This is just a quick piece to note that I am pleased to see the Guardian following up on what I wrote in March with some strong reporting on the connections between former U.K. Independence Party (UKIP) leader Nigel Farage and Donald Trump, Roger Stone, Steve Bannon, Julian Assange and Guccifer 2.0.
They even used some of the connections that I discovered while researching that piece (like Roger Stone’s dinner with Farage), and they found something else. I had reported that Breitbart’s London editor-in-chief Raheem Kassam was keen to defend UKIP against allegations that it was funded by Vladimir Putin. Here’s what I didn’t know:
Two years later, in 2014, Breitbart News, of which Bannon was executive chair, opened an office in London. A top editor, Raheem Kassam, later went on to work as Farage’s chief of staff.
This is getting discussed today because the FBI apparently agrees with me that Nigel Farage seems to be the hub for a remarkable number of spokes.
Sources who spoke to the Guardian said it was Farage’s proximity to people at the heart of the investigation that was being examined as an element in their broader inquiry into how Russia may have worked with Trump campaign officials to influence the US election.
“One of the things the intelligence investigators have been looking at is points of contact and persons involved,” one source said. “If you triangulate Russia, WikiLeaks, Assange and Trump associates the person who comes up with the most hits is Nigel Farage.
“He’s right in the middle of these relationships. He turns up over and over again. There’s a lot of attention being paid to him.”
The source mentioned Farage’s links with Roger Stone, Trump’s long-time political adviser who has admitted being in contact with Guccifer 2.0, a hacker whom US intelligence agencies believe to be a Kremlin agent.
Guccifer 2.0 isn’t believed to be a Kremlin agent. The belief is that Guccifer 2.0 isn’t a person at all, but a fake persona created by Russian intelligence.
In any case, I feel like a made a small contribution to this reporting, so I wanted to share it.