Trump blames hacking talk on ’embarrassed Dems’

President-elect Donald Trump is slamming Democrats again — one day after the intelligence community released an unclassified report confirming its conclusions that Russia sought to interfere in the presidential election.

Trump in a series of tweets early Saturday morning downplayed Russian influence on one hand, stating that there was no evidence the hacking affected election results.

Intelligence stated very strongly there was absolutely no evidence that hacking affected the election results. Voting machines not touched!

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

The assessment from the intelligence community delivered in a public report on Friday and provided to Trump in a separate classified briefing is that Russia sought to influence the election to help the Republican nominee win.

“Russia’s goals were to undermine public faith in the U.S. democratic process, denigrate Secretary [Hillary] Clinton, and harm her electability and potential presidency. We further assess Putin and the Russian Government developed a clear preference for President-elect Trump,” the report said.

The report described a sophisticated Russian campaign ordered by President Vladimir Putin included fake news stories, attacks by state-supported media and the hackings of Democratic political organizations.

The report did not conclude that the Russian interference tipped the scales to Trump, who defeated Hillary Clinton in the electoral college with surprise wins in the states of Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin. Trump was the first Republican to win those states in decades. Clinton won the popular vote.

But the report also said that it did not consider the degree to which Russia’s involvement might have shifted the election.

“We did not make an assessment of the impact that Russian activities had on the outcome of the 2016 election,” it said. The US Intelligence Community is charged with monitoring and assessing the intentions, capabilities, and actions of foreign actors; it does not analyze US political processes or US public opinion.”

In a second tweet just after 7 a.m., Trump stated that Democrats were making a lot of “noise” about Russian hacks of Democratic operations because they had been “embarrassed” by the election results.

Only reason the hacking of the poorly defended DNC is discussed is that the loss by the Dems was so big that they are totally embarrassed!

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

Late Friday night, Trump in another tweet said gross negligence by the Democratic National Committee had allowed the hacking by Russia.

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 and his team have sought to prevent any talk of Russia’s interference in the election from undermining his victory in the election or tarnishing his presidency.

He has talked about the need to move beyond the issue of Russian hacking, but has also at times offered comments on Twitter that have irritated members of the intelligence community by casting doubts on their conclusions.