A crony of then-Director of National Intelligence (DNI) James Clapper threatened to withhold a promotion from a senior intelligence official unless he concurred in the fake Intelligence Community Assessment (ICA) on Russia’s meddling in the 2016 election, notes obtained exclusively by The Federalist show.
The notes made public for the first time today recount a conversation the top analyst in the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) had with an unnamed superior who worked closely with the then-Director James Clapper, according to sources familiar with the document.
The release of the notes represents the latest cache of documents declassified by the Trump administration official concerning the ICA that outgoing President Barack Obama ordered, which falsely assessed that Putin “aspired” to help Trump win the election. An earlier release by the current Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, revealed the senior intelligence official — whom her office identified as an ODNI whistleblower — had been charged with conducting a “scrub,” which is a review, of the intelligence in the non-compartmented ICA. Emails released last week by Gabbard show the top analyst expressing shock over the ICA’s reliance on the Steele dossier because the versions the analyst reviewed included no intel relying on the Hillary Clinton-based fairy tale of opposition research.
According to a person familiar with the notes, the analyst documented his recollection of the conversation on March 31, 2023 — more than six years after the conversation occurred. The delay, The Federalist’s source explained, occurred because the analyst’s efforts to share his concerns, first with the Inspector General of the Intelligence Community (IC), and then later with Special Counsel John Durham and Virginia Sen. Mark Warner, proved unsuccessful. Only later did the analyst receive an inquiry for more information about his claims, leading to the drafting of the summary of his recollections.
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