Summary
- Tulsi Gabbard released documents alleging Obama
officials manipulated 2016 election intelligence. - She claims a “treasonous conspiracy” aimed to
harm President Trump. - Gabbard threatened criminal referrals against former
Obama administration officials. - Multiple investigations found no evidence of vote
manipulation by Russia. - Democrats denounce Gabbard’s report as politically
motivated and baseless.
According to Gabbard’s materials, intelligence
officers were under pressure from the Obama administration to change their
conclusions. According to the records, President Barack Obama asked for a fresh
evaluation of Russian actions during the 2016 election, as evidenced by an
email sent by an aide to former Director of National Intelligence James
Clapper.
In response to the accusations, Gabbard has
vowed to submit criminal referrals to senior Obama administration officials
through the Justice Department.
Several analyses, including a Senate assessment led by Republicans, have backed up the
initial conclusions that Russia sought to sway the election by undermining
Hillary Clinton’s campaign and aiding Trump in spite of these allegations.
There was no proof of vote manipulation,
according to earlier findings by Senate investigators and intelligence
services, even though Russia carried out measures to sway public opinion.
Democrats have criticized the report as
politically driven and erroneous, according to The New York Times. The leading
Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, Representative Jim Himes of
Connecticut, referred to Gabbard’s charges as “baseless.” Virginia
Senator Mark Warner stressed that the latest assessment mixes up Russian
influence campaigns and hacking attempts, which were two different things.
What evidence supports Gabbard’s claim of a
treasonous Obama conspiracy in 2016?
Senior Obama-era officials, including former DNI
James Clapper, CIA Director John Brennan, and FBI Director James Comey,
manipulated and withheld key intelligence concerning Russian interference in
the 2016 election to create a misleading narrative that Russia had actively
targeted the election via cyberattacks.
A December 2016 National Security Council
meeting led to an order—via an email from Clapper’s executive assistant—to
intelligence community leaders to produce a new assessment “per the
President’s request” detailing alleged Russian tools and actions to
influence the election. Gabbard contends this assessment was politically
motivated and contradicted earlier intelligence conclusions.
The intelligence community report released on
January 6, 2017, which assessed Russian interference, allegedly relied partly
on sources considered “not credible” and conflicted with prior
intelligence indicating that Russia was
“probably not trying… to influence
the election by using cyber means.”
