Did not discuss sources, methods or Military Operations. The president only discussed the common threats that both countries face. But anderson, nowhere in these statements that were released by tillerson, powell or the National Security advisor. Is there any kind of denial that the president released Classified Information to the russians, and of course thats a deeply sensitive topic because President Trump went after Hillary Clinton for having emails on her private server. H. R. Mcmaster will be briefing reporters tomorrow on the president s upcoming foreign trip. Obviously if mcmaster does not show up at that briefing, thats a telling sign that we should
circle the wagons on this. Its not clear that any of those statements almost sound word for word the same, the fact that they dont specifically say hi didnt reveal Classified Information, thats not just an oversight that the white house put out a statement that didnt directly address that. This is the sort of denial speak that you get from administrations when there are very serious questions being raised and obviously up on capitol hill, theyre raising some very serious questions tonight and republicans are tearing their hair out wishing they could just get through a day in this town without the white house doing serious damage to itself. How does this tie into the reporting that youve done on the airline lap top story. Reporter when we were reporting that story, we worked with Intelligence Agencies for a couple of days, specifically to remove any references that the
president is allegedly discussed with these top two russian officials there in the oval office. They specifically did not want to mention the city, and they said specifically, if you mention these types of things, the Terrorist Groups will be able to figure out that we have certainly Collection Methods and our allies have certain Collection Methods and this could lead to lives put in danger, not only sources and methods being put in danger, people inside isis, might be put at risk as a result of this reporting. We went through the Classified Information, we wanted to make sure that the public understood the grave danger that this lap top bomb, this intelligence showed, but we didnt want to put anybodys lives in danger. So we worked with the Intelligence Agency to remove this from the story. When mcmaster spoke, he said he Didnt Talk About Methods and sources, what youre saying is if there had been any level of detail of these conversations with the russians, that could have allowed eed a very sarryes figure out. Whether the president said this is how this was collected, by just telling the details, its possible the information the russians in this case could figure out what the sources and methods were . They could Reverse Engineer the information to figure out how it was collected, to figure out how the u. S. Obtained it. Heres the other the president Still Regards russia as not the adversary here, he really believe in the fight the reaction is of deep, deep concern on a number of levels. One because its Classified Information, thats obvious. And two, the russians were the ones to receive this information, its prime adversary in the Intelligence Community today. And it seems to show a there are countries that you share intel with as a matter of alliances, the uk, france, et cetera, thats natural. There are others that you dont want public, because of the nature of those relationships, those three things make this particularly serious. Former senior u. S. Intelligence official described it to me this way, i have never before soon a senior Government Official so carelessly share information that endangers a sensitive relationship. Unprecedented. Believes that the president
cannot be quiet about that information in front of the russians thats not the first time we have heard concerns from our allies, what they share with the president and what comes out. This relates to the lap top threat, the idea of getting a bomb hid on in a personal ele electronics on to an airplane. I have talked today about suspe suspending this threat is considered right now the greatest, most immediate, clear and present Terror Danger to the u. S. So beyond the obvious sensitive territory that youre in with the nature of the information and the relationship, the nature of the threat, makes it the most sensitive territory you can get. If what the Washington Times and New York Times reported is true this is the most serious accusation made against a sitting president. Ever . I cannot think of any other president that has put the National Security in danger. Remember that russia gives information to iran, that gives it to hezbollah, gives it to syria, were talking about agencies like jordan, israel, england that may have worked for five years to get somebody into isis at a leadership level, hes going to be killed. If its electronic, theyre going to disclose this information. This is so serious. Now we have to unite. We have to put aside all the stuff about comey, about whether the campaign coordinated. We have to put all this aside because the we have to find out if its true. The first step is Damage Control, the second step is doing something to protect us. Do we have to ban the lap tops
tomorrow or this week . We have to focus on this, do not politicize this issue, thats the greatest risk we have faced so far. The white house saying that the president Didnt Share Sources or methods with the russians, he shared specifics about looming threats to both countries. But to evans point, can you kind of Reverse Engineer if you get some information and figure out what the sources and methods are and endanger whoever gathered that . If anyone can Reverse Engineer something, its serge the russians, but my greater concern here is this is going to have a widespread chilling effects on all of the intelligence relationships that we have with all of our allies, the ripple effects is going to be regard having these relationships for a number of years overseas, our allies pass
this information with the expectation that we are going to keep it to ourselves and not share it with anyone else, certainly not with the russians without talking to them first, and if we do that, and if its true that the president spread this without the Liaison Service that gave it to him, theyre going to become more conservative, theyre going to stop giving information, and so that puts us most at risk. That risk was created by the Washington Post, that second risk. The Washington Post published this material, i dont blame them, somebody leaked it. We now learn from something the editor of the Washington Post reporter told us, that the leak had to have come from within the United States, how do we know this . Is that the leaker, quote, did not want to come pound the problem. Russia would want to compound the problem. So we now know that the leaking of the information that creates
the Compounding Problem of the Intelligence Services, it would be bad enough if this happened, but nobody knew about it. Now we have two problems, one sources and methods could now where found by russia. You can make the argument that the United States would have to informal lied Intelligence Services that this information had been disclosed. That would be part of the Damage Control, were not talking about messaged Damage Control, were talking about risk Damage Control, which is obviously far more important. The information the president reportedly revealed, were not talking about confidential, not top secret, this is code word information. What kind of dots can you connect with that . Code word means that the programs are so significant, the sources and methods are so
critically important that any leaks or information about that might give away damage that the program exists. I have been read in on code word programs before both in combat and peacetime. Youre not read in, youre also read off when you leave the program, which means you say i will never disclose that i know anything about this program or that i will give any information about it or even give what the code word is that describes the program. And it is so dangerous, any kind of investigation that comes out on a code word program, would n endanger the fight for the when you connect the dots, any significant item might be able to lead you to the source and the methods. Even though the sources and methods as general mcmaster said but not given. If anything was given up, it might lead the russian
intelligence service to find out more things and connect dots. It could destroy the program, ruin the relationship with the other country, generate a lack of trust with all other nations, because whatever country this came from, others are going to see it as well. Its not just going to affect that oneonone relationship, its going to affect everybody that shares intelligence with our Intelligence Community, because theyre afraid to give it to them because they dont want it given to the president who might give it to the president. You worked with the cia and the fbi. What do you make that this was a statement made by the president of the United States to russian officials, who one of them is at the center of the ongoing investigations and who were allowed into the oval office the day after the fbi director is fired. You would think of all the times somebody would be careful of what they said, and how they said it, it would have been that meeting right there, photos of
which are being provided by the russians because u. S. Reporters were not allowed in the room at the time. Anderson i have a different perspective. There was a mistake, that wasnt what the president said. In 2016, the rush shanks lost 220 people. If the president had not warned them about threats on aircraft and a russian aircraft went down tomorrow, what would we say . Two mistakes were made here and they are significant. The first was a minor mistake, it was not a moral sin. You have got to tell your foreign partners if youre the president of the United States, im going to reveal your information to the russians, i dont believe the russians are going to leak it to isis, theyre killing isis periodically in syria. And the second mistake was by general mcmaster, i respect him, but hes playing us for fools, there are two elements of intelligence, what you know and how we know it. What you know about threats to aircraft and who told you. What he told us today is that the president did not reveal sources and methods. He said nothing about what the president said in terms of the fall threat. Dont play us for fools, if the president revealed the actual threat without revealing the source of the threat, please tell us and dont play us for idiots, general mcmaster really lost some credibility today, he should have been honest with us, he was not. What do you expect russia to do with information like this. Also the reporting from cnn earlier was that Rex Tillersons statement sounded like it was coordinated from the white house, it didnt come from the state department itself, because a lot of state Department People had no idea that the statement had even been made. On the second part, i had talked to some colleagues in the state department. It seemed like the statement was moving so fast and the white house wanted to present one
coordinated set of cabinet officials all at once. Thats unusual, i honestly have never seen that happen before, but it does i do see the logic there, they were moving fast. On your first question, anderson, it really depends on what kind of information it was. I will say this, the russians are not only not our friends, particularly in syria, they are acting in and an nom anymore kl way in syria. Open opposing what we have tried to get done in syria. They have done little to nothing in syria. So if it was isis related, i fail to see the great benefit here. Im kind of like phil, i dont see the benefit here about them sharing information about the fight against isis in syria. If however, they were in peril, being in an attack, okay, you might want to share some, but you do it in a more deliberate,
scheduled, measured fashion, you discuss this with the Intelligence Community before you meet with the russians and you lay out the degree to which youll share and how much. It doesnt seem like this was done in any kind of a coordinated fashion. Youre talking about a president who doesnt get the intel briefing every single day. When you get it every day and you really absorb it, and you take some time with it, then you know the nuance, then you know the complexity, then youre more careful when you get in a meeting. This is a man that doesnt get it every day, and because he doesnt, hes lacking that nuance, that fidelity about information thats really not fit to put out. Some very strong views about dysfunction at the white house, well speak with a democrat on the House Intelligence Committee investigating improper ties to russia. This will no doubt come up in tonights town hall with House Minority leader nancy pelosi. Stay with us. Theres nothing traditional about my Small Business so when
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information. Crooked Hillary Clinton and her team were extremely careless in their handling of very sensitive highly Classified Information, not fit. Thats no ee thats not all he said. What we should do is enforce all laws dealing with the handling of Classified Information. Hillary is the one who endangered National Security by sending Classified Information. Classified information in the reach of our enemies. What happens when im dealing with the problems in the middle east. Are you folks going to be reporting all of that very, very confidential information, very important . We got to stop it. Thats why its a criminal penalty. She sent vast amounts of Classified Information, and this is where they said that she was extremely careless and frankly i say grossly incompetent. She will be such a lousy
president , folks. Joining me is my panel. Matthew, you continue to report the story out for the New York Times, how does your reporting and the reporting of your colleagues jibed with the white house so far . The white house carefully worded their denial, and theyre saying that the president didnt discuss any sources or methods or Military Operations that were ongoing or secret. The thing is nobodys saying he did that, what theyre saying is that he was sitting with the Russian Ambassador and the Foreign Minister and he got excited and told some incredibly granular detail about this intelligence, he talked about the city wher