Hannity denies report he advised Trump on Nunes memo: ‘A total lie’

Fox News host Sean Hannity on Thursday denied a report that he personally advised President Trump regarding a controversial memo alleging surveillance abuses by the Justice Department.

In a tweet Thursday night, Hannity called The Daily Beast’s report “fake news,” saying it was based on “phony ‘anonymous sources.'”

“A total lie, Fake news. Phony ‘anonymous sources’. Amazing how the left wing media just makes Sh&)(: up,” Hannity tweeted.

A total lie, Fake news. Phony “anonymous sources”. Amazing how the left wing media just makes Sh&)(: up. https://t.co/aytDS89o0L

— Sean Hannity (@seanhannity) February 1, 2018

“Obviously, we stand by our reporting,” Beast reporter Asawin Suebsaeng tweeted in response. “To be clear, we asked Hannity multiple times about what we had been told by multiple sources, and he didn’t deny and declined to comment. If he’s mad about it now & wants to pull the ‘fake news’ card, cool.”

{mosads}

The Daily Beast cited three sources with knowledge of the conversations who said that Trump has been in “regular contact” with the Fox News host over the last few weeks concerning the memo, which could be released as early as Friday.

The memo, authored by GOP staff for House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), reportedly details surveillance abuses by the FBI.

The memo’s release comes despite objections from Democrats and the FBI that it contains misleading and inaccurate claims, as well as omissions of key details.

The FBI has “grave concerns about material omissions of fact that fundamentally impact the memo’s accuracy,” the bureau said in a statement this week.

Nunes has dismissed the FBI’s criticism and accused agents of running a counterintelligence operation off of unverified information during the 2016 election.

“It’s clear that top officials used unverified information in a court document to fuel a counterintelligence investigation during an American political campaign. Once the truth gets out, we can begin taking steps to ensure our intelligence agencies and courts are never misused like this again,” Nunes said.