Schiff: Trump Still ‘Corrupt’ Even Though Steele Dossier Debunked
The Steele dossier played a 'limited role'
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Representative Adam Schiff (D-CA) said that despite the Steele dossier being discredited, it doesn't change “Donald Trump’s corrupt behavior.”
The Steele dossier was compiled by former British intelligence officer Christopher Steele and was used by the FBI to get a FISA warrant to spy on then-Trump campaign aide Carter Page.
CNN host Wolf Blitzer said to Schiff:
“According to CNN and other major news organizations, a series of investigations and lawsuits have discredited many of the infamous so-called Trump dossier central allegations and exposed the unreliability of that so-called dossier’s sources.
"Do you worry, congressman, that your credibility, other Democrats’ credibility, could be hurt by that?
"And that it potentially could impact how some see this current investigation?"
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Schiff said:
“No. People that have been following the investigation understand the very limited role that the Steele dossier played."
"And also understand that while we may now know that one of his primary sources was lying to him, it doesn’t change Donald Trump’s corrupt behavior in 2016.”
He continued:
“It doesn’t change the fact that the president’s son was secretly meeting in Trump Tower with the Russian delegation to get dirt on Hillary Clinton or that others in Trump orbit were also seeking the gain of the Russian hack of the Democratic Party.
"The Steele dossier is a nice talking point for kind of right-wing pundits, but it’s a distraction from what we did learn.
"What we did learn was very damning of the former president, of the Russians, and his campaign.”
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Blitzer said, “Did you ever believe those allegations in the Steele dossier?”
Schiff said, “Well, some of those allegations proved to be all too accurate.”
In October, Steele said he stood behind his fake "dossier,” which examined the now-debunked link between President Trump and Russia.
Steele admitted the dossier was inaccurate but still believed he did good work.
Meanwhile, the New York Times admitted that the "Steele Dossier" was fabricated propaganda designed to smear Trump.
But despite this, the outlet pushed the conspiracy theory that Trump colluded with Russia to win the election in 2016.
The Times recently wrote:
"No corroborating evidence has emerged in intervening years to support many of the specific claims in the dossier, and government investigators determined that one key allegation — that Mr. Trump’s lawyer, Michael Cohen, had met with Russian officials in Prague during the campaign — was false."
The Times then claimed the FBI did not open the investigation based don't he dossier:
"Trump and his allies have insinuated that the F.B.I. based the Russia investigation on the dossier."
"But when counterintelligence agents launched the effort on July 30, 2016, they did not yet know about the dossier.
"An inspector general report established that Mr. Steele’s reports reached that counterintelligence team on Sept. 19, 2016."
