NEW YORK (AP) — A conservative website with strong ties to the Republican establishment triggered the investigation into Donald Trump’s past that ultimately produced the dossier that alleged a compromised relationship between the president and the Kremlin.
The Washington Free Beacon on Friday confirmed it originally retained the political research firm Fusion GPS to scour then-candidate Trump’s background for negative information, a common practice known as “opposition research” in politics. Leaders from the Free Beacon, which is funded largely by Republican billionaire Paul Singer, insisted none of the early material it collected appeared in the dossier released later in the year detailing explosive allegations, many uncorroborated, about Trump compiled by a former British spy.
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