WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — In testimony before the US Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday, former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper repeated previous assertions that he had seen no evidence of collusion, despite conversations between Russian and Trump campaign officials.
"Today we don't have direct clear evidence of collusion between Trump himself, high levels of the campaign and the Russian government," Senator Murphy told MSNBC. "But we certainly seem to be getting closer to that moment."
US intelligence has concluded that Russian hackers stole emails connected to presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s campaign to help Trump win the presidency — a charge the Russian government has repeatedly denied and characterized as absurd.
Murphy’s comments came a day after Clapper and former acting Attorney General Sally Yates appeared before the US Senate Judiciary Committee.
Much of the hearing concerned conversations between former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn and Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak — contact that Flynn denied had occurred.
Trump fired Flynn after press accounts disclosed otherwise.
Without that disclosure, Murphy told MSNBC on Tuesday, Flynn could still be national security adviser today.
Yates told the Senate panel that Flynn was vulnerable to blackmail because Russian intelligence had been aware that Flynn’s conversations with the ambassador were intercepted.
