Graham said in a statement that Ratcliffe is making the underlying information available for review in a classified setting. Ratcliffe said that Brennan’s handwritten notes from a briefing to Obama refer to the “alleged approval by Hillary Clinton on Jof a proposal from one of her foreign policy advisors to vilify Donald Trump by stirring up a scandal claiming interference by Russian security services.” or by Russia.Īccording to Ratcliffe, former CIA Director John Brennan briefed President Obama in late July 2016 about Clinton’s approval of a plan to link Trump to Russia’s election-meddling efforts. The letter does not make it clear whether the term “Russian intelligence analysis” refers to intelligence activities conducted by the U.S. “The does not know the accuracy of this allegation or the extent to which the Russian intelligence analysis may reflect exaggeration or fabrication,” Ratcliffe wrote. intelligence agencies in late July 2016 “obtained insight into Russian intelligence analysis” which alleged that Clinton had approved a campaign to link Trump to Russia’s hack of the DNC. The FBI relied heavily on the dossier to obtain Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act warrants against Carter Page.Īccording to Ratcliffe, U.S. Last week, Graham released a declassified FBI memo which said that the bureau opened a counterintelligence investigation in 2009 against Igor Danchenko, the primary source for Christopher Steele. A Justice Department inspector general’s report said that the FBI received evidence in early 2017 that Russian intelligence officers may have fed disinformation into the dossier. Key allegations in Steele’s dossier remain either uncorroborated or have been debunked. While the Russian government hacked emails from the DNC and Clinton campaign, the special counsel’s office determined that nobody on the Trump campaign conspired with the Kremlin. Fusion in turn hired former British spy Christopher Steele, who compiled a dossier that accused the Trump campaign of a “well-developed conspiracy of cooperation” with the Kremlin to influence the 2016 election. The FBI did not respond to requests for comment.Ĭlinton’s campaign authorized hiring an opposition research firm, Fusion GPS, to investigate Donald Trump’s possible ties to Russia. It also does not describe the information underlying the Clinton referral or the alleged plan to target Trump.Ĭomey is scheduled to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday. The letter does not say that the investigation was criminal in nature, or directly focused on Clinton.
It is unclear who submitted the referral to the FBI and whether the bureau opened an investigation into the matter. elections as a means of distracting the public from her use of a private mail server.” Presidential candidate Donald Trump and Russian hackers hampering U.S. Ratcliffe quotes the referral as dealing with Clinton’s “approval of a plan concerning U.S. intelligence officials forwarded a referral for an investigation regarding Clinton to then-FBI Director James Comey and Peter Strzok, the deputy chief of counterintelligence.
Lindsey Graham on Tuesday.ĭaily Caller reports: Ratcliffe said in the letter that on Sept. Ratcliffe made the admission in a letter to Sen. According to the intelligence, Clinton approved a plan to connect then-candidate Donald Trump to the alleged Russian hacking of the Democratic National Committee (DNC).