Free Republic

On Wednesday’s broadcast of MSNBC’s “The Last Word,” House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) stated that Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe’s statement that Iran is seeking to undermine President Donald Trump could just be Ratcliffe putting a political spin on intelligence and “it’s very difficult to rely on what he has to say.”

Far-left Politico released a report yesterday claiming the Hunter Biden laptop story is Russian disinformation. What can you say… Politico writes: More than 50 former senior intelligence officials have signed on to a letter outlining their belief that the recent disclosure of emails allegedly belonging to Joe Biden’s son “has all the classic earmarks of a Russian information operation.”The letter, signed on Monday, centers around a batch of documents released by the New York Post last week that purport to tie the Democratic nominee to his son Hunter’s business dealings. Under the banner headline “Biden Secret E-mails,” the Post reported...

Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe on Monday said the information contained on Hunter Biden’s laptop revealed by The Post last week “is not part of some Russian disinformation campaign.” During an appearance on Fox Business’ “Mornings with Maria,” Ratcliffe shot down allegations by Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff, chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, that emails showing former Vice President Joe Biden knew about his son’s business dealings in Ukraine are a “smear” created by Moscow. “Hunter Biden’s laptop is not part of some Russian disinformation campaign,” Ratcliffe said. “Let me be clear: The intelligence community doesn’t believe that because...

Adam Schiff, the Chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, spent the last four years crying "Russia, Russia, Russia." Schiff claimed there was evidence of Russian collusion "in plain sight" but was the only one who could ever see it. Schiff sees Russians everywhere and they're all imaginary. When the story about Hunter Biden's laptop broke, Schiff once again fingered the Russians“We know that this whole smear on Joe Biden comes from the Kremlin. That’s been clear for well over a year now that they’ve been pushing this false narrative about this vice president and his son.” We...

'There is no intelligence that supports that,' Director of National Intelligence Ratcliffe says Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe on Monday said that Hunter Biden’s laptop “is not part of some Russian disinformation campaign,” amid claims from House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff suggesting otherwise. Ratcliffe, during an exclusive interview on FOX Business’ “Mornings with Maria,” was asked about the allegations from Schiff, D-Calif., who over the weekend said that the Hunter Biden emails suggesting Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden had knowledge of, and was allegedly involved in, his son’s foreign business dealings. “It’s funny that some of the people...

The CIA wrote a highly classified three-page memo to FBI Director James B. Comey and agent Peter Strzok telling them that 2016 Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton had approved a plan to blame Russian computer hacking on rival Donald Trump. The Washington Times obtained a copy of the heavily redacted memo sent to the FBI on Sept. 7, 2016, weeks after Mr. Strzok had opened the Crossfire Hurricane probe into the Trump campaign on suspicion of conspiring with the Kremlin.Then-CIA Director John O. Brennan wrote in notes that Mrs. Clinton allegedly approved the plan, one declassified document shows.Director of National...

Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe on Wednesday said he had approved the release of almost 1,000 pages of materials to the Justice Department as part of an investigation of the FBI’s probe of Russian election interference in 2016.... On Tuesday, Ratcliffe declassified a heavily redacted set of notes written by Brennan that appear to show he briefed President Barack Obama in 2016 on intelligence the U.S. had obtained from Russian sources, indicating that Hillary Clinton had approved a plan to try to tie the hacking of Democratic emails by Russia to the Trump campaign.

President Trump on Tuesday said he has “fully authorized the total Declassification of any & all documents” related to the Russia investigation and the FBI’s investigation into former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server. “I have fully authorized the total Declassification of any & all documents pertaining to the single greatest political CRIME in American History, the Russia Hoax. Likewise, the Hillary Clinton Email Scandal. No redactions!”, the president tweeted Tuesday night. “All Russia Hoax Scandal information was Declassified by me long ago,” Trump tweeted. “Unfortunately for our Country, people have acted very slowly, especially...

“I pledged to a bipartisan group of senators that I would look at all of the underlying intelligence surrounding the intelligence community’s assessment of Russia’s interference and this idea of Trump-Russia collusion,” Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe told “Sunday Morning Futures.” “But I’m not going to prejudice John Durham’s work in connection with that, so we’ve had to coordinate with his office about the timing of that. But I’m optimistic that I’ll be declassifying additional documents soon.” “He’s looking at the same documents that I am,” Ratcliffe said referring to U.S. Attorney John Durham’s review of the investigation. “He’s...

The Talk Shows August 30th, 2020 Guests to be interviewed today on major television talk shows:FOX NEWS SUNDAY (Fox Network): Kate Bedingfield, Biden's deputy campaign manager; Lara Trump, Campaign Adviser to the 45th president of the United States, Donald Trump; Thomas Peters, RumbleUp, the first peer-to-peer texting platform for Republicans. Panel: Guy Benson, political editor of Townhall.com; Gillian Turner, news correspondent on FOX News; Charles Lane, Amazon Bezos Post reporter.MEET THE PRESS (NBC): White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows; Rep. Cedric Richmond (D-La.), Hiden’ Biden campaign Panel: Yamiche Alcindor, PBS White House correspondent; Hallie Jackson, Chief White House correspondent...

WASHINGTON -- State Sen. Pat Fallon was elected Saturday afternoon by 144 Republican officials from northeast Texas to replace Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe as the GOP nominee on the ballot for Texas’ 4th Congressional District, likely sending the Prosper Republican to Washington as the district’s next representative. Fallon, who represents District 30 in the Texas Senate, beat out 17 other candidates with 82 votes from the 144 voting GOP county and precinct chairs who live in the district, needing only one round to secure a majority. The chairs gathered Saturday afternoon at the Hopkins County Civic Center for...

Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) told reporters Tuesday that bombshell media reports that Russia’s military intelligence paid bounties to Taliban-linked militants to kill U.S. troops is “absolutely inaccurate,” making the claim after she and other Republicans were briefed at the White House. “I think that reporting was absolutely inaccurate. I had a briefing this morning and I know that the evidence is not corroborated,” she said, emphasizing that she was putting “evidence” in air quotes. “We take threats seriously. At the tactical level, obviously making sure our positions are hardened and we’re watching out for adversaries,” she added. Ernst was one...

Richard Grenell has declassified a new batch of Russia probe documents on his way out as acting director of national intelligence, leaving the decision on whether to make those files public up to newly sworn-in Director John Ratcliffe. The documents include transcripts of phone calls that then-incoming National Security Adviser Michael Flynn and then-Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak had in December 2016, during the presidential transition period. Grenell said publicly last week that he was in the process of declassifying those files, after House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, D-Calif., asked that he do so. Fox News has learned that the...

Tomorrow morning ends the tenure of Richard “Ric” Grenell as the acting Director of National Intelligence. At 12:15pm DNI John Ratcliffe will be sworn-in [LINK] and the declassification/sunlight baton will be passed to senate confirmed DNI John Ratcliffe. On the topic of the FBI capture and use of the December 29, 2016, Flynn-Kislyak phone call… First we had a hunch; then it became a suspicion… that evolved into a likelihood… that has now become a strong probability. The capture of the December 29th phone call, which generated the raw “CR cuts“, was an FBI summary, modified for a specific interpretation....

Trump had a very good week, pressuring states to reopen, threatening to withdraw from the Open Skies treaty with Russia, ending all funding to the World Health Organization, and launching another round of deregulation. Trump won a big battle in the Supreme Court when it denied Congress the right to examine secret grand jury testimony from the Mueller “Russia collusion” investigation. The Democrats said they needed it to try to impeach Trump — again. Withdrawing from the Open Skies treaty (because the Russians are denying flights over Kaliningrad and Chechnya) is a positive step, as is Trump’s refusal to enter...

The Senate on Thursday voted to confirm Rep. John Ratcliffe as the next director of national intelligence. Ratcliffe, R-Texas, was approved on a 49-44 vote. The installment comes as the intelligence community once again finds itself in the middle of a political firestorm, over whether Trump associates were improperly "unmasked" in intelligence reports during the latter days of the Obama administration. Ratcliffe's nomination was voted out of the Senate Intelligence Committee earlier this week on a party-line vote of 8-7, reflecting lingering partisan tensions over the post. “The DNI’s role is crucial to our national security, and I look forward...

Rep. John Ratcliffe (R-Texas), President Trump’s nominee for director of national intelligence (DNI), refused to say Tuesday whether he agreed with the Intelligence Community’s (IC) assessment that Russia interfered in the 2016 elections to help the president. Both the IC and the Senate Intelligence Committee concluded that Russia interfered in the 2016 elections to favor Trump. The House Intelligence Committee’s Republican majority concluded in 2018 that Russia interfered in the elections, but did not conclude this was to favor Trump, an analysis Democratic members of the committee disagreed with. When asked about his thoughts on these conclusions by Senate Intelligence...

You understand why San Fran Nan wonÂ’t call the House back in session, right? ItÂ’s because she and Chuck Schumer are trying to shame Mitch McConnell into keeping the Senate shut down. Why? Well, itÂ’s obvious: They want to keep the Senate shut down in order to prevent the confirmation of President TrumpÂ’s judicial nominees and other key nominees like John Ratcliffe, who is up to become the Director of National Intelligence. Luckily, McConnell is having none of it, and called the Senate back into session this week with his main goal to specifically get those nominees moving again. He...

Democrats are afraid of Rep. John Ratcliffe, R-Texas, becoming President Donald Trump's next director of national intelligence because they are concerned about how he'll work on reforms of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, Rep. Jim Jordan said Tuesday. “I think they’re scared (Ratcliffe) is going to clean FISA up,” the Ohio Republican told Fox News' "America's Newsroom," pointing out that Ratcliffe identified issues with the FISA process three years ago. "It also shows that (Rep.) Adam Schiff was wrong," said Jordan. "They don't like the fact that Adam Schiff was wrong and John Ratcliffe was right." Republicans were vindicated by...