House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) says he does not regret promoting the Steele Dossier because the “top line” information in it turned out to be “all too accurate.”
On Sunday, NBC’s Chuck Todd played a montage of the California Democrat talking about the Steele Dossier. He asked, “As chair of the House Intelligence Committee, do you regret giving some credibility to the Steele Dossier before anybody had been able to verify anything in that?”
Todd noted that “a lot” of the clips of Schiff he played were from before “there was any good verification.” Additionally, the host pointed out that some news organizations published stories about the contents of the dossier without verifying the information.
“That’s a separate conversation to those news organizations,” Todd added.
He asked if the chairman regrets helping give credibility to the dossier.
“I don’t regret saying that we should investigate claims of someone who, frankly, was a well-respected British intelligence officer,” Schiff said, adding, “And we couldn’t have known, of course, years ago that we would learn years later that someone who is a primary source lied to him.”
He continued, “But what I just said in the clip you just played ends up being exactly right, which is Steele did reveal that the Russians were trying to help elect Donald Trump…So the top line there of Russian help and Trump willingness to accept it and make use of it proved all too accurate.”
Watch the video below:
TUNE IN: As the chair of the House Intelligence Committee do you regret helping to give the Steele Dossier credibility?
— Meet the Press (@MeetThePress) November 14, 2021
The conclusion that Russia was trying to help Trump "turned out to be all too true," @RepAdamSchiff says. pic.twitter.com/1IN3Ozwjat
However, Todd pushed back as he asked, “The summary was accurate, but the details were incorrect. That does undermine the credibility, does it not?”
“Well, certainly. This Danchenko lied to Christopher Steele and then lied to the FBI,” Schiff responded.
He added, “He should be prosecuted. He is being prosecuted. And I’ll tell you this, if he’s convicted, he should not be pardoned the way Donald Trump pardoned people who lied to FBI agents, like Roger Stone and Mike Flynn. There ought to be the same standard in terms of prosecuting the liars. But I don’t think there ought to be any pardon, no matter which way the lies cut.”
As Axios notes, “Outsized coverage of the unvetted document drove a media frenzy at the start of Donald Trump’s presidency that helped drive a narrative of collusion between former President Trump and Russia.”
However, “In wake of the key source’s arrest and further reporting on the situation, The Washington Post on Friday corrected and removed large portions of two articles.” The outlet notes that other news organizations have not addressed whether they plan to revisit their earlier reporting.
Igor Danchenko, the primary researcher for the dossier, was indicted earlier this month for allegedly making false statements to the FBI about his sources for the document.
