TPM EDITORS BLOG. The Only News Out of The Simpson Testimony is Republican Disgrace

By JOSH MARSHALL Published JANUARY 9, 2018 6:20 PM

Over the course of the day I’ve been listening to news reports which say that the Fusion GPS testimony from co-owner Glenn Simpson belies the received narrative about the Steele dossier, or at least that argued by Republicans and Trump supporters. As Jake Tapper put it when speaking with CNN’s Jim Acosta today, Simpson’s account “contradicts president Trump and his supporters who argue that the dossier was a purely political document paid for by Democrats trying to hurt Trump.” Really though this is a testament to the power of disinformation when it is empowered by one of the country’s two political parties. Let’s put this more simply: this is a testament to what can happen when the GOP unites behind a campaign of willful disinformation at the country’s expense.

We shouldn’t take any party’s account at face value. But the testimony released today confirms what has always been clear. A business intelligence firm (contracted by a law firm which in turn was working for the Clinton campaign) hired a former British intelligence officer, with deep Russia experience, to look deeper at Donald Trump’s ties to Russia. What he found went well beyond fodder for political campaigns and made him worry that there was a genuine threat to US national security, either because Trump or people around him were conspiring with Russians or because Trump was or could be blackmailed. He took that information to the FBI. He had worked with the FBI before and they trusted his work.

The FBI’s response was basically, “Yeah, we know.” That overstates it a bit. But not much. The FBI was already getting tips and reports that something was afoot. Steele’s information just confirmed the seriousness of the situation. Indeed, as we now know, one key report it supported was that from the Australian Ambassador to the UK who had heard a Trump foreign policy advisor brag about dirt the Russians had on Hillary Clinton. Steele first reached out to an FBI contact in July. The FBI reached back out to him in September wanting to know more.

As we’ve long discussed, the so-called dossier is not and was not intended to be a final intelligence ‘product’. It’s raw intelligence. Everything is piled together. We shouldn’t assume that everything in it is accurate even if we believe it was compiled in good faith by a seasoned professional. But Steele here was clearly acting in some sense like a whistleblower. It’s not clear whether Steele told Simpson he was contacting the FBI at the time or soon after the fact. But if Simpson’s account is accurate, Steele was acting as a former intelligence officer of America’s closest ally.

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