The Rise And Fall Of The Man Who Tried To Save the U.S. from Trump

Christopher Steele worked for British intelligence before becoming a private investigator. He was widely known as an expert on Russia, having worked for three years as a spy for M.I.6 in Moscow and later on its Russia desk in London. After leaving the agency in 2009 Steele co-founded Orbis, a private investigative-research firm. In the Spring of 2016, Steele's firm was hired to conduct "opposition research on Trump’s murky relationship with Russia". His research was subsidized by Hillary Clinton's campaign and by the Democratic National Committee. 

What Steele discovered shocked him. He wrote a series of memos, which later became the "Russia dossier". After BuzzFeed published the dossier on its website in January 2017, the public learned the extent of Steele's findings: 

The dossier painted a damning picture of collusion between Trump and Russia, suggesting that his campaign had "accepted a regular flow of intelligence from the Kremlin, including on his Democratic and other political rivals". It also alleged that Russian officials had been “cultivating” Trump as an asset for five years, and had obtained leverage over him, in part by recording videos of him while he engaged in compromising sexual acts, including consorting with Moscow prostitutes who, at his request, urinated on a bed.

But before then, Steele took several steps to alert authorities to his findings. Through behind-the-scene details, Jane Mayer, a New Yorker staff writer, unveils just how far Steele went. 

After the dossier was published, Steele and his family were forced to go into hiding. In January, Chuck Grassley, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and Lindsey Graham, chairman of the crime subcommittee, referred Steele to the Justice Department for a possible criminal investigation. 

“They’re trying to take down the whole intelligence community,” Steele said. “And they’re using me as the battering ram to do it.”