Transcript: Trump dossier focused on "opaque" business deals
WASHINGTON (AP)  â Donald Trump 's "opaque" business deals in the former Soviet Union  history of tax disputes and real estate projects abroad were critical areas of research that led to the dossier alleging a compromised relationship between the president and the Kremlin  according to the transcript of a congressional interview released Thursday.
Glenn Simpson told the House Intelligence Committee in a private interview in November that after his firm  Fusion GPS  was hired to look into  Trump   it enlisted a former British spy "to figure out what  Trump 's been up to" in Russia "because he's gone over a bunch of times" and "said some weird things about (Russian President Vladimir) Putin."
The committee released a transcript of the hours-long interview on Thursday  following the lead of a separate Senate panel that made public its own session with Simpson. The two documents give new details about the origins of the dossier  which for the last year has been a source of political fascination because of sensational allegations of a Russian effort to aid  Trump .
Simpson's firm was hired first by a conservative website with strong ties to the Republican establishment to scour  Trump 's background for negative information. A law firm representing the Democratic National Committee continued funding Fusion's work after the original GOP source  the Washington Free Beacon  lost interest.
"One of the central mysteries of Donald Trump is that  you know  beginning in the mid-2000s he was not a creditworthy businessman. And so he â you know  if you're analyzing  you know  someone who says they're a billionaire but can't get a bank loan  you know  there's this whole issue of where is the credit coming from."
WASHINGTON (AP)  â  [TGT]  "opaque" business deals in the former Soviet Union  history of tax disputes and real estate projects abroad were critical areas of research that led to the dossier alleging a compromised relationship between the president and the Kremlin  according to the transcript of a congressional interview released Thursday.
Glenn Simpson told the House Intelligence Committee in a private interview in November that after his firm  Fusion GPS  was hired to look into   [TGT]     [TGT]  enlisted a former British spy "to figure out what   [TGT]  's been up to" in Russia "because he's gone over a bunch of times" and "said some weird things about (Russian President Vladimir) Putin."
The committee released a transcript of the hours-long interview on Thursday  following the lead of a separate Senate panel that made public its own session with Simpson. The two documents give new details about the origins of the dossier  which for the last year has been a source of political fascination because of sensational allegations of a Russian effort to aid   [TGT] 
Simpson's firm was hired first by a conservative website with strong ties to the Republican establishment to scour  Trump 's background for negative information. A law firm representing the Democratic National Committee continued funding Fusion's work after the original GOP source  the Washington Free Beacon  lost interest.
"One of the central mysteries of  [TGT]  is that  you know  beginning in the mid-2000s  [TGT]  was not a creditworthy businessman. And so  [TGT]  â you know  if you're analyzing  you know  someone who says they're a billionaire but can't get a bank loan  you know  there's this whole issue of where is the credit coming from."