The Virginia home of Dimitri Simes, a notable author and policy analyst who advised Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign and currently hosts a current affairs program on Russia’s state-run Channel One, was raided by FBI agents on August 13th. The FBI confirmed the raid to the local Rappahannock News, which initially reported the story.
Simes, whose name appeared more than 100 times in the 2019 Mueller report investigating Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election, stated he was out of the country during the raid and was not informed beforehand. He expressed his confusion and concern, noting that he had not seen a warrant or been contacted by any law enforcement.
In an interview with Russian government-owned Sputnik News, Simes described the raid as an intimidation tactic aimed at anyone opposing official policies or the so-called "deep state." He speculated that the true purpose of the raid was to deter him from returning to the United States.
Simes’s son, Dimitri Simes Jr., told Sputnik News that his father has been out of the United States since October 2022. He criticized the Biden administration in tweets, suggesting that elements within the government are attempting to prevent de-escalation with Russia and could potentially lead the country into a broader conflict.
Born in Moscow, Simes emigrated to the United States in 1973. He served as an informal foreign policy adviser to President Richard Nixon and led the Center for the National Interest for nearly three decades. In March 2016, after meeting Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, Simes began providing informal foreign policy advice to the Trump campaign, advocating for greater cooperation with Russia.
The Mueller report, which investigated connections between the Trump campaign and Russian officials, prominently featured Simes and the Center for the National Interest, though it cleared them of any wrongdoing. Simes also underwent a Senate finance committee investigation into his contacts with Russian Central Bank official Alexander Torshin and Maria Butina, who was sentenced to 18 months in prison for attempting to infiltrate U.S. conservative groups before the 2016 election.
Last year, Simes moderated a discussion with Russian President Vladimir Putin at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum. In June, he participated in a closed-door meeting with Putin, as reported by the state-owned Russian news agency Tass.
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