The Washington Post dropped a bombshell report claiming that “Donald Trump shared classified information with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak and Foreign Ambassador  Sergei Lavrov”
President Trump revealed highly classified information to the Russian foreign minister and ambassador in a White House meeting last week, according to current and former U.S. officials, who said Trump’s disclosures jeopardized a critical source of intelligence on the Islamic State.
The information the president relayed had been provided by a U.S. partner through an intelligence-sharing arrangement considered so sensitive that details have been withheld from allies and tightly restricted even within the U.S. government, officials said.
The partner had not given the United States permission to share the material with Russia, and officials said Trump’s decision to do so endangers cooperation from an ally that has access to the inner workings of the Islamic State. After Trump’s meeting, senior White House officials took steps to contain the damage, placing calls to the CIA and the National Security Agency.
Now three members of Trump’s administration that attended the meeting have denied these claims
National Security Advisor General McMaster:
“The president and the foreign minister reviewed common threats from terrorist organizations to include threats to aviation,†said H.R. McMaster, the national security adviser, who participated in the meeting. “At no time were any intelligence sources or methods discussed, and no military operations were disclosed that were not already known publicly.â€
“Other senior officials who were present, including the secretary of state, remember the meeting the same way and have said so. Their on-the-record accounts should outweigh those of anonymous sources. I was in the room, it didn’t happen.â€
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson:
“During President Trump’s meeting with Foreign Minister Lavrov a broad range of subjects were discussed among which were common efforts and threats regarding counter-terrorism. During that exchange the nature of specific threats were discussed, but they did not discuss sources, methods or military operations.”
Deputy National Security Advisor for Strategy Dina Powell:
“This story is false. The president only discussed the common threats that both countries faced,â€
We also must keep in mind that even if the report is 100% true it is unlikely Trump broke any laws:
“As president, Trump has broad authority to declassify government secrets, making it unlikely that his disclosures broke the law,â€
Extreme critics of this story have claimed The Washington Post story is completely fabricated:
WH source with direct knowledge just told me @washingtonpost didn’t talk to ANY U.S. official at mtg w/ Lavrov. “It’s Fake News”
— Laura Ingraham (@IngrahamAngle) May 15, 2017
Meaning of course @washingtonpost didn’t talk to ANY WH official at the mtg who confirmed their story.
— Laura Ingraham (@IngrahamAngle) May 15, 2017
If The Washington Post report is right then Trump will once again have a huge issue on his hands. The Democrats will have more baseless evidence to back up their witch hunt that is The Russia-Trump collusion ordeal. Â The report on its own holds little weight if true considering Trump had the authority to make this decision. The issue comes in the fact that it will allow his skeptics to further have ammunition.
The report states this:
In his meeting with Lavrov, Trump seemed to be boasting about his inside knowledge of the looming threat. “I get great intel. I have people brief me on great intel every day,†the president said, according to an official with knowledge of the exchange.
If true this makes Trump look like a child. By this supposed quote Trump looks like someone who should be nowhere near classified information due to the fact he handles it carelessly. Classified information is not to be bragged about but rather handled with care.
The next issue this will cause Trump is the fact Russia is involved. This could have been any other country and the story would have been a lot smaller. Since Russia is involved conspiracy theorists on the Left are going to use this to point at Trump being Putin’s stooge and attempt to point at Trump needing to be impeached.
Now, if The Washington Post is wrong this will be a huge disaster for them. This won’t just be proof of how slanted the Mainstream Medias narrative is but it will showcase them printing completely false news. This comes after just last week both The New York Times and Washington Post printed completely false stories about Comey’s firing.
This latest story from WaPo comes after two similarly provocative stories were published by the New York Times and Washington Post last week and then promptly debunked by the FBI and Department of Justice. First there was the story from the NYT saying that Comey had asked for a “significant increase” in funding for his Russia probe just days before he was fired and then WaPo ran a story saying that Rod Rosenstein had threatened to quit when Trump attributed the Comey firing to his letter. Both accusations were subsequently denied on the record by the Department of Justice.
Trump has yet to take to Twitter to deny this story which seems odd but he may do so very soon.
The true story here is that Donald Trump must contain the leakers within his administration and intelligence communities. Actions such as this are nothing new when it pertains to President’s meeting with foreign countries. The issue comes in the fact that this information should never reach the media.
This smells an awful lot like a smear campaign orchestrated by the deep state to delegitmize Trump but only time will tell who is telling the truth.
