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Dead Drop: January 13

Dead Drop: January 13

SHORTEST HONEYMOON EVER: Last Friday, after the briefing by top U.S. intelligence officials, President-elect Trump said: “I have tremendous respect for the work and service done by the men and women of this community to our great nation.”  On Wednesday, after news reports of Russian collection on him, he referred to it as: “…nonsense that was released by maybe the intelligence agencies — who knows? But maybe the intelligence agencies — which would be a tremendous blot on their record if they in fact did that. A tremendous blot on their record, because a thing like that should never have been written.” In a Tweet and at his press conference Wednesday, Trump implied that leaks he believes came from the intelligence community were something “that Nazi Germany would have done.” On Wednesday evening, outgoing DNI James Clapper issued a press release saying he was dismayed at the leaks and that in a call to the President-elect, he had expressed doubt that the leaks had come from the intelligence community. Détente between Trump and the IC was shorter-lived than a Syrian cease fire.

MAKING A BIGLY DEAL ON HACKING: At his presser on Wednesday, Trump finally conceded that Russia was probably behind the hacking of the DNC and Clinton Campaign Manager John Podesta. But he complained that on things like China hacking OPM, “we lost 22 million names and everything else that was hacked recently, they didn't make a big deal out of that. That was something that was extraordinary. That was probably China.” Apparently, his argument was that the Obama administration did not take action against Beijing comparable to that recently taken against Moscow.  But then Trump went on to also blame the media saying: “…it's not just Russia. Take a look at what's happened. You don't report it the same way; 22 million accounts were hacked in this country by China.” Obviously, the President-elect has not been reading The Cipher Brief where article, after article, after article – and more delved into the significance of the OPM breach.

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