CIA declassifies review of intelligence report on 2016 Russia election interference
Washington – CIA officials failed in some cases to follow standard procedures in an intelligence analysis of Russian interference efforts in the 2016 elections, according to an internal review declassified on Wednesday.
Intelligence agents have received an unusually short calendar for the analysis, there was an “excessive involvement” by senior leaders, and staff members had uneven access to crucial information on Russia, said the “lessons learned by the lessons”.
But the examination did not refute the conclusions of the 2017 intelligence assessment that Russia led an information war campaign designed to undermine the confidence of the Americans in the electoral process, damage Hillary Clinton and stimulate the prospects of Donald Trump in the 2016 elections.
“Although the overall evaluation has been deemed defensible, the procedural anomalies identified and the business problems highlight critical lessons for the management of controversial or politically loaded subjects,” said the exam.
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Trump and his allies have long rejected information and other reports indicating that Russia has used false information and propaganda to try to influence the 2016 elections and give the ball in his favor. They accused officials of intelligence and the application of the laws of plotting to link Trump to Russia and cast a doubt about the legitimacy of his victory in 2016.
A special lawyer appointed during the first Trump administration largely examined the way in which the CIA has designed its evaluation, but did not file any criminal accusation and noted any clear evidence that the political bias fell to the process.
A bipartite survey of the Senate Intelligence Committee in 2020 was approved with the 2017 intelligence assessment and found no reason to challenge its conclusions.
In Trump’s second presidential term, his deputies promised to bring more transparency to the intelligence community and prevent any attempt to politicize his work.
CIA director John Ratcliffe ordered the internal exam this year and declassified it on Wednesday, according to the CIA.
The intelligence assessment of the 2016 vote, which President Barack Obama asked after the November elections, noted that Russia was looking to undermine public faith in the democratic process and to denigrate Clinton and that Moscow “aspired” to help Trump to win the election.
According to the internal journal, two senior leaders of a CIA mission center focusing on Russia opposed the conclusion that Russia was aimed at ensuring Trump’s victory. They argued that the point of view was mainly supported by a single intelligence report while other judgments were saved by more information.
The examination indicated that the evaluation was carried out on an unusually short calendar. Instead of having months to prepare a complex and politically sensitive analysis, the authors had “less than a week to write the evaluation” and “less than two days to coordinate it formally” with other intelligence agents.
Several intelligence officers “said they felt” blocked “by the compressed calendar”, according to the review.
The examination said that senior CIA officials were strongly involved in the evaluation effort, which “was very unusual both in scope and intensity”. Consequently, the Defense Intelligence Agency and the Intelligence and Research Office of the State Department were “completely excluded” from the analysis, which was a “important gap” of the standard practice of the intelligence community, according to the journal.
The authors of the 2016 evaluation and other CIA officers also “strongly opposed”, including a reference in the analysis to the so-called Trump file compiled by the former British intelligence officer Christopher Steele. The file included undeclaged allegations concerning Trump’s collusion with Russia.
In the end, a summary of the file was included in an annex, with a warning that it was not used “to draw analytical conclusions” in the evaluation.
The examination also revealed reasons to rent the 2016 evaluation, saying that a large part of the team’s work showed a “robust” profession with a extensive supply and that there was no sign of systemic problems.
John Brennan, who was director of the CIA at the time of the evaluation, told NBC News on Wednesday that he was aware of the exam but had not yet had the chance to read it.
