House Democrats emerged from a closed-door briefing at the White House on Tuesday, which reacted to President Donald Trump’s response to reports that Russia paid rewards to Taliban-linked militants in Afghanistan for attacking and kill American troops.
“The president publicly called this a hoax. Nothing in the briefing we just received led me to believe it was a hoax,” Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, the No. 2 Democrat in the House of Representatives, told reporters. .
“There may be different judgments about the level of credibility [of the reports], but there was no affirmation that the information we had was a hoax, “he added.
House of Representatives Intelligence Speaker Adam Schiff, a Democrat from California, another aide at the briefing, said: “I find it inexplicable in light of these very public allegations that the President has not come before the country and assured the American people who will get to the bottom of whether the Russians are putting a reward on the heads of the American troops. “
The briefing for the group of less than a dozen Democrats, all of whom have previous experience with national security or intelligence issues, came a day after the White House briefed a separate group of Republicans on the reported findings that A Russian military intelligence unit secretly offered Afghan militants are rewarded for killing coalition forces.
A Republican, Rep. Jim Banks of Indiana, left that briefing in harsh words for The New York Times, which revealed the story.
“The real scandal: We will probably never know the truth … because @nytimes used unconfirmed information in an ONGOING investigation into the targeted killing of US soldiers to defame the President,” Banks tweeted. “The blood is on his hands.”
However, at a press conference Tuesday morning, Republican Rep. Mac Thornberry of Texas said he “of course” has additional questions after being briefed by the White House.
Hoyer said he told Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, who invited him to the briefing, that he wanted to hear directly from intelligence sources about the reports “very, very troubling.”
“We did not receive any new substantive information” from the briefing, Hoyer said.
The head of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the House of Representatives, Eliot Engel, DN.Y., agreed and added: “I think the American people deserve to know why the president does not question [Russian President Vladimir] Putin, why doesn’t the President condemn Putin?
“I mean, for God’s sake, these are our soldiers, and if we are not going to protect them, what are we going to do?” Said Engel.
The White House did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request for comment on the Democrats’ comments.
Democrats have called for responses from the White House on the alleged U.S. intelligence evaluations, which were reported by the Times and later confirmed by other media.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer have called on the Trump administration to inform all members of their respective houses of the reports. Those requests have not yet been granted.
The White House has maintained that Trump, who in the past year said he wanted Russia to join the alliance of world leaders known as the Group of 7, had not been informed of the reported intelligence findings.
As recently as Monday afternoon, White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany told reporters that Trump “has not been briefed on the matter,” even after Trump tweeted on Sunday night, ” Intel informed me that they did not find this information credible, and therefore did not inform me. “
Trump in that tweet suggested the reports are “possibly another fabricated Russia hoax” intended to “make Republicans look bad.”
But the Times, citing two officials with knowledge of the matter, reported Monday night that Trump had received a written intelligence report in February about the alleged rewards. That same night, the Associated Press reported that the White House was aware of the matter in early 2019, and that former national security adviser John Bolton told colleagues that he briefed Trump on intelligence in March last year.
Trump administration officials, such as national security adviser Robert O’Brien, say Trump was not informed because the allegations had not been verified by the intelligence community. Democrats have criticized that response.
“President Truman said, ‘The money stops here.’ President Trump says, ‘I never saw the money,'” Hoyer said in the Tuesday morning press.
Schiff also said, without providing details, that the subject of the president’s daily intelligence briefing was discussed at the White House. An official quoted by the Times on Monday said the matter appeared in the president’s daily report on February 27.
“I do not want to comment on this particular case, but I will only say that it is not a justification to say that the president should have read any material he has. If he does not read, he does not read,” Schiff said. said. “You should know that by now.”
Hoyer added: “Our focus was, what did the President know and when did he know?”
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