passport and said he d never even been to prague. and even though it is common to travel in europe without getting a passport stamped in every country visited, cohen s passport tweet was touted by the president elect as a definitive repudiation of the entire dossier. it s a disgrace what took place, it s a disgrace, and i think they ought to apologize to start with, michael cohen. reporter: the president elect attacked not just the dossier itself, he accused the u.s. intelligence community of leaking it. i think it was disgraceful, disgraceful that the intelligence agencies allowed any information that turned out to be so false and fake, out. i think it s a disgrace. and i say that and i say that. and that s something that nazi germany would have done and did do. reporter: trump also lashed out at buzzfeed. buzzfeed, which is a failing pile of garbage. reporter: on top of the criticism from the president elect, buzzfeed also took heat from other journalists for
former british spy christopher steele and published by buzzfeed. within hours of being outed, steele went into hiding with his wife and children. the media were all over him. reporter: christopher steele s friend, nigel west. and the advice that he adopted was the correct advice that anybody in reputation management would give, which is saying nothing and disappear. reporter: in the days immediately after the dossier s publication, anyone interested in russia s role in the election had read it, including jonathan weiner. i looked at it like i look at all human reports. you look at professionalism of the person gathering it, their background, the care with which they operate. and you say, this is serious stuff. but intelligence is not evidence. these are two very different things.
page served as an intermediary with the russians. trump s personal lawyer michael cohen traveled to prague to meet with russians trying to cover up the scandal. damaging allegations about trump and his dealings with russians. reporter: the reaction from the trump camp was immediate and furious. the buzzfeed memo is total complete garbage is what it is. reporter: the trump associates named in the dossier vehemently denied any wrongdoing. paul manafort said the allegations were a democrat party dirty trick and completely false. it s so crazy that it s laughable. reporter: carter page admitted he had been to russia, but insisted he had gone on personal business, not as trump s russian go-between. i had no dealings in russia that would directly that had anything to do with the trump campaign. reporter: as for michael cohen, trump s lawyer, he tweeted a picture of his
what was fast becoming the worst kept secret in washington. the question we ask ourselves, why would we keep this from our audience? reporter: at 5:20 p.m. on january 10th, buzzfeed hit publish. all 35 pages of the dossier went online with a warning that the allegations are unverified and the report contains errors. and that was really our main goal in our summary of it, was to say very, very clearly, we haven t verified this. there are some, as you say, minor, but real errors in it that could give you pause and here s what we know about where it comes from. reporter: it was explosive stuff, and not just the lewd allegations. there were other serious charges, names named in black and white. the public was seeing it all for the first time. according to the dossier s unnamed sources, campaign chairman paul manafort managed a conspiracy of cooperation with the russians. foreign policy adviser carter
as part of last week s classified intelligence briefing regarding russian efforts to undermine the u.s. election. reporter: that report set off alarm bells in the new york offices of buzzfeed news. as was true at several other news organizations, reporters at buzzfeed had obtained a copy of christopher steele s memos. we looked at things that seemed confirmable. reporter: ben smith is buzzfeed s editor in chief. he said buzzfeed was not able to verify claims in the dossier, but smith felthat su a dossier was being taken seriously by u.s. intelligence, that itself was news. we knew that this document was being circulated, talked about, and in some cases acted upon, at the very highest levels of government. and you see important decision-makers, making decisions about how they are relating to the administration, how they re thinking about russia, that are explained by this piece of dark matter. reporter: ben smith and others at buzzfeed felt it was time to let their audience in