Key Source in Steele Dossier Identified as Disgruntled Russian PR Exec

A key source in ex-British spy Christopher Steele’s infamous dossier investigating links between the 2016 Trump campaign and Russia was a disgruntled Russian PR executive and old friend of Steele’s employee, according to a Wall Street Journal investigation. Olga Galkina, who was working in Cyprus at the time of Steele’s investigations, is a middle school classmate of Igor Danchenko, who helped Steele try to uncover potentially compromising information on then-candidate Trump. She is responsible for some of the dossier’s key allegations, including the accusation that internet service company Webzilla played a central role in the 2016 DNC hack and that its Russian owner, Aleksej Gubarev, was strong-armed into cooperating with Russian security services. Galkina also claimed ex-Trump lawyer Michael Cohen held a secret meeting with Russian intel officials.

Special Counsel Robert Mueller deemed the dossier unreliable and found no evidence to prove some of its wildest claims. Sources familiar with the matter said Galkina was fired from one of Gubarev’s companies in late 2016 and implicated her former employer weeks later.