A woman married to a Justice Department official involved with the investigation into whether President Donald Trump and his campaign colluded with Russia to steal the 2016 election was asked by her employer, opposition research firm Fusion GPS, to investigate Trump’s children.
Nellie Ohr used to work for Fusion GPS. Her husband, Bruce Ohr, works for the Justice Department and is heavily tied to the Russian collusion investigation. While working for Fusion, Nellie was asked to investigate Trump’s children. She also told lawmakers in her October 19, 2018 deposition that ex-British Spy Christopher Steele, who was also a contractor for Fusion and responsible for the infamous Steele Dossier used to accuse Trump of a number of salacious acts, had passed information from his dossier to Bruce in the hopes that he would turn it over to the FBI.
Nellie’s testimony has been recently leaked, transcripts of which were confirmed by The Daily Caller News Foundation’s (DCNF) Chuck Ross.
Ross reported that it was “unclear whether Ohr shared any information that she gathered working for Fusion GPS with her husband, who served as associate deputy attorney general until he was reassigned in December 2017.” He also reported there is “no indication that Ohr’s research of the Trump children wound up in the dossier, which the FBI used to obtain surveillance warrants against Carter Page.”
Is it possible that Nellie did not share information with her husband, even though Steele did? Sure, but it’s hard to look past Bruce Ohr’s clear conflict of interest.
Fusion GPS was working on behalf of a law firm hired by Hillary Clinton’s campaign and the Democratic National Committee.
Nellie testified that she was given information from Steele’s dossier without knowing it, and did not see the completed dossier until Buzzfeed broke journalistic ethics to publish it on January 10, 2017. She also testified that she was asked to research Trump’s family.
“But in terms of actually performing research, did you begin to break out President Trump’s family in terms of Melania Trump, all of his children? Were you doing independent research based off of each family member?” Nellie was asked during her testimony, according to the DCNF.
Nellie responded that she “did some research on all of them, but not into much depth.”
When asked if she looked into Donald Trump Jr. and Ivanka Trump specifically, Nellie said she did, but “it was relatively superficial.” She said she looked into their travels “to see whether they were involved in dealings and transactions with people who had had suspicious pasts.”
Ross also notes several conflicting accounts in the testimony of Bruce Ohr and Glenn Simpson, the founder of Fusion:
“Simpson testified to the Intelligence committee on Nov. 14, 2017 that he did not meet with anyone from the Justice Department or FBI until after the election. But Ohr testified that he met Simpson on Aug. 22, 2016.”
“Democrats on House Intelligence also claimed in a memo released last year that Ohr did not pass information he gleaned from Fusion GPS or Steele until after the election. But Ohr testified that he contacted top FBI officials almost immediately after his July 30, 2016 meeting with Steele.”