Latest news with #RussiaInterference
The National
5 days ago
- Politics
- The National
Trump administration declassifies Russia 2016 election investigation documents
President Donald Trump 's administration on Wednesday announced it has declassified documents that allegedly prove officials under president Barack Obama distorted facts about Russia's interference in the 2016 election. In a surprise appearance in the White House briefing room, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard said the report contains 'irrefutable evidence that details how President Obama and his national security team directed the creation of an intelligence community assessment that they knew was false.' This was part of a 'years-long coup and a treasonous conspiracy against the American people, our republic and an attempt to undermine President Trump's administration.' Ms Gabbard said evidence and intelligence confirm that Mr Obama 'manufactured intelligence assessment.' The 44-page report was released on Friday, and points to emails by Obama administration officials in which they concluded that Russia had not hacked election systems for more votes in Mr Trump's favour. The report was led by Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee after Mr Trump's win over Hillary Clinton in 2016. The report also said Russian intelligence services had damaging material on Ms Clinton as well as information about her health. Multiple investigations have been conducted over whether Russia interfered in the 2016, directly or through misinformation campaigns. The Russia investigation shadowed much of Mr Trump's first term in office. An investigation conducted by special counsel Robert Mueller found that the Trump campaign had welcomed the Kremlin's help, and that Mr Trump was Russia President Vladimir Putin's preferred candidate, but found insufficient evidence of criminal wrongdoing. Mr Obama's spokesman Patrick Rodenbush issued a statement responding to Ms Gabbard's claims. 'Our office does not normally dignify the constant nonsense and misinformation flowing out of this White House with a response,' he said. 'But these claims are outrageous enough to merit one. These bizarre allegations are ridiculous and a weak attempt at distraction.' The development comes as Mr Trump is under pressure from his Maga base, a conspiracy-minded segment of his political support, to release more details in the case of Jeffrey Epstein, a convicted sex offender. Mr Trump and Epstein socialised together on multiple occasions, before Epstein's criminal behaviour came to light. On Tuesday during an Oval Office meeting with the Philippines President Ferdinand Marcos Jr, Mr Trump said Mr Obama and other officials in his administration were engaged in treason. 'It's time to go after people,' he said.
News24
6 days ago
- Politics
- News24
‘This was treason': Trump attacks Obama to deflect from Jeffrey Epstein backlash
US President Donald Trump accused Barack Obama of treason. He claimed Obama sought to undermine the 2016 Trump presidential campaign. The US intelligence community concluded that Russia sought to damage Hillary Clinton's campaign and bolster Trump. US President Donald Trump accused former US president Barack Obama of 'treason' on Tuesday, accusing him, without providing evidence, of leading an effort to falsely tie him to Russia and undermine his 2016 presidential campaign. A spokesperson for Obama denounced Trump's claims, saying 'these bizarre allegations are ridiculous and a weak attempt at distraction'. While Trump has frequently attacked Obama by name, the Republican president has not, since returning to office in January, gone this far in pointing the finger at his Democratic predecessor with allegations of criminal action. During remarks in the Oval Office, Trump leaped on comments from his intelligence chief, Tulsi Gabbard, on Friday in which she threatened to refer Obama administration officials to the Justice Department for prosecution over an intelligence assessment of Russian interference in the 2016 election. READ | 'Joe is a fighter': Obama, Trump, Harris send wishes as Biden is diagnosed with 'aggressive' cancer She declassified documents and said the information she was releasing showed a 'treasonous conspiracy' in 2016 by top Obama administration officials to undermine Trump, claims that Democrats called false and politically motivated. 'It's there, he's guilty. This was treason,' Trump said on Tuesday, though he offered no proof of his claims. They tried to steal the election, they tried to obfuscate the election. They did things that nobody's ever imagined, even in other countries. Donald Trump An assessment by the US intelligence community published in January 2017 concluded that Russia, using social media disinformation, hacking and Russian bot farms, sought to damage Democrat Hillary Clinton's campaign and bolster Trump. The assessment determined that the actual impact was likely limited and showed no evidence that Moscow's efforts actually changed voting outcomes. A 2020 bipartisan report by the Senate intelligence committee had found that Russia used Republican political operative Paul Manafort, the WikiLeaks website and others to try to influence the 2016 election to help Trump's campaign. 'Nothing in the document issued last week (by Gabbard) undercuts the widely accepted conclusion that Russia worked to influence the 2016 presidential election but did not successfully manipulate any votes,' Obama spokesperson Patrick Rodenbush said in a statement. Trump, who has a history of promoting false conspiracy theories, has frequently denounced the assessments as a 'hoax'. In recent days, Trump reposted on his Truth Social account a fake video showing Obama being arrested in handcuffs in the Oval Office. Trump has been seeking to divert attention to other issues after coming under pressure from his conservative base to release more information about Jeffrey Epstein, who died by suicide in 2019 while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges. Backers of conspiracy theories about Epstein have urged Trump, who socialised with the disgraced financier during the 1990s and early 2000s, to release investigative files related to the case. Trump, asked in the Oval Office about Epstein, quickly pivoted into an attack on Obama and Clinton. 'The witch hunt that you should be talking about is they caught President Obama absolutely cold,' Trump suggested action would be taken against Obama and his former officials, calling the Russia investigation a treasonous act and the former president guilty of 'trying to lead a coup'. 'It's time to start, after what they did to me, and whether it's right or wrong, it's time to go after people. Obama has been caught directly,' he said. Democratic Representative Jim Himes responded on X: 'This is a lie. And if he's confused, the President should ask @SecRubio, who helped lead the bipartisan Senate investigation that unanimously concluded that there was no evidence of politicisation in the intelligence community's behaviour around the 2016 election.' Former Republican Senator Marco Rubio is now Trump's secretary of state. Since returning to office, Trump has castigated his political opponents whom he claims weaponised the federal government against him and his allies for the 6 January 2021, attack on the US Capitol by his supporters and his handling of classified materials after he left office in 2021. Laura Cavanaugh and Handout/various sources/AFP Obama has long been a target of Trump. In 2011 he accused then-President Obama of not being born in the US, prompting Obama to release a copy of his birth certificate. In recent months, Trump has rarely held back in his rhetorical broadsides against his two Democratic predecessors in a way all but unprecedented in modern times. He launched an investigation after accusing former President Joe Biden and his staff, without evidence, of a 'conspiracy' to use an autopen, an automated device that replicates a person's signature, to sign sensitive documents on the president's behalf. Biden has rejected the claim as false and 'ridiculous'. Gabbard's charge that Obama conspired to subvert Trump's 2016 election by manufacturing intelligence on Russia's interference is contradicted by a CIA review ordered by Director John Ratcliffe and published on 2 July, a 2018 bipartisan Senate report and declassified documents that Gabbard herself released last week. Aaron Schwartz/CNP/Bloomberg via Getty Images The documents show that Gabbard conflated two separate US intelligence findings in alleging that Obama and his national security aides changed an assessment that Russia probably was not trying to influence the election through cyber means. One finding was that Russia was not trying to hack US election infrastructure to change vote counts and the second was that Moscow probably was using cyber means to influence the US political environment through information and propaganda operations, including by stealing and leaking data from Democratic Party servers. The January 2017 US intelligence assessment ordered by Obama built on that second finding: That Russian President Vladimir Putin authorised influence operations to sway the 2016 vote to Trump. The review ordered by Ratcliffe found flaws in the production of that assessment. But it did not contest its conclusion and upheld 'the quality and credibility' of a highly classified CIA report on which the assessment's authors relied.
CNN
03-07-2025
- Politics
- CNN
New CIA report criticizes investigation into Russia's support for Trump in 2016
A declassified CIA memo released Wednesday challenges the work intelligence agencies did to conclude that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election because it wanted Republican Donald Trump to win. The memo was written on the orders of CIA Director John Ratcliffe, a Trump loyalist who spoke out against the Russia investigation as a member of Congress. It finds fault with a 2017 intelligence assessment that concluded the Russian government, at the direction of President Vladimir Putin, waged a covert influence campaign to help Trump win. It does not address that multiple investigations since then, including a report from the Republican-led Senate Intelligence Committee in 2020, reached the same conclusion about Russia's influence and motives. The eight-page document is part of an ongoing effort by Trump and close allies who now lead key government agencies to revisit the history of the long-concluded Russia investigation, which resulted in criminal indictments and shadowed most of his first term but also produced unresolved grievances and contributed to the Republican president's deep-rooted suspicions of the intelligence community. The report is also the latest effort by Ratcliffe to challenge the decision-making and actions of intelligence agencies during the course of the Russia investigation. A vocal Trump supporter in Congress who aggressively questioned former special counsel Robert Mueller during his 2019 testimony on Russian election interference, Ratcliffe later used his position as director of national intelligence to declassify Russian intelligence alleging damaging information about Democrats during the 2016 election even as he acknowledged that it might not be true. The new, 'lessons-learned' review ordered by Ratcliffe in May was meant to examine the tradecraft that went into the intelligence community's 2017 assessment on Russian interference and to scrutinize in particular the conclusion that Putin 'aspired' to help Trump win. The report cited several 'anomalies' that the authors wrote could have affected that conclusion, including a rushed timeline and a reliance on unconfirmed information, such as Democratic-funded opposition research about Trump's ties to Russia compiled by a former British spy, Christopher Steele. The report takes particular aim at the inclusion of a two-page summary of the Steele dossier, which included salacious and uncorroborated rumors about Trump's ties to Russia, in an annex of the intelligence community assessment. It said that decision, championed by the FBI, 'implicitly elevated unsubstantiated claims to the status of credible supporting evidence, compromising the analytical integrity of the judgment.' But even as Ratcliffe faulted top intelligence officials for a 'politically charged environment that triggered an atypical analytic process,' his agency's report does not directly contradict any previous intelligence. Russia's support for Trump has been outlined in a number of intelligence reports and the August 2020 conclusions of the Senate Intelligence Committee, then chaired by Sen. Marco Rubio, who now serves as Trump's secretary of state. It also was backed by Mueller, who in his 2019 report said that Russia interfered on Trump's behalf and that the campaign welcomed the aid, even if there was insufficient evidence to establish a criminal conspiracy. 'This report doesn't change any of the underlying evidence — in fact it doesn't even address any of that evidence,' said Brian Taylor, a Russia expert who directs the Moynihan Institute of Global Affairs at Syracuse University. Taylor suggested the report may have been intended to reinforce Trump's claims that investigations into his ties to Russia are part of a Democratic hoax. 'Good intelligence analysts will tell you their job is to speak truth to power,' Taylor said. 'If they tell the leader what he wants to hear, you often get flawed intelligence.' Intelligence agencies regularly perform after-action reports to learn from past operations and investigations, but it's uncommon for the evaluations to be declassified and released to the public. Ratcliffe has said he wants to release material on a number of topics of public debate and has already declassified records relating to the assassinations of President John Kennedy and his brother, Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, as well as the origins of COVID-19.
CNN
03-07-2025
- Politics
- CNN
New CIA report criticizes investigation into Russia's support for Trump in 2016
A declassified CIA memo released Wednesday challenges the work intelligence agencies did to conclude that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election because it wanted Republican Donald Trump to win. The memo was written on the orders of CIA Director John Ratcliffe, a Trump loyalist who spoke out against the Russia investigation as a member of Congress. It finds fault with a 2017 intelligence assessment that concluded the Russian government, at the direction of President Vladimir Putin, waged a covert influence campaign to help Trump win. It does not address that multiple investigations since then, including a report from the Republican-led Senate Intelligence Committee in 2020, reached the same conclusion about Russia's influence and motives. The eight-page document is part of an ongoing effort by Trump and close allies who now lead key government agencies to revisit the history of the long-concluded Russia investigation, which resulted in criminal indictments and shadowed most of his first term but also produced unresolved grievances and contributed to the Republican president's deep-rooted suspicions of the intelligence community. The report is also the latest effort by Ratcliffe to challenge the decision-making and actions of intelligence agencies during the course of the Russia investigation. A vocal Trump supporter in Congress who aggressively questioned former special counsel Robert Mueller during his 2019 testimony on Russian election interference, Ratcliffe later used his position as director of national intelligence to declassify Russian intelligence alleging damaging information about Democrats during the 2016 election even as he acknowledged that it might not be true. The new, 'lessons-learned' review ordered by Ratcliffe in May was meant to examine the tradecraft that went into the intelligence community's 2017 assessment on Russian interference and to scrutinize in particular the conclusion that Putin 'aspired' to help Trump win. The report cited several 'anomalies' that the authors wrote could have affected that conclusion, including a rushed timeline and a reliance on unconfirmed information, such as Democratic-funded opposition research about Trump's ties to Russia compiled by a former British spy, Christopher Steele. The report takes particular aim at the inclusion of a two-page summary of the Steele dossier, which included salacious and uncorroborated rumors about Trump's ties to Russia, in an annex of the intelligence community assessment. It said that decision, championed by the FBI, 'implicitly elevated unsubstantiated claims to the status of credible supporting evidence, compromising the analytical integrity of the judgment.' But even as Ratcliffe faulted top intelligence officials for a 'politically charged environment that triggered an atypical analytic process,' his agency's report does not directly contradict any previous intelligence. Russia's support for Trump has been outlined in a number of intelligence reports and the August 2020 conclusions of the Senate Intelligence Committee, then chaired by Sen. Marco Rubio, who now serves as Trump's secretary of state. It also was backed by Mueller, who in his 2019 report said that Russia interfered on Trump's behalf and that the campaign welcomed the aid, even if there was insufficient evidence to establish a criminal conspiracy. 'This report doesn't change any of the underlying evidence — in fact it doesn't even address any of that evidence,' said Brian Taylor, a Russia expert who directs the Moynihan Institute of Global Affairs at Syracuse University. Taylor suggested the report may have been intended to reinforce Trump's claims that investigations into his ties to Russia are part of a Democratic hoax. 'Good intelligence analysts will tell you their job is to speak truth to power,' Taylor said. 'If they tell the leader what he wants to hear, you often get flawed intelligence.' Intelligence agencies regularly perform after-action reports to learn from past operations and investigations, but it's uncommon for the evaluations to be declassified and released to the public. Ratcliffe has said he wants to release material on a number of topics of public debate and has already declassified records relating to the assassinations of President John Kennedy and his brother, Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, as well as the origins of COVID-19.
Washington Post
02-07-2025
- Politics
- Washington Post
New CIA report criticizes investigation into Russia's support for Trump in 2016
WASHINGTON — A declassified CIA memo released Wednesday challenges the work intelligence agencies did to conclude that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election because it wanted Republican Donald Trump to win. The memo was written on the orders of CIA Director John Ratcliffe, a Trump loyalist who spoke out against the Russia investigation as a member of Congress. It finds fault with a 2017 intelligence assessment that concluded the Russian government, at the direction of President Vladimir Putin, waged a covert influence campaign to help Trump win. It does not address that multiple investigations since then, including a report from the Republican-led Senate Intelligence Committee in 2020, reached the same conclusion about Russia's influence and motives. The eight-page document is part of an ongoing effort by Trump and close allies who now lead key government agencies to revisit the history of the long-concluded Russia investigation, which resulted in criminal indictments and shadowed most of his first term but also produced unresolved grievances and contributed to the Republican president's deep-rooted suspicions of the intelligence community . The report is also the latest effort by Ratcliffe to challenge the decision-making and actions of intelligence agencies during the course of the Russia investigation. A vocal Trump supporter in Congress who aggressively questioned former special counsel Robert Mueller during his 2019 testimony on Russian election interference, Ratcliffe later used his position as director of national intelligence to declassify Russian intelligence alleging damaging information about Democrats during the 2016 election even as he acknowledged that it might not be true. The new, 'lessons-learned' review ordered by Ratcliffe in May was meant to examine the tradecraft that went into the intelligence community's 2017 assessment on Russian interference and to scrutinize in particular the conclusion that Putin 'aspired' to help Trump win. The report cited several 'anomalies' that the authors wrote could have affected that conclusion, including a rushed timeline and a reliance on unconfirmed information, such as Democratic-funded opposition research about Trump's ties to Russia compiled by a former British spy, Christopher Steele . The report takes particular aim at the inclusion of a two-page summary of the Steele dossier, which included salacious and uncorroborated rumors about Trump's ties to Russia, in an annex of the intelligence community assessment. It said that decision, championed by the FBI, 'implicitly elevated unsubstantiated claims to the status of credible supporting evidence, compromising the analytical integrity of the judgment.' But even as Ratcliffe faulted top intelligence officials for a 'politically charged environment that triggered an atypical analytic process,' his agency's report does not directly contradict any previous intelligence. Russia's support for Trump has been outlined in a number of intelligence reports and the August 2020 conclusions of the Senate Intelligence Committee, then chaired by Sen. Marco Rubio , who now serves as Trump's secretary of state. It also was backed by Mueller, who in his 2019 report said that Russia interfered on Trump's behalf and that the campaign welcomed the aid even if there was insufficient evidence to establish a criminal conspiracy. 'This report doesn't change any of the underlying evidence — in fact it doesn't even address any of that evidence,' said Brian Taylor, a Russia expert who directs the Moynihan Institute of Global Affairs at Syracuse University. Taylor suggested the report may have been intended to reinforce Trump's claims that investigations into his ties to Russia are part of a Democratic hoax. 'Good intelligence analysts will tell you their job is to speak truth to power,' Taylor said. 'If they tell the leader what he wants to hear, you often get flawed intelligence.' Intelligence agencies regularly perform after-action reports to learn from past operations and investigations, but it's uncommon for the evaluations to be declassified and released to the public. Ratcliffe has said he wants to release material on a number of topics of public debate and has already declassified records relating to the assassinations of President John Kennedy and his brother, Sen. Robert F. Kennedy , as well as the origins of COVID-19 .
