Tuesday night the Washington Post broke the story: The infamous ‘Trump Dossier” was paid for by Hillary Clinton’s campaign and the DNC.  

The Hillary Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee helped fund research that resulted in a now-famous dossier containing allegations about Donald Trump’s connections to Russia and possible coordination between his campaign and the Kremlin, people familiar with the matter said.

“Helped fund” is putting it euphemistically. The Clinton campaign pushed $6 million to the lawyer tasked with retaining Fusion GPS to gather Russian mud on Trump. The DNC kicked in another $3.6 million. In other words: almost $10 million.

Fusion GPS

Fusion GPS, a professional mud-gathering outfit, hired a former British intelligence officer named Christopher Steele to author the dossier. As the Washington Times reported in July, “Mr. Steele makes clear that his unproven charges came almost exclusively from sources linked to the Kremlin and Russian President Vladimir Putin.” Further, as former acting CIA director Michael Morell told NBC, Steele paid the Russians. 

The dossier gave rise to the notion Trump was in cahoots with Russians during the election. Ergo, the whole Trump-Collusion narrative was financed by the Clinton campaign and DNC. As we’ll see below, the story gets even worse.

Fusion GPS has refused to tell Congress who had paid them. In fact, they pleaded the Fifth to avoid self-incrimination. (Wouldn’t you love to know what crime they expect to be accused of?) CNN reports both former DNC chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz and Hillary’s campaign chairman John Podesta had denied to Congress they knew anything about payments.  

He Flat-Out Lied

The Clinton lawyer paid the $9.6 million, Marc Elias, flat out fibbed to the New York Times when they were chasing the story down. Tweeted Maggie Haberman of the Times, “folks involved in funding this lied about it, and with sanctimony, for a year.”

Folks involved in funding this lied about it, and with sanctimony, for a year https://t.co/vXKRV1wRJc

— Maggie Haberman (@maggieNYT) October 24, 2017

Think of it. If America knew the Russian collusion story was a multi-million dollar production of the Clinton campaign would the story have gone anywhere?

As has been the Clinton M.O. since before Millennials were born, the Clinton camp is blowing off the news like it’s nothing to see. Just good ol’ fashioned opposition research. Former spokesman Brian Fallon even took the dubious position that he would have joined Steele in collecting the dirt on Trump. (Notice in his bravado he doesn’t say “Russia.”) 

I regret I didnt know about Christopher Steele's hiring pre-election. If I had, I would have volunteered to go to Europe and try to help him

— Brian Fallon (@brianefallon) October 25, 2017

CNN quotes anonymous sources as saying Hillary Clinton didn’t know about the dossier until after it was published. Her campaign spent millions on it and she didn’t know what she was buying? Sounds like a good thing she wasn’t put in charge of the U.S. budget. 

The DNC’s response to the story is actually funny. Current Chairman “Tom Perez and the new leadership of the DNC were not involved in any decision-making regarding Fusion GPS.” In essence, “Don’t blame us. It was Debbie Wasserman Schultz’s fault.” 

The CNN source claims Hillary was actually mad that the (uncorroborated, salacious, Kremlin-fed) dossier did not come out before the election. Oh, but it was in the hands of her loyalists at the FBI. 

Where It Really Gets Dicey

Maybe you’re thinking — certainly you’re hearing — “What’s the big deal? Candidates have been collecting dirt on their opponents since the days of Jefferson and Adams.” First off, they didn’t get their dirt from paid off foreign adversaries hellbent on causing havoc with our election system. Second, as Jesse Watters put it on The Five, “When Clintons do it, it’s oppo research. When Trump doesn’t, it’s called collusion.”

More important, CNN reported in April that then-FBI director James Comey used the soiled dossier to convince a FISA court in October 2016 to allow the Obama Administration to conduct surveillance on Trump’s team. Just three months earlier, the court denied the request.

But with dirt in hand Comey got a different result. In fact, he was so enamored of the Russian-bred, Democrat bought dossier he wanted to pay Steele even more money to keep digging. He dropped the idea when Steele’s name became public. (Perhaps Comey worried someone would ask the obvious question: Why would the Federal Bureau of Investigation have to pay an outsider to investigate anything?) 

The BBC said the dossier served as a “roadmap” for the FBI’s investigation into the alleged Trump-Russia collusion. That road map has led nowhere, but it did pave the way for all the surveillance, the accelerated unmasking and illegal leaking. And, of course, the months of never-ending media hysteria about Trump-Russia Collusion.

So to Summarize

Let’s see where we are thus far: Hillary pays a lawyer millions, the lawyer pays Fusion GPS, Fusion GPS pays Steele, Steele pays the Russians. The dirt is gathered. The dossier is created. The dossier starts circulating. Comey uses the Democrat’s dossier to convince a FISA court to approve surveillance on Republicans during the election. Hillary loses the election.

Suddenly, the allegations in the dossier — a Russian-Clinton collaboration — are used to claim Russia and Trump colluded to deny Hillary her throne. 

The surveillance leads to the unmasking and leaking of information on Trump associates. The media drowns in a flood of unmaskings and leaks, thanks to President Obama’s last-ditch effort to disseminate damaging information about Trump as far and wide as possible.

President Trump gets a Special Prosecutor, the rights of Americans get violated, Rachel Maddow gets higher ratings, And evil Vladimir Putin gets his wish for American political chaos. 

This business makes House of Cards look like Howdy Doody.  

But look on the bright side. The Russia-Clinton dossier may have caused a mess, but it’s not like they teamed up to siphon away American uranium.