While Grilling Horowitz, Grassley Discovers That ‘A Number Of People’ At FBI Knew Dems Funded The Dossier

[Image Source; NBC Video Screenshots. Swamp Drain Compilation].

Posted By: Lindsey Michelle December 11, 2019

Wednesday in the Senate Judiciary Committee, Department of Justice Inspector General Michael Horowitz testified before the committee pertaining to his findings of the FISA report, which was released on Monday.

During Senator Chuck Grassley’s (R-IA) line of questioning to the DOJ watchdog, Grassley pressed Horowitz on how many people at the FBI and DOJ knew that the Steele Dossier was funded by the DNC and the Clinton campaign.

“Bruce Ohr told the FBI that [Christopher] Steele’s reporting had gone to the Clinton campaign [in] November 2016. By January 11, 2017, key investigators knew the dossier was prepared in part, for the DNC. And by February and March 2017, ‘it was broadly known’ in the FBI by senior justice department officials that Glenn Simpson was working for the Democratic Party,” Senator Grassley said.

“How many people in the FBI and DOJ knew that the Steele dossier was political opposition research funded by the Democrats and who were they and did any of them approve information in the FISA or any of its renewals while knowing who was paying for it?” Grassley then asked of Inspector General Horowitz.

“On the FBI side, as we layout in the report, it’s page 258 forward– there were a number of people who knew,” Horowitz admitted. “It’s challenging…  to know precisely what was known at the very highest levels of the FBI and when– the deputy director levels, because of the lack of direct record of entire briefings.” [Emphasis added].

“But there was certainly much information as we layout here, known at the FBI. At the Justice Department, much of that information was not known,” he continued.

“In fact, one of the concerns we note, in the information of what Mr. [Bruce] Ohr did– Mr. Ohr was passing along this information from Mr. Steele to the FBI that information was not then being given back by the FBI to the Justice Department,” Horowitz stated.

(Related: President Trump Fires Back After The Release Of IG Horowitz’s Report: “This Was An Attempted Overthrow & They Got Caught”)

“So, the colleagues of Mr. Ohr at the Justice Department, who were approving and reviewing these FISA’s, didn’t know that their colleague had passed along that information to the FBI,” Horowitz added. (Video Below)

Watch:

Sen. Grassley also tweeted on Wednesday: “FISA report shows Steele dossier built on lies&rumor Graham/Grassley crim referral of Steele Jan 2018 looks like tip of iceberg compared 2details exposed by IG re politically motivated Steele dossier. FBI fed FISA court a bunch of hogwash knowing Steele dossier had NO credibility. Read: [HERE]”.

(Continued Below)

Sen. Grassley’s press also tweeted a video from the hearing and wrote: “DOJ IG Horowitz said @FBI, w/out evidence, made contradicting claims about Steele’s contacts w/ press in Page #FISA application. Those contacts were at the heart of @ChuckGrassley & @LindseyGrahamSC 2018 referral & undermine Steele’s credibility.”

Mollie Hemingway noted: “Grassley reminds he sent a criminal referral on Steele in January 2018 regarding media contacts. (man this has been dragging on for years and media and other partisans were defending Steele and his dossier until literally this week.)”

“Grassley says he has been asking about defensive briefings to Trump campaign since September 2017. Worried that they were using intelligence briefings to investigate campaign. Horowitz again confirms that the one for Trump was for investigative purposes,” she added.

(Related: AG Barr On Whether He Stands By His Statement That Trump’s Campaign Was Spied Upon: “It Was Clearly Spied Upon”)