Jury acquits the Steele dossier source
On Tuesday, a jury found— the primary sub-source of the anti-Trump dossier—Igor Danchenko, not guilty on all four counts of making false statements to the FBI.
The charges against the Russian national were brought by Special Counsel John Durham.
Durham is investigating the origins of the FBI’s original Trump-Russia investigation, which included the now debunked Russian dossier.
This is the second trial from Durham’s years-long investigation.
The Danchenko trial is also the second time a jury delivered an acquittal.
It served as the basis for a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant and renewals against Trump campaign aide Carter Page.
The Justice Department admitted in 2020 that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant against Trump campaign aide Carter Page was an effort to surveil Page
The DOJ also said that when stripped of the FBI’s misinformation, the warrant did not meet the necessary legal threshold and never should have been issued.
Opposition research firm Fusion GPS commissioned the dossier which was paid for by Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign along with the Democratic National Committee via the law firm Perkins Coie.
During the trial, it was revealed that the FBI had paid Danchenko more than $200,000 to serve as a confidential human source for the bureau.
