Buried in IG Report: How an FBI Team in Rome Gave Steele Highly Guarded Secrets

RealClear Investigations ^ | 2-14-2020 | Eric Felten

[Fedora]

It was in the context of the FIFA investigation that Steele met FBI agent Michael Gaeta in 2010. Gaeta was in charge of a team fighting Russian organized crime. When the bureau’s reliance on the Steele dossier first became public in 2017, press reports claimed that Steele’s contributions to the soccer probe proved he was reliable. However, the IG report summarizes the views of a case agent and a prosecutor who said, “Steele did not have any role in the [FIFA] investigation itself, he did not provide court testimony, and his information did not appear in any indictments, search warrants, or other court filings.”

Nonetheless, between 2014 and 2016, Steele collected $95,000 from the bureau for his work on the FIFA case and reports on corruption in Russia and Ukraine.

His paymaster was Gaeta, referred to in the Horowitz report as “Handling Agent 1.” So when Steele and Simpson decided to approach the FBI to promote a conspiracy theory about Trump and Russia, Gaeta was the natural contact. Steele met with Gaeta in London on July 5, 2016 and presented him with a tantalizing preview of the “dossier.” This first installment included the lurid “pee tape” story – the salacious rumor that Trump had paid Russian prostitutes to urinate on a Moscow hotel bed the Obamas had slept on.

By September Steele had given the FBI the bulk of his Trump-Russia reports. That led to the meeting in Rome on October 3 between Steele and several agents from the Crossfire Hurricane team, as the IG report describes them: “Case Agent 2,” a “Supervisory Intel Analyst,” and an “Acting Section Chief,” together with Gaeta. . . .

The FBI had every reason to expect Steele to share information with Glenn Simpson, whose client was the Clinton campaign. Steele claims to have been “candid” with Gaeta about who was writing the checks for his Trump-Russia research. Steele took notes of the July 5 meeting he had with the “handling agent.” According to the Horowitz report, those notes state that Steele told Gaeta "Democratic Party associates" were funding his Fusion GPS work, that the "ultimate client" was the Clinton campaign, and that "the candidate," as the IG report puts it, “was aware of Steele's reporting.”

But by the fall, the Crossfire Hurricane team was so eager to lock in access to Steele’s ongoing “reporting” that they were willing to offer the former spy inducements. Steele said the FBI didn’t want him to share his election intelligence with other U.S. government agencies or with any of his private clients except for Fusion GPS. Gaeta said it was a reasonable request given that Steele "was now being offered compensation to go forward from the United States government" -- compensation such as the $15,000 he had been told he would be paid for attending the meeting in Rome. . .

Instead of recommending Case Agent 2 for any prosecution or punishment, the IG report offers possible explanations for the agent’s behavior. One is that the agent had been “given significant latitude from his supervisors to frame his discussions with Steele.” Another is that the “Case Agent believed he had authorization to discuss classified information with Steele based on prior discussion with his supervisors.” But the report suggests no effort by the IG’s office to determine how and why the agent could have believed that. Another explanation offered is that a Counterintelligence Division Section Chief “was present when Case Agent 2 made the disclosure,” the Horowitz report states, “and the CD Section Chief did not voice objection to it at the time or afterward.”

The Inspector General's office treats the section chief’s presence as tacit permission for Case Agent 2 to disclose classified information. But this rationale also cuts the other way: If the disclosure of highly classified material was not just the careless act of a rogue agent, then was it FBI policy? If so, who made that decision?

An earlier footnote, number 252, states, “FBI Security staff told us [the IG’s office] that the Assistant Director for CD [Counterintelligence Division] can authorize the disclosure of classified information.” Is there a record this authorization was granted? RealClearInvestigations provided written questions to the Inspector General's office. RCI asked whether the IG had identified “any law, rule, or regulations giving the Asst. Director the power to authorize disclosure” of classified material?

Office of the Inspector General spokesperson Stephanie M. Logan declined to comment. . .

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