Conservative commentator Dinesh D'Souza recently amplified claims that billionaire George Soros has been "directly exposed in the Russia hoax," leading to calls for "jail time." The assertion, made via a tweet by D'Souza, references newly declassified Justice Department documents that allege involvement by Soros and Hillary Clinton's campaign in disseminating claims linking Donald Trump to Russia before the 2016 presidential election.
The declassified annex of former Special Counsel John Durham’s report contains underlying intelligence suggesting that "credible foreign sources" allegedly tied to George Soros's Open Society Foundations (OSF) played a role in spreading the Trump-Russia narrative. According to these documents, the alleged plan, which involved the Clinton campaign, aimed to "distract people from her own missing emails" by raising the theme of "Putin’s support for Trump." Emails from a senior OSF official, Leonard Benardo, are cited as laying out plans to spread the "Russia collusion hoax" to U.S. media outlets.
An Open Society Foundations spokesperson has vehemently rejected these accusations, stating that "the claim that the Open Society Foundations helped orchestrate an FBI investigation is an outrageous falsehood." This comes after OSF faced a hack in 2016 by alleged Russian-backed entities, which released thousands of internal documents, some of which detailed the foundation's efforts to counter Russian influence. Despite these denials, Soros's spokesman Michael Vachon previously confirmed Soros supported continued investigations into Russia collusion allegations against Trump well past 2016.
Dinesh D'Souza, a prominent conservative filmmaker and author, has a history of making controversial claims against George Soros, including previously debunked allegations. His recent tweet reignites a long-standing narrative among some conservative circles regarding the origins of the "Russiagate" investigation, often referred to as the "Russia hoax." The FBI's "Crossfire Hurricane" investigation into alleged Trump-Russia collusion, which heavily relied on the now-discredited Steele Dossier funded by the Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee, is central to these discussions.
The newly surfaced allegations from the Durham report annex continue to fuel debate over the origins and motivations behind the Trump-Russia narrative. While these documents present specific claims regarding Soros's and the Clinton campaign's alleged roles, the Open Society Foundations maintain their innocence, asserting that the accusations are baseless. The ongoing controversy underscores the deep partisan divisions surrounding the 2016 election and its aftermath.