The Trump administration made public documents demonstrating how Barack Obama’s Director of National Intelligence hastily completed a 2017 report on Russian election interference, despite concerns about its potential impact on the findings.
President Trump’s Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, ordered the release of these classified documents on Wednesday. The documents detail the discussions among Obama’s top intelligence officials regarding a 2017 intelligence assessment, which Gabbard labels as ‘politicized.’ This assessment suggested Russia aimed to help Trump by interfering in that year’s election.
The declassified documents include email exchanges between Obama’s Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, FBI Director James Comey, CIA Director John Brennan, and then-Director of the National Security Agency Mike Rogers.
The two-page document highlights a warning from Rogers to Clapper on December 22, 2016. Rogers expressed that his team lacked sufficient time to properly evaluate the intelligence concerning Russia’s involvement.
‘I wanted to reach out to you directly to let you know of some concerns I have with what I am hearing,’ Rogers writes to Clapper, Comey and Brennan.
‘I’m concerned that, given the expedited nature of this activity, my folks aren’t fully comfortable saying that they have had enough time to review all of the intelligence to be absolutely confident in their assessments,’ Rogers stated.
The former head of the NSA informed the leaders of the DNI, FBI, and CIA about his staff’s insufficient access to the intelligence and an inadequate time frame to properly review it before approving the final report.
But Clapper shot down Rogers’ concerns and admitted the intelligence community may have to bend its own rules.
Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard declassified emails showing former DNI James Clapper told intelligence officials that ‘normal’ protocol may have to be compromised to produce an intelligence report regarding claims that Russia interfered with the 2016 election to help Donald Trump win
Obama’s Director of National Intelligence James Clapper
‘We may have to compromise on our ‘normal’ modalities,’ Clapper responded in an email, adding, ‘more time is not negotiable.’
‘It is essential that we (CIA/NSA/FBI/ODNI) be on the same page and are all supportive of the report—in the highest tradition of ‘that’s OUR story, and we’re stickin’ to it,” Clapper wrote.
‘This is one project that has to be a team sport,’ the former DNI continued.
In the email, Clapper also notes how an ‘ad hoc fusion cell’ at the CIA had drafted an intelligence report that was to be circulated.
The ‘ad hoc’ cell was a small team assembled by former CIA Director John Brennan to create the now-notorious 2017 Intelligence Community Assessment (ICA) that was later used to instigate investigations into Trump, sources revealed to Fox News.
In the 2017 ICA, the report stated that ‘Russia was responsible for leaking data from the DNC and DCCC’ and that ‘the Russian Government aspired to help President-elect Trump’s election chances.’
According to Gabbard, Clapper’s email instructing everyone to get on board with the assessment that Russia interfered on behalf of Trump came just hours before intelligence officials sent a ‘politicized’ report to intel officials.
‘The leading figures in the Russia Hoax have spent years deceiving the American public by presenting their manufactured and politicized assessments as credible intelligence,’ Gabbard said on Wednesday.
Former President Barack Obama and his DNI James Clapper
‘The email released today reinforces what we already exposed: the decision to compromise standards and violate protocols in the creation of the 2017 manufactured intelligence assessment was deliberate and came from the very top.’
‘Clapper’s own words confirm that complying with the order to manufacture intelligence was a ‘team sport,” she added.
DNI Gabbard released additional documents this summer showing that Clapper had talking points drafted in early December 2016, weeks before the email thread with Rogers, Comey and Brennan, refuting claims that Russia interfered in the election.
‘Foreign adversaries did not use cyberattacks on election infrastructure to alter the U.S. presidential election outcome,’ a copy of Clapper’s talking points from December 7, 2016, stated.
