WASHINGTON — The F.B.I.
warned a Republican congressman in 2012 that Russian spies were trying
to recruit him, officials said, an example of how aggressively Russian
agents have tried to influence Washington politics.
The
congressman, Dana Rohrabacher of California, has been known for years
as one of Moscow’s biggest defenders in Washington and as a vocal
opponent of American economic sanctions against Russia. He claims to
have lost a drunken arm-wrestling match with the current Russian
president, Vladimir V. Putin, in the 1990s. He is one of President
Trump’s staunchest allies on Capitol Hill.
As a newly appointed special counsel
investigates connections between the Trump campaign and Russian
operatives, the warning to Mr. Rohrabacher shows that the F.B.I. has for
years viewed Russian spies, sometimes posing as diplomats, as having a
hand in Washington.
Mr. Rohrabacher was drawn into the maelstrom this week when The Washington Post reported on an audio recording
of Representative Kevin McCarthy of California, the House majority
leader, saying last year, “There’s two people I think Putin pays:
Rohrabacher and Trump.” Mr. McCarthy said on Wednesday that he had made a joke that landed poorly.
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But
the F.B.I. has taken seriously the possibility that Russian spies would
target American politicians. In a secure room at the Capitol, an F.B.I.
agent told Mr. Rohrabacher in 2012 that Russian spies were trying to
recruit him as an “agent of influence” — someone the Russian government
might be able to use to steer Washington policy-making, former officials
said.
Mr.
Rohrabacher said in a telephone interview on Thursday that the meeting
had focused on his contact with one member of the Russian Foreign
Ministry, whom he recalled meeting on a trip to Moscow. “They were
telling me he had something to do with some kind of Russian
intelligence,” Mr. Rohrabacher said. He recalled the F.B.I. agent saying
that Moscow “looked at me as someone who could be influenced.”
Law
enforcement officials did not think that Mr. Rohrabacher was actively
working with Russian intelligence, officials said, rather that he was
being targeted as an unwitting player in a Russian effort to gain access
in Washington, according to one former American official. The official
said there was no evidence that Mr. Rohrabacher was ever paid by the
Russians.
Also
at the meeting were Representative Mike Rogers, Republican of Michigan,
and according to one former official, Representative C. A. Dutch
Ruppersberger, Democrat of Maryland. Mr. Rogers and Mr. Ruppersberger
were the senior members of the House Intelligence Committee. In a brief
telephone interview, Mr. Ruppersberger said that he recalled a meeting
with Mr. Rogers and Mr. Rohrabacher, but did not remember that an F.B.I.
agent was present. “Mike and I reminded Dana that Russia is our
adversary,” he said.
Mr. Rogers, who has since retired from Congress, declined to comment.
Mr.
Rohrabacher said he appreciated the warning but needed no reminder.
“Any time you meet a Russian member of their Foreign Ministry or the
Russian government, you assume those people have something to do with
Russian intelligence,” he said.
American
intelligence authorities have concluded that Russian spies started a
coordinated campaign of hacking and propaganda to damage Hillary
Clinton’s presidential campaign and help Mr. Trump. The Justice
Department appointed the former F.B.I. director Robert S. Mueller III on
Wednesday to lead the investigation into whether Mr. Trump’s campaign
colluded in that effort.
Mr. Rohrabacher, like Mr. Trump, has played down the significance of Russian meddling.
“Did
they try to influence our election? We have tried to influence their
elections, and everybody’s elections,” Mr. Rohrabacher told The Los Angeles Times
in March. “The American people are being fed information that would
lead them to believe that we need to be in a warlike stance when it
comes to Russia.”
Mr.
Trump’s presidency has been plagued by questions about his links to
Russia. Journalists have uncovered repeated instances of meetings
between Trump associates and Russians that were not disclosed or that
the White House initially mischaracterized. Mr. Trump’s first national
security adviser, Michael T. Flynn, was forced to resign after
misrepresenting his conversations with the Russian ambassador.
A
federal judge authorized a secret wiretap last year on Carter Page, a
foreign policy adviser to Mr. Trump’s campaign, based on evidence that
he was acting as a Russian agent. Mr. Page has denied any wrongdoing.
American authorities believe that Mr. Page met with a suspected
intelligence officer in Russia.
Mr.
Rohrabacher, for his part, said he was confident that Mr. Trump’s
associates had been savvy in their dealings with Russia. “The president
has some very astute people around him,” he said. “I can’t imagine
someone in a position of power in the United States government not fully
appreciating the fact that whoever he’s dealing with who’s a foreigner
that he doesn’t know is trying to influence him.”
Mr.
Rohrabacher was already facing what is shaping up to be the most
difficult campaign of his 28-year career in Congress — a race some of
his own colleagues would rather not see him run, given how much money
the party may have to spend on his behalf. After largely avoiding
difficult re-elections in his Republican-leaning district along a
stretch of the Pacific Ocean in Orange County, he finds himself in the
Democrats’ cross hairs.
With
an increasingly diverse district, which Hillary Clinton carried last
year, and a penchant for provocation, Mr. Rohrabacher has made himself
an irresistible target. One well-funded Democrat, Harley Rouda, has
already declared his candidacy, and there is talk of other potentially
formidable challengers also entering the race.
Mr. Rouda, a real estate executive, called Mr. Rohrabacher “Putin’s favorite congressman.”
“It
is the strangest thing imaginable in light of what all the intelligence
agencies have said about Russia hacking the United States’ electoral
process, yet he carries on,” Mr. Rouda said.
As
for Mr. McCarthy’s remark, even if only a quip, it showed that
Republican leaders were aware enough of Mr. Trump’s Russian ties six
months before Election Day to joke about them. WikiLeaks had not yet
begun to publish hacked emails from the Democratic National Committee or
Mrs. Clinton’s campaign chairman. And many of the revelations about Mr.
Trump’s associates and their Russian meetings had not yet been
revealed.
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