Trump: DNC’s ‘gross negligence’ allowed hacking

President-elect Donald Trump blamed the Democratic National Committee’s “gross negligence” for Russian hacking into its computer systems.

“Gross negligence by the Democratic National Committee allowed hacking to take place,” he wrote on Twitter Friday night. “The Republican National Committee had strong defense!” 

Gross negligence by the Democratic National Committee allowed hacking to take place.The Republican National Committee had strong defense!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 7, 2017

Trump received a briefing earlier Friday on the Intelligence Community’s findings about Russian meddling in the election. 

The report, a declassified version of which was released publicly, found that Russian hackers breached the DNC and committed other cyberattacks with the intention of helping Trump win the White House over Hillary Clinton.  

Trump, who has continuously cast doubt on intelligence agencies’ findings, did not say that he agrees with the report’s conclusions in a statement after his briefing. 

“[T]here was absolutely no effect on the outcome of the election including the fact that there was no tampering whatsoever with voting machines,” he said.

He also reiterated praise for the Republican National Committee’s defenses in his afternoon statement. While the IC report did not mention any Russian attempts to hack the RNC, it has been previously reported that Russia did try to breach its systems as well. However, according to the Wall Street Journal, the effort to hack Republicans was far less aggressive and persistent.