Ga. Republican releases interview with official

DOJ’s Ohr served as link between FBI and author of controversial dossier.

The House Judiciary Committee’s top Republican on Friday released the transcript of an interview with Justice Department official Bruce Ohr, who came under the GOP’s scrutiny last year over his contacts with the author of a controversial dossier alleging President Donald Trump had personal and financial ties to Russian officials.

What it means

Republicans considered Ohr, who served as a link between the dossier’s author and the FBI, to be a key witness in a probe they conducted last year of how federal law enforcement officials handled investigations surrounding Trump and his 2016 opponent, Hillary Clinton. While the House Judiciary and Oversight committees spoke with Ohr in August, Republicans are releasing the interview record just as Democrats are using their new House majority to investigate Trump for alleged obstruction of justice, public corruption, and abuse of power — an investigation the GOP believes is political overreach.

Rep. Douglas Collins, R-Ga., the ranking Republican on the Judiciary Committee, told reporters Friday that the information in Ohr’s transcript went to the heart of the GOP’s concerns that federal law enforcement officials secured warrants to conduct surveillance on Trump campaign affiliates based on an incompletely verified and politically-funded dossier — a charge that law enforcement officials have denied.

“I find great problematic issues when you have an unverified salacious dossier used in a FISA application,” Collins told reporters. “Nobody — Republican, Democrat, independent — should want this to happen. This should not be happening.”

Ohr’s attorney, Joshua Berman, declined to comment on the transcript’s release.

Why it matters

The transcript released Friday contains new details, but no big surprises about the conversation lawmakers held with Ohr behind closed doors last August.

Ohr’s transcript details his testimony about his contacts with Chris Steele, which continued even after the FBI terminated its relationship with the former British spy, and how Ohr passed that information on to investigators. The transcript shows Ohr had doubts about the reliability of Steele’s information because of his Russian sources and financial sponsors, even as he was transmitting it to officials, but did not think it was improper to pass it along.

Republican members’ suspicions were also amplified because Steele’s research was partially funded by the Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee, and because Ohr’s wife — Nellie Ohr — worked briefly for Fusion GPS, the firm that was later linked to Steele and his work. President Trump has denied the allegations in Steele’s dossier, many of which have been called into question as Democrats and Republicans on Capitol Hill argue about whether Trump was engaged in any wrongdoing, and whether witnesses alleging so should be believed.

What’s next

Collins said that the Ohr transcript would be the first of many that Judiciary Republicans planned to release in the coming weeks. He elected to release it without any redactions, despite the Justice Department having recommended certain parts of it be kept from public view.

PABLO MARTINEZ MONSIVAIS / AP Right: Bruce Ohr was reportedly told by an ex-British spy that Russian intelligence believed it had Donald Trump ‘over a barrel,’ according to people familiar with the encounter.

ALEX WONG / GETTY IMAGES Left: U.S. Rep. Douglas Collins, R-Ga., believes the dossier isn’t fully verified and was funded by political interests.