Page:Simpson-transcript-redacted.pdf/149

Glenn SimpsonPage 149 know, reviewed or backed up. On the question of whether it makes sense — well, let me stay on the question of some of the events that are described. We were aware of some of these trips and we were obviously aware of the hostility toward Hillary Clinton and, you know, there was a lot of general knowledge that we had that fit with this just in terms of dates and places and roles of people in the Kremlin. So on a surface level, you know, it was credible too, but the thing that, you know, most concerned me at this point was my own familiarity with foreign meddling in American elections, which is a subject that I've dealt with for a long time.

In the 1990s I was working at the Wall Street Journal and I wrote some of the very first stories about the Chinese government's interference in the 1996 presidential election which triggered a massive national security investigation, numerous prosecutions, lots of business for Bob Muse, and a lot of congressional hearings, congressional inquiries. And in that episode it was eventually dug out by congressional investigations that the fundraisers, the Asian fundraisers were Chinese intelligence assets. So there's ample recent 1-800-FOR-DEPO