Peter Strzok says FBI counterintelligence probe into Trump's Russian business ties was incomplete
Peter Strzok's new book, COMPROMISED, is published next week.
In an interview with Politico, the former FBI agent says it's unlikely the FBI was able to do a thorough and complete counterintelligence investigation into Donald Trump's widely reported business links to the Russian government and Russian organized crime, and that those financial mysteries, like Trump's tax returns, are yet to be revealed.
Strzok is the former FBI agent who started the 2016 probe into Russian election interference. He also says Trump remains a "clear and present danger" to U.S. national security.
Politico got an advance copy of Strzok's new book, and he has a lot to say.
After nearly two years, Mueller released his final report in April 2019. It outlined the Trump's campaign's extensive contacts with Kremlin-linked actors before, during, and after the election, and led to dozens of indictments and multiple guilty pleas and convictions, including of Manafort. But the report showed no signs of a holistic examination of Trump's decades in the business world, including his company's myriad real estate transactions with several Russians suspected of ties to organized crime and the many opaque deals, masked through shell companies, that helped Trump's companies stay afloat throughout the years.
"I personally don't see how they could have done [the counterintelligence investigation] because I don't know how you do that without getting tax records, financial records, and doing things that would become public," Strzok said of Mueller's team. "Had they done it, I would have expected to see litigation and screaming from Trump. And the absence of that makes me think it didn't occur."
Would it be occurring now? He's doubtful. "With an attorney general who now says there was no basis to open this investigation at all," Strzok said, it's unlikely FBI Director Chris Wray and his deputy have been pushing the issue. "I'm sure the senior levels of the FBI were more than happy to have it off their plate, and just say, 'Mueller's got this.'"
More at Politico: Peter Strzok would like to clear a few things up
Peter Strzok, a former FBI agent at the center of the Russia investigation who was fired for sending anti-Trump texts, reveals details in his new book about the bureau's internal debate over investigating President Trump https://t.co/Cj5QCJNIZp
- NYT Politics (@nytpolitics) September 5, 2020
My interview with Peter Strzok, the FBI agent who led investigations into Clinton's email and the Trump campaign's links to Russia. His book, COMPROMISED, is published next week. https://t.co/UfoeTUJ96F
- Anne Applebaum (@anneapplebaum) September 4, 2020
"...it also seemed conceivable, if unlikely, that Moscow had indeed pulled off the most stunning intelligence achievement in human history: secretly controlling the president of the United States," ex-FBI agent Peter Strzok wrote in his new memoir.https://t.co/dPohskuVAY
- Axios (@axios) September 5, 2020