Steele dossier

The Steele dossier, also known as the Trump–Russia dossier, is a controversial political opposition research report on the 2016 presidential campaign of Donald Trump compiled by counterintelligence specialist Christopher Steele. It was published without permission in 2017 as an unfinished 35-page compilation of "unverified, and potentially unverifiable" memos that were considered by Steele to be "raw intelligence – not established facts, but a starting point for further investigation". The dossier was written from June to December 2016 as reports from his sources were received, and contains allegations of misconduct, conspiracy, and cooperation between Trump's presidential campaign and the government of Russia prior to and during the 2016 election campaign. U.S. intelligence agencies have reported that Vladimir Putin personally ordered the whole Russian election interference operation, that the Russians codenamed Project Lakhta. While the dossier played a significant role in initially highlighting the general friendliness between Trump and the Putin administration, the corroboration status of specific allegations is highly variable. The following allegations have been publicly corroborated by U.S. intelligence agencies, the January 2017 ODNI report, and the Mueller report: "that the Russian government was working to get Mr. Trump elected"; that Russia sought "to cultivate people in Trump's orbit"; that Trump campaign officials and associates had secretive contacts with Russian officials and agents; that Putin favored Trump over Hillary Clinton; that Putin personally ordered an "influence campaign" to harm Clinton's campaign and to "undermine public faith in the US democratic process"; and that he ordered cyberattacks on both parties. Some other allegations are plausible but not specifically confirmed, and some lack evidence and are considered dubious. The dossier was based on reports from initially anonymous sources known to Steele and his "primary sub-source", Igor Danchenko. Steele, a former head of the Russia Desk for British intelligence (MI6), wrote the report...