Collusion: how Russia helped Trump win the White House

Abstract

President Donald Trump's first year in office was dogged by the ‘Russiagate’ scandal, sparked by allegations that the Russian authorities intervened to sway the 2016 US presidential election in Trump's favour by undermining the campaign of his opponent, Hillary Clinton. President Trump has strongly denied that his campaign team colluded with Moscow and has deplored the allegations as ‘a cloud’ overhanging his presidency. The ongoing controversy has tied the hands of his administration and undermined hopes of improved relations between Russia and the US. These relations are now, according to a Russian Foreign Ministry statement in 2017, the worst they have been since the end of the Cold War. Improving them seems set to be, at best, a long and difficult process. Luke Harding describes the many forms that Russian meddling is alleged to have taken to further Trump's presidential campaign and undermine Clinton's. His book is a compelling read, providing much deeply researched detail. It opens with the story behind the so-called Steele dossier—a series of reports prepared by former British intelligence officer Christopher Steele. Their publication in January 2017 highlighted the possibility not only that the Russian authorities might have interfered in the US presidential election but, even more sensationally, that members of the Trump campaign team might have collaborated with the Russians in these efforts. The dossier was and remains highly controversial—supporting evidence has surfaced for some of its assertions but much has not (yet) been either confirmed or disproved. This is hardly surprising, given that, as Harding notes, Steele could not travel to Russia but depended for his information on intermediaries. As a result, Steele himself could not support the claims with verifiable data. To Harding's credit, he repeatedly points out that, while Steele could not be sure of the dossier's veracity, he did believe that it was credible (pp. 30, 32).