In a series of tweets Sunday morning, President Donald Trump harshly criticized the ongoing congressional investigation into Russian interference during the 2016 election to tilt the results in his favor, and issued fresh condemnations on the “lack of investigation” into his Democratic presidential opponent Hillary Clinton.

Never seen such Republican ANGER & UNITY as I have concerning the lack of investigation on Clinton made Fake Dossier (now $12,000,000?),…. — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 29, 2017

The president’s successive tweets come days after the Washington Post reported that Clinton’s campaign and the Democratic National Committee (DNC) helped fun a “dossier” that outlined alleged ties between the Trump campaign and Russian government operatives. Fusion GPS, a Washington, D.C. firm, was retained to carry out the research between April 2016 until just before the general election last year, sources told Politico.


Among the misleading or blatantly false assertions he made, the $12 million figure Trump cites likely refers to the total amount the campaign paid to the law firm Perkins Coie, which represented the Clinton campaign and the DNC. It is unclear how much of that amount went to fund the Trump-Russia dossier. Earlier in the week, Trump slammed the dossier as “a total phony” and “disgraceful,” claiming the Clinton campaign paid $6 million to fund the opposition research. In the months since it was first disclosed though, several components of the dossier have been verified by the intelligence community.

Trump and his Republican allies have also neglected to mention that the Clinton campaign was not the first to retain Fusion GPS to conduct research into Donald Trump. On Friday, conservative news outlet Washington Free Beacon revealed it funded the same opposition research six months earlier.

Contrary to what Trump tweeted about a “lack of investigation on Clinton,” the Senate Judiciary Committee has demanded ten federal agencies to look into whether Russian bribery was involved during negotiations of the Uranium One deal, in which Clinton served as part of the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), to the Russian nuclear company Rosatom. There’s no indication that Clinton or any other government officials who had a hand in approving the deal knew that the FBI had evidence that Russian nuclear industry officials were involved in bribery, kickbacks, extortion, and money laundering.

As recently as this week, House Intelligence Committee Chair Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA) said his committee would launch an investigation into Clinton and the Obama administration over dealings with Uranium One, the Canadian mining company with holdings inside the United States that was gradually acquired by Russian investors. Nunes’ committee is also looking into how the Department of Justice handled the deletion of Clinton emails.

…the Uranium to Russia deal, the 33,000 plus deleted Emails, the Comey fix and so much more. Instead they look at phony Trump/Russia,…. — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 29, 2017

…"collusion," which doesn't exist. The Dems are using this terrible (and bad for our country) Witch Hunt for evil politics, but the R's… — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 29, 2017

…"collusion," which doesn't exist. The Dems are using this terrible (and bad for our country) Witch Hunt for evil politics, but the R's… — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 29, 2017

…are now fighting back like never before. There is so much GUILT by Democrats/Clinton, and now the facts are pouring out. DO SOMETHING! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 29, 2017

A federal grand jury convened by Special Counsel Robert Mueller — who was appointed in May to look into Russian meddling in the 2016 general election — has approved the first criminal charges related to the investigation. Mueller, who was appointed after FBI Director James Comey was fired, has been given “wide latitude” to look into the investigation, including looking at collusion between Trump campaign associates and Kremlin operatives. The targets of his investigation include former campaign chairman Paul Manafort and former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn.

On Sunday, Gov. Chris Christie (R-NJ) took to CNN to say that the president was not the subject of Mueller’s investigation.


“The last news that we’ve received, Jake, publicly is that the president was told he’s not under investigation,” Christie told CNN’s Jake Tapper. “We’ve heard nothing to the contrary, so I’m making that statement off of the public information that we’ve already been given.” What he failed to mention is that any investigation would likely not be revealed in the first place, and federal indictments are often sealed until an arrest is made or charges are formally filed.