Gabbard Releases New Documents on Russia Hoax

The U.S. intelligence community had no direct evidence that Russian President Vladimir Putin wanted to help then-candidate Donald Trump during the 2016 election but advanced that claim anyway under the direction of then-President Barack Obama, according to a newly declassified House Intelligence Committee report.

The report, kept classified since it was finalized on Sept. 18, 2020, under the leadership of then-California Rep. Devin Nunes, was made public this week by Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard. It concludes that the 2017 Intelligence Community Assessment, which claimed Putin sought to help elect Trump, was based on scant, cherry-picked, and, in some cases, dubious intelligence.

Only five CIA analysts and a principal drafter produced the final assessment, with little input or oversight from other agencies. The House report says the team was “rushed” and operated under “unusual directives” from Obama and then-CIA Director John Brennan, who personally pushed to include unverified material in the ICA despite objections from other officials in the CIA.

The newly declassified document “exposes how the Obama Administration manufactured the January 2017 Intelligence Community Assessment that they knew was false, promoting the LIE that Vladimir Putin and the Russian government helped President Trump win the 2016 election,” Gabbard wrote in a post to X on Wednesday.

One vague, unverifiable line in a substandard intelligence report formed the sole classified basis for the ICA’s claim that Putin “aspired” to help Trump, the report found. Meanwhile, other analysts warned Brennan that no direct evidence supported the conclusion that Putin had a preference.

The ICA went on to underpin years of partisan Democratic talking points about Putin’s support of Trump, as well as the yearslong criminal investigation of Trump for alleged collusion with Russia.

Evidence contradicting the Russia collusion narrative was suppressed

The report says the ICA overlooked key intelligence, including from a longtime Putin confidant, who told U.S. officials the Russian leader “did not care who won” and “often outlined the weaknesses of both major candidates.” Other suppressed intelligence suggested Russia expected a Hillary Clinton victory and believed it could work with her more effectively.

The ICA also failed to explain why Russia didn’t release additional damaging information on Clinton in the closing weeks of the race, the House Intelligence Committee report said. According to the committee, that omission further undercut the idea that Putin wanted to tip the election in Trump’s favor, because if Putin’s main goal was to elect Trump, he would have released the most damaging material during the race, when it could have been most helpful.

The damaging information about Clinton included serious private concerns among Democratic National Committee officials about her mental and physical health, which at the time was a campaign issue.

Latest report compiles atop last week’s DNI release

Last week, Gabbard also declassified records showing that Obama’s national security team set the stage for the Trump-Russia collusion investigation without clear evidence to support the narrative.

Transcripts of closed-door House interviews from 2017 and 2018 show Obama-era officials —including James Clapper, Susan Rice, Loretta Lynch, and Samantha Power — admitted under oath they had no empirical evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia.

“I never saw any direct empirical evidence that the Trump campaign or someone in it was plotting or conspiring with the Russians,” Clapper testified. Rice and Lynch likewise said they didn’t recall seeing or being briefed on any such intelligence.

These admissions aligned with the findings of special counsel Robert Mueller, who concluded in 2019 that there was no evidence of criminal coordination between Trump and Russia.

Criminal referrals and investigations

The disclosures have prompted new scrutiny of the intelligence community’s role in advancing the Trump-Russia theory. Brennan and former FBI Director James Comey have been under criminal investigation by the FBI, and Gabbard has since made referrals to the Justice Department to bring possible charges, though it is unclear who could be subject to prosecution beyond the former CIA and FBI heads.

Previously declassified notes show Brennan briefed Obama in July 2016 on a Clinton campaign plan to “vilify Donald Trump” by tying him to Russia. That briefing included references to intelligence suggesting the effort was personally approved by Clinton and meant to stir up a scandal around alleged foreign interference.

The Steele dossier, which was later discredited, was funded by Clinton’s campaign and funneled through the law firm Perkins Coie. Brennan and Comey were both aware of the dossier’s limitations at the time the opposition research was used to brief Trump and open investigations.

Despite that, the now-declassified ICA omitted that context and instead helped justify years of criminal and congressional investigations that found no conspiracy.

Obama has largely avoided commenting on the revelations, but a spokesman issued a rare public statement this week denouncing the latest claims.

“These bizarre allegations are ridiculous and a weak attempt at distraction,” Obama’s spokesman Patrick Rodenbush said. He insisted the findings did not undermine the consensus that Russia tried to interfere in 2016, and pointed to a 2020 Senate Intelligence Committee report led by then-Chairman Marco Rubio as confirmation.

But with mounting evidence that key conclusions in the ICA were shaped by politicized intelligence, the credibility of those findings, and the officials who endorsed them, continues to erode.

Read the full declassified September 2020 report here: