Act Daily News
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John Durham, the particular counsel investigating potential misconduct within the Trump-Russia probe, has spent at the least $6.5 million on his inquiry, together with $2 million this yr, in response to monetary paperwork launched Friday by the Justice Department.
The topline $6.5 million determine captures Durham’s spending between October 2020 and September 2022. However, Durham began his inquiry in early 2019, and the price of his first yr and half of labor has not been disclosed. That’s as a result of he was working at the moment as a US lawyer and was solely appointed as a particular counsel in October 2020.
More than $1 million of this yr’s spending was for worker salaries and advantages. The paperwork present that Durham’s workplace additionally spent greater than $220,000 on journey, greater than $600,000 on contractual companies akin to IT help, and greater than $100,000 on hire.
Durham’s yearslong investigation has fallen wanting expectations. Though he has detailed some embarrassing fake pas within the origins of the investigation into ties between Russia and former President Donald Trump’s 2016 marketing campaign, the particular counsel has not charged any present authorities officers with any crime.
The probe has resulted in only one conviction: a low-level FBI lawyer named Kevin Clinesmith, who averted jail by pleading responsible to doctoring an electronic mail in 2017 that the FBI used to justify the surveillance of a former Trump marketing campaign aide. The two different prosecutions Durham pursued – in opposition to Trump-Russia file supply Igor Danchenko and Hillary Clinton marketing campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann – led to acquittals.
Act Daily News has reported that Durham’s investigation is now in its closing phases as his group finally ends up its written report, which can be despatched to Attorney General Merrick Garland. The lawyer basic and different high Justice Department officers will resolve how a lot of the report back to make public. Garland has beforehand mentioned he desires to launch “as much as possible.”
In comparability, particular counsel Robert Mueller spent practically $32 million throughout the two-year Russia investigation.
This story and headline have been up to date.