More evidence has emerged indicating that the FBI under then-Director James Comey was every bit as politicized against Donald Trump as it is under Director Christopher Wray — his replacement — and President Joe Biden.
During testimony this week in the trial of Igor Danchenko, the primary source of allegations in Steele’s dossier, FBI analyst Brian Auten testified that the bureau offered dossier ‘author’ and former British spy Christopher Steele $1 million if he could prove his head-turning claims against then-GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump ahead of the 2016 election that he won, the Daily Wire reported Tuesday.
But the former MI6 operative was unable to do so, Auten said.
The analyst testified that he and a group of agents met with Steele in October 2021 and offered him the stipend in exchange for evidence supporting the contentious allegations contained in the dossier, Fox News reported. The million-dollar offer came several years after Comey’s FBI nevertheless used the dossier to obtain warrants from the FISA court to spy on Trump’s campaign.
“On October 21, 2016, did you have any information to corroborate that information?” special counsel John Durham asked Auten, in reference to the date of the first FISA application filed to put former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page under surveillance.
“No,” Auten responded, according to Fox News.
The Daily Wire adds:
Auten testified that the FBI offered Steele “up to $1 million” for proof substantiating allegations made in a series of reports to the bureau over the course of several months in 2016. The analyst said Steele never received any money because he could not “prove the allegations,” according to CNN. Steel’s reports were eventually compiled into the dossier first published by BuzzFeed News in January 2017.
Danchenko has pleaded not guilty to lying to the FBI. His trial is the last scheduled as part of special counsel John Durham’s investigation into the origins of the Trump/Russia collusion hoax before Durham issues his final report.
Auten himself has come under scrutiny by Congress. In July, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), the ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said in a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland and Wray that Auten was involved in suppressing a probe into first son Hunter Biden during his father’s 2020 presidential campaign.
“First, it’s been alleged that the FBI developed information in 2020 about Hunter Biden’s criminal financial and related activity. [I]n August 2020, FBI Supervisory Intelligence Analyst Brian Auten opened an assessment which was used by a FBI Headquarters … team to improperly discredit negative Hunter Biden information as disinformation and caused investigative activity to cease. Based on allegations, verified and verifiable derogatory information on Hunter Biden was falsely labeled as disinformation,” Grassley wrote in the letter.
