WASHINGTON (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 16th May, 2023) The FBI engaged and paid Russian national Igor Danchenko for information related to alleged ties between then-US presidential candidate Donald Trump and Russia, which was never verified and used to justify US government surveillance of the Trump campaign, Special Counsel John Durham said on Monday.
From January 2017 through October 2020, the FBI conducted multiple interviews with Danchenko regarding information he provided for a dossier compiled by investigator Christopher Steele on alleged ties between Trump and Russia, which was paid for and used by the Clinton campaign, Durham said in a report on his probe into the origins of the US government's Trump-Russia investigation.
Danchenko never provided "any corroborating evidence" to support the Steele allegations, the report said, adding that Danchenko described his interactions with sub-sources as "rumor and speculation."
Moreover, significant parts of what Danchenko told the FBI were inconsistent with what Steele told them during prior interviews, the report said. Danchenko lived in Washington for many years, despite assertions on surveillance applications that Steele's source was based in Russia, the report said. However, the FBI never corrected assertions in their surveillance renewal applications, the report said.
"Rather, beginning in March 2017, the FBI engaged Danchenko as a CHS (confidential human source) and began making regular financial payments to him for information - none of which corroborated Steele's reporting," the report said.
Investigators also never resolved prior concerns about a previous preliminary FBI investigation into potential espionage by Danchenko before employing him as a paid source, the report said.
The Durham report, released Monday, concluded that the FBI never should have launched its probe into alleged ties between Trump and Russia. Durham was tasked in 2019 with reviewing the US government's probe into Trump-Russia ties, which included surveillance on a former campaign adviser.
