On Tuesday, Republican Rep. Mark Meadows (NC) highlighted an exchange between himself and James Comey in which the Trump-fired FBI director repeated a long-debunked claim about the anti-Trump Steele dossier and then admitted he simply didn’t care who was behind the salacious and still unverified document that helped spark the FBI’s “collusion” investigation.
On Monday, House Republicans held a closed-door meeting with Comey in which they discussed details about the FBI’s handling of Trump, the dossier, and former national security adviser Michael Flynn. On Tuesday, the GOP released a 173-page transcript of the session. Included in that transcript is an exchange between Meadows and Comey about the infamous Democrat-funded Steele dossier that has caused a stir (h/t Chuck Ross, Twitchy).
Comey’s attempt to argue that Republicans partly paid for the dossier is a reference to a long-debunked claim that The Washington Free Beacon, which hired Fusion GPS, the firm behind the dossier, was partly responsible for it. However, the Free Beacon ended its relationship with the oppo-research firm before ex-British intelligence agent Christopher Steele, who compiled the dossier, was hired by the firm to conduct research for the Democratic National Committee and the Hillary Clinton campaign. The Steele dossier was an entirely Democrat-funded project. – READ MORE