Christopher Steele, former British intelligence officer in London Tuesday March 7, 2017 where he has spoken to the media for the first time . Steele who compiled an explosive and unproven dossier on President Donald Trump’s purported activities in Russia has returned to work. Christopher Steele said Tuesday he is “really pleased” to be back at work in London after a prolonged period out of public view. He went into hiding in January. (Victoria Jones/PA via AP)

According to The New York Times, Attorney General William Barr recently approved the release of information about former British spy Christopher Steele which had been previously redacted.

Citing two individuals with knowledge of the situation, the Times reported:

A representative from the office of the Justice Department inspector general, Michael E. Horowitz, told the former F.B.I. informant, Christopher Steele, on Sunday that the Justice Department had decided to allow for the release of the information, two people briefed on the situation said late on Sunday.

…

The notice to Mr. Steele on the eve of the report’s release was highly unusual. Like the other witnesses interviewed for the inspector general’s report, Mr. Steele had earlier reviewed the findings that are pertinent to him, and he was given a chance to comment on them. In this case, Mr. Horowitz’s office did not detail for him the additional information and gave him no opportunity to respond for the report to be released on Monday.

The Times claims the IG report is “expected to debunk the idea that the FBI relied on the Steele dossier to open its Russia investigation” and that it wasn’t clear “to what extent” the FBI’s application to the FISA Court for the warrant to spy on Trump campaign advisor Carter Page relied on Steele’s dossier. Aside from a Yahoo News article written by reporter Michael Isikoff in late September 2016, who had used Christopher Steele as the source for his information, what else did they have?

Then-FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe himself told lawmakers the FBI would not have received the warrant to spy on Page without the dossier. Now Democrats and their co-conspirators in the media are reporting the FBI had additional documentation to support they had “probable cause” to surveil Page. Although we won’t know if this claim is true until we see the report, it’s odd no one has ever mentioned it before.

Dan Bongino, who has followed this case closely addressed this in a podcast last week. I posted on this here. Here’s what Bongino had to say about it.

Are the leakers “now suggesting there is something else out there”? McCabe himself once said there would have been no warrant without the dossier. “Where is it? Where’s the beef?…Where is this information they’re claiming would be probable cause? Your dossier was false. Your information on Carter Page was false and now it’s alleged you manipulated evidence to get this passed through the court? Where’s the other stuff?…You’re suggesting that hiding out there is a gift basket of information that was used to spy on the Trump team that was verified and true that would have led to a warrant anyway? And it hasn’t leaked yet? Nobody’s heard it? Mueller didn’t find it? The press didn’t find it? So there’s probable cause to believe the collusion hoax was real?”

I suppose we’ll hear the answer later on today.

In the meantime, a little levity as we await the report.

#RealSearchBan
RT If You Think It’s Time To
………. LOCK THEM ALL UP#WhatILikeIn4Words pic.twitter.com/EQP94VZXmF

— alice 🇺🇸 (@realTRUMPERLAND) September 5, 2018