Trevor McFadden is only overseeing Fusion GPS's motion to quash the subpoena served on the company in the BuzzFeed case. | Drew Angerer/Getty Images Trump-appointed judge won't recuse from dossier case Trevor McFadden says his private-sector legal work and his efforts on Trump transition don't merit stepping aside.

A federal judge appointed by President Donald Trump is refusing to step aside from a legal dispute related to the so-called dossier alleging links between Trump and Russia.

U.S. District Court Trevor McFadden turned down a request from the firm that commissioned the dossier, Fusion GPS, to recuse himself from an attempt by Russian entrepreneur Aleksej Gubarev to obtain information about the project.


Gubarev, whom the dossier accuses of illicit links to Russian President Vladimir Putin, is suing BuzzFeed for libel over its publication of the compilation.

Fusion GPS sought to have the subpoena dispute reassigned because McFadden worked as an adviser on the Trump transition team and represented a firm linked to another Russian named in the dossier, Mikhail Fridman.

However, McFadden — who was confirmed to the bench last October — ruled Friday that those connections were too remote to justify his recusal.

"I decline Fusion's invitation to decide its motion based on the alleged connection between the motion and President Trump's political interests," the judge wrote in a 13-page decision. "The President's connection with me and his interest in this case are simply too tenuous to cause a reasonable observer to question my impartiality."

Fusion argued that the information Gubarev is seeking could be political fodder for Trump, but the judge said the records were likely to stay under wraps. He also said his work for the transition was limited and his relationship with Trump, aside from the nomination, is nonexistent.

"As a volunteer, I reviewed public-source information about potential cabinet appointees for approximately four hours every few weeks for two to three months," McFadden wrote. "I did not come into contact with Mr. Trump or any of the senior members of his campaign team. In fact, I do not know the president and have never met him in any capacity."

The judge said any suggestion that he should recuse merely because he is a Trump appointee was meritless.

McFadden also noted that he never represented Gubarev and never directly represented Fridman, who is suing Fusion GPS for libel in a separate case assigned to another judge. The judge acknowledged that while he was a law partner at Chicago-based Baker & McKenzie, he represented a telecommunications business Fridman has an ownership stake in, VimpelCom, now known as VEON.

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However, McFadden said Fridman's alleged control of about half the business was too limited to say that Fridman himself had been McFadden's client.

"By no stretch of the imagination is VimpelCom a mere shell company serving as Mr. Fridman's alter ego," the judge wrote. "It is one of the world's largest publicly traded companies, with nearly 42,000 employees and a market cap of $6.8 billion, and it provides telecommunications services to customers in 17 countries around the world."

The judge also said Fridman's interest in the litigation between Gubarev, BuzzFeed and Fusion GPS wasn't direct enough to warrant recusal even if the judge had a stronger tie to Fridman.

"Although Mr. Fridman may consider my resolution of this discovery dispute interesting, he is not an interested third party in the same sense as the third parties in the cases on which Fusion relies," McFadden wrote.

A spokeswoman for Fusion GPS did not respond to a request for comment Friday night.

McFadden is overseeing only Fusion GPS' motion to quash the subpoena served on the company in the BuzzFeed case. That suit is pending before a federal judge in Miami, but the Washington-based private investigation firm chose to challenge the subpoena in Washington, as is permitted under federal court rules.