In a startling revelation, an internal CIA review has found that senior intelligence officials during the Obama administration may have engaged in manipulation of the 2016 intelligence assessment on Russian election interference, potentially undermining President Donald Trump's administration. The review, brought to light by CIA Director John Ratcliffe, has raised serious concerns about the integrity of the intelligence community's procedures and the political motives that may have influenced them.
The investigation, conducted by career professionals at the CIA's Directorate of Analysis, scrutinized the Intelligence Community Assessment (ICA) that concluded Russian President Vladimir Putin "aspired" to help Trump win the election. This assessment was ordered by then-President Barack Obama on December 6, 2016, and completed in an unusually short timeframe before the end of his term.
According to the internal review, the process led by then-CIA Director John Brennan, FBI Director James Comey, and Director of National Intelligence James Clapper was "atypical" and "markedly unconventional." It departed from established intelligence practices, raising red flags about the analytical integrity and impartiality of the findings.
The review outlined several "procedural anomalies," such as a "highly compressed production timeline, stringent compartmentation, and excessive involvement of agency heads." These deviations from the norm were seen as undermining the credibility of the original assessment. Brennan, in particular, was noted for handpicking analysts to compile the assessment while excluding 13 of the then-17 intelligence agencies from participation, a move that limited the breadth of expertise involved.
One of the most contentious points of the review was the forced inclusion of the Steele dossier, a document containing unverified claims about Russian blackmail material on Trump and funded by Hillary Clinton's campaign. Despite strong objections from CIA authors and senior Russia experts, Brennan insisted on its inclusion, arguing that "the information warrants inclusion in the report." The Deputy Director for Analysis warned Brennan that including the dossier "risked the credibility of the entire paper."
The FBI also made its participation in the assessment contingent on the dossier's inclusion, with attempts to integrate references throughout the document. The compressed timeline presented further challenges, with CIA's primary authors having less than a week to draft the assessment and less than two days for peer coordination before the formal review began.
Leaks to the media before the assessment's creation were also a concern, as they could have created an "anchoring" effect, potentially influencing analysts to conform their findings to the leaked narrative rather than conducting objective analysis.
The review's findings suggest that several aspects of tradecraft rigor were compromised, particularly in supporting the judgment that Putin "aspired" to help Trump win. The two senior leaders of the CIA mission center responsible for Russia jointly argued against including this judgment, stating in an email to Brennan that it was "both weakly supported and unnecessary," and warning that it would "open up a line of very politicized inquiry."
The flawed process and subsequent assessment played a role in the initiation of the Mueller investigation, which ultimately concluded that there was no collusion between Trump and Russia. However, the intelligence community's seal of approval on the allegations cast a shadow over Trump's first term in office.
Ratcliffe has condemned the actions of the intelligence leaders involved, stating that they decided to "screw Trump" by creating an assessment with the "imprimatur of an IC assessment in a way that nobody can question it." He praised the career CIA officers who conducted the review for bringing the truth to light.
