Last updated on July 17th, 2023 at 09:48 pm
Since the bombshell news broke earlier this week about Russia having potentially damaging personal and financial information on Trump, the president-elect’s team has been scrambling to deny everything.
When CNN reported that Trump was briefed on the allegations last week, Kellyanne Conway was quick to say that, no, the president-elect knew nothing about it.
“He says he’s not aware of it,” Conway told Light Night host Seth Meyers earlier in the week.
To get more stories like this, subscribe to our newsletter The Daily.
Video:
But new reporting out Thursday confirms that Trump was briefed by FBI Director James Comey on the two-paged synopsis of unconfirmed claims about Russia having dirt on the incoming president.
Tweet via CNN’s Jake Tapper:
It was FBI Director Comey in a one on one who briefed PEOTUS Trump on that synopsis, we can now report. More here –> pic.twitter.com/hklsmquhEF
— Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) January 12, 2017
More from CNN’s new report:
Multiple US officials briefed on the matter told CNN on Thursday FBI Director James Comey and Trump had a brief one-on-one conversation at last Friday’s intelligence briefing.
It’s during that pull aside that Comey briefed the President-elect on the two-page synopsis of the claims about Trump and Russia. All four intelligence chiefs had decided that Comey would be the one who would handle the sensitive discussion with the President-elect.
NBC News also reported that Trump was told about the new allegations last week after an intelligence briefing: “President-elect Donald Trump was informed about the existence of the unverified allegations against him about Russian ties after last Friday’s Intel briefing at Trump Tower on alleged Russian hacking, U.S. officials told NBC News.”
After waging an all-out assault on various news organizations – all while specifically denying that Trump was briefed on the latest Russian allegations – it turns out that it wasn’t “fake news” after all.
In fact, lies weren’t being fed to the public from the media as much as they were from the Trump team.
Either the president-elect and his team are blatantly lying about having been given this information, or they weren’t even aware that they were briefed in the first place.
Each one is a possibility, but both are deeply concerning.
Sean Colarossi currently resides in Cleveland, Ohio. He earned his Bachelor of Arts degree in Journalism from the University of Massachusetts Amherst and was an organizing fellow for both of President Obama’s presidential campaigns. He also worked with Planned Parenthood as an Affordable Care Act Outreach Organizer in 2014, helping northeast Ohio residents obtain health insurance coverage.