After just 25 days the Trump administration is clearly under a microscope. Following the resignation of the National Security Advisor, Michael Flynn, on Monday, the New York Times has a front page story today that claims various members of the presidents campaign had repeated contacts with Russian intelligence officials.
The President has taken to twitter this morning to blast these reports, claiming the bigger problem is the leaks in Washington: [story lower down]
Reuters: Phone records and intercepted calls show that members of Donald Trump’s presidential campaign and other Trump associates had repeated contacts with senior Russian intelligence officials in the year before the election, the New York Times reported on Tuesday, citing four current and former U.S. officials.
U.S. law enforcement and intelligence agencies intercepted the communications around the same time they were discovering evidence that Russia was trying to disrupt the presidential election by hacking into the Democratic National Committee, three of the officials said, according to the Times.
The intelligence agencies then sought to learn whether the Trump campaign was colluding with the Russians on the hacking or other efforts to influence the election, the newspaper said.
The officials interviewed in recent weeks said they had seen no evidence of such cooperation so far, it said.
However, the intercepts alarmed U.S. intelligence and law enforcement agencies, in part because of the amount of contact that was occurring while Trump was speaking glowingly about Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The intercepted calls are different from the wiretapped conversations last year between Michael Flynn, Trump’s former national security adviser, and Sergei I. Kislyak, the Russian ambassador to the United States, the Times said.
During those calls, the two men discussed sanctions that the Obama administration imposed on Russia in December. Flynn misled the White House about those calls and was asked to resign on Monday night.
The White House did not immediately respond to a request from Reuters for comment on the Times story. Continue reading
BloombergTV: President Donald Trump’s administration is facing mounting questions about ties to Russian intelligence agencies following the resignation of national security adviser Michael Flynn. Bloomberg’s Kevin Cirilli reports on “Bloomberg Surveillance.”
