President-elect Donald Trump took to Twitter early Wednesday to blast the leak of unsubstantiated anti-Trump documents that touch on everything from Russia allegedly having leverage to extort him, to sexual escapades, and even to a potentially treasonous act.
The soon-to-be 45th president tweeted, "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." Later at a news conference Wednesday, he called the report "a disgrace," "fake news," "phony stuff," and "crap."
"It certainly never should have been released," he said.
The documents, and portrayals of them, began widely circulating on the Internet Tuesday and were even published in full by BuzzFeed, which said they were unverified. Shortly after, Trump went on Twitter for the first time to address the issue. "FAKE NEWS - A TOTAL Political Witch HUNT!"
The documents were said to have been drawn up by operatives seeking to derail his presidency and were allegedly passed from Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) to FBI director James Comey. Trump and President Barack Obama were briefed on them a week ago.
Russia denied it had a dossier with incriminating details on Trump, which US intel officials maintain they have not yet vetted.
"The Kremlin has no compromising dossier on Trump, such information isn’t consistent with reality and is nothing but an absolute fantasy," Putin spokesman, Dmitri Peskov, told a news conference.
Trump on Wednesday tweeted again, "Russia just said the unverified report paid for by political opponents is "A COMPLETE AND TOTAL FABRICATION, UTTER NONSENSE. Very unfair!"
But beyond the claims of sex videos and alleged proposed Russian business deals, there's a potentially treasonous claim in the documents. One of the opposition research documents notes an unidentified Russian source that the hack of the Democratic National Committee happened "with the full knowledge and support of TRUMP and senior member of his campaign team." The memo said that, in exchange, the Trump campaign "agreed to sideline Russian intervention in Ukraine as a campaign issue."
The Tuesday disclosure came the same day when Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) asked Comey during a hearing whether the FBI was investigating Trump, and Comey did not say. However, Comey did announce days before the election that the agency was investigating newly discovered e-mails connected to the Hillary Clinton e-mail server debacle.
The Guardian, meanwhile, has an unconfirmed report that the FBI applied for a warrant from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to monitor four members of the Trump team and their contacts with Russian officials.
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