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Turning elections into a national security issue Trump DNI pick dodges questions on 2020 election · INSIGHT TODAY

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: With President Trump seemingly putting the full force of the
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: federal government behind his attempts to undermine confidence and elections.
• 0:08
  Speaker 2: This week, Jay.
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: Clayton, Trump's picked to serve as Director of National Intelligence
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: did little, very little to instill confidence that he'd be
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: any less of a bag man for the President's election
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: conspiracies than the current acting d and I, Bill Poulty. Clayton,
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  Speaker 1: currently the US Attorney for the Southern District of New York,
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  Speaker 1: has no national security, no intelligence experience, just like Poulty,
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  Speaker 1: the housing executive and Trump loyalist. At his Senate hearing
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  Speaker 1: this week, like so many Trump nominees before him, Clayton
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  Speaker 1: ducked questions from Democrats about whether Joe Biden won the
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: twenty twenty election.
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  Speaker 3: Who won the twenty twenty election. You know, I'm not
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  Speaker 3: going to do this with you who won the twenty
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  Speaker 3: twenty election?
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  Speaker 2: Like I said, I'm not going to get into that
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  Speaker 2: with you. Who won the question? We can keep doing this.
• 0:58
  Speaker 3: Well, We're going to keep doing it because not being
• 1:00
  Speaker 3: honest and forthright, I'm not going to age in the theater.
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  Speaker 3: Who won having twenty election? I have answered to answer it?
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  Speaker 3: What is your answer?
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  Speaker 2: I've given you my answer.
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  Speaker 3: What is your answer? You refuse to answer a basic
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  Speaker 3: question about who won a presidential election? Now, but you
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  Speaker 3: asked to lead America's intelligence.
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  Speaker 1: Community, joining us now or Vivian's Lama, staff writer for
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: The Atlantic and David Roade ms now senior national security reporter.
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  Speaker 1: So David, two, First, you heard that back and forth
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: who won the twenty twenty election? And Clayton couldn't answer it,
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  Speaker 1: given you know this is happening. Clayton is refusing to
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: answer that question at the same time that the president
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: is peddling conspiracy theories with an I towards the midterms.
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: What's the overall impact here when you're looking at the
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: intelligence community.
• 1:59
  Speaker 4: It's essentially And then this was a later question to Clayton.
• 2:03
  Speaker 4: Will he, let's say, declare that he has evidence that
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  Speaker 4: China has hacked into voting machines in Fulton County, Georgia,
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  Speaker 4: the Democratic stronghold that could decide the Senate race in Georgia,
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  Speaker 4: and show up on election day with FBI agents and
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  Speaker 4: say he needs to seize voting machines or voting records
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  Speaker 4: for an investigation. And the reason they're asking that is
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  Speaker 4: because that's exactly what Telsea Gabber did earlier this year.
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  Speaker 4: She showed up with FBI agents. They seized voting records
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  Speaker 4: through twenty twenty, and she said under oath to Congress
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  Speaker 4: that the President instructed.
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  Speaker 2: Her to go.
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  Speaker 4: So when he was asked, would you go to Fulton
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  Speaker 4: County or any county and be part of such a
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  Speaker 4: raid which is illegal under federal law, he also said
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  Speaker 4: he didn't answer the question, and then he also.
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  Speaker 2: Said later, I haven't even thought about that before.
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, And there was just astonishment from the members of
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  Speaker 4: this Go ahead, right.
• 3:02
  Speaker 5: And David to that point, let's play that moment in
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  Speaker 5: the hearing when I'm centered off us grilled him about
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  Speaker 5: Telsea Gabbard showing.
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  Speaker 2: Up in Georgia.
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  Speaker 3: The first time you learned that Director Gabbard was president
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  Speaker 3: that raid was in my office yesterday.
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  Speaker 2: It was the first time that in my recollection. I've
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  Speaker 2: thought about it recently. Now was I aware of it before?
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  Speaker 4: What?
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  Speaker 3: Are you aware that former Director Grabbert testified that her
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  Speaker 3: presence at the raid was quote requested by the president.
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  Speaker 3: I'm not aware of that until now. If the White
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  Speaker 3: House Chief of Staff or the President asks you to
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  Speaker 3: travel somewhere across the United States and oversee the execution
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  Speaker 3: of a domestic search warrant on a sensitive election facility.
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  Speaker 3: Will you do it?
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  Speaker 2: That's appropriate?
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  Speaker 3: Is that appropriate for the Director of National Intelligence?
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  Speaker 2: That's a hypothetical, I.
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  Speaker 5: Mean, David, not hypothetical, not a hypothetical.
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  Speaker 2: You brought it up, we sued it. Your reaction that
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  Speaker 2: is incredibly alarming.
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  Speaker 4: There is a nineteen forty eight federal law that man's
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  Speaker 4: armed federal soldiers or federal officers from going anywhere near.
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  Speaker 2: An election site.
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  Speaker 4: This is what the constitution says, State and local officials
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  Speaker 4: control elections. The idea was that the president shouldn't count
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  Speaker 4: the votes because if the president's trying to get reelected
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  Speaker 4: or trying to defend his party's control of Congress, the
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  Speaker 4: president could try to manipulate the election.
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  Speaker 2: So this has never been done.
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  Speaker 4: What Tolca Gabber done has never been done in American history.
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  Speaker 4: And to have the person who's essentially applying to serve,
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  Speaker 4: you know, to do her job, claim he'd.
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  Speaker 2: Never even thought about it.
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  Speaker 4: There was a follow up just lastly where Senator Warner,
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  Speaker 4: the ranking Democrat who knows Poltie, he said, I know
• 5:00
  Speaker 4: know you, you know, and I've known you for years.
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  Speaker 4: He's like, did you not think of this being asked
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  Speaker 4: this question about going to an election site as you
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  Speaker 4: were preparing for this hearing? And he said, no, I
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  Speaker 4: didn't really think about it. Again, and Warner was just
• 5:15
  Speaker 4: visibly shocked and said he was bitterly disappointed with the
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  Speaker 4: answers that Paulty gave to these questions.
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  Speaker 2: You mean you mean Clayton Clayton, there is a nomination
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  Speaker 2: of DNA.
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  Speaker 5: Easy to conflate them because neither of them have any experience.
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  Speaker 5: You know, Jake Clayton don't have no experience. Bill Polti
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  Speaker 5: has no experience. None of them do, despite the fact
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  Speaker 5: that the statute Vivian says that they have to have it.
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  Speaker 5: When you detail you who cares the law? Have we
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  Speaker 5: ever in this country? When you think about the d
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  Speaker 5: N I, they haven't been around that long.
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  Speaker 2: I had to think so much about how d and.
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  Speaker 5: I would engage in a domestic election, other than to
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  Speaker 5: think about how they protect the country from foreign interferance,
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  Speaker 5: et cetera. But that is now what we're talking about here.
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  Speaker 5: We're talking about the concern about foreign interference and also
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  Speaker 5: interferance from the federal government.
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  Speaker 6: I mean, we're literally it's completely outside the boundaries of
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  Speaker 6: what the dn I is supposed to do. The dn
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  Speaker 6: I was created in the post nine to eleven era
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  Speaker 6: to oversee and to coordinate between the intelligence agencies. That
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  Speaker 6: is the d and i's job. As David just said,
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  Speaker 6: elections have always been regarded as a domestic issue, something
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  Speaker 6: that the States at here too.
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  Speaker 2: But what the Trump.
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  Speaker 6: Administration is doing right now is they are turning this
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  Speaker 6: into a national security issue. And going back also to
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  Speaker 6: your previous segment about the President's speech on Thursday night,
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  Speaker 6: they are now turning elections into a national security issue
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  Speaker 6: and saying that it is within the auspice of the
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  Speaker 6: federal government to try to dictate what happens. As a result,
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  Speaker 6: you then weaponize various federal agencies like DHS, like the FBI,
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  Speaker 6: and like od and I to then interfere in this,
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  Speaker 6: to oversee it, to try to basically get involved and
• 7:03
  Speaker 6: take over the process. And that has huge implications obviously
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  Speaker 6: all overseas, where governments like in Russia and Iran and
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  Speaker 6: China have long felt that this concept of Western democracy
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  Speaker 6: is hypocritical, and now you have the federal government, undermining
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  Speaker 6: the process, both in terms of the words of the
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  Speaker 6: president but also in terms of the agencies then being
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  Speaker 6: weaponized to take over these elections. It's very dangerous. It's
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  Speaker 6: sets a very alarming president both.
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  Speaker 5: Words and actions. And you know when the federal government starts, yeah,
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  Speaker 5: a national security they think they.
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  Speaker 2: Can basically just do whatever they want and people believe it.
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  Speaker 5: Yes, every time gives it sound because we don't understand,
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  Speaker 5: not everybody knows that everything about it