Fusion GPS
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| Founded | 2009 |
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| Headquarters | Washington D.C. |
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Key people
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Glenn Simpson |
| Website | fusiongps.com |
Fusion GPS is a commercial research and strategic intelligence firm based in Washington D.C. The company conducts open-source investigations, provides research and strategic advice for businesses, law firms and investors, as well as for political inquiries, such as opposition research. Fusion GPS uses "source networks to find information that is not readily accessible or in the public domain".
The company was co-founded in 2009 by Glenn R. Simpson and Peter Fritsch, both former journalists for The Wall Street Journal.
Fusion GPS was hired by Democrats in 2012 to do opposition research on Mitt Romney. Some of the work that received the most media attention was focused on investigating the marriage records of a large donor to the Romney presidential campaign, Frank VanderSloot.
In August 2015, Planned Parenthood retained Fusion GPS to defensively investigate the veracity of a series of undercover videos released by pro-life activists that they claim showed Planned Parenthood officials agreeing to sell fetal tissues obtained through abortions to medical researchers. Fusion GPS hired video and transcription experts to analyze the videos and summarized the findings in a forensic report. The report concluded that the "unedited" videos posted by activists had been edited. The pro-life activists attributed the gaps to "bathroom breaks and waiting periods."
The report was provided to U.S. congressional leadership as evidence as they were considering funding and other issues related to Planned Parenthood operations. After a grand jury cleared Planned Parenthood of any wrongdoing, the pro-life activists behind the undercover videos were later arrested and charged with 15 felonies, including unlawfully recording people without their permission and conspiracy to invade privacy.These charges were dropped 6 months later, but on March 28, 2017, Daleiden and Merritt were charged with 15 felonies in the State of California - one for each of the people whom they had filmed without consent, and one for criminal conspiracy to invade privacy. On 21 June 2017, fourteen of these charges were dismissed, with leave to amend, on the grounds that they were legally insufficient.
During 2015 and 2016, Fusion GPS was hired by the BakerHostetler law firm which was defending Prevezon from an asset seizure by the U.S. government. As part of their litigation support, Fusion GPS investigated Bill Browder, a witness central to the case. During the course of the case, Browder claimed that Fusion GPS had previously been hired to undertake a pro-Russia campaign to aimed at stopping passage of the Magnitsky Act, named after Sergei Magnitsky, a lawyer and auditor who died while being held without charges in a Russian government prison after he revealed that the Kremlin had stolen hundreds of millions of dollars from Hermitage Capital Management.
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