In 2019, the inspector general for the Department of Justice released a detailed report on the FBI's investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 campaign. He went on social media to call the assertions false, and appeared on a Russian television news outlet to call the claims "a blatant lie." Millian strenuously denied being a source of any material in the dossier, including any information about a supposed tape. Trump denied that claim and called the Steele dossier "junk" and "fake." In January 2017, shortly after the dossier surfaced publicly, people familiar with the dossier told the FBI, and later told media outlets including ABC News, that Millian had been an unwitting source of some of the most salacious but unverified information laid out in the document, including claims that the Russian government had a video of Trump watching prostitutes urinating on a bed at a Moscow hotel, which if true could be used to blackmail the then-candidate and future American president. The new allegations made public last week have reignited questions about the now-infamous Steele dossier and about earlier claims that Millian had been one of many sources for the content. The arrest of Danchenko appeared to be an escalation of the wide-ranging probe by Durham, who was appointed by Trump Attorney General William Barr in October 2020 to investigate the origins of the FBI's Russia investigation. Danchenko's attorney said in court his client intends to plead not guilty, releasing a statement accusing the special counsel of presenting "a false narrative designed to humiliate and slander a renowned expert in business intelligence for political gain." " The indictment alleges that Danchenko "never spoke to" Millian at all.Īn indictment in the investigation into how officials probed Donald Trump's ties to Russia has raised new questions about sourcing of the Steele dossier. rather, Danchenko fabricated these facts regarding. "Danchenko never received such a phone call or such information from any person he believed to be. then president of the Russian-American Chamber of Commerce" and obtained information about Trump from that man, the indictment says, referring to Millian but not naming him. "Danchenko stated falsely that, in or about late July 2016, he received an anonymous phone call from an individual who Danchenko believed to be. The indictment from special counsel John Durham alleged that Igor Danchenko, the key "collector" hired by Steele to gather information for the dossier, had lied to the FBI when he suggested that he had spoken with Millian, who at the time served as president of the Russian-American Chamber of Commerce, and had obtained information from Millian that then made its way into the dossier.ĭanchenko, a Russian national living in the U.S., was arrested last week on charges that he "willfully and knowingly" made a number of false statements during interviews with the FBI, including the alleged lies about Millian, in describing how he obtained information that he later provided to Steele for inclusion in the dossier. The long-running special investigation into how the government probed candidate Donald Trump's ties to Russia brought a new indictment last week and in the process cast fresh doubt on earlier claims that a little-known Belarusian-born businessman named Sergei Millian had been an unwitting source for the "dossier" prepared by former British spy Christopher Steele.
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