A new book by Guardian journalist and former Moscow bureau chief Luke Harding entitled "Collusion: Secret Meetings, Dirty Money, and How Russia Helped Donald Trump Win" says former British intelligence officer Christopher Steele is confident in the veracity of his information.
The book...quotes Steele as telling friends that he believes his reports – based on sources cultivated over three decades of intelligence work – will be vindicated as the US special counsel investigation digs deeper into contacts between Trump, his associates and Moscow.
“I’ve been dealing with this country for thirty years. Why would I invent this stuff?” Steele is quoted as saying.
The book recounts Steele's successful career with M16 from his time in Moscow in 1990 to his departure from the service in 2009 to start his own business. Over the years, Steele became known as a reliable source for valuable Russian intel:
Years earlier, Steele shared the results of his investigation of the global football organisation, Fifa, with a senior FBI official in Rome that let to an investigation by US federal prosecutors, and ultimately the arrest of seven Fifa officials.
“The episode burnished Steele’s reputation inside the US intelligence community and the FBI. Here was a pro, a well-connected Brit, who understood Russian espionage and its subterranean tricks. Steele was regarded as credible,” Harding writes.
Business Insider has even more on what Steele reportedly told Harding about Donald Trump's financial ties to Russian interests and where investigators should be focusing their attention:
[Steele] told a reporter last year that investigators examining Trump's Russia ties needed "to look at the contracts for the hotel deals and land deals" that Trump has pursued with Russian nationals.
"Check their values against the money Trump secured via loans," the former spy, Christopher Steele, told The Guardian's Luke Harding last December. "The difference is what's important."
(...)
Steele did not go into further detail, Harding said, but said he seemed to be referring to a 2008 home sale to the Russian oligarch Dmitry Rybolovlev that has come under scrutiny by special counsel Robert Mueller.
Mueller is examining whether any collusion occurred between the Trump campaign and Russia during the election, and is also investigating Russian purchases of apartments in Trump buildings, according to Bloomberg.
Dmitry Rybolovlev is a Russian billionaire who bought a considerably overpriced Palm Beach mansion from Trump for $95 million on July 15, 2008.
In related news, the House Intelligence Committee spent seven hours Tuesday interviewing Glenn Simpson, the founder of Fusion GPS. His firm commissioned Steele to investigate Donald Trump's alleged ties to Russia.
Simpson's attorney released a statement afterwards saying it is up to the committee whether or not to make that testimony public.
Full story: Christopher Steele believes his dossier on Trump-Russia is 70-90% accurate (The Guardian)
'Dossier' author Christopher Steele: Trump's hotel and land deals with Russians 'need' to be examined (Business Insider)
House Intel panel interviews co-founder of firm tied to Trump dossier (The Hill)