He Was Not Briefed

In response to reports that Russia offered bounties to Taliban fighters to kill US troops in Afghanistan, the White House has denied that President Trump was "personally briefed" on the matter, claiming that the intelligence "wasn't verified."

But a US official familiar with the latest information told CNN on Monday that intelligence about the Russian bounty was included in the President's Daily Briefing (PDB) sometime in the spring. The written document includes the intelligence communities' most important and urgent information. On Monday night, The New York Times reported that the information was included in a written briefing to the President in late February.

  

Trump is known to not read his daily briefing, and instead prefers an oral briefing a few times a week. But even in those sessions, participants have described him as distracted. The President receives a copy of the PDB every day, but Trump is notorious for not reading it. Even after intelligence analysts added more photos and charts to make it more appealing, the document often goes unread, according to people familiar with the matter.

These latest revelations come as numerous former senior intelligence officials are pushing back on the White House denials, saying it was "absurd," "ridiculous," and "inconceivable" that the President would not have been briefed on such critical intelligence that potentially put US soldiers in harm's way.