Republican Sen. John McCain had no clue if the documents he handed the FBI detailing alleged Russian dirt on President-elect Donald Trump were accurate, he said in a statement Wednesday.
“Late last year, I received sensitive information that has since been made public,” he said in a statement. “Upon examination of the contents, and unable to make a judgment about their accuracy, I delivered the information to the Director of the FBI. That has been the extent of my contact with the FBI or any other government agency regarding this issue.”
McCain obtained the dossier last year when it was circulating in Washington, D.C., after it was put together by an opposition researcher paid by Republicans and Democrats to dig up dirt on Trump during the campaign. The memos detail serious and explosive information the Russians allegedly have on Trump, and McCain decided to forward them along to the intelligence community.
Neither the intelligence community nor an army of motivated journalists were able to verify any of the claims in the document, but it sprang into the spotlight Tuesday after news broke President Barack Obama and Trump were briefed on its existence. Buzzfeed then published the entire dossier, which it notes in the story is not verified and contains “potentially unverifiable” claims.
McCain’s statement adds to a swirl of skepticism regarding the claims Wednesday, as a growing number of journalists and pundits question Buzzfeed’s decision to print unverified rumors.
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