Trump probe tip-off

Downer’s information prompted FBI’s Russia investigation

INFORMATION handed by Australia’s UK ambassador Alexander Downer to the FBI prompted the Russia probe into US President Donald Trump’s 2016 election campaign, according to a new independent report from the US Justice Department.

The report by Inspector General Michael Horowitz also reveals for the first time the concerns Mr Downer conveyed to authorities after an encounter with Trump campaign aide George Papadopoulos.

When the pair met for a drink in London in May 2016, Mr Trump was yet to secure the Republican nomination and Mr Papadopoulos boasted he knew Russia had damaging information about Democrat candidate Hillary Clinton.

Mr Downer’s interaction with Mr Papadopoulos and the fact he communicated his concerns about him have already been reported, but the Horowitz report confirms how influential Australia’s input into domestic US politics was, describing it as the “tipping point”.

Mr Downer is not named in the Horowitz report, but News Corp Australia can reveal he is the official referred to as FFG – or a Friendly Foreign Government representative.

“The FBI opened Crossfire Hurricane on July 31, 2016, just days after its receipt of information from a Friendly Foreign Government (FFG) reporting that, in May 2016, during a meeting with the FFG, then Trump campaign foreign policy adviser George Papadopoulos ‘suggested the Trump team had received some kind of suggestion from Russia that it could assist this process with the anonymous release of information during the campaign that would be damaging to Mrs Clinton (and President Obama),” the report states.

Attorney-General William Barr praised Mr Downer’s initiative: “I want to emphasise that this FFG did the right thing in supplying that information; the FFG has acted at all times just as we would hope a close ally would.”