On Thursday, Joe Biden revealed that he and Obama learned about the instantly infamous (and unsubstantiated) “Golden Showers” file last week from U.S. intelligence. The dynamic duo didn’t sound thrilled to hear the information, but intelligence officers decided that they needed to hear it before the general public did. Donald Trump received a briefing too, but telling him that the filed contained peeing prostitutes (and so much more) couldn’t have been fun.
Undoubtedly, Trump was even less pleased than the Obama-Biden crew to hear about the dossier, but someone had to tell him. Can you imagine being the one? John McCain had to think things through before handing over the dossier to the FBI, but being the one to break the terrible news had to be harder. In the end, U.S. officials told NBC news that FBI Director James Comey had to do the honors:
President-elect Donald Trump was informed about the existence of the unverified allegations against him about Russian ties after last Friday’s Intel briefing at Trump Tower on alleged Russian hacking, U.S. officials told NBC News.
A senior U.S. official said that it was FBI Director James Comey himself who pulled Trump aside after the briefing and spoke with him one-on-one about the so-called “dossier,”35 pages of memos prepared by a former British spy for an anti-Trump client prior to last year’s election.
So, Trump (at last) had his long-overdue intelligence briefing, which was supposed to solely be about the Russian hacking mess. And then Comey pulled him aside after the briefing ended and laid out what was in the 35 pages. Trump was probably livid, if his tweeted reactions and and “fake news” accusations are any clue. Comey had one of the most difficult jobs in the universe on that day.
(Via NBC News)