Trump admin rips Hillary Clinton over alleged role in ‘Russia Hoax’

Trump administration officials are pushing back against media reports casting doubt on newly released intelligence files that suggest Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign sought to tie Donald Trump to Russia. The officials insist the documents are authentic and accuse critics of recycling disinformation claims.

Trump admin

“Are we really doing this?” asked Alexa Henning, deputy chief of staff to Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, after The New York Times characterized the declassified intelligence as likely fabricated by Moscow. Henning posted screenshots of the Times article alongside older pieces from The Washington Post and NBC News to argue that the media has repeated the same narrative for years. “The Russia Hoax was concocted against President Trump by Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, James Clapper, John Brennan, James Comey, Loretta Lynch, etc. by funding a FAKE Dossier and putting [it] into a ‘real’ intelligence product briefed to Congress, the [White House] and leaked to the public by the spineless, gutless shills in the media. Where’s that headline??” Henning wrote on X. She also pointed to the Durham annex and House Intelligence Committee reports, claiming they proved authenticity: “Not to mention it says in the recently released Durham annex and [House Intelligence Committee] report it says multiple times the Clinton emails were corroborated as authentic by the CIA. No one is buying your b******* anymore,” she wrote.

CIA

CIA Director John Ratcliffe and Attorney General Pam Bondi recently declassified a 24-page annex to special counsel John Durham’s 2023 report. They said it documented coordination between Clinton’s campaign and Obama’s administration to spread the Trump-Russia narrative during the 2016 election. Ratcliffe, who previously referred former CIA chief John Brennan to the Justice Department for possible prosecution related to Russiagate, said the files revealed “a coordinated plan to prevent and destroy Donald Trump’s presidency.” CIA spokesperson Liz Lyons added that “the Hillary Clinton campaign worked to plant the Trump–Russia narrative in the press — with her direct approval.”

Clinton

It was reported that key emails suggesting Clinton approved such a plan were likely fabricated. But the annex, released by Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), stated otherwise. In 2017, the CIA determined that intelligence on the purported Clinton campaign — including messages from George Soros’ Open Society Foundations — was “not the product of Russian fabrication.” Brennan also drafted a memo based on the intelligence to brief Obama, then-Vice President Joe Biden, Attorney General Loretta Lynch, FBI Director James Comey and Director of National Intelligence James Clapper.

Trump and Russia

Among the emails were messages from Leonard Benardo, Open Society’s regional director, outlining Clinton campaign efforts to highlight “Trump and Russian hackers hampering U.S. elections” to distract from scrutiny over her own missing emails. “It will be a long-term affair to demonize Putin and Trump,” Benardo allegedly wrote on July 25, 2016. Days later, he added, “HRC approved Julia’s idea about Trump and Russian hackers hampering U.S. elections. That should distract people from her own missing email, especially if the affair goes to the Olympic level.” Lyons argued the timing was no accident: “We now know from the recent declassification that just days before the FBI launched Crossfire Hurricane, Russian intelligence reported on Clinton allies accurately predicting that the FBI would ‘put more oil into the fire.’ That’s no coincidence, and any objective observer can see that,” she said. FBI analysts interviewed by Durham’s office said their best assessment was that the Benardo emails were “likely authentic,” though they noted it was possible Russia could have fabricated or altered them.

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