Former President Donald Trump responded to special counsel John Durham’s report on Monday about the origins of the FBI’s Trump-Russia investigation by saying that Americans were “scammed.”
Durham’s 320-page report found that the FBI had no evidence to support launching the investigation and found “sobering” differences in how the FBI approached the Trump probe compared to other politically sensitive investigations.
“WOW! After extensive research, Special Counsel John Durham concludes the FBI never should have launched the Trump-Russia Probe!” Trump wrote on social media. “In other words, the American Public was scammed, just as it is being scammed right now by those who don’t want to see GREATNESS for AMERICA!”
Trump later said in an interview that the Democrats had started a “long-running and treasonous charade” and that “there must be a heavy price to pay for putting our country through this.”
The report said the FBI immediately opened a full investigation based on a brief note from Australian diplomat Alexander Downer recounting that he had met with George Papadopoulos, a volunteer with the Trump campaign, in which he mentioned that Russia might have damaging information on Democrat presidential nominee Hillary Clinton. “At the time of the opening of Crossfire Hurricane, the FBI did not possess any intelligence showing that anyone associated with the Trump campaign was in contact with Russian intelligence officers at any point during the campaign,” the Durham report said.
The probe later relied on the “Steele dossier,” which came from a circular loop of people with little insight into Russia — except that some of them had been on the FBI’s radar for possible misconduct or ties to Russian intelligence in their own right, it said. The FBI knew it was nothing but “rumor and speculation,” it said.
“Upon receipt of unevaluated intelligence information from Australia, the FBI swiftly opened the Crossfire Hurricane investigation,” the report said. “In particular, at the direction of Deputy Director Andrew McCabe, Deputy Assistant Director for Counterintelligence Peter Strzok opened Crossfire Hurricane immediately. Strzok, at a minimum, had pronounced hostile feelings toward Trump.”
This report has been updated to include additional information.