Matt Tait, a cybersecurity expert who claims a Republican opposition researcher recruited him to collude with Russians in the 2016 presidential elections, was interviewed by special counsel Robert Mueller. Tait was interviewed as part of Mueller’s probe of possible Russian interference with the elections, as well as potential collusion between Kremlin and the Trump campaign.
Tait disclosed he had been interacting with GOP opposition researcher Peter Smith, who was also the one to recruit him. Tait added that he was a source for the Wall Street Journal reports showing that Smith had tried to obtain stolen emails from Hilary Clinton’s private email. Despite the lack of evidence suggesting Clinton’s server had been hacked, it still remains a possibility, FBI Director James Comey said.
Earlier this year, Tait published a blog post, “The Time I Got Recruited to Collude with the Russians”, in which he claims Donald Trump gave Smith the blessing to conduct opposition research and verify the stolen emails he had previously obtained from dark web hackers. Tait said he accepted Smith’s request in order to discover more about the hackers, and even though he didn’t, Tait maintained it was “immediately apparent that Smith was well connected within the top echelons of the campaign” and was even working for it, Business Insider reports.
Tait further claimed Smith had formed a group of top Trump advisers to carry out opposition research on Hilary Clinton, including asking hackers for her private emails.
“A few weeks into my interactions with Smith, he sent me a document, ostensibly a cover page for a dossier of opposition research to be compiled by Smith’s group, and which purported to clear up who was involved,” Tait said.
Tait was also interviewed by the House Intelligence Committee, as part of their own separate Russia investigation.
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