As USA Today reports, the release of special counsel Robert Mueller’s report on Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election reveals many occasions where President…
As USA Today reports, the release of special counsel Robert Mueller’s report on Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election reveals many occasions where President Donald Trump leaned on intelligence chiefs during the probe.
In 2017, Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats had to tell Trump that his job prevented him from getting involved in FBI investigations. Not only that, on more than one occasion the president complained to Mike Pompeo, Trump’s first CIA director, that nobody was publicly defending him during the midst of the Russia probe. And Michael Rogers, who headed the National Security Agency in 2017, was reportedly so taken aback by Trump’s attempt to get him to refute news stories linking him to Russia that he documented the conversation.
While Trump has always voiced his skepticism at the idea that the actions of Russia helped him win the White House, Mueller’s report sheds more light on the fractured relationship between the president and the leaders of the intelligence community.
