An attorney for the co-founder of opposition research firm Fusion GPS revealed during a closed-door interview this summer with congressional investigators that “somebody's already been killed” as a result of the publication of the anti-Trump dossier.
The statement was contained in a 312-page transcript of Fusion GPS co-founder Glenn Simpson's August interview with committee investigators, released unilaterally Tuesday by Senate Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif.
The release itself provoked controversy, with an aide to Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, calling it “confounding” for Feinstein to drop the transcript in the “middle of an ongoing investigation.”
Among the many revelations in the document, though, is the claim from Simpson's attorney that someone died because the dossier -- which was commissioned by Fusion GPS -- was publicly released.
“He wants to be very careful to protect his sources,” attorney Josh Levy said during the Aug. 22 Senate Judiciary Committee interview of his client. “Somebody's already been killed as a result of the publication of this dossier and no harm should come to anybody related to this honest work.”
Glenn Simpson's attorney said someone has been killed over the Trump dossier's release.
Levy didn't elaborate on who was killed. The website BuzzFeed first published the dossier online last January, airing its unverified allegations about President Trump's connections with Russia.
The dossier was written by former British MI6 agent Christopher Steele. Fusion GPS, which hired Steele, got funding from the Clinton campaign and Democratic National Committee.
Trump has long derided the dossier as politically motivated, and several GOP-led committees are investigating whether it formed the basis for the FBI's initial investigation into Russian election interference.
Feinstein said in a statement she released the transcript to combat misinformation about the inteview.
“The innuendo and misinformation circulating about the transcript are part of a deeply troubling effort to undermine the investigation into potential collusion and obstruction of justice,” Feinstein said in a statement. “The only way to set the record straight is to make the transcript public.”
Taylor Foy, a spokesman for Grassley, said Feinstein’s release “undermines the integrity of the committee’s oversight work and jeopardizes its ability to secure candid voluntary testimony relating to the independent recollections of future witnesses.”
“It’s totally confounding that Senator Feinstein would unilaterally release a transcript of a witness interview in the middle of an ongoing investigation – a witness that Feinstein herself subpoenaed last year for lack of cooperation,” Foy said.
