Vice President-elect Mike Pence said Wednesday that he supports Donald Trump’s move to question U.S. intelligence agency claims that the Russia was responsible for the pre-election hacking of Democratic emails.
“The president-elect has expressed his very sincere and healthy American skepticism about intelligence conclusions,” Pence said following a closed-door meeting with House Republicans on Wednesday.
Pence and President-elect Trump will receive an intelligence briefing Friday. Trump has expressed doubts about reports that the nation’s intelligence community universally blames the Russians for hacking into the emails of Democratic and Clinton operatives prior to the election.
“Julian Assange said ‘a 14 year old could have hacked Podesta’ — why was DNC so careless? Also said Russians did not give him the info!” Trump tweeted on Wednesday, referring to top Clinton aide John Podesta.
Trump suggested in a tweet this week that his intelligence briefing was delayed until Friday to give intelligence officers more time to “build a case” that the Russians influence the Nov. 8 election. Trump has argued that the intelligence community provided faulty information about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq prior to the war.
WikiLeaks founder Assange told Fox News he did not obtain the leaked emails from the Russians.
Pence did not walk back Trump’s doubts on Wednesday.
“We’ll be looking at the facts and the information,” Pence told reporters. “Given some of the intelligence failures in recent years, the president-elect made it clear he is skeptical of the conclusions.”
