Washington journal. We will be back tomorrow morning at 7 a. M. My day rather, he my big is , he a look at the national mall, and lastminute preparations. The event is organized and sponsored by reverend al sharpton and the action work, as well as the Naacp National urban league and black womens roundtable. The event will officially begin with a march from Washington Monument to dr. Martin luther king jr. Monument, where a rally takes place. Speakers will be focusing on voting rights, criminal justice, health care, and economic justice. The event goes on rain or shine. We do have a cold rain. That march and rally scheduled to kickoff at noon eastern time. You can see live here on cspan. To upholsterer the ideas of a clean democracy and republic. This democracy and republic was thatd in such a way allowed every human the opportunity to seek greater good. Coming up next the heads of u. S. Type u. S. Intelligence agencies testified on the russian election. Focusing onnd rally voting rights, criminal Justice Health care, and economic justice. The director of National Intelligence and the heads of the fbi, cia, and National Security agency testified for the Senate Intelligence community on their Investigation Findings on russian influence in the 20 16 president ial election. This is almost two hours. I would like to welcome our witnesses. Director of the central ofelligence agency, director the federal bureau of investigation and mike rogers, director of the National Security agency. Directors clapper and brendan, while i have said this to you before in closed session, this is likely your last appearance before the committee at least in your current roles and i want to thank each of you before you get out of here for your many years of dedicated service both in uniform and out of uniform, jim. John, in many different capacities you have served your country in an unbelievable way, both of you. And i want you to know how grateful we are to you and how grateful the nation is to you for your service. We convene today to discuss the russian activities into intentions in recent elections. While russia and the soviet union have used espionage as tools of statecraft, recent actions represent as you reported, a notable escalation and out of Public Disclosure of these activities surprised many and the nation that another state would at attempt to interfere in our elections is quite troubling. Russian active member russian active measures is not new to the members of this committee. To better understand the scale and scope of these efforts and the intentions behind them. Each of our businesses have appeared before a closed session to discuss this topic in a bipartisan basis. Committee and its Sister Committee that put forward unclassified and classified proposals to address these , some work has been done. But to address this challenge to government will require a whole of government approach. I look forward to the details on the Intelligence Community assessment. Intelligence can conclude the classified portions of this assessment give me no reason to doubt the findings contained within the product. We owe it to our colleagues and American People to do an independent and bipartisan review of the report and its conclusions. Therefore i have constructed i have instructed committee to carry out the enforcement. We will ask each of the witnesses to provide Committee Access to the intelligence that contributed to the assessment. I want to ensure my committee that we will follow the intelligence wherever it leaves. This has long been our practice. The committee will treat the protection of the sources with the level of security and professionalism required. I would like to cook we thank the men and women of the Intelligence Community for their work in completing this review, to each of our witnesses, please thank your reflective staffs. They will into many holiday plans. While this moment in our history settingcal, in an open it will, i hope, help the American People understand what russia attempted it is focused on our 2016 elections. Our democracy is not at risk. We can rest assured that the United States of america have faith in the electoral process. We must be alert to the challenges that face us and the to seek toed undermine western values. Active measures targeting our friends and our allies abroad. Are indeed under assault. The key differences between the effort of the past and the are thetoday, however, tools being used to carry this out. Thank you again for being here today. I look forward to your testimony to create opportunity questions to the rest. Thank you, mr. Chairman, and i want to go your comments. I want to knowledge new members of our community, both new members here i want took knowledge the great rule that senator feinstein has played on this committee. Into russian interference in our 2016 president ial election. Eventsthe most serious of my public life. Interference in american democracy and our electoral process by any outside power is unacceptable. Much of the press reporting and conversation had focused on the dnc. The russians are also associated with republicans. They chose not to release that material yet. There is nothing that prevents them from doing so at a time of their choosing. Secretary clinton, any of us, democrats or republicans. What the russians did is nothing on ouran an attack political system. The assessment is more detailed. But it is in line with previous assessments. Officials at the highest level, including president putin. It concludes that these actions of harming the candidacy of Hillary Clinton and boosting the candidacy of president elect donald trump. Not here to relitigate the results of the election. At the same time i am committed to ensuring there is a thorough bipartisan and expeditious congressional investigation into russias role. In my view our committee should thes on three rod areas, russian hacking and release of stolen information, russians use of state owned media and other means to empire real and fake news to further their goal, and contact between the russian government and its agents and associates of any campaign. Asking them to cooperate with us in this investigation and turn over as many documents and as much at much evidence as quickly as possible. It is equally as important that the Incoming Administration and the roless will take going forward. Additionally it is my hope that they will continue to declassify as much as possible. Deserved to people know that their elected representatives had taken a close look at the Intelligence Report that we are considering today. They deserve to know whether we concur not and that we are prepared to respond to the threats outlined in the assessment. The actions the president took recently in response to the russian activities are appropriate. Time i have questions about why the Obama Administration didnt act further. We look forward, preventing future attempts to undermine our democracy will require a sustained response. Americas strength and democracy will be measured in part on what actions we take on a robust cyber strategy. Part of that strategy must include tools and the capability to determine. One of the things ive always valued on this Intelligence Community is the tradition of leaving partisanship on the door. I look forward to completing this investigation as quickly as possible. Your agency, the work your agency is completed underscores the importance of the role the Intelligence Community plays and the men and women who quietly work everyday every day to keep our country safe. This report represents the best analysis of the men and women of the Intelligence Community. These are professionals who have taken and both of office and present the whole truth as they see it. As a member of this committee and all of us who have served for some time have seen firsthand the dedication of the men and women who work for you, i know one of the most primary missions is to render the best professional judgment, regardless of political consideration and always be willing to speak truth to power. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Four members, once dr. Clapper has been recognized and completes his testimony, it is the intention of the chair to recognize members aced on cn based on seniority. There is a vote scheduled to complete our questions and open session. And then it moves to a closed session after the 2 30 vote, if there is need to adjust that on the way. Reminderid that, a that we are in an open session and you should take that into account for the standpoint that there are unclassified and classified reports. Members of the committee, thank you for your gracious comments. Still 10 days left. More importantly the comments about the work of the dedication and patriotism of the Intelligence Community. Are here to present the assessment of russian activities and intentions during the u. S. President ial election. Aspectsndicated some involve very important senses and methods. Obviously asking for your support and understanding as we need to defer to a closed setting. Produced by the three agencies represented here. They have released publicly in a clean a buckley in a declassified version. The motivationrs and scope of moscows intentions regarding the u. S. Election. Cyber tools use of and media to influence u. S. Public opinion. I want to make clear that this the does not assess the impact of russian activities on the outcome of the 2016 election or draw any conclusions with that regard one way or another. Therole is to assess intentions, capabilities and actions of foreign actors, not to analyze political processes. We cannot say we see evidence of russian altering vote tallies. Can discuss the full range of classified information that supports our conclusions because of the extreme sensitivity of the sources. The key judgment of the public unclassified versions are the same. Report the some of which came to light after election day. When the ic says high confidence, we have multiple highquality sources that contribute to this assessment. Intelligence comes from a wide range of sources, technical collection, and open source information. The key judgments are based on corroborating sources based on understanding of our understanding of historical and current russian behavior. While he cannot publicly disclose some of the information that backs up these judgments we have reached a report and detail to president obama and his team, president elect trump, and congressional leadership. Both the classified and public versions of this report were written by seasons intelligence professionals, consistent with high standards of objectivity. To ensure we provide policymakers most accurate insights that we can. I also need to add this reflects the intelligence committees review, not that of the administration. Operations isyber difficult but not impossible. I see use this trail and they are constantly growing in maliciousbase of actors to trace operations back to their source and determine their connections to foreign governments. This is exactly what we did here. Findings,ct to the first addressing russias goals. Aimed at the u. S. President ial election. The goals from this campaign are to undermine public faith and andu. S. Democratic process denigrate secretary clinton, and harm her electability and potential presidency. Putin and the russian government russianvernment government over theapproach course of the Campaign Based on russias understanding of the Electoral Prospects and each of the candidates when it appeared secretary clinton was the campaign, began to focus more on undermining her future presidency. Moscows influence campaign blended Covert Intelligence operations with covert efforts by government agencies, thirdparty media, intermediaries and paid social media users. We are confident the Russian Intelligence Services conducted Cyber Operations against people and organizations associated 2016 president ial election, including both major u. S. Political parties. Russian military intelligence compromised the email accounts of Democratic Party officials and publicly released victim data. They also relayed material to wikileaks. They did not conduct a comparable disclosure campaign. Maintainedelligence access to multiple u. S. State or local electoral boards. The department of Homeland Security assesses these types were not involved. Russias state Propaganda Machine contributed to the influence campaign by serving as a platform for criminal messaging using funded out that funded outlets. Moscow has longsought to undermine u. S. Led liberal democratic order. Ofsia has a history conducting covert influence campaigns focused on u. S. President ial elections. They influence agents and press placements to disparage candidates. Moscows behavior reflects russias most aggressive cyber posture in recent years. As well as, as we have seen now. Russias activities in 2016 demonstrated a significant escalation indirectness, level of activity, and we assess moscow will apply the Lessons Learned from the 2016 campaign aimed in the future to influence efforts worldwide, including u. S. Allies. I would like to wrap up by left in myve 10 days 53 years or so in my intel business. I have seen that i have seen icy get things right and get things wrong. I believe the level of tradecraft and cross agency needed to get this information, i believe weve got this right here. I am happy to take your questions. Thank you for that thorough and concise testimony. Director klapper, i have totructed a select group conduct an independent review of the reporting. Do i have your assurance that you will buy the access to the willting necessary you provide the access to the reporting necessary to make their reporting . Director clapper yes. Isator burr i know there tremendous value when the fbi is able to do surveillance on devices. I believe there is conflicting reporting on whether the fbi requested access to the dnc services and john podesta fro personal devices. Of four asks us to those devices to perform transits on them . Yes, we did. Would that senator burr senator burr would that have provided access . Director comey our forensics folks would always prefer the access to the original server involved. It is the best evidence. Senator burr were you given access . We were not. Y a highly respected private company eventually got access and shared. Senator burr is that typically the way the fbi would prefer to do the forensics, or would your fields ofunit rather view servers and to the forensics themselves . Director comey we would always prefer to have access if that is possible. Senator burr do you know why you were denied access to the service . Director comey i dont know for sure. I dont know for sure. Senator burr was there one wasest at multiple level among request or multiple requests . Director comey there were multiple requests. Senator burr there is been much debate about the information released by wikileaks and the intention behind those disclosures. You made itpper, perfectly clear in your testimony the Community Feels that vote tallies were not altered. Director clapper that is correct. Senator burr do you believe theres any evidence that the cc or john Podesta Emails were altered in any way. Director clapper we have no evidence of that. , dotor burr director comey you have any evidence any Republican Organization was successfully penetrated and there was data export traded was there any exfiltration . Director comey there were successful penetrations of some groups and campaigns particularly at the state level on the republican side of the aisle, and some limited penetration of all Republican National committee to mains. To many domains. Senator burr penetrations of those National Committee domains . Director comey right, that were no longer in use. Senator burr from the standpoint of republican candidates running for president , were any of those campaigns targeted under this same effort by the russians . Director comey the campaigns themselves, not to my knowledge. Senator burr vice chairman. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Again, let me thank you, for yourclapper, report, and the point you continue to make that it was not effects to analyze the in terms of the Political Campaign i think i would add any of us appear who have been through a close election, any small item can cause harm. I want to follow on where the chairman was headed. Was some information taken by republican affiliated entities. There was a great deal of information taken from democrats. There was selective leaking, as the director has indicated, with a clear political intent in process. One of the things i am most flabbergasted is that somehow because this is in the rearview mirror, dont the russians have the capability of taking, even if it is old information about republicans or other information about democrats, and selectively leak that prospectively . Director comey sure. Could yourner describe to my mind, this is not only one of the most significant items i have seen in my political life, but this is an ongoing threat to all of us in our electoral process. We have to be on guard. Could you speak for any of the members of the panel, speak to the fact that you expect to see similar tactics used by russians in terms of the Upcoming Elections in germany, france, and the netherlands . Yes, we do. Ey our alliesner are taking what happened in america with significant enough importance . Are they putting up new defenses