Overview

#Pissgate refers to an ongoing political scandal surrounding allegations made by a former British intelligence officer that the Russian government has been grooming Donald Trump to be the United States president for years, while simultaneously gathering compromising information about him, including a claim that Trump hired a group of prostitutes to urinate on the bed in the presidential suite of the Ritz Carlton Hotel, where President Obama and the First Lady had stayed during their official trip to Russia in 2013.

Background

On January 10th, 2017, CNN reported that both President Barack Obama and President-Elect Donald Trump received a classified debriefing of allegations from a credible source that the Russian government has been covertly gathering compromisable personal and financial information about Trump, all the while regularly exchanging information with his campaign team through indirect channels. About an hour after CNN broke the story, BuzzFeed News published the full-length version of the document, a 25-page long dossier compiled by a former British MI6 agent with ties to the U.S. spy agencies and prepared as opposition research for a bipartisan group of anti-Trump Republicans and Democrats.

'Golden Showers' Claim

The allegations in the document includes a particularly scandalous claim that during one of Donald Trump's visit to Russia in recent years, he hired a group of prostitutes to urinate on the bed, otherwise known as a 'golden showers' show, in the presidential suite of the Ritz Carlton Hotel, where President Obama and the First Lady had stayed during their official trip to Russia in 2013. According to news reports, while the credibility of the source has been vetted by the U.S. authorities, the allegations remain unverified and under investigation.

Notable Developments

Online Reaction

Upon its publication, the BuzzFeed News report garnered over 1.3 million views within first three hours. On Twitter, readers reacted to the article with satirical commentaries using the hashtag #PissGate, #goldenshowers^[19] and #PEEOTUS^[20] while the /r/PissGate subreddit was launched on Reddit.

On 4chan and Reddit, fake photographs of highlighted documents with parody accusations against Trump began circulating on /pol/ and /r/The_Donald (shown below).

Official Investigation

According to CNN's sources inside the U.S. government, while the U.S. intelligence officials have vetted the credibility of British MI6 agent's works in the past, the FBI has launched an investigation to assess the credibility and accuracy of the allegations, due to its heavy reliance on claims made by Russian sources.

Donald Trump's Responses

That day, Trump tweeted the statement "Fake news – a total political witch hunt!" in all capital letters. Within 24 hours, the tweet gained over 72,000 likes, 50,000 replies and 25,000 retweets.^[14]

The following day, Trump posted several additional tweets responding to the accusations (shown below).

Michael Cohen's Response

Also on January 10th, Trump's attorney Michael Cohen responded to specific claims made in the document that he met secretely with Kremlin officials in Prague in August 2016, tweeting "I have never been to Prague in my life" (shown below).

In reply, other Twitter users mocked the tweet by posting photographs of other objects, along with denials of going to Prague and various locations (shown below). That day, the blog TrumpOrMrBurns^[18] published a post highlighting various examples of the tweet replies.

BuzzFeed Ben Smith's Company Letter

That day, BuzzFeed Editor-in-Chief Ben Smith issued an email to BuzzFeed News staff explaining the reason for releasing the unverified documents, noting that "there is serious reason to doubt the allegations" but that "publishing the dossier reflects how we see the job of reporters in 2017" (shown below).^[21]

4chan Hoax Rumor

Meanwhile on 4chan, an elaborate alternative theory behind the origin of the dossier began circulating on the imageboard, which claimed that the 'golden showers' passage in the report was a hoax fabricated by Anonymous pranksters since as early as late October 2016 that was sent to Republican strategist and #NeverTrump critic Rick Wilson, who then proceeded to pass it on to the CIA, resulting its inclusion in the agency's official classified intelligence report on Russia's U.S. election interference. The theory was accompanied by a jumble of remarks made by Rick Wilson on Twitter and threads on 4chan.

Wilson subsequently denied the rumor in on Twitter, saying that the reports did not come from /pol/ and that he was not BuzzFeed's source (shown below).

That same evening, Twitter user @trsprudence^[16] posted several tweets claiming to have sent Rick Wilson a "piss fan fiction" based off a story about KGB black mail he discovered on Reddit.^[15] The following day, @trsprudence^[17] announced he was "speaking to a lawyer today about publishing".

Press Conference

On January 11th, 2016, Donald Trump held a press conference in which he discussed the Pissgate allegations, referring to them as "false" and "fake news." During the conference, he referred to BuzzFeed as a "steaming pile of garbage" (shown below, left) and refused to take questions from a CNN reporter, calling the cable news network "fake news" (shown below, right).

Clinton Campaign/DNC Funding

On October 24th, 2017, The Washington Post^[22] reported that Marc E. Elias, a lawyer representing the DNC and the Hillary Clinton campaign, retained Washington law firm Fusion GPS to conduct the research that led to the "Pissgate" dossier. Fusion GPS then hired Christopher Steele, the author behind the dossier. Several members of the DNC said they were unaware of the funding, but said that had they known, they would have worked harder to get the dossier out before the election. On October 25th, Trump called it disgraceful the Democrats funded the dossier, but also suggested that the report was likely initially launched by a Republican client, though he refused to divulge his guess, telling reporters "you'll be surprised."^[23] This echoes a report from CNN^[24] released shortly after the dossier story broke, writing:

"His investigations related to Mr. Trump were initially funded by groups and donors supporting Republican opponents of Mr. Trump during the GOP primaries, multiple sources confirmed to CNN. Those sources also said that once Mr. Trump became the nominee, further investigation was funded by groups and donors supporting Hillary Clinton."

Fusion GPS Transcript Release

On January 9th, 2018, Senator Dianne Feinstein (Dem., California) published the entire transcript of Fusion GPS founder Glenn Simpson's hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee.^[32][33] The move was made after Republicans had selectively leaked portions of the transcript and referred Simpson and Fusion GPS to the Department of Justice. Many Twitter users interpreted a section of Simpson's testimony in which he said Trump was perhaps being blackmailed by the Russians to confirm the supposed "Pee Tape" was real (examples shown below).

Defamation Lawsuit

On January 9th, 2018, Bloomberg reporter Jennifer Jacobs tweeted that Trump's lawyer Michael Cohen was filing a defamation lawsuit against Buzzfeed for publishing the dossier,^[25] as well as Fusion GPS and its founder Glenn Simpson.^[26] Cohen confirmed the lawsuit on Twitter later that day.^[28] The dossier has become a key part of the investigation into the Trump campaign by Special Counsel Robert Mueller. Writing in the New York Times,^[27] Buzzfeed editor Ben Smith defended his decision to publish the dossier, writing "a year of government inquiries and blockbuster journalism has made clear that the dossier is unquestionably real news." The news was covered by major news outlets including The Washington Times,^[29] Newsweek,^[30] and ABC News.^[31]

James Comey's Book

According to an excerpt from James Comey's upcoming book, A Higher Loyalty, Trump asked Comey personally to investigate the allegations about the pee tape.^[34] The excerpt recalls a January 27th, 2017 conversation. Comey writes:

“He brought up what he called the ‘golden showers thing’ . . . adding that it bothered him if there was ‘even a 1 percent chance’ his wife, Melania, thought it was true… He just rolled on, unprompted, explaining why it couldn’t possibly be true, ending by saying he was thinking of asking me to investigate the allegation to prove it was a lie. I said it was up to him.”

Comey also details other instances in which Trump spoke to him about the pee tape. Trump denied that he had ever stayed in the Russian hotel where the tape was allegedly made, and noted to Comey that he's a germophobe. "There’s no way I would let people pee on each other around me, no way,” he is quoted as saying.

Online, the excerpt inspired another set of memes about the pee tape. User @KrangTNelson tweeted a combination of the Twitter Sparkles and Donald Trump Staring at the Eclipse referencing the tape, gaining over 2,000 retweets (shown below, left). Twitter user and Daily Beast reporter Spencer Ackerman joked that should the pee tape turn out to be real, it would cause Trump supporters to become urine enthusiasts, gaining over 430 retweets (shown below, right).

Related Memes

The Pee Tape

Since the release of the dossier, the most salacious allegation in it, the supposed tape in which Trump hired Russian prostitutes to urinate on the bed Barack Obama once slept on, has been joked about on Twitter and dubbed "The Pee Tape." Common jokes about the pee tape involve insisting that it's real and could be the thing which forces Trump's resignation. Some popular tweets referencing the "Pee Tape" include a tweet by @nxthompson which suggested a James Comey tweet may have been mocking Trump (shown below, left), which gained 9,600 retweets and 36,000 likes. Another tweet by illustrator Matt Lubchansky gained over 120 likes (shown below, right).

Jesse Watters' Defense

On February 1st, 2018, political pundit Jesse Watters appeared on Sean Hannity ahead of the release of the Nunes Memo to discuss the contents of the memo. While interviewing with Hannity, the subject of the pee tape arose. Hannity suggested the pee tape was invented to obtain a warrant to begin the Russiagate investigation, to which Watters replied, "And you know it’s not true. If someone pees in the bed, where are you gonna sleep?"

Twitter users responded to the news with more assuredness that the pee tape is real. User @pattymo tweeted that the pee tape was real, gaining over 300 retweets and 3,200 likes (shown below, left). Twitter user @Rschooley tweeted that Fox News attempting to debunk the pee tape's existence was further evidence of the pee tape's existence.

Search Interest

External References