Natalia Veselnitskaya (pictured) denied having ties to a dossier that made a litany of tawdry accusations against President Trump
The Russian woman who met with Donald Trump Jr. in a highly controversial meeting last year during the presidential campaign is seeking to distance herself from a scandalous dossier on the President that surfaced following his White House win.
Natalia Veselnitskaya described the infamous document as ‘cheap gossip’ and denied having any links with the file after a Senate witness testified that she worked with the company that put together the information on a separate project.
‘When I read some parts of this “dossier” in the media I laughed,’ Veselnitskaya told Fox News.
Former British intelligence officer Christopher Steele (pictured) was hired by the firm Fusion GPS to compile the now infamous dossier
President Donald Trump arrives in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington, FebRUARY 1, 2017
‘What kind of idiots does one have to take Americans for to think that they can believe that stupid and incompetent [and] absurd [dossier]?’
The unsubstantiated dossier, commissioned as opposition research by unknown anti-Trump actors from the firm Fusion GPS, makes a number of salacious charges against the President, including his involvement with Russian prostitutes.
Fusion GPS hired Christopher Steele, a former MI-6 intelligence officer, to compile the document.
CEO of Hermitage Capital Management Bill Browder (pictured) testified that Veselnitskaya was hired by the same firm commissioned to compile Trump dossier to smear him
CEO of Hermitage Capital Bill Browder testified before a Senate committee last week that Veselnitskaya coordinated a ‘smear campaign’ against him while working for Fusion GPS and its co-founder Glenn Simpson.
Browder told the committee that he believes he was targeted for his support of the Magnitsky Act, a law passed in 2012 in the wake of Russian whistleblower Sergei Magnitsky’s death to impose sanctions on Russian oligarchs suspected of money laundering.
The Trump administration was quick to highlight the point, saying it offered proof that Moscow was actually working against the President during the campaign despite ‘collusion’ claims.
The dossier was first made public in January by Internet publication Buzzfeed, who posted the file in its entirety causing an international firestorm.
Buzzfeed is now being sued for libel in a civil suit, with Steele fighting an order to give a deposition in the case.
In speaking with Fox News, Veselnitskaya, 42, said she was almost in ‘shock’ when she learned Simpson was behind the compiling of the dossier.
In this July 11, 2017, file photo, Donald Trump Jr. is interviewed by host Sean Hannity on his Fox News
“The only thing I can say is that what I read on BuzzFeed—that is not something of Glenn’s level, it’s not his modus operandi, it’s not his work,’ Veselnitskaya said.
‘Cheap gossip and tall tales—that is diminishing for an investigator like Mr. Simpson.’
Veselnitskaya denies that she had anything to do with the dossier, but acknowledged that she had worked for Simpson’s firm around the same time the file was being compiled.
Veselnitskaya first made headlines when it was revealed earlier this year that she held a private meeting with Trump Jr., senior White House aid Jared Kushner and former Trump campaign chairmen Paul Manafort last summer.
The episode helped stoke an investigation into possible Russian government efforts to meddle in the 2016 US election, and is being headed by special prosecutor Robert Mueller, the former head of the FBI.
The Trump administration denies any wrongdoing.
Russian President Vladimir Putin attends a meeting with journalists in Moscow June 15, 2017