I already posted the source. It was the reported statement by the people who actually commissioned Steele. Here is that source again:
The Steele dossier was first commissioned in 2011 for Fusion GPS which was run at the time by Glenn Simpson and three other former journalists at the Wall Street Journal. As for who first paid for Fusion GPS to commission Steele, we only have Fusion's statements that it was from a “Never Trump Republican and not directly from the campaign war chests of any of Trump’s primary opponents."
https://www.vanityfair.com/news/201...ssian-dossier-was-compiled-christopher-steele
The article you post is how the Washington Free Beacon said that they commissioned Fusion GPS in 2012 to provide them with information on Trump. Or in their own words, from the article you posted "
we retained Fusion GPS to provide research on multiple candidates in the Republican presidential primary, just as we retained other firms to assist in our research into Hillary Clinton,"
This was a year after Fusion had accepted money from a “Never Trump Republican and not directly from the campaign war chests of any of Trump’s primary opponents." At no point does your article make the claim that the gathering of information that would form the dossier didn't start until the Washington Free Beacon came calling.