https://www.dni.gov/files/HPSCI_Transcripts/2020-05-04-John_Podesta_Dec17-MTR_Redacted.pdf
INTERVIEW OF: JOHN PODESTSA
Monday, December 4, 2017 Washington, D.C.
(page 13)
DR. WENSTRUP: And you testified then you did not know who paid Fusion GPS.
MR. PODESTA: I don't have a transcript in front of me. I don't know that that was the precise question. I think that I only learned subsequently that the payments were made through Perkins Coie, 50 percent from the campaign, 50 percent from the DNC. I didn't know that at the time I was before the Senate.
(page 21-22)
DR. WENSTRUP: So when did you first learn that Mr. Elias had retained Fusion GPS?
MR. PODESTA: Well–
DR. WENSTRUP: To conduct opposition research, I should say, more specifically.
MR. PODESTA: Well, I think I first my first actual knowledge wasn't until October of this year. I mean, you know, the course of conduct, this question about who was Fusion, who paid Fusion, etcetera, started coming up this summer I, frankly, didn't pay much attention to it before that– as a result of hearings on the Senate side.
And I think that, you know, whether there was some course of conduct in which information was coming to the Perkins firm through some course of conduct, I guess I had a hunch about that earlier, but I think I learned the details about it in October, as I said, in 2017.
DR. WENSTRUP: So when he was here as your representative in June, you were not aware?
MR. PODESTA: I certainly learned much– I learned that he had contracted with Fusion and that the bills were being split 50-50 in October of this year.
DR. WENSTRUP: But you didn't know in June, when he was here as your representative, there was no conversation, he never mentioned when working with you–
MR. PODESTA: Well –
DR. WENSTRUP: –that he had hired Fusion GPS to do the opposition research?
MR. PODESTA: I mean, I think, again –
MR. TROUT: Excuse me. Congressman, I do want to avoid the witness getting into attorney-client privileged communications, because they're protected and you shouldn't be talking about privileged communications.