WASHINGTON, D.C. —Tulsi Gabbard, serving as the eighth Director of National Intelligence under President Donald J. Trump, on Friday, July 18, released evidence alleging that a secret 2016 White House meeting under former President Barack Obama directed intelligence agencies to fabricate claims of Russian election interference. Gabbard called the actions by 25 Obama administration officials, including the former president and members of his national security cabinet, a politicization of intelligence to undermine Trump’s presidency in a “years-long coup,” with calls for the Department of Justice to investigate to ensure accountability and prevent future occurrences.
“The issue I am raising is not a partisan issue. It is one that concerns every American. The information we are releasing today clearly shows there was a treasonous conspiracy in 2016 committed by officials at the highest level of our government. Their goal was to subvert the will of the American people and enact what was essentially a years-long coup with the objective of trying to usurp the President from fulfilling the mandate bestowed upon him by the American people,” said Director Gabbard. “Their egregious abuse of power and blatant rejection of our Constitution threatens the very foundation and integrity of our democratic republic. No matter how powerful, every person involved in this conspiracy must be investigated and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, to ensure nothing like this ever happens again. The American people’s faith and trust in our democratic republic and therefore the future of our nation depends on it. As such, I am providing all documents to the Department of Justice to deliver the accountability that President Trump, his family, and the American people deserve.”
If the DOJ does bring charges against suspects in the alleged Russia Hoax, treason and other federal crimes are tried in Article III courts and not military commissions (or tribunals). Military commissions are for those accused of war crimes or violations of the law of armed conflict, enemy combatants and for spies aiding and abetting an enemy regime.
According to US Code 3237, “Offenses begun in one district and completed in another,” opens up the avenue for the charges to be tried in courts other than the Washington D.C. Court District. Also, according to U.S. Code 18 Section 371, “Conspiracy to Defraud the United States,” the conspiracy claims to which Director Gabbard is alluding to can be tried in any U.S. District Court throughout the country.
Below is the alleged process of the “Russian Hoax” outlined by Director Gabbard to lay the groundwork for what she called a “years-long coup” against President Trump by Obama administration officials:
- In the months leading up to the November 2016 election, the Intelligence Community (IC) consistently assessed that Russia is “probably not trying … to influence the election by using cyber means.”
- On December 7, 2016, after the election, talking points were prepared for DNI James Clapper stating, “Foreign adversaries did not use cyberattacks on election infrastructure to alter the US Presidential election outcome.”
- On December 9, 2016, President Obama’s White House gathered top National Security Council Principals for a meeting that included James Clapper, John Brennan, Susan Rice, John Kerry, Loretta Lynch, Andrew McCabe and others, to discuss Russia.
- After the meeting, DNI Clapper’s Executive Assistant sent an email to IC leaders tasking them with creating a new IC assessment “per the President’s request” that details the “tools Moscow used and actions it took to influence the 2016 election.” It went on to say, “ODNI will lead this effort with participation from CIA, FBI, NSA, and DHS.”
- Obama officials leaked false statements to media outlets, including The Washington Post, claiming, “Russia has attempted through cyber means to interfere in, if not actively influence, the outcome of an election.”
- On January 6, 2017, a new Intelligence Community Assessment was released that directly contradicted the IC assessments that were made throughout the previous six months.
Although she is implicating former President Obama in the conspiracy, she did not provide direct evidence to his involvement in the alleged conspiracy.
“What I was concerned about in particular was making sure that [Wikileaks/Clinton emails] wasn’t compounded by potential hacking that could hamper vote counting and affect the actual election process itself. And so, in early September, when I saw President Putin in China, I felt that the most effective way to ensure that, that didn’t happen was to talk to him directly. And tell him to cut it out,” wrote President Obama on the alleged hacking the Presidential Election.
Russian threat to directly manipulate the actual vote count. Source: Tulsi Gabbard, Director of National Intelligence.
She claimed that “President Barack Obama directed the IC [Intelligence Community] to create a new intelligence assessment that detailed Russian election meddling, even though it would contradict multiple intelligence assessments released over the previous several months.” Following this, “Obama officials immediately leaned on their allies in the media to advance their falsehoods,” with “Anonymous IC sources leaked classified information to the Washington Post and others that Russia had intervened to hack the election in Trump’s favor.
“On January 6, 2017, “just days before President Trump took office,” Gabbard stated that former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper “unveiled the Obama-directed politicized assessment, a gross weaponization of intelligence that laid the groundwork for a years-long coup intended to subvert President Trump’s entire presidency.”
She cited redacted declassified whistleblower emails shared with DNI on Friday, July 18, 2025, which allegedly revealed that Clapper and former Director of the Central Intelligence Agency John Brennan used the baseless discredited Steele Dossier as a source to push this false narrative in the intelligence assessment that Russia interfered in the 2016 Presidential Election.
The Steele Dossier is a controversial collection of 17 raw intelligence reports compiled in 2016 by Christopher Steele, a former British MI6 officer and head of the Russia Desk at the firm Orbis Business Intelligence.
It alleged a conspiracy between Trump’s presidential campaign and the Russian government to interfere in the 2016 U.S. election, including claims of Russian efforts to spy on Trump, exchange intelligence, and possess compromising material (known as kompromat) on him.
The fake Steele dossier is alleged to have originated as part of opposition research conducted by the firm Fusion GPS, starting in October 2015 and initially funded by conservative opponents of Trump according to The Washington Free Beacon. Funding later shifted in April 2016 to the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and Hillary Clinton’s campaign through Seattle-based Perkins Coie.
In March of 2022, the Clinton presidential campaign and the DNC paid a $113,000 fine to the Federal Election Commission for misreporting spending of Fuson GPS research for the Steele dossier.
Steele was hired in June 2016, producing reports as “raw intelligence”—unverified information. Key claims included an alleged “well-developed conspiracy of cooperation” directed by Vladimir Putin, involving Russian cultivation of Trump, secret back channels with figures like Paul Manafort, Michael Cohen, and Carter Page, kompromat such as alleged tapes of Trump engaging in compromising sexual acts during a 2013 Moscow visit (aka the pee tapes), Russian hacking of Democratic emails via WikiLeaks, and related offers.
The fake Steele dossier was shared with the FBI in September 2016, used for FISA warrants on Carter Page, and circulated among journalists and officials, leading to briefings for Obama and Trump-elect in January 2017.
BuzzFeed News published it on January 10, 2017. It influenced the FBI’s Crossfire Hurricane investigation and the Mueller probe (2017–2019), where the 2019 Mueller report found no Trump-Russia conspiracy despite widespread interference claims. The 2020 bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee report reaffirmed Russian interference, using the fake Steele dossier as a ‘roadmap’ for some aspects. However, the 2023 Durham report (by Special Counsel John Durham) concluded the FBI could not corroborate any substantive allegations despite extensive efforts, calling the dossier unreliable and criticizing the FBI’s handling.
Here is a list of individuals listed on a memo, released by Gabbard, who allegedly attended an “Obama secret White House meeting on ‘Russia Election Meddling’ on December 9, 2016 that launched what she called a “years-long coup,” against President Trump tied to the Russia Hoax:” Susan Rice (National Security Advisor), John Kerry (Secretary of State), Victoria Nuland (Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs), Adam Szubin (Acting Under Secretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence), Brian McKeon (Acting Under Secretary of Defense for Policy), Loretta Lynch (Attorney General), Mary McCord (Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General for the National Security Division), Jeh Johnson (Secretary of Homeland Security), Rob Silvers (Assistant Secretary for Cyber Policy at the Department of Homeland Security), Denis McDonough (White House Chief of Staff), Maher Bitar (Director for Israeli and Palestinian Affairs at the National Security Council), Neil Eggleston (White House Counsel), James Clapper (Director of National Intelligence), Andrew McCabe (Deputy Director of the FBI), John Brennan (Director of the Central Intelligence Agency), Joseph Dunford (Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff), Richard Ledgett (Deputy Director of the National Security Agency), Avril Haines (Deputy National Security Advisor), Lisa Monaco (Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism), Ben Rhodes (Deputy National Security Advisor for Strategic Communications), Celeste Wallander (Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Russia and Central Asia at the National Security Council), Caroline Tess (Adviser to the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations), Brett Holmgren (Director for Counterterrorism at the National Security Council), Michael Daniel (Special Assistant to the President and Cybersecurity Coordinator), Samir Jain (Senior Director for Cybersecurity Policy at the National Security Council), and Jeffrey Edmonds (Russia Political-Military Analyst at the Central Intelligence Agency).
Author: Mario Lotmore
