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Conway: Trump ‘not aware’ of reported briefing on new Russia allegations

by Nikita Vladimirov - 01/10/17 9:59 PM ET

President-elect Donald Trump’s top aide Kellyanne Conway on Tuesday said that Trump was not briefed on a summary of an unsubstantiated but explosive dossier that claims Russia collected compromising info on him.

CNN on Tuesday reported that the Intelligence Community briefed the president-elect and President Obama last week about the allegations by appending a two-page synopsis, based on memos written by a former British MI6 operative, to its larger report about Russian meddling in the election.

The dossier has reportedly been circulating through the intelligence community. The synopsis was reportedly included in part to show that Russia was partial to Trump over Hillary Clinton, choosing not releasing damaging information about him.

Conway said late Tuesday that Trump was “not aware” of the two-page synopsis that was presented as an appendix to the main intelligence report.

{mosads}”He has said that he is not aware of that,” Conway said in an appearance on “Late Night with Seth Meyers.”

Conway also criticized the reports by questioning the reliability of the sources.

“Well guess what has’t happened … nobody has sourced it. They are all unnamed, unspoken sources in the story and it says it was based on a Russian investigator to begin with,” she said.

According to CNN, the memos of the former British operative originated as opposition research and were commissioned by anti-Trump Republicans and later by Democrats supporting Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign.

CNN also noted that while the former MI6 operative now works for a private intelligence gathering firm, his previous work was considered reliable by the U.S. intelligence community and he has deep ties to Russian sources.

“It also says that Hillary Clinton and groups that wanted Hillary Clinton to win may have been behind the investigations themselves, and most importantly, it says that the FBI is trying to confirm it. So nothing has been confirmed,” Conway continued.

“And I actually have to say as an American citizen, regardless of your party … we should be concerned that intelligence officials leaked to the press and won’t go and tell the president-elect or the president of the United States,” she added.

Tags Donald Trump Hillary Clinton