Tuesday, September 25, 2018

FBI memos detail 'partisan axes,' secret conflicts behind the Russia election meddling assessment

For most of the past two years, the U.S. intelligence community has presented a united front on all the key conclusions in the January 2017 report that Russia meddled in the 2016 presidential election.

Now, congressional investigators have unearthed text messages and emails showing the FBI feared there were some in the intelligence community with "Partisan axes to grind" and suggesting there could be no singular conclusion that Moscow wanted to help elect Donald Trump.

The text messages were exchanged at a critical time, less than 72 hours before the U.S. intelligence community would release an explosive report to then-President Obama, President-elect Donald Trump and the public concluding that Russia did in fact meddle in the 2016 election.

At the same time, the FBI also was debating whether it could definitely conclude that Russia's intent in meddling in the 2016 election was to help Trump win.

On Dec. 10, 2016, the FBI received an inquiry from a reporter about whether the FBI was uncertain about the emerging conclusion that Russia was trying to help Trump win.

Strzok weighed in to help the FBI press office address the reporter's question, an email that has now captured congressional investigators' fancy because it states clearly the FBI couldn't distinguish that any one of three possible motives drove Russia's meddling.

Now Strzok's recently disclosed emails and texts show the final process leading to the issuance of the Russia report was secretly mired in concerns about "partisan axes," differences in intelligence community information and a subtle but important realization that the "primary purpose" for Russia's meddling really couldn't be determined.

https://thehill.com/hilltv/rising/407677-fbi-memos-detail-partisan-axes-secret-conflicts-behind-the-russia-election

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