A Cambridge University professor with CIA contacts who President Trump calls a ‘spy’ kept tabs on key Trump campaign contacts – and once tried to establish that Trump foreign policy advisor George Papadopoulos was linked to the Russia-based hacking of emails belonging to Hillary Clinton.
The academic, Stefan Halper, had contacts with Trump campaign advisers including Papadopoulos, Carter Page and former national campaign co-chairman Sam Clovis.
He dined with Papadopoulos, bringing along his Turkish assistant, Azra Turk.
Halper, 73, cut a colorful figure as he strolled through diplomatic, academic, and espionage circles, having served in the Reagan, Ford, and Nixon administrations.
Owing to his girth, he earned the nickname ‘the walrus’ from some who know of his exploits.
During one of their dinners, Halper asked Papadopoulos whether he was involved in Russian hacking of Democratic emails, The Daily Caller reported.
‘George, you know about hacking the emails from Russia, right?’ he asked, according to multiple news reports.
After Papadopoulos denied it, Halper grew frustrated.
Cambridge University academic Stefan Halper tried to get three Trump campaign aides to trust him in 2016, including then-foreign policy adviser George Papadopoulos
Papadopoulos sat down in London for dinner with Halper and was asked what he knew about Russians hacking Hillary Clinton’s emails – a question that now appears part of a spy plot
The odd question would fit with a scenario suggested over the weekend by conservative pundits, in which Halper – acting on the FBI’s behalf – attempted to confirm Papadopoulos’ complicity but came up empty-handed.
The Washington Post and New York Times both reported Halper’s existence as an informant but did not publish his identity. Halper’s name had been circulating among reporters last week.
Halper, who has longstanding MI6 and CIA ties, married into the family of U.S. intelligence legend Ray Cline – famed for being the chief CIA analyst during the Cuban Missile Crisis.
Cultivating a rapport with Papadopoulos to gain his confdence was apparently important enough to the FBI that Halper offered him a payment for an academic paper – as a pretext for having in-person meetings.
Agreeing to pay Page $3,000 for a policy paper about erergy issues in Turkey, Israel and Cyprus gave him a reason to spend even more money to fly him to London to discuss the project during meetings and at least one dinner.
Later, Turk tried to meet with Papadopoulos in his home town of Chicago.
President Trump smelled blood over the weekend, demanding a Justice Department inquest into whether or not the Obama administration spied on his campaign organization for partisan purposes.
Halper also cultivated a relationship with Carter Page, a Trump aide, and invited him to visit his home in Virginia
‘If the FBI or DOJ was infiltrating a campaign for the benefit of another campaign, that is a really big deal,’ he tweeted Saturday, demanding the FBI turn over key documents to Republicans in Congress.
Halper could become Exhibit A if the GOP turns political spycraft into a midterm election issue.
An email obtained by the Daily Caller shows Halper reaching out to Page, whose Russia contacts drew the attention of FBI investigators in the early days of the Trump-Russia probe.
‘I thought I’d write as the summer wears on to see how you are,’ Halper wrote last year.
‘It seems attention has shifted a bit from the “collusion” investigation to the “contretempts” [sic] within the White House,’ he wrote July 28, 2017.
‘I must assume this gives you some relief,’ he added. ‘Be in touch when you have the time. Would be great to catch up.’
Halper invited Page to visit his farm in Virginia, part of what may have been an extended effort to cultivate him as a source of information for the FBI.
Page told The Daily Caller that Halper ingratiated himself by claiming to have been a longtime friend of Paul Manafort, who was at the time the Turmp campaign’s chairman.
But a person close to Manafort told the publication that the pair hadn’t seen one another since the Gerald Ford administration.
And Halper ‘rolled his eyes’ in faux solidarity with Page in mid-2016 when they discussed a letter from then-Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid to then-FBI Director James Comey, in which the Democratic senator suggested Page might be a Russian agent.
Halper’s effort to nurture a similar relationship with Clovis met with less success. Their sole meeting was a small-talk affair
Clovis had earlier recruited Page and Papadopoulos into the Trump campaign, making hima logical person of interest to any investigators who believed the pair were Trumpworld’s conduits to Moscow.
It’s not known whether Halper was on the FBI’s payroll. But according to public records, he has received six-figure payouts from a shadowy Department of Defense sub-agency in 2016 and 2017.
The Pentagon’s Office of Net Assessment paid him $129,000 last year and $282,000 the year before, while the Trump capaign was in full swing.