To bolster Mr. Steele’s credibility, Mr. Schiff said this about Trump campaign adviser Carter Page and Russian oil giant Rosneft: “Is it a coincidence that the Russian gas company Rosneft sold a 19% share after former British intelligence officer Steele was told by Russian sources that Carter Page was offered fees on a deal of just that size?”
The only coincidence was that the 19% figure was in the press weeks before Mr. Steele wrote his memo.
Mr. Schiff also quoted Mr. Steele on a purported conspiracy between campaign chairman Paul Manafort and Mr. Page: “According to Steele, it was Manafort who chose Page to serve as a go-between for the Trump campaign and Russian interests.”
Independent evidence shows the two never knew or spoke with each other.
Mr. Schiff also said Mr. Steele was “highly regarded” by U.S. intelligence.
When Mr. Page later appeared before the committee, Mr. Schiff repeatedly quoted the dossier in questioning the former aide, forcing him to disprove what Mr. Steele had written.
Mr. Schiff also tried to use Mr. Page to prove another dossier allegation: that Trump attorney Michael Cohen secretly traveled to Prague to visit operatives of Russian President Vladimir Putin. He asked Mr. Page whether his 2016 trip to Hungary was linked to Cohen.
By November 2017, Mr. Schiff was dismissing critics and sticking by Mr. Steele and his dossier.
“So I think this is a bit of an effort to discredit Christopher Steele, discredit the dossier, ignore how much of it has been corroborated already and ignore the fact that the intelligence community is operating from a broad array of sources as a way of basically calling this all a hoax. And it just doesn’t add up to me,” he said on CNN.
Naked Trump photos
The dossier disclosure was not the only time Mr. Schiff welcomed Kremlin claims into the political process. He also sought naked photos of Mr. Trump from Moscow via a politician in Ukraine.
He was pranked by two Russian comedians, one of whom posed as a Ukrainian official. During a lengthy phone call, Mr. Schiff eagerly questioned the impostors on the types of compromising photos he could obtain, according to a recording posted online.
Later, a top Schiff aide reached out to the Russian and asked whether the material was being delivered to the Ukrainian Embassy in Washington.
Evidence
Mr. Schiff said several times that he had seen evidence of Trump-Russia collusion to interfere in the election and it was beyond circumstantial.
He began this talking point in March 2017.
“I can tell you that the case is more than that,” he said on MSNBC. “And I can’t go into the particulars, but there is more than circumstantial evidence now.”
Special counsel Robert Mueller said in his March 2019 report that he did not find a Trump election conspiracy. No Trump associate was charged in such a conspiracy.
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2020/jan/23/adam-schiff-impeachment-manager-has-history-inaccu/