Free Republic

The trial of Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann is coming to an end [ZH: has now ended with Sussman’s acquittal] but rather than provide definitive answers to the origins of the Russiagate hoax, the trial has thrown up many new mysteries and unanswered questions.Special Counsel John Durham arrives at federal court in Washington on May 16, 2022. (Evan Vucci/AP Photo)Durham’s overarching trial narrative was that the FBI was duped by Sussmann when he presented them with data purportedly tying Trump to the Kremlin via the Russian Alfa Bank. It may have been Durham’s only viable strategy given the fact he...

On Tuesday, trial in United States v. Sussmann began. Michael Sussmann’s theory of defense has major factual holes.The Hillary Clinton campaign did not want its attorney, Michael Sussmann, to share the Alfa Bank data with the FBI, jurors were told yesterday during the defense’s opening arguments in the special counsel’s criminal case against Sussmann. But the information known to date, as well as the modus operandi of the Spygate players throughout the years they peddled the Russia-collusion hoax, render this argument laughable. On Tuesday, trial in United States v. Sussmann began in earnest following a day of jury selection. At...

Day 2 of the Michael Sussmann trial started with some housekeeping. Here are the rulings of note: Robby Mook, who has a scheduled vacation in Spain, will testify on Friday. He’s a defense witness. Evidence of Steele’s meetings with Sussmann and Fusion GPS in July 2016, and his tasking to conduct research on Alfa Bank, according to the judge, “can come in.” The judge observed they are “relevant to Mr. Sussmann’s activities for the campaign and his attorney-client relationship, as far as it went, with the campaign as it relates to Alfa-Bank.” Onto the witnesses. We start with the short...

Daniel Jones, lead author of the Senate Intelligence Committee’s report on the CIA’s interrogation program, founded the Democracy Integrity Project in January 2017. Tax records show he funded Steele, Fusion, and others involved with Russia-related inquiries, keeping a web of groups working and donor money flowing to the tune of millions. The new filings contend that “the purpose of the Democracy Integrity Project is to promote democracy in the United States and around the world.” Tax records from the Democracy Integrity Project filed in November 2020 and made public in April show the Jones organization sent $1,222,714 in 2019 for...

...Just 10 days before the February 2017 meeting, Jones had incorporated a nonprofit called The Democracy Integrity Project (known internally as TDIP) after huddling with Simpson. The goal of their ongoing project is to “prove” the allegations in the dossier, while digging up new dirt on Trump and feeding it to media outlets, congressional investigators and the FBI to derail his presidency. The work of such opposition research outfits has become a mainstay of Washington journalism. In their book, “Crime in Progress,” Simpson and Fritsch detail their access to top journalists at The New York Times and other influential publications....

The efforts in both countries had much in common. They were aided by a transatlantic cast of characters loosely organised around the Trump and Brexit campaigns. Many of them worked in concert and interacted with Russians close to the Kremlin. The outcome in both countries was also eerily similar. Both countries have been at war with themselves in the three years since, pulling them back from the international stage at a time when Putin has consolidated his position in Crimea, Ukraine, Syria and beyond. ***** "Glenn R Simpson and Peter Fritsch, both former journalists, are the founders of the research...

Book includes how Steele was commissioned to write dossier Robert Reich: Trump is an international mobster The former journalists Glenn Simpson and Peter Fritsch are to publish a book on Donald Trump’s relationship with Russia, including an account of how they commissioned the British ex-spy Christopher Steele to write his dossier on the future president. Crime in Progress: The Secret History of the Trump-Russia Investigation will be published in December by Penguin Random House in the US and UK. Simpson and Fritsch founded the Washington intelligence firm Fusion GPS. In summer 2015, it began investigating Trump and Moscow. It hired...

WASHINGTON – As part of their ongoing oversight efforts to ensure that the FBI’s law enforcement activities are free of improper political influence, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Terrorism Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) yesterday sent six letters seeking information and documents regarding Christopher Steele’s work on behalf of the Democratic National Committee and Hillary for America. The letters seek information and documents relating to those political organizations’ knowledge of and involvement in Mr. Steele’s work and his reported interactions with the FBI while he was working on behalf of these political organizations....

The House Intelligence Committee unanimously voted Thursday to release hours of private testimony from an interview with the co-founder of the firm that compiled the infamous anti-Trump dossier, Fox News has learned. The Committee voted to make public the transcript of the November interview with Fusion GPS’ Glenn Simpson, who testified behind closed doors. The transcript will be posted to the committee’s website Thursday afternoon. “Democrats and Fusion GPS supporters will get some unwelcome surprises if this is published,” a Republican source told Fox News ahead of the vote. Simpson and Fusions' co-founder Peter Fritsch penned an Op-Ed for The...

Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley (Iowa-R) is pushing back on Fusion GPS, the opposition research firm that helped assemble the controversial "Steele dossier" about President Trump. The co-founders of Fusion GPS, Glenn Simpson and Peter Fritsch, wrote a blistering op-ed for The New York Times on Tuesday slamming the GOP's investigations into the dossier. They accused Republicans of selectively leaking details of their testimony to the press and demanded that full transcripts be released. But Grassley, whose panel interviewed Simpson in August, in a statement Wednesday said Simpson has already been invited to testify publicly about the dossier, adding that...

Fusion GPS founder Glenn Simpson struck a deal on Wednesday to testify voluntarily before the House Intelligence Committee next week to discuss his opposition research firm’s involvement in the Steele dossier. Simpson and his lawyer met with members of the committee for several hours to hammer out a deal for his closed-door testimony. The Daily Caller was informed that Simpson had indicated prior to Wednesday’s meeting that he would plead the Fifth during his deposition, just as his two co-founders, Peter Fritsch and Thomas Catan, did during interviews last month. But as part of the deal struck Wednesday, Simpson will...

Fritsch, who served as the Journal’s bureau chief in Mexico City and has lectured at the liberal Wilson Center’s Mexico Institute, married into a family with Mexican business interests. His wife, Beatriz Garcia, formerly worked as an executive at Grupo Dina, a manufacturer of trucks and buses in Mexico City that benefits from NAFTA, which Trump opposes. Fritsch’s Fusion GPS partner Thomas Catan, who grew up in Britain, once edited a business magazine in Mexico, moreover. A third founding partner, Glenn Simpson, is reported to have shared dark views of both Russian President Vladimir Putin and Trump. Before joining Fusion...

In the summer of 2015, Center for Medical Progress (CMP) began releasing its undercover videos exposing alleged profiteering on the part of Planned Parenthood and its partners in the biomedical fetal tissue procurement industry. The shocking videos forced America’s largest abortion provider into rapid defense mode, and smearing undercover journalist David Daleiden and his group became a top priority of Planned Parenthood. The group hired Fusion GPS to perform a forensic evaluation on CMP’s videos, the results of which were reported at Politico in August of 2015 with the headline, “Report for Planned Parenthood Finds Sting Videos Manipulated.”

Thursday's New York Times has a report on how the highly suspicious dossier alleging that Donald Trump was compromised by Russian intelligence agents came into existence. Among the other interesting revelations was that the dubious opposition research report was put together by the research firm Fusion GPS: The story began in September 2015, when a wealthy Republican donor who strongly opposed Mr. Trump put up the money to hire a Washington research firm run by former journalists, Fusion GPS, to compile a dossier about the real estate magnate's past scandals and weaknesses, according to a person familiar with the effort....

On December 2, I had the opportunity to interview Texas gubernatorial candidate Lisa Fritsch about her jumping into the race and discuss her ideas and on issues such as education, poverty, and immigration. Lisa Fritsch has entered a large field of primary candidates, including Greg Abbott, Tom Pauken, Miriam Martinez, and Larry SECEDE Kilgore. Video of InterviewDisclaimer: Hardhatters is a non-partisan political research organization, and we do not support or endorse any political candidates.