Russian analyst Igor Danchenko pleads not guilty after creating Steele Dossier that spread lies about Trump Russia ties
RUSSIAN analyst Igor Danchenko, who worked on the Steele Dossier that spread rumors about Donald Trump in the run-up to the 2016 election, has pleaded not guilty to five felony charges.
Federal authorities arrested Danchenko on Thursday as part of the special counsel inquiry led by John H Durham.
Now, Danchenko has pleaded not guilty to five felony charges of lying to the FBI.
His trial date has been set for April 18, 2022.
The administration appointed Durham to scrutinize the Russia investigation for any wrongdoing; the outlet reported citing sources.
Danchenko was the primary researcher of the Steele dossier, a collection of rumors and unproven assertions suggesting that Trump and his 2016 campaign were compromised by and conspiring with Russian intelligence officials in Moscow’s covert operation to help him defeat .
The documents also allege that Russia sought to damage Clinton's candidacy, including sharing negative information about Clinton with the Trump campaign.
Most read in The Sun
Danchenko, a Russian citizen residing in Virginia, was charged with five counts of making false statements to the FBI.
According to the indictment, Danchenko's allegedly lied to federal authorities on five separate occasions from March-November 2017 regarding the sources of certain information that he provided to a UK investigative firm.
In October 2016, claims from the Steele dossier made their way into an FBI wiretap application, which targeted a former Trump campaign adviser.
However, the claims in the dossier - which were written by Danchenko’s employer, Christopher Steele, a former British intelligence agent - have not been proven, and some have been refuted.
In a 2020 interview with , Danchenko defended his claims, saying he had been tasked to gather “raw intelligence” and was passing it on to Steele.
Danchenko also denied being a Russian agent.
“I’ve never been a Russian agent,” Danchenko told the outlet.
“It is ridiculous to suggest that. This, I think, it’s slander.”
Danchenko's arrests come after the September indictment of cybersecurity lawyer Michael Sussman, who is being accused of lying to the about who he was working for when he brought concerns about possible Trump-Russia links to the bureau in 2016.
Sussmann was relaying concerns developed by data scientists about odd internet logs they said suggested the possibility of a covert communications channel between the Trump Organization and Alfa Bank, a Kremlin-linked financial institution.
He has denied lying to the FBI about who he was working for.
We pay for your stories!
Do you have a story for The US Sun team?
Email us at [email protected] or call 212 416 4552.
Like us on Facebook at and follow us from our main Twitter account at