Sen. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., is throwing cold water on Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard’s assertion about the Obama administration’s role in pushing the Trump-Russia collusion narrative during the 2016 presidential election.
Gabbard has declassified documents, including a House Intelligence Committee memo, alleging that former President Barack Obama and his national security team ‘manufactured an Intelligence Community Assessment they knew was false.’
‘I think what Gabbard and her staff are doing is dishonest and misstated, and I’ll leave it at that,’ Schiff told Fox News Digital on Capitol Hill.
But White House Spokesman Davis Ingle was quick to fire back in a statement to Fox News Digital. ‘Pencil neck, watermelon head Adam ‘Shifty’ Schiff was one of the chief propagandists behind the Russia collusion hoax,’ he said. ‘He’s now trying to desperately cover his tracks as this entire lie is being exposed to the world.’
Schiff was elected to the Senate last year but served in the House while Congress investigated whether Trump colluded with Russia to influence the 2016 election.
And as a ranking member and then chair of the House Intelligence Committee, Schiff was directly involved in the congressional investigation and became a leading Democratic voice accusing Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign of colluding with Russia.
‘Should Obama and his team be held responsible in some way for pushing the Russia collusion narrative that was proven false to take down Trump?’ Fox News Digital asked Schiff.
‘Well, if you read the well-reported intelligence community report, you know they documented Russia’s efforts to help denigrate Hillary Clinton, which gave a boost to the Trump campaign,’ Schiff responded.
Schiff was referring to an Intelligence Community Assessment report from 2017 that asserted that Russia’s goals were to undermine faith in the U.S. democratic process and to ‘denigrate’ former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and that Russian President Vladimir Putin ‘developed a clear preference’ for Trump.
Gabbard’s office alleged in a press release outlining the unearthed documents that Putin did not favor a candidate in 2016. It also said, ‘There is irrefutable evidence detailing how President Obama and his national security team directed the creation of an Intelligence Community Assessment that they knew was false.’
When asked if he should apologize, Schiff told Fox News Digital, ‘It’s been proven accurate.’
And as he walked away, Schiff seemed to nod in agreement and say, ‘Yes,’ when asked if everything he had said about the Russia collusion was accurate.
The Justice Department, however, has formed a ‘strike force’ to assess the evidence publicized by Gabbard into the Obama administration’s role in the Trump–Russia collusion narrative.
Trump and Schiff have long been political foes, as the president often evoked Schiff’s nickname on the presidential campaign trail in 2024 while Trump weaved through a range of topics, including what he has come to refer to as the ‘Russia, Russia, Russia hoax.’
‘Adam ‘Shifty’ Schiff is in BIG TROUBLE!’ Trump said on Truth Social on Sunday. ‘He falsified Loan Documents. He once said my son would go to prison on a SCAM that Schiff, along with other Crooked Dems, illegally ‘manufactured’ in order to stage an actual coup.’
‘My son did nothing wrong, knew nothing about the fictional story,’ he added. ‘It was an American Tragedy! Now Shifty should pay the price of prison for a real crime, not one made up by the corrupt accusers!’
The U.S. Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) sent a letter to the Department of Justice in May alleging that Schiff has ‘falsified bank documents and property records to acquire more favorable loan terms, impacting payments from 2003-2019 for a Potomac, Maryland-based property.’
‘Since I led his first impeachment, Trump has repeatedly called for me to be arrested for treason,’ Schiff said after Trump first accused Schiff of mortgage fraud. ‘So in a way, I guess this is a bit of a letdown. And this baseless attempt at political retribution won’t stop me from holding him accountable. Not by a long shot.’
Fox News Digital’s Brooke Singman, Emma Colton, Danielle Wallace, and Peter Doocy contributed to this report.