Think it would make them feel more comfortable to hear him Say Something critical about russia. Certainly, we have not heard that from the president and no indication yet about whether his tone will change. Great reporting, sara murray, breaking that at the white house. Thank you so much. Lets take you to moscow, because before this hearing even begins, russias president is weighing in. Hes claiming that all of these claims of election meddling are just provocations and lies. Paula newton is in moscow with more. What else did he say . Reporter oh, he said quite a bit. I mean, he had a roundtable in northern russia. This wasnt the topic at all, but he was asked a pointed question, did russia interfere in u. S. Elections. His response read my lips, no. Having said that, though, he had a lot to get off of his chest. He basically was saying that, look, these, as you said, are all lies, these are all provocations, this is whats being done for political gain in the United States. I want you to take a listen. Translator we have said more than once, and i want to stress, we know that according to opinion polls in the usa, we have a lot of friends, and i want to address them directly, that we think the usa is a great country with which we want to have a Kind Partnership and relationship. Everything else regarding russia is lies, hoaxes, and provocations. This is all being used for the domestic political agenda in the usa. Reporter its interesting, because given sara murrays reporting from the white house, the kremlin knows this. They had already been hearing that, look, the idea of having this kind of summit thats being discussed right now would have to at least wait, especially as all of these investigations are under way. At the same time, Vladimir Putin saying, look, i dont understand why we have this kind of relationship. We do not interfere. It is not our policy to interfere. And all of this being done in order for certain Political Forces to gain some kind of advantage to, as he says, play the russia card. Well, we do know, paula newton, that according to 17 different u. S. Intelligence agencies, russia did interfere in the election. The question is just was there any coordination between russia and the Trump Campaign. Appreciate the reporting from moscow. Thank you. Fbi director james comey pushing back against criticism of the agency investigating these alleged russia ties to Trump Associates. The cries of political motivation may sound familiar. He heard them from Hillary Clintons supporters during his investigation of her emails during the campaign. Comey says the backlash, well, from both parties, it is a badge of honor. Ive never been prouder of the fbi. What makes it easy is were not on anybodys side, ever. Were not considering whose ox will be gored by this action or that action, whose fortunes will be helped by this or that. We just dont care, and we cant care. We only ask, so, what are the facts . Whats the law . Whats the right thing to do here . All right, lets bring in our panel to talk about all of this. Kerstin powers is our political analyst and columnist for usa today. David drucker is our political analyst and senior Congressional Correspondent for the washington examiner. Niamalika henderson is here, our senior political reporter, along with bob baer, our intelligence and security analyst as well as former cia operative, and michael allen, former staff director for the hoss Intelligence Committee. Weve got a super, uber, big panel this morning, as we wait for this big Senate Intel Committee hearing to begin. Nia, just set the scene for us, because this is a committee that has its proverbial house in order. They do, and we saw that yesterday with that press conference with the chairman of this committee, richard burr, and the vice chairman, mark warner, one a democrat, one a republican, in a very stark contrast there between what weve seen out of the house. And they very much are wanting to in some ways be the adults in terms of this investigation, in terms of what congress is going to do. Today well hear from cybersecurity experts. Its going to be about fake news. Its going to be about russias dissemination of disinformation. So well hear how these senators are questioning these panelists. And one of the things thats going to be interesting to look for is to see if it is like the house panel, right . For the house panel, you could definitely see sort of the partisan lines being drawn and being drawn early and often. Republicans very much interested, at least on the house side in terms of the leakers, and the democrats interested in the substance of the leaks. It will be interesting to see what happens here. Were going to see some real stars here, or potential stars in terms of different parties, people like kamala harris, people like marco rubio, people like tom cotton. And so, it will be a really interesting panel to watch in the beginning of what were going to see over the next many months of this panel really doing a deep dive into russia in the 2016 campaign. Absolutely. Lets just take a moment and listen to the Ranking Member and chairman burr yesterday speaking about this. Manu raju asking a very pointed question. Heres a response. Reporter from what you have seen so far, can you definitively rule out that there was no coordination whatsoever between Trump Officials and russian officials during the election . Manu, we would be crazy to try to draw conclusions from where we are in the investigation. I think mark and i have committed to let this process go through before we form any opinions. When we started this, we saw the scope, what was involved. I said it was the most important thing id ever taken on in my public life. I believe that more firmly now than even when we started. Were going to get it right. Were going to get it right, were going to do it together, this is going to be a bipartisan effort. We will watch as they begin in just minutes. David drucker to you. The fact that richard burr, someone very close to the president , someone who sat on his National SecurityAdvisory Council during the election and the transition, did not say to manu, yes, we can rule out collusion, et cetera. Its striking, is it not . Well, look, its interesting that nobody has ever ruled out collusion, even on the house side where republicans have focused on the leaking. Theyve never ruled it out. I think what was interesting about the burr and warner News Conference is that theyre really taking their time here and they were very, very hesitant to draw even the hint of a conclusion, and that was i think the case for mark warner as well, because House Democrats on their Intelligence Committee have been very out front and basically saying, yeah, there was collusion. Theyve tried in public, as they did in that public hearing last week to connect all the dots. And even though warner hinted around the edges that he believes theres a lot there, talking about why this is the most important thing hes ever done in his public life, he held back from drawing conclusions that there was collusion between Trump Associates and russian officials. And so, i think youre seeing on both sides of the aisle in the senate just a more methodical, bipartisan approach that wants the investigation to be led by facts, rather than conclusions leading to the facts they prefer. And we just are seeing the chairman, richard burr there of North Carolina, and the ranking democrat, mark warner of virginia, walking in. Theyre about to make their opening remarks. Obviously, they know the eyes of the world are on these remarks. We will bring them to you live as they prepare to do that amid all of the photo ops taking place right now. Kerstin, to you. Youve said neither of these committees can cut it. We need something independent like a 9 11style commission. Yeah. I think these are not the first committees to behave in a partisan manner. I think what congressman nunes has done has been sort of out of the norm in terms of his behavior, but typically, if you watch a lot of these hearings, not necessarily intelligence hearings, because they do less in public, but generally, hearings can be very partisan. And with Something Like this, i think where you have seen, at least on the house side it become overly partisan, and i think david raises an important point. I think from both sides, probably, it would be better to have an independent investigation, and there are people who say, well, you can never find a nonpartisan person in washington. Thats probably true, but you can find somebody who actually wasnt advising President Trump on the campaign. So you know, that would be something that i think we have in both committees we have a situation where these are people who were very supportive of President Trump and very close to him. Bob baer, to you. Interesting breaking news reporting out of sara murray at the white house, saying that the administration is giving up hope of a grand bargain with russia. Comes on the same day as these hearings kick off on the senate side. It comes on the same day as Vladimir Putin says this is all bogus, weve done nothing to interfere in the u. S. Election whatsoever. What do you make of the change of strategy, the posture towards russia by this administration now . Well, poppy, i think reality is setting in. The Trump Administration knows its a very serious investigation. Theres a lot of lines to it, including u. S. Banking, money, intelligence officers. Its a black cloud over the white house. And right now, the last thing anybody with common sense would do is make a gesture to russia to make up. You just cant do it now. Our relations are going to be frozen as long as this investigation goes on. Bob, let me just jump in. Were going to listen to chairman richard burr, his opening remarks. Then we should hear from the Ranking Member, democrat mark warner. Quite rare for us. An open hearing on an ongoing, critical intelligence question the role of russian acting measures past and present. As many of you know, this committee is conducting a thorough, independent, and nonpartisan review of the russian active Members Campaign conducted against the 2016 u. S. Elections. Some of the intelligence provided to the committee is extremely sensitive and requires that most of the work be conducted in a secure setting to maintain the integrity of the information and to protect the very sensitive sources and methods that gave us access to that intelligence. However, the vice chairman and i understand the gravity of the issues that were here reviewing and have decided that its crucial that we take the rare step of discussing publicly an ongoing intelligence question. Thats why weve convened this second open hearing on the topic of russian acted measures. And i can assure you to the extent possible that the committee will hold additional open hearings on this issue. The American Public, indeed, all democratic societies need to understand that blind actors are using old techniques with new platforms to undermine our democratic institutions. This hearing entitled disinformation, a primer in russian acted measures and influence campaigns will consist of two panels and will provide a foundational understanding of russian acted measures and Information Operations campaigns. The first panel will examine the history and characteristics of those campaigns. The second panel will examine the history and characteristics of those campaigns and the role and capabilities of Cyber Operations in support of these activities. Unfortunately, you will learn today that these efforts by russia to discredit the u. S. And weaken the west are not new. These efforts are at the heart of russian and Previous Soviet Union intelligence efforts. You will learn today that our community has been a target of russian information warfare, propaganda, and cyber campaigns and still is. The efforts our experts will outline today continue unabated. The takeaway from todays hearing were all targets of a sophisticated and capable adversary, and we must engage in a whole of government approach to combat russian acted measures. Today well receive testimony from experts who have in some cases worked directly to respond to acted measures, who understand the history and context of active measures and whose significant experience and knowledge will shed new light on the problem and provide useful context. Doctors goodson and mr. Watts, were grateful for your appearances today. This afternoon we will reconvene and welcome witnesses who will discuss the technical side of the question Cyber Operations, including Computer Network exploitation, social media and online propaganda activities and how they enable and promote russian influence campaigns and promote operations. We have a full day ahead of us and i am confident that the testimony you will hear today will help you establish a foundational understanding of the problem as the community continues its inquiry into russian activities. Finally, id like to commend the vice chairman for his dedication to the goals of the committees inquiry and to the integrity of the process. The vice chairman and i realize that if we politicize this process, our efforts will likely fail. The public deserves to hear the truth about possible russian involvement in our elections, how they came to be involved, how we may have failed to prevent that involvement, what actions were taken in response, if any, and what we plan to do to ensure the integrity of future free elections at the heart of our democracy. Gentlemen, again, thank you for your willingness to be here and i turn to the vice chairman. Thank you, mr. Chairman. I also want to welcome our Witnesses Today. Todays hearing is important to understand the role russia played in the 2016 president ial elections. As to the u. S. Intelligence community unanimously assessed in january of this year, russia sought to hijack our democratic process, and that most important part of our democratic process, our president ial elections. As well learn today, russias strategy and tactics are not new, but their brazenness certainly was. The hearing is also important because its open, as the chairman mentioned, which is sometimes unusual for this Committee Due to the classified nature of our work. We typically work behind closed doors. But todays public hearing will help, i hope, the American Public writ large understand how the kremlin made effective use of its hacking skills to steal and weaponize information and engage in a coordinated effort to damage a particularly candidate and to undermine Public Confidence in our democratic process. Our Witnesses Today will help us to understand how russia deployed this deluge of disinformation in a broader attempt to undermine americas strength and leadership throughout the world. We simply must, and we will, get this right. The chairman and i agree it is vitally important that we do this as a credible, bipartisan, and transparent manner as possible. As was said yesterday at our press conference, chairman burr and i trust each other, and equally important, we trust our colleagues on this committee that we are going to move together and were going to get to the bottom of this and do it right. As this hearing begins, lets take just one moment to review what we already know. Russias president , Vladimir Putin, ordered a deliberate campaign carefully constructed to undermine our election. First, russia struck at our Political Institutions by electronically breaking into the headquarters of one of our Political Parties and stealing vast amounts of information. Russian operatives also hacked emails to steal personal messages and other information from individuals ranging from Clinton Campaign manager john podesta, to former secretary of state colin powell. This stolen information was then weaponized. We know that russian intelligence used the guccifer 2 persona, and others like wikileaks, and seemingly choreographed times that would cost maximum damage to one candidate. They did this with an unprecedented level of sophistication about american president ial politics that should be a line of inquiry for us on this committee, and candidly, while it helped one candidate this time, they are not favoring one party over another and consequently should be concerned for all of us. Second, russia continually sought to diminish and undermine our trust in the American Media, like blurring our faith in what is true and what is not. Russian propaganda outlets like rt and sputnik successfully produced and peddled disinformation to american audiences in pursuit of moscows preferred outcome. This russian propaganda on steroids was designed to poison the National Conversation in america. The russians employed thousands of paid internet trolls and botnets to push out disinformation and fake news at a high volume, focusing this material on to your twitter and facebook feeds and flooding our social media with misinformation. This fake news and disinformation was then hyped by the American Media echochamber and our own social Media Networks to reach and potentially influence millions of americans. This is not innuendo or false allegations. This is not fake news. This is a