Let it be said that the word “allegations” is key. A lot of what has been released has not been verified. It could turn out to be a mixture of truth and enough that’s not true to allow Trump to push it all aside, as he did at his news conference Wednesday. “It’s all fake news,” he said. “It’s phony stuff. It didn’t happen.”
read the UNClASSIFIED DOSSIER HERE
But given Trump’s relentless public praise for Putin and the derision he has directed at those who mistrust Russia and its intentions (our president-elect called those who disagree with his Russia policies “stupid”), the accusations need to be dealt with very seriously and investigated meticulously. If we have learned nothing else, we know that Trump’s denials can never be believed until they are independently confirmed. The new standard for presidential statements must be: “Mistrust and verify.”
U.S. officials said Wednesday that the decision had been unanimous to attach the two-page summary of the dossier to a sweeping report on Russian election interference commissioned by the White House and briefed to Obama, Trump and congressional leaders.
read the UNClASSIFIED DOSSIER HERE
But given Trump’s relentless public praise for Putin and the derision he has directed at those who mistrust Russia and its intentions (our president-elect called those who disagree with his Russia policies “stupid”), the accusations need to be dealt with very seriously and investigated meticulously. If we have learned nothing else, we know that Trump’s denials can never be believed until they are independently confirmed. The new standard for presidential statements must be: “Mistrust and verify.”
U.S. officials said Wednesday that the decision had been unanimous to attach the two-page summary of the dossier to a sweeping report on Russian election interference commissioned by the White House and briefed to Obama, Trump and congressional leaders.
But U.S. intelligence officials appear to have been caught off-guard by the fallout, including a blistering attack by Trump, who accused spy agencies of engaging in Nazi-like tactics to smear him.
In an effort to contain the damage, Director of National Intelligence James R. Clapper Jr. said he spoke with Trump on Wednesday and “expressed my profound dismay at the leaks that have been appearing in the press.”
Clapper said in a statement issued late Wednesday that he told Trump that the allegations had come from a “private security company,” that U.S. spy agencies had “not made any judgment that the information in this document is reliable.”
“However, part of our obligation is to ensure that policymakers are provided with the fullest possible picture of any matters that might affect national security,” Clapper said.
A U.S. official who spoke on the condition of anonymity said the nature of the summary “was fully explained” to Trump on Friday and “put into context.”
Washington Post Fact Checker Glenn Kessler assesses five moments from President-elect Donald Trump's Jan. 11 question-and-answer session with reporters. (Video: Sarah Parnass, Glenn Kessler/Photo: Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)
Clapper, CIA Director John Brennan, FBI Chief James B. Comey and National Security Agency Director Mike Rogers all concurred that both Obama and Trump should know that U.S. spy agencies were aware of the claims about compromising information on Trump and had investigated or explored them to some degree.
U.S. officials emphasized that the summary was merely an annex to the main report, that the allegations it contained have never been substantiated and did not appear in the main body of the report or influence its conclusions that Russia sought to sabotage the 2016 race and help elect Trump.
The handling of the matter also seemed to deepen the level of distrust between Trump and the intelligence community, whose work he has repeatedly disparaged since his election victory two months ago.
In a news conference in New York, Trump blasted U.S. intelligence agencies and accused them of employing Nazi-like tactics to discredit him.
“I think it was disgraceful, disgraceful, that the intelligence agencies allowed any information that turned out to be so false and fake, out,” Trump said, referring to a burst of headlines over the past two days about the dossier. “That’s something that Nazi Germany would do and did do.”
Source Washington Post
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