explicitly warned this ukraine theory is being perpetrated and promulgated and he tells cnn s manu raju in response, quote, i think they did. meaning i think ukraine did meddle in the 2016 elections. and we know of course the president himself has continued to advance this theory, including a long call-in interview to a fox news channel this morning. we know incredibly that secretary of state mike pompeo has himself advanced this theory from russian intelligence. that ukraine is the real entity that meddled in the election. he himself not that long ago was the freaking director of the cia, and here he is helping the kremlin with its disinformation campaign to hurt the united states and help russian interests at our expense. but, you know, he s not cia director anymore, so maybe that s a defense for him. maybe he doesn t know. maybe it s a defense for these
as people who could potentially promulgate this disinformation themselves? do we know why the ic decided to brief this to the senate? that s an excellent question. because what we can t say is were intelligence officers upset by this coming so forcefully into mainstream discussion, into political debate in capitol hill. the timing suggests maybe the timing suggests that this was this was not new information. the united states has known about this interference, this disinformation campaign for quite some time. so why is information being pushed now? one theory is because it has come so forcefully on display in the impeachment proceedings. however however we don t know my reporting does not say definitively that the intelligence officers who gave
there has been other signs of this, too. rick gates told fbi agents in an interview for the russia investigation that the main person in the trump campaign who started spreading this falsehood that it was ukraine that interfered in the 2016 election and not russia was paul manafort, the president s campaign chair who s now serving a long federal prison term in part for him laundering and not paying taxes on millions of dollars he got from pro-putin interests in ukraine. more specifically than that, though, where did manafort get that theory from? he got it from his longtime associate in ukraine who was assessed by the fbi to have active ties to russian intelligence services. so russian intelligence services cooked this up. they have every incentive in the world to spread this idea that it was ukraine, bad, bad ukraine that interfered in the 2016 election against trump. not russia interfering in the 2016 election to help trump, right? they had every incentive in the world to do that.
the times reporting as part of this scoop as well that president trump has spoken directly to president putin on this issue. that s new. the times also reporting as part of the same effort the russians have also promoted a theory essentially that the president s campaign chairman paul manafort was framed. that the so-called black ledger that showed him taking millions of dollars in illicit payments from ukraine is not new information and that he somehow shouldn t be in jail. joining us now, julian barnes. thank you for joining us tonight. i know it s a busy environment. thanks have having me on the show. let me ask you about some of the things i see within your reporting below the main headline that struck me as new. am i right that this is the first reporting that we ve seen that president trump spoke directly with vladimir putin about this false claim that ukraine interfered in the 2016
conference with president putin and prime minister orban of hungary where putin says, second, as we all know, during the presidential campaign in the united states the ukrainian government adopted a unilateral position in favor of one candidate. more than that, certain oligarchs certainly with the approval of the political leadership funded this candidate or female candidate, to be more precise. mr. holmes, you spent three years as well in the u.s. embassy in russia. why would it be to vladimir putin s advantage to promote this theory of ukraine interference? first of all, to deflect from the allegations of russian interference. second of all, to drive a wedge between the united states and ukraine, which russia wants to essentially get back into its sphere of influence. so at these open hearings we have this dramatic warning from fiona hill that makes headlines nationwide, right? she s warning congress, particularly warning the republicans on the impeachment