Donald Trump on Wednesday morning tried to defend himself from Tuesday night reports that a British intelligence officer compiled a 35-page memo with salacious allegations about Trump.
In his first tweet, Trump cited comments from a spokesman for Russian President Vladimir Putin denying that the country had collected compromising information on Trump. The President-elect attempted to use the comments from Putin’s spokesman to cast doubt on the validity of the memo.
Russia just said the unverified report paid for by political opponents is “A COMPLETE AND TOTAL FABRICATION, UTTER NONSENSE.” Very unfair!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 11, 2017
Trump then denied that he has any links to Russia and dismissed the CNN report on the memo as “fake news.” He also compared leaks about the intelligence briefing to Nazi Germany.
Russia has never tried to use leverage over me. I HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH RUSSIA – NO DEALS, NO LOANS, NO NOTHING!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 11, 2017
I win an election easily, a great “movement” is verified, and crooked opponents try to belittle our victory with FAKE NEWS. A sorry state!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 11, 2017
Intelligence agencies should never have allowed this fake news to “leak” into the public. One last shot at me.Are we living in Nazi Germany?
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 11, 2017
U.S. intelligence officials last week briefed Trump and President Obama about allegations that Russian actors have compromising information about Trump, according to a CNN report. The briefing also included allegations that Trump surrogates communicated with Russian actors during the 2016 campaign, CNN reported.
Correction: This piece had been corrected to reflect that the dossier came from a former British operative and not Russia. We regret the error.
