Paul Sperry, Real Clear Investigations, Dec. 20, 2022
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The FBI relied more extensively on Christopher Steele’s debunked dossier in their Russiagate investigation than has been revealed, inserting key parts from it into their applications for warrants to spy on the 2016 Trump campaign.
Agents did this without telling the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court that the precise wording was plucked directly from a political rumor sheet paid for by Hillary Clinton’s campaign or providing judges with any independent corroboration of the explosive allegations.
For years, defenders of the FBI and its Russiagate probe have downplayed the bureau’s reliance on the opposition research cooked up by Steele – with its incredible tales of billion-dollar bribes and pee-tapes – insisting it was limited to justifying the surveillance of a single Trump campaign adviser and used sparingly.
But the notion that mere “snippets” of the reporting by paid Clinton subcontractor Christopher Steele showed up in FISA applications, as CNN has described it, no longer holds up to scrutiny. … [To read the full article, click here]