Obama tries to extract himself from Russiagate, but documents put him at the heart of it

President Barack Obama has sought to distance himself from the Russiagate scandal, but evidence — including records of key meetings he attended and an unambiguous directive he issued — puts him at the heart of some of the bogus Trump-Russia claims.

The chairman of the House Intelligence Committee said Wednesday that “there were a lot of people involved, and it goes all the way up to President Obama.” Rep. Rick Crawford, R-Ark., who leads the important intelligence oversight panel, told Just the News, No Noise that Obama cannot be allowed to avoid responsibility: “He can’t plead ignorance. He can’t play the plausible deniability card. He was intimately involved in this and authorized it.”

Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard on Friday issued a press release stating that her office had “revealed overwhelming evidence that demonstrates how, after President Trump won the 2016 election against Hillary Clinton, President Obama and his national security cabinet members manufactured and politicized intelligence to lay the groundwork for what was essentially a years-long coup against President Trump.”

A spokesperson for Obama released a statement on Tuesday in response to Gabbard’s report from last week, where he sought to deny Gabbard’s claims.

“Out of respect for the office of the presidency, our office does not normally dignify the constant nonsense and misinformation flowing out of this White House with a response. But these claims are outrageous enough to merit one,” the Obama statement read. 

“These bizarre allegations are ridiculous and a weak attempt at distraction. Nothing in the document issued last week undercuts the widely accepted conclusion that Russia worked to influence the 2016 presidential election but did not successfully manipulate any votes. These findings were affirmed in a 2020 report by the bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee, led by then-Chairman Marco Rubio," the former president's statement said.

Obama briefed on Clinton Plan, helped it along

The record — bolstered by newly-declassified documents — shows that Obama was a central figure at key points throughout the Russiagate saga. Obama was briefed on “Clinton Plan intelligence” which indicated Clinton was seeking to falsely link Trump to Russia to distract from her own classified email server scandal, but the FBI launched "Crossfire Hurricane" later in July 2016 anyway.

Obama was made aware of what has been dubbed the “Clinton Plan intelligence” in the summer of 2016. Special Counsel John Durham’s 2023 report referenced the “Clinton plan intelligence" — with key details about it placed in a classified annex that has yet been kept from the American public and even many members of Congress.

Obama directed the creation of a new Intelligence Community Assessment (ICA) on Russian meddling only after Trump was victorious in November 2016. The then-president was part of key discussions in January 2017 related to the FBI’s targeting of Trump national security adviser Mike Flynn.

“There is irrefutable evidence that details how President Obama and his national security team directed the creation of an intelligence community assessment that they knew was false,” Gabbard said at the White House press briefing room on Wednesday. “They knew it would promote this contrived narrative that Russia interfered in the 2016 election to help President Trump win, selling it to the American people as though it were true. It wasn’t.”

Durham said then-CIA Director John Brennan's handwritten notes — declassified by Ratcliffe when he was the Director of National Intelligence in October 2020 — reflect that Brennan briefed Obama, Comey, Biden, and others in the summer of 2016 regarding the "alleged approval by Hillary Clinton on 26 July of a proposal from one of her [campaign] advisors to vilify Donald Trump by stirring up a scandal claiming interference by the Russian security services."

Brennan briefed Obama and others on the intelligence, and Durham noted that “it was also of enough importance for the CIA to send a formal written referral memorandum” in early September 2016 to since-fired FBI Director James Comey and then-FBI special agent Peter Strzok.

A newly-declassified bombshell House Intelligence Committee report declassified by Gabbard last week revealed that, despite repeated denials, the 2016 ICA on Russian election meddling pointed to — and relied in part — on the debunked Steele Dossier. The key part of that assessment was to force home the now-discredited conclusion that Vladimir Putin had tried to help Donald Trump win. 

That ICA also apparently ignored dissenting evidence from experts on Russian intelligence showing that the Russian leader may have actually favored (or at least fully expected) a Hillary Clinton victory instead.

The IC only accepted material designed to hurt Trump, help Clinton

The dissenting declassified House report critiqued the “high confidence” assessment by the FBI and CIA that Putin had “aspired” to help Trump win in 2016. The declassified report said that “the judgment that Putin developed ‘a clear preference’ for candidate Trump and ‘aspired to help his chances of victory’ did not adhere to the tenets of the Intelligence Community Directive 203, Analytic Standards.”

Durham’s report pointed to a double standard in how the FBI accepted baseless allegations of Trump-Russia collusion as compared to the way the FBI shrugged off information suggesting that at least some of the collusion claims were tainted as originating from the Clinton campaign.

“These examples are also markedly different from the FBI's actions with respect to other highly significant intelligence it received from a trusted foreign source pointing to a Clinton campaign plan to vilify Trump by tying him to Vladimir Putin so as to divert attention from her own concerns relating to her use of a private email server,” Durham wrote. 

The CIA referral memo sent to the FBI — which Durham said was completed on September 7, 2016 — was addressed to Comey and later-disgraced FBI special agent Peter Strzok, according to Durham, and stated in part: “Per FBI verbal request, CIA provides the below examples of information the CROSSFIRE HURRICANE fusion cell has gleaned to date [Source revealing information redacted]: … An exchange ... discussing U.S. presidential candidate Hillary Clinton's approval of a plan concerning U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump and Russian hackers hampering U.S. elections as a means of distracting the public from her use of a private email server.” The FBI did not investigate further.

The newly-declassified House report also stated that “the SVR [Russian intelligence] possessed a campaign email discussing a plan approved by Secretary Clinton to link Putin and Russian hackers to Trump in order to ‘distract the [American] public’ from the Clinton email server scandal.” Against the logic of the FBI and CIA's narrative, the Russians did not release this information when it could have impacted the 2016 election.

IC makes no claims of Putin trying to get Trump elected ahead of November 2016

Between the launch of Crossfire Hurricane and Trump’s win in November, there is no known U.S. intelligence assessment which would claim that Putin was working to get Trump elected — although that is exactly what the ICA delivered on Obama's orders.

An ODNI official sent a recently-declassified email in late August 2016 stating that “Secretary [Jeh] Johnson committed DHS to supporting state and local agencies to secure computer-enabled election infrastructure. … POTUS agreed yesterday that our electoral apparatus ((my term)) should be considered as critical infrastructure. I have directed my folks to generate an NIE on attendant cyber threats to this key infrastructure, and to get it done sooner than later.”

The same day that a public version of the ICA was released — January 6, 2017 — DHS Secretary Johnson would release a statement declaring that "Given the vital role elections play in this country, it is clear that certain systems and assets of election infrastructure meet the definition of critical infrastructure, in fact and in law.” Johnson would add that day that “particularly in these times, this designation is simply the right and obvious thing to do.” Despite DHS reaching into the matter, the 2016 ICA found no evidence that the Russians had changed any votes nor impacted the electoral outcome in any way.

The "Russia wanted Trump" logic falls apart

The newly-declassified House report revealed that in the summer of 2016 the Russians were aware of serious problems with the Clinton candidacy. Apparently Obama was equally aware.

“As of September 2016, the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) had Democratic National Committee information that President Obama and party leaders found the state of Secretary Clinton's health to be ‘extraordinarily alarming’ and felt it could have ‘serious negative impact’ on her election prospects,” the report said. “Her health information was being kept in ‘strictest secrecy’ and even close advisors were not being fully informed.” 

Although they could have done so, the Russians did not release this information ahead of the 2016 election, which would have further damaged Clinton's electability.

A recently-declassified September 2016 ICA, first obtained by Just the News, made no mention of Russia’s alleged animosity towards Clinton nor of its supposed preference for Trump, included no discussion of the Kremlin allegedly seeking to sink Clinton’s candidacy and elevate Trump’s chances, and generally attributed Russian efforts to a generalized desire to undermine the legitimacy of the U.S. election or the legitimacy of the next presidential administration, sowing chaos rather than a desire to pick a winner and a loser.

Putin's goal was chaos

The September 2016 ICA stated that “we assess that the Russian services probably orchestrated at least some of the disclosures of DNC and DCCC documents from June to August” but that the “FBI and NSA, however, have low confidence in the attribution of the data leaks to Russia.” The assessment from September 2016 added that “the Kremlin probably expects that publicity surrounding the leaked party data will raise questions about the integrity of the U.S. political process, as Putin hinted in a recent interview.”

At no point did the September 2016 ICA hint that Putin was acting to hurt Clinton’s election chances nor to help Trump win the presidency.

As the election drew closer, Johnson at DHS and Clapper at ODNI released an early October 2016 joint public statement arguing that “the U.S. Intelligence Community is confident that the Russian Government directed the recent compromises of e-mails from U.S. persons and institutions, including from U.S. political organizations” and that “the recent disclosures of alleged hacked e-mails … are consistent with the methods and motivations of Russian-directed efforts.” DHS and ODNI said that “these thefts and disclosures are intended to interfere with the U.S. election process.”

The statement by DHS and ODNI similarly did not claim the efforts were aimed at helping Trump win and making Clinton lose.

Obama orders skewed ICA on Russian meddling after Trump win

Following Trump’s electoral victory over Clinton, Obama ordered the U.S. intelligence community to put together a new ICA on Russian meddling — and this intelligence assessment would specifically claim that Putin had worked to defeat Clinton and to secure victory for Trump.

The newly-declassified House report said that “Obama orders a rewrite of 10 assessments on Russian activities during the election” on December 6, 2016.

“The President directed the IC to review their work to date on the Russian influence campaign, and quickly produce the new ICA for release in early January, before President-elect Trump took office,” the report said. 

“The ICA would rehash much of the previously published material on Russian activities, but would also inject anew the judgment that President Putin ‘aspired’ for Trump to win. CIA would be the lead drafter, in coordination with FBI and NSA.”

The Senate Intelligence Committee’s 2020 report said that Obama instructed Clapper “to have the Intelligence Community prepare a comprehensive report on Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election” during the December 6, 2016 meeting of the National Security Council.

“The President directed that the report include everything the IC knew about Russian interference in the 2016 elections,” the Senate report said. “The instruction was to have a version available to brief Congress, and also a declassified version releasable to the public.” 

The Senate report said that Obama “requested this product be completed by the end of his Administration” — January 20, 2017. Mysteriously, for such an important tasking, “there was no document memorializing this presidential direction,” according to the Senate report.

The same day, the Senate report said, “Clapper passed the President's verbal direction to the National Intelligence Council (NIC), specifically the National Intelligence Officer (NIO) for Russia and Eurasia, Julia Gurganus, and the NIO for Cyber Issues, Vinh Nguyen.”

"Per the President's request"

A press release from Gabbard’s ODNI said that three days later — on December 9, 2016 — “President Obama’s White House gathered top National Security Council Principals for a meeting … to discuss Russia.”

Declassified documents about the meeting in the White House Situation Room labeled it the “PC [Principals Committee] Meeting on a Sensitive Topic” — Russia and the 2016 election.

The meeting was chaired by Obama National Security Advisor Susan Rice and included Brennan, then-DNI Clapper, and disgraced FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe. The meeting was also attended by Obama chief of staff Denis McDonough, future Biden DNI Avril Haines, future Biden Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco, Attorney General Loretta Lynch, Acting Assistant Attorney General for National Security Mary McCord, Secretary of State John Kerry and State Department official Victoria Nuland, then-Obama and future-Biden Pentagon official Brian McKeon, and Deputy National Security Advisor Ben Rhodes.

After the meeting, in an email titled “POTUS Tasking on Russia Election Meddling,” Clapper’s assistant sent an email to ODNI leaders stating that “pursuant to the POTUS tasking at Monday’s [December 5, 2016] meeting on Russia election meddling for a comprehensive assessment, the DNI broached the TPs [talking points] below with Denis McDonough and DCIA [Brennan] at the Russia PC [Principals Committee] this afternoon.”

Clapper’s executive assistant said that “the IC is prepared to produce an assessment per the President’s request, that pulls together the information we have on the tools Moscow used and the actions it took to influence the 2016 election, an explanation of why Moscow directed these activities, and how Moscow’s approach has changed over time, going back to 2008 and 2012 as reference points. ODNI will lead the effort with participation from CIA, FBI, NSA, and DHS.”

The Obama-era national intelligence officer for cyber issues sent an email with the heading “RE: POTUS Tasking on Russia Election Meddling.” The intelligence officer said that “our plan is to put this into an ICA with Annexes. We will also decide on how to integrate the DHS recommendation section later. We will use some part of our summer’s ICA on cyber threats to presidential election as a starting point.”

The declassified House report said that, the same day, “DCIA Brennan Orders Publication of Substandard Reporting on Russian Activities During the Election.”

“Acting on President Obama's orders, DCIA Brennan directed a ‘full review’ and publication of raw HUMINT [human intelligence] information that had been collected before the election,” the House report said. “CIA officers said that some of this information had been held on the orders of DCIA, while other reporting had been judged by experienced CIA officers to have not met longstanding publication standards. Some of the latter was unclear or from unknown subsources, but would nonetheless be published after the election — over the objections of veteran officers — on orders of DCIA and cited in the ICA to support claims that Putin aspired to help Trump win.”

Clapper later told the Senate Intelligence Committee in July 2017 that "I don't think we would have mounted the effort [creating the ICA] we did, probably, to be honest, in the absence of presidential direction, because that kind of cleared the way on sharing all the accesses."

Obama endorses the conclusions of the ICA before it's even completed

Well before the ICA was finalized, during a press conference on December 19, 2016, Obama said “When the report comes out, before I leave office, that will have drawn together all the threads. And so I don’t want to step on their work ahead of time. What I can tell you is that the intelligence that I have seen gives me great confidence in their assessment that the Russians carried out this hack… The hack of the DNC.”

Obama also suggested that “maybe the Russians were trying to help” Trump in the election — a conclusion that the U.S. intelligence community had not yet reached, but soon would in the ICA.

The declassified House report also noted that “even though the dossier information was unclassified, the dossier summary was only included in the highest classified version of the ICA that was briefed to President Obama and President-elect Trump, and was seen by various national security officials and senior political appointees.” The report noted that “by relegating the dossier text to only the highest classified version of the ICA, the authors were better able to shield the assessment from scrutiny, since access to that ICA version was so limited.”

The House report said that “the most sensitive classified version of the ICA was briefed to President Obama and shared with about 250 Administration officials and policymakers” on January 5, 2017. The report added that “the ICA was briefed to President-elect Trump, and the unclassified version was posted on the DNI website” the next day.

“By the Book” meeting in the Oval Office

Obama held a “by the book” meeting in the Oval Office on January 5, 2017 — it was then that Obama was likely briefed on the ICA, but the meeting also involved discussion by Obama about the Crossfire Hurricane investigation into the claims of Trump-Russia collusion.

Then-Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates told Robert Mueller’s team that she first learned the FBI possessed and was investigating recordings of Mike Flynn’s conversations with Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak following the early January 2017 national security meeting at the White House, and that it was Obama — not Comey — who told her about it.

Obama “started by saying that he had ‘learned of the information about Flynn’ and his conversation with Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak,” Yates said, according to FBI notes. “Obama specified he did not want any additional information on the matter but was seeking information on whether the White House should be treating Flynn any differently.”

Yates told investigators that “at that point,” she “had no idea what the President was talking about.” She “recalled Comey mentioning the Logan Act” but could not remember if Comey specifically said there was an “investigation.”

Susan Rice wrote the email to herself on Obama’s final day in office — January 20, 2017 — detailing the meeting between Obama, Biden, and spy officials on January 5, 2017. “On January 5, following a briefing by IC [intelligence community] leadership on Russian hacking during the 2016 presidential election, President Obama had a brief follow-on conversation with FBI Director Jim Comey and Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates in the Oval Office. Vice President Biden and I were also present,” Rice wrote in an email for her files.

“President Obama began the conversation by stressing his continued commitment to ensuring that every aspect of this issue is handled by the intelligence and law enforcement communities ‘by the book.’ … The president stressed that he is not asking about, initiating, or instructing anything from a law enforcement perspective,” Rice wrote. “He reiterated that our law enforcement team needs to proceed as it normally would by the book.”

Flynn treated with suspicion

The email from Rice about the meeting also showed Obama and Comey considered not sharing information on Russia with Flynn.

“Director Comey affirmed that he is processing ‘by the book’ as it relates to law enforcement. From a national security perspective, Comey said he does have some concerns that incoming NSA Flynn is speaking frequently with Russian ambassador Kislyak. Comey said that could be an issue as it relates to sharing sensitive information,” Rice wrote. “President Obama asked if Comey was saying that the NSC should not pass sensitive information related to Russia to Flynn.”

Rice said that Comey replied “potentially” and added that although he had no indication that Flynn had passed classified information to Kislyak, Comey believed that “the level of communication is unusual.”

Rice’s spokeswoman, Erin Pelton, previously released a statement defending Rice’s actions.

Comey said the calls between Flynn and Kislyak “appear legit” while Obama emphasized that “the right people” should look into Flynn, according to notes taken by since-fired FBI special agent Peter Strzok. Biden also allegedly mentioned the “Logan Act” in relation to Flynn during the meeting.

Yates later said “I don’t remember” whether Biden had brought up the Logan Act or not, adding that “I have a vague memory of Director Comey mentioning the Logan Act.”

Earlier in the meeting, Obama said something to the effect of “these are unusual times,” according to Strzok’s notes, with Biden saying, “I’ve been on the Intel Committee for ten years and I never” before the notes trail off.

Flynn’s communications with Kislyak were leaked to the media in early 2017. A Washington Post column in mid-January 2017 contained classified details that set off a media frenzy. Citing a “senior U.S. government official,” it said Flynn and Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak spoke on the phone in December 2016, the day former President Barack Obama announced actions against Russia, and suggested Flynn had violated the archaic Logan Act. A follow-up article by the Washington Post in early February 2017 revealed classified details from Flynn’s monitored calls with Kislyak, citing “nine current and former officials” in “senior positions at multiple agencies.”

Both Comey and McCabe played key roles in the FBI’s investigation into Flynn.

Comey admitted in 2018 that he took advantage of the chaos in the early days of Trump’s administration when he sent Strzok and FBI agent Joseph Pientka to talk to Flynn on January 24, 2017.

“I sent them,” Comey said to MSNBC anchor Nicolle Wallace, prompting laughter in the audience. “Something I probably wouldn’t have done or maybe gotten away with in … a more organized administration. In the George W. Bush administration, for example, or the Obama administration.”

“In both of those administrations, there was process, and so, if the FBI wanted to send agents into the White House itself to interview a senior official, you would work through the White House counsel, and there’d be discussions and approvals and who would be there, and I thought, it’s early enough — let’s just send a couple guys over,” he added.

Among the Flynn records eventually unveiled to the public were handwritten notes from former FBI Assistant Director of the Counterintelligence Division Bill Priestap on the day the FBI interviewed Flynn. “I believe we should rethink this,” Priestap wrote. “What is our goal? Truth/Admission or to get him to lie, so we can prosecute him or get him fired?”

The Trump Justice Department’s motion to dismiss the Flynn case in May 2020 stated that Strzok learned in early January 2017 that the Flynn case had not been closed despite the lack of evidence for keeping it open, and relayed the “serendipitously good” news to FBI lawyer Lisa Page, a special assistant to McCabe, with Strzok remarking that “our utter incompetence actually helps us.” Strzok then instructed FBI agents to “keep it open for now” at the behest of “the 7th Floor” of the bureau.

The DOJ said that “the FBI kept open its counterintelligence investigation into Mr. Flynn based solely on his calls with Kislyak — the only new information to arise since the FBI’s determination to close the case.” McCabe did not tell Flynn that he was being interviewed by the FBI as part of an investigation targeting the Trump campaign.

Top FBI officials had discussed the possibility of prosecuting Flynn for lying to the FBI about his contacts with the Russians as agents planned how to conduct their January 2017 interview of the Trump national security adviser, bureau notes show.

William Barnett, the FBI agent who handled Flynn’s case in 2016 and 2017, called the Trump-Russia investigation “Collusion Clue” and argued many investigators were out to “get Trump.”

Stefan Halper, a key FBI informant in the widely-debunked Russia collusion case, was paid nearly $1.2 million over three decades, was motivated in part by "monetary compensation," and continued snitching to the bureau even after agents concluded he told them an inaccurate story about Flynn, declassified documents show.

“Treasonous Conspiracy”

These declassifications by Gabbard come on the heels of the CIA’s recent “lessons learned” review — released earlier in July — which also critiqued the “high confidence” assessment by the FBI and the CIA that Putin had “aspired” to help Trump win. The CIA review also concluded that “the decision by agency heads to include the Steele Dossier in the ICA ran counter to fundamental tradecraft principles and ultimately undermined the credibility of a key judgment.”

The FBI offered Steele an “incentive” in October 2016 of up to $1 million if Steele could prove the allegations in his discredited anti-Trump dossier, but the former MI6 agent was unable to back up his claims.

The Crossfire Hurricane team also put together a lengthy spreadsheet by December 2016 laying out the wildly unsuccessful efforts taken by the bureau to attempt to verify the claims in Steele’s discredited dossier.

Declassified footnotes from Horowitz’s report provide multiple concerns that the dossier may have been infected by “Russian disinformation.” And declassified documents also show the FBI previously investigated Danchenko as a possible “threat to national security” in part due to his alleged contacts with “suspected Russian intelligence officers.”

And a report by Durham concluded in 2023 that the "FBI ignored the fact that at no time before, during, or after Crossfire Hurricane were investigators able to corroborate a single substantive allegation in the Steele dossier reporting.”

Nevertheless, the dossier helped underpin a key assertion in the ICA.

Ratcliffe also sent a criminal referral on Brennan to the FBI following the CIA lessons-learned review earlier in July.

Last week, Gabbard sent declassified evidence to the Justice Department on what she dubbed a “treasonous conspiracy” related to top U.S. intelligence officials allegedly politicizing intelligence related to Russia and the 2016 election.

The FBI opened a “grand conspiracy” case several weeks ago related to the nearly decade-long lawfare efforts against Trump, Just the News previously reported. It remains to be seen what action Attorney General Pam Bondi may take.