Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard stumbled through her appearance on Fox News when offered a layup as she accused the Obama administration of a “treasonous conspiracy.”
Trump’s intelligence chief claims top Obama officials manufactured intelligence that Russia meddled in the 2016 election and referred her findings to the Justice Department to pursue criminal charges.
When asked about her claim that she has “irrefutable evidence” that former President Barack Obama was the mastermind, Gabbard on Tuesday delivered a garbled word salad of an answer.
“What is that irrefutable evidence for our viewers tonight?” pressed conservative host Laura Ingraham.
“Laura, you know, as you were playing those clips of these people like Morning Joe seemingly befuddled saying that by no account is any of this true, I would challenge them to see if they have actually read the documents, every single page of the documents that we’ve released over the last couple of weeks,” Gabbard deflected.
She then plugged the website where the DNI has been posting documents, claiming: “It’s all right there for anyone to see.”
What Gabbard did not deliver in her response was that “irrefutable evidence,” instead resorting to the blanket accusations she has been making for weeks.
“Those who go in and read this will see how President Obama directed that a National Security Council meeting be called to talk about Russia,” Gabbard said.
She went on to say that the report that came out of the meeting was filled with tasks directed by the president to former CIA Director John Brennan and others in the intelligence community.
Gabbard argued that, “they were tasked to create an intelligence assessment that detailed how Moscow tried to influence the election, not if but how, and this was the beginning of this manufactured intelligence assessment.”
The DNI also argued that Obama officials “knowingly wrote things in this assessment that were false.”
She did not point to any specific evidence to back her claim that they knew specifically new information was “false” despite weeks of peddling her accusations.
Gabbard has been posting documents on the DNI government website for weeks, including emails from Obama administration officials as well as a declassified House report written by Republican staff.
The findings all show that Russia was not able to specifically hack the U.S. election infrastructure and change votes, but Moscow did carry out a campaign to influence the 2016 election.
The emails discuss how Russia meddled in the election, but there is no evidence that officials knowingly wrote in the assessment information they knew was false or that the president was a mastermind behind “manufactured” intelligence.
The separate declassified report from House Republicans on Russian election interference that Gabbard released also found that Russia interfered in the U.S. election.
Where that report did not align with other bipartisan assessments was that the meddling was done specifically to help Donald Trump.
However, Gabbard has accused Obama officials of trying to “subvert” Trump’s presidency and carrying out a years-long “coup.”
Attorney General Pam Bondi has taken Gabbard’s claims and run with them. She ordered a grand jury to potentially hear evidence in the case.
On Tuesday, Gabbard confirmed on Fox News that the Justice Department was asking for more documents, further undermining Gabbard’s own claim that she had already delivered “irrefutable evidence.”
Gabbard said she spoke with DOJ investigators, and they were committed to leaving “no stone unturned” but had more questions.
Obama’s office issued a rare statement in response to the Trump administration’s accusations when Gabbard first started making them. His office called them “bizarre” and a distraction.
The post Tulsi Gabbard Caught Up in Word Salad Over Russiagate Hoax appeared first on The Daily Beast.
