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
00:33:17.495,00:00:00.000
that there is a bigger
adversary.
>> 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
