Read the full transcript of National Intelligence Director Tulsi Gabbard’s remarks on Russia Hoax during the White House Press Briefing to discuss the report that President Obama “went through nefarious lengths” to delegitimize Trump’s 2016 Presidency on July 23, 2025.
Opening Remarks on Declassified Report
TULSI GABBARD: Thank you very much. Good afternoon. At President Trump’s direction and with the support and coordination of the House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rick Crawford, today we’ve released a declassified oversight majority staff report that was produced in September of 2020.
The stunning revelations that we are releasing today should be of concern to every American. This is not about Democrats or Republicans. This has to do with the integrity of our democratic republic and American voters having faith that the votes cast will count.
There is irrefutable evidence that detail how President Obama and his national security team directed the creation of an intelligence community assessment that they knew was false. They knew it would promote this contrived narrative that Russia interfered in the 2016 election to help President Trump win, selling it to the American people as though it were true. It wasn’t.
The report that we released today shows in great detail how they carried this out. They manufactured findings from shoddy sources. They suppressed evidence and credible intelligence that disproved their false claims. They disobeyed traditional tradecraft intelligence community standards and withheld the truth from the American people.
In doing so, they conspired to subvert the will of the American people who elected Donald Trump in that election in November of 2016. They worked with their partners in the media to promote this lie, ultimately to undermine the legitimacy of President Trump and launching what would be a years-long coup against him and his administration.
Call for Truth and Accountability
We’re here today because the American people deserve the truth. They deserve accountability, and they deserve justice. The records that we released on Friday that were ODNI records, Senator Chuck Grassley’s release on Monday of what is known as the Clinton Annex, which was an appendix to the Department of Justice Office of Inspector General’s 2018 report, as well as the House Intelligence Committee’s majority oversight report that we’re releasing today, all come back to and confirm the same report.
There was a gross politicization manipulation of intelligence by the Obama administration intended to delegitimize President Trump even before he was inaugurated, ultimately usurping the will of the American people.
Key Findings from House Intelligence Report
I’m going to go over the key findings from the House Intelligence Report, which investigated the claims that were made by an intelligence community assessment ordered by President Obama and published in January of 2017.
First, Putin’s principal interests relating to the 2016 election were to undermine faith in the U.S. democratic process, not show any preference of a certain candidate. In fact, this report shows Putin held back from leaking compromising material on Hillary Clinton prior to the election, instead planning to release it after the election to weaken what Moscow viewed as an inevitable Clinton presidency.
In the January 2017 intelligence community assessment that President Obama ordered, John Brennan, who was CIA director at the time, and the intelligence community intentionally suppressed intelligence that showed Putin was saving the most damaging material that he had in his possession about Hillary Clinton until after her potential and likely victory.
Suppressed Intelligence on Hillary Clinton
The report goes into great detail about the information that Russia and Putin had on Hillary Clinton, which included possible criminal acts, like secret meetings with multiple named U.S. religious organizations in which State Department officials offered, in exchange for supporting Secretary Clinton’s campaign for the presidency, significant increases in financing from the State Department.
They also had documents that showed the patronage of the State Department to State Department employees who would go and support Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign. There were high-level DNC emails that detailed evidence of Hillary’s, quote, “psycho-emotional problems, uncontrolled fits of anger, aggression, and cheerfulness,” and that then-Secretary Clinton was allegedly on a daily regimen of heavy tranquilizers.
Brennan’s Mischaracterization of Intelligence
Then CIA director Brennan and the intelligence community mischaracterized intelligence and relied on dubious substandard sources to create a contrived false narrative that Putin developed a, “clear preference for Trump.”
Brennan and the IC misled lawmakers by referencing the debunked Steele dossier to assess, “Russia’s plans and intentions,” falsely suggesting that this dossier had intelligence value when he knew that it was discredited.
The intelligence community excluded significant intelligence and ignored or selectively quoted reliable intelligence that contradicted the intelligence community assessment’s key findings on Putin’s alleged support for Trump, including this intelligence reporting would have exposed the ICA’s claim as implausible, if not ridiculous.
The intelligence community assessment omitted reliably sourced information such as how some Russian intelligence officials were, “planning for candidate Hillary Clinton’s victory,” while others assessed neither Trump nor Clinton would respect Russia’s interests.
Timeline of December 2016 Events
As was reflected in the ODNI documents that we released on Friday, multiple intelligence community assessments released in the months leading up to the November 2016 election concluded that Russia had neither the intent nor capability to impact the outcome of the U.S. election.
On December 5th of 2016, the FBI and ODNI gave the House Intelligence Committee its first post-election classified briefing in which there was no mention of Putin aspiring to elect Trump by either agency.
The presidential daily brief, drafted on December 8th of 2016, stated that no Russian or criminal actors impacted vote counts. This document was pulled just hours before it was to be published due to, “new guidance.” If it had been published, it would have been briefed to both President Obama and President-elect Donald Trump.
On December 9th, 2016, a National Security Council meeting was called to gather President Obama’s senior national security officials, which included CIA Director Brennan, then-Obama DNI James Clapper, Susan Rice, and others. Following that secret meeting, DNI Clapper’s assistant sent an email to the intelligence community with the subject line, “POTUS tasking on Russia election meddling,” tasking ODNI leaders to create a new assessment per the president’s request.
Unusual Production of Intelligence Community Assessment
The House Intelligence Committee oversight report that we released today reveals that, “unlike routine intelligence community analysis, the intelligence community assessment was a high profile product ordered by the president, President Obama.
It directed senior intelligence community agency heads and created an intelligence community assessment limited to just five analysts using one principal drafter.”
This is not something that occurs in the normal path of producing an intelligence community assessment that reflects the views across the intelligence community. The production of this intelligence community assessment was subject to unusual directives directly from the president and senior political appointees, especially the former director of the CIA, John Brennan.
The House Intelligence Committee oversight report also shows how later that same day on December 9th, Brennan ordered the publication of, “substandard reporting on Russian activities,” which had previously been withheld from publication of prior assessments because the information was judged, “to have not met longstanding publication standards.”
Some of the information later used in the Obama ordered assessment over the objections of veteran CIA officers was, “unclear or from unknown sources.”
Brennan Overruled Senior CIA Officers
The Intelligence Committee’s oversight report reveals that CIA director Brennan overruled senior CIA officers who challenged the Obama ordered intelligence assessment, stating, “we don’t have direct information that Putin wanted to get Trump elected.”
Yet the Obama directed assessment was published on January 6, 2017, which explicitly stated, “we assess Putin and the Russian government aspired to help President elect Trump’s election chances when possible by discrediting Secretary Clinton and publicly contrasting her unfavorably to him.”
The CIA and FBI, then led by John Brennan and James Comey, expressed high confidence in this judgment, while the NSA expressed moderate confidence. Yet as the report we released today shows, the ICA, the Intelligence Committee assessment did not cite any report where Putin indicated helping Trump win was an objective. The opposite is true.
The Steele Dossier Connection
With regards to the Steele dossier, we now know that one of the source documents that the Obama administration used in the creation of this intelligence assessment in January of 2017 was none other than the discredited unverified Steele dossier.
The House Intel report states, “contradicting public claims by then CIA director Brennan that the dossier was not in any way incorporated into this intelligence assessment. The dossier was referenced in the intelligence assessments main body text and further detailed in a two page assessment annex.”
John Brennan lied and he denied using this dossier in this intelligence assessment that President Obama ordered because he knew it was discredited. It was a politically motivated manufactured document. He directed senior CIA officials to use it anyway.
CIA officer told the House Intelligence Committee staff as they investigated this, “the director of the CIA, John Brennan, refused to remove it.” And when confronted with the dossiers, many flaws responded, “yes, but doesn’t it ring true?”
Even the bipartisan Senate Select Committee on Intelligence report published in 2020 criticized the FBI’s handling of the Steele dossier, noting it’s completely unverified nature and purposeful sidestepping of intelligence community procedures in its use.
Now, President Obama, Hillary Clinton, John Brennan, James Clapper, James Comey and others, including their mouthpieces in the media, knowingly lied as they repeated the contrived narrative that was created in this January 2017 intelligence community assessment with high confidence as though it were fact. John Brennan, as CIA director, stated in a memo to his agency staff in December of 2016, saying, quote, “there is strong consensus among us on the scope, nature and intent of Russian interference in our presidential election.” This was reported by NBC News, confirming that Brennan, along with James Clapper and James Comey, agreed with the CIA’s assessment that Russia intervened to help Trump win the presidency.
As Obama’s director of national intelligence, James Clapper was tasked with overseeing the creation of this assessment in January of 2017 by President Obama, and he expressed confidence in its findings. In a 2018 interview with the Harvard Gazette, he talked about how he provided Trump with the same classified assessment that President Obama received, which included the high confidence judgment that Putin directly ordered the hacking and election interference. Clapper then went on to add, “I think they, the Russians, actually influenced the outcome.”
This is a brief summary of the details that you’ll find within the House Majority Staff’s report in their investigation into the Obama-directed January 2017 intelligence community assessment that leads us to the very same conclusion that we announced in the release of our documents on Friday. The implications of this are far-reaching and have to do with the integrity of our democratic republic. It has to do with an outgoing president taking action to manufacture intelligence, to undermine and usurp the will of the American people in that election, and launch what would be a years-long coup against the incoming President of the United States, Donald Trump. Thank you.
Q&A Session with Director Gabbard
LEAVITT: Well, thank you, Tulsi. And we do want to take questions on this topic. While the director has time for this topic, she will leave. I’m happy to take questions on other matters after that. But if anyone has questions for Director Gabbard, you’re welcome to ask them. We’ll start with our new media seat as always. Emily, go ahead.
REPORTER: Thank you. And Director Gabbard, this one is for you. Do you believe that any of this new information implicates former President Obama in criminal behavior?
GABBARD: We have referred and will continue to refer all of these documents to the Department of Justice and the FBI to investigate the criminal implications of this.
REPORTER: For even former President Obama?
GABBARD: Correct. The evidence that we have found and that we have released directly point to President Obama leading the manufacturing of this intelligence assessment. There are multiple pieces of evidence and intelligence that confirm that fact. Ed, go ahead.
Questions on Treason and Previous Investigations
REPORTER: Director Gabbard, thank you. So just two questions. But to begin on that, the President yesterday, you’ve inferred that the former President helped lead a coup. Based on what you now see, do you believe President Obama is guilty of treason?
GABBARD: I’m leaving the criminal charges to the Department of Justice. I’m not an attorney. But as I’ve said previously, when you look at the intent behind creating a fake manufactured intelligence document that directly contradicts multiple assessments that were created by the intelligence community, the expressed intent and what followed afterward can only be described as a years long coup and a treasonous conspiracy against the American people, our republic, and an attempt to undermine President Trump’s administration.
REPORTER: The Senate Intelligence Committee spent several years looking into this and unanimously agreed that bipartisan factions, Secretary of State Rubio was a member of that committee, that there was no political interference. There was a years long Justice Department investigation into this as well that also concluded no political interference. Help us, from a 50,000 foot level, explain, what do you now have that refutes those two assertions?
GABBARD: I will encourage you, in my role as the Director of National Intelligence, my job, again, as I said when I came into this role, was to make sure that we are telling the truth to the American people, and that we are ensuring that the intelligence community is not being politicized. So, I’m not asking you to take my word for it, I’m asking you and the media to conduct honest journalism, and the American people, to see for yourself, in the documents that we’ve released now, close to 200 pages, that point in multiple references, multiple examples, to include comments that have been made by senior intelligence professionals, who are some, still working within these agencies today, that confirm the conclusions that we have drawn. That President Obama directed an intelligence community assessment to be created, to further this contrived, false narrative, that ultimately led to a years-long coup to try to undermine President Trump’s presidency. John, go ahead.
REPORTER: And if your belief is those two previous investigations, you dismissed that, or covered it up?
GABBARD: I’m telling you to look at the evidence. Look at the evidence, and you will know the truth.
John?
Timing of Document Declassification
REPORTER: Thanks, Karoline. Thanks, Director Gabbard. You declassified these documents, if I’m not mistaken, Friday of last week, correct?
GABBARD: We released them on Friday of last week, the first tranche, yes.
REPORTER: This isn’t the first time that President Trump has been President of the United States. He was President from 2017 to 2021. Couldn’t the prior DNI under President Trump have declassified these documents? And why didn’t that DNI do that at that time?
GABBARD: I can’t speak to what happened there. There were several DNIs under the first Trump administration. President Trump faced many challenges from those who were working in the government who sought to undermine his presidency. That’s been clearly detailed. What I can speak to is the fact that this was one of the first things that we started to investigate here within this Trump administration, and have released the results upon the conclusion of our investigation.
REPORTER: And then my second question has to do with what intelligence agencies around the world have said about Russia, that they have tried to influence elections in the United States, in France, in Germany, in the UK. Do you disagree with that? Do you believe that Russia is a bad actor as it relates to trying to influence elections?
GABBARD: I’ll point back to the intelligence that President Trump has ordered declassified, that we have declassified and released, that the intelligence reflects Russia’s motives were to try to sow discord and chaos within the US election, which is a clear distinction from showing a preference for or against a specific candidate, which is what the Obama-manufactured intelligence document alleges, that Russia preferred Donald Trump and tried to help Donald Trump get elected. Again, going back to the most important point here, with the intent to undermine the legitimacy of President Trump’s election, and therefore subvert the will of the American people who chose to send him to the White House. Reagan.
Presidential Daily Briefings and Media Coverage
REPORTER: Thanks, Jermaine. Director Gabbard, Reagan Research Daily. You laid out that the document revealed that the Obama administration did not publish the December 2016 Presidential Daily Briefing that demonstrated that Russia did not steal the election. Trump was receiving these briefings at the time he was President-elect. Are you of the view that that information was kept out of the briefing because then President-elect Donald Trump would have seen it?
GABBARD: I don’t have any documents that speak to exactly what the new guidance was that was given as the reason for pulling that document, which, by the way, still has never been published until we released it last week, Friday. One could assume that they didn’t want President Trump to see a document that came from the intelligence community that would contradict the Russia hoax narrative that began through the Hillary Clinton campaign with the Steele dossier. One more.
REPORTER: Maybe either for you or Karoline, the President said yesterday that Obama committed treason. Do you or the White House believe that the Supreme Court’s immunity decision protects Obama from prosecution?
LEAVITT: I can speak to the President’s feelings on this matter. He spoke to all of you yesterday in the Oval Office, but I also spoke to him about this this morning. And he wants to see all those who perpetuated this fraud against our country, who betrayed our country and the Constitution to be thoroughly investigated and held accountable. And it’s been 10 years of this. And I would just add, based on everything the director has said and declassified, all of you in this room should go through it and take a look at this report and review the intelligence because, unfortunately, that hasn’t happened. And many of the people who perpetuated this hoax, Clapper, Andy McCabe, James Comey and many others, have been hired by major networks in this room to go on television and continue to spew these lies, knowing that they are lies. And if you all recall, just flashback to 2016 and the years after, the
REPORTER: Thank you. A question for Director Gabbard. A spokesperson for former President Obama said in a statement earlier this week, quote, “nothing in the documents issued last week undercuts the widely accepted conclusion that Russia worked to influence the 2016 election, but did not successfully manipulate any votes.” How do you respond to critics like former President Obama and also others on the Hill who say that the administration is conflating apples and oranges here, conflating allegations of actual hacking of voter machines and allegations of interference generally?
GABBARD: I think it’s a disservice to the American people that former President Obama’s office and others who are criticizing the transparency that is being delivered by releasing these documents. They are doing a disservice to the American people and trying to deflect away from their culpability in what is a historic scandal and negative action towards the American people and our democratic republic. The answer to that statement can very clearly be found throughout all of the documents that we have released, again, showing that Russia took action to try to sow discord in the election, but showed no preference for or against any singular candidate.
REPORTER: You’ve long been an opponent of weaponization in government. How do you respond to criticism that referring Obama administration officials and even potentially the former president is just more weaponization and this is a potential race to the bottom?
GABBARD: I think that’s a very disrespectful attack on the American people who deserve the truth. They deserve to have faith and trust in the integrity of our democratic republic, which has been undermined by President Obama through his direction of this manufactured fake intelligence document, knowing that it was filled with lies and knowing that it would and could then be used for all of the actions that came after.
LEAVITT: And I would just add there needs to be accountability for that weaponization, Phil, that we’ve seen. And no one has been a victim of the weaponized government more than President Trump, not just because of this political scandal. You all recall his house was raided. So I think, you know, it’s very disingenuous for people to say, how dare they speak of former President Obama about this based on evidence and based on intelligence when the former president of the United States, Donald Trump’s home was raided when he was forced to sit in a Manhattan courtroom and many other courtrooms across the country for crimes he never committed when he was impeached and indicted and the entire country witnessed that. That’s the weaponization of justice. Now the president is back because the American people see the truth. Nearly 80 million Americans reelected him back to this office. And he believes that we need to have justice and accountability. And I think the nearly 80 million Americans who reelected him agree with that.
Caitlin.
Addressing Intelligence Community Reports and Personal Standings
REPORTER: Thank you, Karoline. Two questions for Director Gabbard. Director Gabbard, you referenced the past intelligence reports and assessments on this, including that 2017 one that was signed off, as noted by every Republican on the Senate intelligence community, including the acting chair of the time, now Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who said in a statement that they did not find any evidence of Russian collusion, but they did find, however, is very troubling and they found irrefutable evidence of Russian meddling. One, are you saying that he’s wrong in that statement that he made then? And secondly, what would you say to people who believe that you’re only releasing these documents now to improve your standing with the president after he said that your intelligence assessments were wrong?
GABBARD: Well, first, I want to correct something that you stated, which was citing the Senate Intelligence Committee’s report as being one and the same. I think you said the intelligence community. The Senate Intelligence Committee has a very different function than the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. The evidence and the intelligence that has been declassified and released is irrefutable. I’m going to let Karoline speak to Secretary Rubio.
LEAVITT: I’ll speak to both questions. First on Secretary Rubio, he put out a statement in 2020 following that Senate Intelligence Committee report, and he said what they found is troubling. “We found irrefutable evidence of Russian meddling,” which the Director of National Intelligence just confirmed for all of you that Russia was trying to sow distrust and chaos. But what’s the outrage in this that Secretary Rubio did not say at the time the Democrats were saying at the time is the fact that the intelligence community was concocting this narrative that the president colluded with the Russians, that the president’s son was holding secret meetings with the Russians. All of these lies that were never true. And he also said at that time, “we discovered deeply troubling actions taken by the FBI under Comey, particularly their acceptance and willingness to rely on the Steele dossier without verifying its methodology or sourcing.” The Steele dossier that many outlets in this room ran as the gospel truth, and it was cooked up and paid for by the Clinton campaign.
As for your second question, Caitlin, I think who is saying that, that she would release this to try to boost her standing with the president? Who has said that?
REPORTER: Well, the president has publicly undermined her when it came to Iran. He said she was wrong. He told me that she didn’t know what she was talking about. That was on Air Force One on camera.
LEAVITT: The only people who are suggesting that the Director of National Intelligence would release evidence to try to boost her standing with the president are the people in this room who constantly try to sow distrust and chaos amongst the president’s cabinet. And it is not working. I will just answer your question directly. I am with the president of the United States every day. He has the utmost confidence in Director Gabbard. He always has. He continues to. And that is true of his entire cabinet, who is all working as one team to deliver on the promises this president made.
Follow-Up Questions on Previous DNIs and Legal Accountability
LEAVITT: Does anyone else have questions for Director Gabbard? And then we’ll turn it over to a couple other questions. Christian, go ahead.
REPORTER: Yeah, thank you. Director Gabbard. Director Gabbard, two follow-ups on questions that have been asked. You mentioned the previous DNIs during the president’s first term. One of them reports to you right now, if I’m not mistaken, John Ratcliffe. So have you not spoken to him about why this information was not declassified during the first term?
GABBARD: He was in that position for a very short period of time. The work that began back then, we have picked up and absolutely completed. We are continuing to investigate this. Additional whistleblowers are now coming forward because they see an opportunity for the truth to come to light. And as Karoline said, for real accountability to be brought forward. The accountability is the essential part of this. We can show the truth, reveal the truth. The accountability needs to occur to be able to start to restore that trust in the integrity of our democracy.
REPORTER: And then just quickly, I know you said you would leave the charging to DOJ, but the statute of limitations on conspiracy is five years. So what else could they possibly pursue besides treason?
GABBARD: I think that’s a great question for Attorney General Pam Bondi. We’re providing all of the evidence, all of the intelligence that we have, both redacted and unredacted versions, referring it to the Department of Justice and the FBI.
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