Former CIA Director Won’t Confirm Collusion Between Russians And Trump Campaign


As he testified, Brennan spoke in carefully considered, measured tones, recognizing the pitfalls that were before him.

Republican representatives Trey Gowdy of South Carolina and Mike Turner of Ohio both went out of their way to make sure that their Democrat counterparts and the mainstream media did not misconstrue Brennan’s responses.

The transcript of Turner’s questioning shows the specificity of both men’s remarks and the effort to make sure the testimony stayed within the proper context. Turner framed the issue this way:

So you indicated that you saw, when asked about whether or not you had seen evidence of collusion or collaboration, you said that you saw intelligence that indicated there had been contacts with individuals, with Russians, that were of a nature that bore investigation. You said those contacts might have been benign, might not have been, but they rose to the level of indicating that they needed to be reviewed for their nature and looking into an investigation. Did I characterize that correctly?”

Brennan was equally cautious in his response, recognizing the high stakes involved.

Yes but I don’t want to take this out of context. We see contacts, interactions, between Russian officials and U.S. persons all the time. It is when it’s in the context that there’s something else going on. So we knew at the time that the Russians were involved in this effort to try to interfere in our election, so with that backdrop, and increasing indications that they were involved with that, seeing these types of contacts and interactions during the same period of time raised my concern.”

That’s when Turner moved in to get to the very heart of the issue.

Excellent. I appreciate that qualification. But if someone left this hearing today and said that you had indicated that those contacts were evidence of collusion or collaboration, they would be misrepresenting your statements, correct?”

Brennan asserted that taken in that context his remarks would not be accurately portrayed. He said he had no way of knowing if collusion existed.

They would have misheard my response to the very good questions that were asked of me. I’m trying to be as clear as possible in terms of what I know, assess, and can say.”

In response to the morning testimony, the White House immediately put out a statement to clarify the entire issue:

This morning’s hearings back up what we’ve been saying all along. That despite a year of investigation, there is still no evidence of any Russia-Trump campaign collusion, that the president never jeopardized intelligence sources or sharing, and that even Obama’s CIA Director believes the leaks of classified information are ‘appalling’ and the culprits must be ‘tracked down.”

Videos of the testimony shows the incredible care both Brennan and his questioners took in making sure it accurately reflected the nature of the contacts in question between Russians and members of the Trump campaign. At no time did the discussion focus on contacts by Russians with the Clinton campaign.



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