Intel Analyst Who Refused to Lie About Russia Hoax Got Threatening In-Person Message from Superior: Declassified Docs
An intelligence analyst recounted being pressured by his superior to confirm that the Russians had interfered in the 2016 election as the intelligence community compiled an assessment, which was ordered by then-President Barack Obama and designed to undermine the incoming administration of President Donald Trump.
The account is found in declassified documents released by Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard’s office on Monday.
In one of those documents, an unnamed deputy national intelligence officer at the National Intelligence Council, which works under the DNI, recounts being abruptly told to abandon a post-election review of alleged Russian attempts to hack the U.S. election-related infrastructure in 2016, when their findings were inconclusive.
“Later, when presenting [redacted] with our findings, [redacted] directed us to abandon any further study of the subject, saying, ‘it’s something else.’ In light of later development in open source reporting, I came to have concerns about this Russia-attributed cyber activity and the abrupt dismissal of the study effort,” the analyst wrote.
A superior told the intelligence officer “you need to trust me on this” in terms of changing his assessment of Russian involvement.
“[Redacted] further reiterated [redacted’s] ongoing invocation that I abandon my tradecraft standards. [Redacted] had told me on prior occasions that [redacted] viewed my analyst culture and tradecraft as a pseudo-religion [redacted] did not share, and had stated I would need to demonstrate an ability to ‘outgrow’ it in order for [redacted] to recommend my promotion,” the analyst wrote.
Gabbard posted a flow chart earlier this month of the genesis of the Russia hoax, explaining that the intelligence community’s first assessment that Moscow had not successfully intervened in the election’s outcome was changed.
Obama ordered a new assessment in early December 2016. Officials then began leaking “facts” to the media outlets so they could run headlines like, “Secret CIA Assessment says Russia was trying to help Trump win White House,” and “Russian Hackers Acted To Aid Trump in Election, U.S. Says,” and “U.S. Officials: Putin Personally Involved in U.S. Election Hack.”
These were likely some of the types of headlines that caused the analyst concerns.
🧵 Americans will finally learn the truth about how in 2016, intelligence was politicized and weaponized by the most powerful people in the Obama Administration to lay the groundwork for what was essentially a years-long coup against President @realDonaldTrump, subverting the… pic.twitter.com/UQKKZ5c4Op
— DNI Tulsi Gabbard (@DNIGabbard) July 18, 2025
The intelligence officer recounted being “pressured to alter my views on the 2017 ICA’s Key Judgements with the expressed intent by [redacted] that my concurrence was sought to enable [redacted] to sway the views of the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA).”
In other words, the analyst was pressured to lie.
“I objected to overall framing of Russian activities as ‘efforts to influence,’ as opposed to discredit the outcome of, the 2016 election, and also judged that the 2017 ICA’s treatment of overt media activities was omitting important context,” the analyst wrote.
“In response, [redacted] actively pressured me to change my judgments, and stated clearly and directly to me that [redacted] sought my concurrence as a means to persuade the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), so that DIA would provide their concurrence with the analytic assessments of the 2017 ICA.”
Gabbard said on Fox News earlier this month that Obama and those intelligence chiefs working for him — like then-CIA Director John Brennan, with the support of then-FBI Director James Comey — created a “manufactured, politicized piece of intelligence with the objective of subverting the will of the American people, who in November of 2016 delivered a historic victory to President Trump.”
🚨 BREAKING: Tulsi Gabbard accuses Barack Obama and his cronies of staging a YEARS-LONG COUP against President Trump, calls for CRIMINAL CHARGES
“They SUBVERTED the will of the people, who voted for President Trump in November of 2016.”
“Accountability is CRITICAL. The people’s… pic.twitter.com/tqWcVCTenU
— Nick Sortor (@nicksortor) July 19, 2025
“President Obama and his team, their goal was to essentially not accept the decision of the American people and to use this manufactured, politicized intelligence as a means to enact what would become essentially a years-long coup against President Trump,” she added.
Let the exposure of corruption continue. The American people have a right to know, and those involved in wrongdoing must be held to account.
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