OAN Staff Katherine Mosack
1:18 PM – Thursday, August 14, 2025
U.S. Director of National Intelligence (DNI) Tulsi Gabbard has released additional “Top Secret” emails dating back to 2016, revealing former Director James Clapper’s attempts to suppress warnings about a politically motivated effort to undermine the 2016 presidential election by falsely linking President Donald Trump to Russian collusion.
The email exchange involved then-National Security Agency (NSA) Director Mike Rogers, then-FBI Director James Comey, and then-CIA Director John Brennan.
The declassified emails reveal that Rogers had expressed significant concerns to Clapper, Comey, Brennan regarding the Intelligence Community’s assessment of alleged Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Rogers highlighted that his team lacked sufficient access to the underlying intelligence and had insufficient time to thoroughly review it — making them uncomfortable endorsing the assessment’s conclusions.
Mere hours before the ICA authors planned to deliver the first draft to Intelligence community leaders, Clapper wrote back that asking for more time was “not negotiable.”
“We may have to compromise on our ‘normal’ modalities, since we must do this on such a compressed schedule,” Clapper claimed.
The former DNI head urged the recipients of the email to remain united in their support of the unverified report.
“That’s OUR story, and we’re stickin’ to it,” was the mantra that Clapper suggested the other men adopt. He also added: “This is one project that has to be a team sport.”
Meanwhile, Gabbard’s office revealed the emails to the public in a statement on Wednesday.
“The leading figures in the Russia Hoax have spent years deceiving the American public by presenting their manufactured and politicized assessments as credible intelligence. The email released today reinforces what we already exposed: the decision to compromise standards and violate protocols in the creation of the 2017 manufactured intelligence assessment was deliberate and came from the very top,” Gabbard said in the statement. “Clapper’s own words confirm that complying with the order to manufacture intelligence was a ‘team sport.’”
This is the most recent release of documents pertaining to the DNI’s investigation into the “Russiagate” scandal.
Last month, Gabbard released more than 100 documents, which she characterized as containing significant evidence implicating Obama-era officials in a conspiracy to falsely allege that Trump colluded with Russia during the 2016 election.
At the time, the GOP president took to social media to respond, emphatically asserting that the allegations leveled against him were entirely unfounded and politically motivated, dismissing them as a calculated hoax designed to undermine him.
“Obama himself manufactured the Russia, Russia, Russia HOAX. Crooked Hillary, Sleepy Joe, and numerous others participated in this, THE CRIME OF THE CENTURY! Irrefutable EVIDENCE.” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
On Thursday, the House Intelligence Committee weighed in to offer its assessment of the newly surfaced findings as well.
“The Russia hoax will go down in U.S. history as one of the most corrupt moments our nation has experienced. It tore the country apart, and to this day, our country is more polarized than ever before because of it. There are still people who passionately believe it is true. There must be accountability. We commend @DNIGabbard on her continued transparency with the American people. Sometimes sunshine is the best disinfectant.”
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