the problem with that is that Weissmann was probably complicit in funneling oppo research on one of the Mueller probe’s subjects to the FBI, just a few weeks before he joined the investigation of that same subject.
At the very least – and here’s the point of law and ethics – Weissmann easily could have been funneling political oppo research to the FBI. Leshchenko had been feeding Fusion GPS in 2016; Leshchenko’s best-known information was the “black ledger” story on Manafort; the 11 April 2017 meeting was about material relating to the black-ledger story; Fusion GPS was known to still be doing oppo research on Trump at the time, and to have had Leshchenko as a source as late as the previous fall; Weissmann had been receiving updates sourced from Fusion contractor Christopher Steele in late 2016 and early 2017; and the demonstrated pattern with information from all of Fusion, Steele, and Leshchenko was seeding the media and public officials with their material. (Indeed, as Chuck Ross points out, Ukraine suspected Leshchenko himself of trying to meddle in the U.S. election by publishing his “black ledger” allegations.)