US Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard has released a previously classified report that she claims reveals how former President Barack Obama and his administration deliberately created false information about Russian interference in the 2016 election.
Gabbard describes it as “the most egregious weaponization and politicization of intelligence in American history”.
At a White House press conference on July 23, Gabbard presented the declassified report from the House Intelligence Committee, which was originally produced in September 2020.
The report questions the foundations for the assessment that Russian President Vladimir Putin would have wanted to help Donald Trump win the election.
— The stunning revelations that we are releasing today should be of concern to every American. This is not about Democrats or Republicans. This has to do with the integrity of our Democratic Republic, Gabbard said at the press conference.
Obama “knew the report was false”
Gabbard accuses the Obama administration of deliberately creating an intelligence assessment that they “knew was false”. She claims they created a fabricated narrative that Russia intervened in the 2016 election to help Trump win.
— There is irrefutable evidence that detail how President Obama and his national security team directed the creation of an intelligence community assessment that they knew was false, Gabbard explained.
According to the report, Obama allegedly issued “unusual directives” to expedite the publication of the intelligence assessment before Trump’s inauguration, bypassing normal coordination procedures within the intelligence services.
CIA accused of inadequate sources
The report criticizes the CIA for failing to follow its own standards and for basing its conclusions on what is described as “scant, unclear, and unverifiable fragment of a sentence from one of the substandard reports”.
Gabbard claims that then-CIA Director John Brennan and the intelligence community deliberately suppressed information showing that Putin “held back from leaking compromising material on Hillary Clinton prior to the election”.
— Brennan and the intelligence community mischaracterized intelligence and relied on dubious substandard sources to create a contrived false narrative that Putin developed a quote clear preference for Trump, she said.
Claims about Clinton’s health condition
The report describes extensive material that Russia allegedly had about Hillary Clinton, including documents that according to Gabbard showed “psycho-emotional problems, uncontrolled fits of anger, aggression” and claims that Clinton was “on a daily regimen of heavy tranquilizers”.
Gabbard also claims that the intelligence community excluded important information that would have contradicted their main conclusions, including reports that “some Russian intelligence officials were planning for candidate Hillary Clinton’s victory”.
Demands for judicial review
She has demanded a criminal investigation of officials from the Obama era and accuses them of manufacturing a false narrative to discredit a sitting president. Trump has supported her conclusions and demanded prosecution of Obama and senior officials in his administration.
— They conspired to subvert the will of the American people who elected Donald Trump in that election in November of 2016 they worked with their partners in the media to promote this lie ultimately to undermine the legitimacy of President Trump and launching what would be a years-long coup against him and his administration, Gabbard said.
The report also claims that internal US intelligence assessments consistently concluded that Russia lacked both the capability and intent to intervene in the 2016 election, but that these findings were deliberately suppressed.
Russia has denied all involvement in American elections, and President Putin has repeatedly said that Moscow does not favor any particular American political candidate.
