After Sen. Dianne Feinstein on Tuesday unilaterally published the transcripts of Fusion GPS co-founder Glenn Simpson’s testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee, media outlets struggled to piece together what all the fuss was about.
CNN has compiled what it knows in a piece here, but The Federalist’s Sean Davis picked up on a particularly interesting tidbit.
You see, part of the drama surrounding the famous Christopher Steele dossier, which BuzzFeed published in full last January, is that someone, presumably a Russian, was killed after the dossier was published. However, CNN is making it sound like the alleged victim is akin to Barack Obama’s “composite girlfriend.”
Yet another Fusion GPS testimony bombshell–one of Steele's sources was killed because of the dossier!–that turned out to be completely fake news. https://t.co/SDjREaOR80 pic.twitter.com/xqAQdxxDf1
— Sean Davis (@seanmdav) January 10, 2018
Here’s that bit from CNN:
“(Simpson) wants to be very careful to protect his sources,” Simpson attorney Joshua Levy said. “Somebody’s already been killed as a result of the publication of this dossier and no harm should come to anybody related to this honest work.”
During the closed-door session, Levy did not identify the person who was killed. Despite Levy’s clear assertion that someone had been killed, a source close to the testimony told CNN on Tuesday that the comment did not refer to any specific killing. Instead, the source said, it referred to the mysterious string of Russian deaths after the 2016 election.
At least nine high-profile Russians died in the nine months after the election, including top diplomats overseas, a former Russian intelligence official that had close ties to figures mentioned in the dossier, and a security officer in the Russian consulate in New York. Some of the Russians appeared to die from natural causes, while others were murdered.
None of the deaths have been definitively linked to the dossier by the authorities.
Sounds legit.
Fusion to Congress: One of the dossier sources was murdered, you know.
Fusion to CNN: Actually, we just meant that people in Russia have died since then.— Sean Davis (@seanmdav) January 10, 2018
That makes two huge bombshell allegations from Glenn Simpson in congressional testimony that we now know were false.
— Sean Davis (@seanmdav) January 10, 2018
The first was that the FBI had an informant in Trump tower. Turns out it was fake news. Rather than inform Congress of the false information, Fusion GPS leaked it to @KenDilanianNBC.
— Sean Davis (@seanmdav) January 10, 2018
The second was that a dossier source was killed, presumably to protect Trump or the Kremlin whatever. Also fake news! Again, instead of informing Congress, Fusion GPS leaked it to CNN's @mkraju. Real intelligence pros, y'all.
— Sean Davis (@seanmdav) January 10, 2018
There’s something seriously wrong with this entire thing https://t.co/j8He5LyqhX
— Joe Gabriel Simonson (@SaysSimonson) January 10, 2018
#WednesdayWisdom #GlennSimpson Sneaky Dianne #FBI
Seriously, it sounded to me like it was an "excuse" so he wouldn't have to answer some "hard" questions. Don't want to answer it cause it may implicate you….then just say….too dangerous to answer cause someone was killed!
— Moms Love Trump?? (@moms4trump2018) January 10, 2018
It’s all about the shock value
They didn’t want to answer the tough questions
Like who were their SOURCES ❓— Barbara Dadam (@BarbaraDadam) January 10, 2018
It was meant to overdramatize the importance of the fiction, after the fashion of non-truth stuff that "should be true" to be made politically useful.
The Democratic party is wasting a nation's time and energy with all of this garbage that they think validates their grievances. https://t.co/L0XZf4GTBC
— ¡No Pasarán! (@nopasa) January 10, 2018
It's almost as if they're just blatantly making up crap now.#desperate https://t.co/4oLSzncYiT
— Cruadin (@cruadin) January 10, 2018
@KimStrassel is correct, at this point Congress should just declassify & release everything they have on Fusion GPS. What a joke this entire investigation has become. DoJ should do a real investigation of all this.
Thread ? https://t.co/GOloHWPAp7
— IT Guy (@ITGuy1959) January 10, 2018
The Russian story is Fusion GPS, not meddling. https://t.co/lJPiflO5X2
— David Williams (@DavidAlWilliams) January 10, 2018
Related:
ABOUT FACE: Now Dianne Feinstein says she was ‘pressured’ to release Fusion GPS transcript