Russian President Vladimir Putin was personally involved in covert efforts to interfere with the U.S. presidential election to try to show corruption in American politics and create an image other countries could no longer depend on the U.S. as a world leader, senior U.S. intelligence officials told NBC News Wednesday.
The effort was started as a vendetta against former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton directed by Putin to benefit President-elect Donald Trump, two senior officials with direct access to intelligence told NBC.
The Russian operation leaked emails embarrassing to the Clinton campaign.
“It is most certainly consistent with the Putin that I have watched and used to work with when I was an ambassador and in the government,” former U.S. Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul told NBC News.
“He has had a vendetta against Hillary Clinton, that has been known for a long time because of what she said about his elections back in the parliamentary elections of 2011. He wants to discredit American democracy and make us weaker in terms of leading the liberal democratic order. And most certainly he likes President-elect Trump’s views on Russia.”
Seventeen U.S. intelligence agencies reached the conclusion in October Russia was responsible for the email hacks and subsequent leaks to WikiLeaks. The CIA concluded the Russian government was trying to get Trump elected, but not all the agencies agree.