By Josh Marshall:
Sater’s business relationship with Trump were extensive enough that there’s little doubt that his FBI and likely CIA handlers would have had some knowledge of them since he carried on this relationship while working as an FBI/CIA informant and awaiting sentencing – at least from 2003 to 2009 and perhaps going back to 2000.
Trump’s longstanding ties to Sater probably wouldn’t have mattered much as long as Trump was just a flashy real estate developer and reality TV star. But one can readily imagine that US law enforcement and perhaps intelligence would have become highly concerned once Trump – with his reliance on money from Russian oligarchs and the post-Soviet criminal underworld – started edging his way toward the presidency and especially after he won election on November 8th, 2016.
My point here is that before US law enforcement and intelligence agencies learned about the Russian hacking campaign, received intercepts about communications between Trump advisors and Russian state officials or got hold of that ‘dossier’ from the former MI6 agent, they may well have had concerns about Trump and the people around him that stemmed from things they learned long before he ever decided to run for President.
The Full Story (February 20, 2017)
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