>> Donald Trump is fanning the flames of the email hack
involved in the Democratic...
>> ...even inciting the Russians to help find some other...
>> The reaction continuing to pour in...
>> NARRATOR: At the Central Intelligence Agency,
there was growing concern about the implications of the leaks.
>> It was quite clear to me that we were seeing a campaign
on the part of the Russians,
that it was a much more aggressive, much more intense,
and much more worrisome effort.
>> NARRATOR: The intelligence community's analysis
had already linked the DNC intrusion to Russian hackers--
the very ones used in Ukraine.
But now at C.I.A. headquarters,
they said they had something more:
direct evidence that Vladimir Putin himself
was personally involved.
>> To get the intelligence that corroborates that
was the coup for the C.I.A.
>> The agency has obtained intelligence that shows
that Putin is behind this operation.
Putin is setting its goals.
Putin is not only aware of this,
but aware that they're planning to weaponize this information.
>> He rarely communicates by phone or email
or anything electronic.
So for them to get this kind of intelligence
was pretty significant.
>> NARRATOR: Exactly what the C.I.A. found is classified,
but to Brennan it was a game-changer.
>> It was something that was, I think, worrying to all of us,
particularly since we didn't know the extent
of what it is that the Russians were engaged in.
And we didn't know how far they would go to really threaten
the integrity of the election.
>> NARRATOR: The information was dispatched
from C.I.A. headquarters to the offices of the director
of national intelligence, James Clapper.
>> I reacted viscerally when I understood the magnitude
of what they were doing, and that it was in fact orchestrated
at the highest levels of the Russian government,
meaning Putin himself.
I've seen a lot of bad stuff in my 50-plus years
in intelligence.
That really shook me.
>> NARRATOR: With Clapper on board,
Brennan delivered the details to the president in person.
>> Obama's senior-most officials have told us
that he was taken aback by this,
that the president was alarmed, as well.
>> NARRATOR: At the White House, some wanted the president
to sound the alarm to the American people.
>> There's a big debate inside the Obama administration.
What kind of actions should they take?
How public should they be about raising the alarm?
>> NARRATOR: Veteran Putin watchers worried
that if the president didn't respond forcefully,
the attacks would continue.
>> As we are watching what's happening,
those of us who've seen this movie before,
whether it was in Estonia or Ukraine,
it seems absolutely familiar.
>> Everybody that I knew who read into this
and who was at high levels of the State Department,
supported both attributing it to the Russians
as early as possible and responding in a robust way.
>> Obama could have destroyed computer servers
that were involved in this.
He could have stepped in to reveal information about Putin
himself and his financial connections to the oligarchs.
He had all kinds of cyber choices.
And then he had all kinds of non-cyber tools:
sanctions, things like that.
>> NARRATOR: But Obama resisted aggressive responses.
>> I think the feeling was, how are you going to talk about this
without seeming to be influencing the election
and taking a side?
I just think they preferred to stay out of it.
>> Overriding all of this was President Obama's concern
about not doing anything that was going to become
a self-fulfilling prophecy for the Russians,
which was to call into question the integrity of the election.
>> Very clever on Putin's part, as well,
because President Obama conceivably could have been
accused of doing the very thing that Putin himself was doing,
and therefore contributing to the discrediting
of the election.
>> The other thing is that the Obama administration
expected Clinton to win.
And they were afraid that if they weighed in now,
it would look like they're really putting their thumbs
on the scale.
This is a kind of a classic case of the Obama administration
overthinking something while the Russians were just kind of
punching them in the gut.
>> NARRATOR: Before he would act,
the president wanted congressional Republicans
to join him in calling out Putin and Russian interference.
>> The Obama administration is so concerned about being accused
of politicizing intelligence during the election,
they're really reluctant for the president himself
to go out on a limb and say, "Look, Russia is doing this.
Russia's messing around in our election."
They really wanted this to be a bipartisan statement
of condemnation of Moscow's interference.
>> NARRATOR: Top intelligence officials traveled
to Capitol Hill to tell congressional leaders
what they knew.
>> They were all there: the Speaker, Leader Pelosi,
Leader McConnell, Leader Reid, the foreign affairs committees,
the intel committees.
They were all there.
And we briefed them on what we knew.
>> NARRATOR: Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell
expressed skepticism about the intelligence,
and warned that he would not join an effort
to publicly challenge Putin.
>> They're told by Mitch McConnell,
the majority leader of the Senate,
that, "If you do that, we are going to interpret that
as you putting the thumb on the scales for Hillary Clinton."
>> NARRATOR: The meetings were top secret,
held behind closed doors.
>> In those briefings of Congress,
some of the individuals expressed concern
that this was motivated by partisan interests
on the part of the administration.
And I took offense to that,
and told them that this is an intelligence assessment.
This is an intelligence matter.
>> It's a moment when politics and partisan positioning
appears to take precedence over national security.
In other words, they are so worried about each other,
the Democrats and Republicans, as adversaries,
that they can't get around the idea
that there is a bigger adversary.
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