FBI ‘Investigating’ Claims Trump ‘Compromised’ by Russia

Serious Doubts About Reliability of Unsubstantiated Allegations

Buzzfeed’s Tuesday release of a long “dossier” of unsubstantiated allegations of Russia having “compromised” President-elect Donald Trump, which involved wild claims of sexual escapades with Russian prostitutes being caught on video by the FSB, sparked a flurry of wild speculation of the dirt Russia putatively has acquired on Trump.

The FBI reportedly has had the documents for months, and it was apparently the source of Democrat claims the FBI was sitting on “explosive” evidence ahead of the November elections that they didn’t release. Given the nature of the dossier, there is a lot of doubt about its reliability.

Still and all, the FBI has been investigating it, and they declined comment on the matter even today, insisting they are continuing to investigating the matter. There’s no indication it has led to anything, at least so far.

It did, however, reportedly lead the FBI into requesting FISA court permission to conduct surveillance against four members of Trump’s campaign during the election, a request which the secretive court denied, saying the request was too broadly worded. FISA rejections are all but unheard of for surveillance requests, which again likely reflects the lack of evidence collected on the allegations.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.