FBI Director James B. Comey and Director of National Intelligence James R. Clapper Jr. are in agreement with a CIA assessment that Russia intervened in the 2016 election in part to help Donald Trump win the White …
Washington: FBI Director James Comey and Director of National Intelligence James Clapper Jr. are in agreement with a CIA assessment that Russia intervened in the 2016 election in part to help Donald Trump win the White …
WASHINGTON: The CIA and FBI have both concluded that Russia intervened in the US presidential election aiming to help Donald Trump win, The Washington Post reported ... that Moscow hoped to damage the White House …
BI in agreement with CIA that Russia aimed to help Trump win White House
A view of the Kremlin in Moscow during a snowfall on Dec. 8. (Maxim Shipenkov/European Pressphoto Agency)
New revelations about Comey’s position could put to rest suggestions by some lawmakers that the CIA and the FBI weren’t on the same page on Russian President Vladimir Putin’s intentions.
ADVERTISING
“I think it’s ridiculous,” Trump said in an interview with “Fox News Sunday,” his first Sunday news-show appearance since the Nov. 8 election. “I think it’s just another excuse. I don’t believe it. . . . No, I don’t believe it at all.”
At a “thank you” event Thursday night with some of her top campaign donors and fundraisers, Clinton said she believed Russian-backed hackers went after her campaign because of a personal grudge that Putin had against her. Putin had blamed Clinton for fomenting mass protests in Russia after disputed 2011 parliamentary elections that challenged his rule. Putin said Clinton, then secretary of state, had “sent a signal” to protesters by labeling the elections “neither free nor fair.”
In December, during a closed door briefing
with senators, the CIA shared a secret assessment. The agency concluded
it was now “quite clear“ that Russia’s goal was to the help Donald Trump
win the White House.
(Jason Aldag/The Washington Post)
“Earlier
this week, I met separately with FBI [Director] James Comey and DNI Jim
Clapper, and there is strong consensus among us on the scope, nature,
and intent of Russian interference in our presidential election,”
Brennan said, according to U.S. officials who have seen the message.
The
CIA and the FBI declined to comment on Brennan’s message or on the
classified intelligence assessment that CIA officials shared with
members of the Senate Intelligence Committee earlier this month, setting
off a political firestorm.In the closed-door Senate briefing, CIA officials said it was now “quite clear” that electing Trump was one of Russia’s goals, according to the officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence matters.
CIA and FBI officials do not think Russia had a “single purpose” by intervening during the presidential campaign, officials said. In addition to the goal of helping elect Trump, Putin aimed to undermine confidence in the U.S. electoral system, intelligence officials have told lawmakers.
A few days after the Senate briefing, a senior FBI counterintelligence official briefed the House Intelligence Committee but was not as categorical as the CIA briefer about Russia’s intention to help Trump, according to officials who were present. The FBI official’s more cautious presentation of the intelligence to the House panel left some Republican and Democratic lawmakers in the room with the impression that the FBI disagreed with the CIA.
Throughout his Dec. 16 news conference,
President Obama came back to Russia's suspected role in the 2016
election, how the U.S. became vulnerable to that country's influence and
what should be focused on going forward.
(Reuters)
Earlier this week, Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), chairman of the House Intelligence Committee and a Trump supporter, wrote to spy chiefs to demand briefings on the Russian meddling.
But Clapper responded that he wanted to first complete a review of all available U.S. intelligence, as directed by Obama.
Brennan tried to talk to Nunes several times about the dispute. But officials said the congressman didn’t take his calls until after he issued a statement Wednesday asking intelligence leaders to “clarify press reports that the CIA has a new assessment that it has not shared with us.”
Officials disputed the statement, saying Nunes had been fully briefed on the intelligence.
“In
recent days, I have had several conversations with members of Congress,
providing an update on the status of the review as well as the
considerations that need to be taken into account as we proceed,”
Brennan wrote in his message to CIA staffers. “Many — but unfortunately
not all — members understand and appreciate the importance and the
gravity of the issue, and they are very supportive of the process that
is underway.”
Brennan wrote to the CIA workforce,
officials said, to reassure them in the face of accusations from Trump
supporters that intelligence was being politicized.Nunes did not respond to requests for comment, but in a statement, he said, “We have not received any information from Intelligence Community (IC) agencies indicating that they have developed new assessments on this issue. I am alarmed that supposedly new information continues to leak to the media but has not been provided to Congress.”
In one of his last news conference of the year, Obama defended his administration’s response to the Russian hacking and vowed to “send a clear message to Russia” that its meddling was unacceptable.
“I
think we handled it the way it should have been handled,” he said of
the hacking investigation and the lack of a formal accusation of blame
until a month before the election. “We allowed law enforcement and the
intelligence community to do its job without political influence.”
Obama
was referring to an Oct. 7 statement by Clapper and Homeland Security
Secretary Jeh Johnson publicly blaming Russia for hacking political
organizations, a clear reference to the Democratic National Committee
and other Democratic officials.U.S. officials said an earlier draft of the Clapper-Johnson statement singled out Putin by name for authorizing the influence operation. But before the final statement was made public, Putin’s name was removed “so it wouldn’t be provocative,” one official said. Instead, the statement blamed “Russia’s senior-most officials.”
“Imagine if we had done the opposite,” he said Friday. “It would have become immediately just one more political scrum. And part of the goal here was to make sure that we did not do the work of the leakers for them by raising more and more questions about the integrity of the election right before the election was taking place — at a time, by the way, when the president-elect himself was raising questions about the integrity of the election.”
At Friday’s
news conference, Obama did not directly point the finger at the Russian
president. But he came close to doing so by saying: “Not much happens in
Russia without Vladimir Putin.”
secrecy group.
Obama said some possible retaliatory measures might not be seen by the public, although they would be seen or felt by Moscow. Obama, who has only a few weeks left in office, made clear any response to the hacks must be carefully thought through.
“The relationship between us and Russia has deteriorated, sadly, significantly over the last several years,” Obama said. “And so how we approach an appropriate response that increases costs for them for behavior like this in the future but does not create problems for us is something that’s worth taking the time to think through and figure out.”
2.4K
Comments
The Post Recommends
Some lawmakers had suggested that the bureau and the agency weren’t in agreement on the issue.
Outgoing
Gov. Pat McCrory (R) signed the bill, despite not issuing any comment
on drama wracking North Carolina politics since it all began Wednesday.
