(Eric Felton, RealClearInvestigations) Jonathan Winer, a former top aide to Secretary of State John Kerry who was a key conduit for disseminating the discredited Steele dossier in the U.S. government, worked as a lobbyist for Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska in years preceding the Russiagate affair.
This revelation raises new questions about Russian efforts to influence American foreign policy — far afield from any Kremlin efforts to favor Donald Trump.
Winer’s connection to Deripaska came to light through last week’s release of the fifth and final volume of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 campaign.
The Senate report also found that at different times ex-British spy Christopher Steele had worked for the powerful oligarch with ties to President Vladimir Putin, and sent scores of reports from his intelligence firm on to Winer, who admitted to the panel destroying many of them before leaving the State Department. Further, the Senate developed evidence that Glenn Simpson – whose company Fusion GPS contracted with Steele for the dossier – also did work for Deripaska. Simpson denied that, telling senators, “I don’t think I’ve knowingly had any contact with his organization.”
In his initial interview with the Senate committee, Winer claimed never to have met the oligarch. In a second interview Winer revised this answer. He conceded that, beginning in 2003, Deripaska had hired the law firm Alston & Bird, where Winer was a partner. He worked on the Deripaska account but, asserting attorney-client privilege, refused to say what exactly he had done on Deripaska’s behalf. RealClearInvestigations sent questions to Alston & Bird’s spokesman but received no reply.
RealClearInvestigations has found that as an employee of the government affairs and public relations firm APCO Worldwide, Winer also worked on behalf of the Russian government’s nuclear agency in 2010 and 2011. Winer also drummed up business for Steele among lobbyists he knew from his work promoting Russia’s nuclear interests. RealClearInvestigations contacted both Winer and APCO; neither responded.
Winer used his position as a top State Department official to distribute the lurid dossier prepared by Steele, which accused Donald Trump of conspiring with Russia to steal the 2016 election.
But the dossier was not the first questionable Steele product Winer put in the hands of policymakers. He had been passing Steele-produced briefs to senior State Department colleagues for years. The memos were “free” for the government because the department didn’t pay for them. But that doesn’t mean Steele wasn’t getting paid.
While at the State Department during President Barack Obama’s second term, Winer disseminated to his colleagues over 100 memos written by Steele’s company, Orbis Business Intelligence. Among them were memos apparently intended to help influence U.S. foreign policy in favor of Steele’s Russian client, billionaire Putin loyalist Deripaska.
The Senate revelations establish that Winer was a key but little-known figure in Russiagate. He, along with former Associate Deputy Attorney General Bruce Ohr – whose wife worked for Fusion GPS – have emerged as prime vehicles for the dissemination of the Steele dossier to the highest reaches of the U.S. government.
Winer was for a decade an aide to Sen. John Kerry. From 1994 to 1999 he was a deputy assistant secretary at the Department of State. From government he went to the international lobby and law firm Alston & Bird. Winer moved to APCO Worldwide in 2008, about the time he met Steele, who had just left British intelligence and was setting up his own shop. Winer told the Senate that in his private sector jobs he “was still engaged in various types of Russian representation all over the map.” Pro-Putin, anti-Putin: Winer didn’t care, he told senators: “It was any work that was consistent with their needs and my values.”
When Kerry became secretary of state, he named his old Senate aide to a top position at the department – special envoy to Libya. Winer seems to have used that position in ways that promoted Steele’s business. Winer’s efforts on his friend’s behalf included sending policymakers memos on Ukraine and Russia produced by Steele’s Orbis Business Intelligence. They were frequent enough to be called by a shorthand – “O Reports.” From the time he rejoined the State Department in 2013, through 2015, Winer distributed over 100 of Steele’s memos.
In an email obtained by Judicial Watch through a Freedom of Information request, Winer promoted Steele’s reports to Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs Victoria Nuland and her deputy, Paul W. Jones (now the chargé d’affaires to Pakistan): “Toria and Paul, Three reports from Orbis,” Winer wrote the afternoon of Nov. 19, 2014. He added, “The man behind them and Orbis, Chris Steele (as previously mentioned, former MI6 Russia expert, and a trusted friend of mine) is in DC next couple of days. If you’d like to meet with him, let me know and I can put it together.”
Once Steele’s “O Reports” had become routine, Winer relied on Nuland’s assistant, Nina Miller, to circulate his friend’s reports. For example, on Feb. 12, 2015, Winer sent an “O Report” to Miller “concerning company said to be secretly owned by Putin, Putin’s Mistress and Friends.” It was sent with these instructions: “Nina please send high side to three usual persons.” The State Department did not respond to questions about the memos.
Winer testified to the Senate Intelligence Committee that Steele’s memos had no purpose other than to provide the State Department with helpful information on Russian and Ukrainian affairs.
But that’s not how Steele viewed his State Department connection. He made it clear that his “reports” were intended to shape U.S. policy. For example, Steele used his in at Foggy Bottom to try to improve diplomatic attitudes toward Deripaska, whom the Senate Intelligence Committee describes as “a key implementer of Russian influence operations around the globe.” The Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control has accused Deripaska of “holding assets and laundering funds on behalf of Russian President Vladimir Putin.”
Deripaska has dismissed the accusations as “guesses, rumors and balderdash.”
Early in 2016 – not long before Steele began creating opposition research on Trump for Fusion GPS – Steele reached out to his friend at the Justice Department, Bruce Ohr.
Page 883 of the Senate report states that Steele emailed Ohr to say he had heard from Deripaska’s lawyers, Paul H[auser] and Adam W[aldman], that the oligarch had been “granted an official visa to visit the US this week.” Steele urged Ohr to promote Deripaska’s trip to the States: “[Y]ou should be pushing at an open door,” Steele wrote.
There was a problem, though: Steele anticipated “counter squalls from State.” It was a problem that had a two-part solution. The first involved Ohr. Steele encouraged his friend to take advantage of “an inter-agency meeting on him [Deripaska] this week which I guess you will be attending.” The second part of Steele’s strategy involved putting his memos to work. We “are circulating some recent sensitive Orbis reporting on the RF [Russian Federation] leadership’s targeting of certain business figures.” The reports, Steele told Ohr, would suggest that Deripaska “is not the leadership tool some have alleged.”
Winer’s distribution of “O Reports” enabled Steele to influence U.S. policy for clients such as Deripaska. That may explain why, at Steele’s direction, Winer collected and destroyed as many copies of Steele’s reports as he could before leaving his job.
“So I destroyed them,” Winer admitted to the intelligence committee. “I basically destroyed all the correspondence I had with him.”
RealClearInvestigations contacted Orbis with questions for Steele. There was no response.
