What did Obama know and when did he know it

By Jerry McConway, 
updated on August 28, 2025

I have little doubt that the Obama administration created the Russian collusion narrative to try to take Donald Trump out of the 2016 election.

There are still some questions that need to be answered, however.

At the top of that list is the involvement of former President Barack Obama.

The Steele Dossier

At the very heart of the attack against Donald Trump was the use of the Steele dossier.

We have covered that document to exhaustion, so there is no need to go back over its contents, but we do need to make note that analysts at both the FBI and CIA believed the information to be of very low confidence.

Yet, then-CIA Director Brennan used the dossier to push the narrative, and the dossier was used in securing FISA warrants. I believe that Brennan was a major player in this, but did he inform Obama of what he was doing?

Hillary’s role

So, we know Hillary’s campaign helped to finance the dossier, and her campaign was fined by the FEC on this front. However, there has been mixed reporting about Hillary approving the plan to go after Trump, which goes back to the John Durham probe.

Numerous reports broke that Hillary gave the final approval to go after Trump, using the dossier, including some salacious information in it, to try to push the Russian collusion narrative.

However, after the fact, a report showed up in the New York Times, citing the Durham investigation, with Durham believing those emails could have been created by the Russians. That, however, was only his conclusion, never proven. To that point, we still have no idea if it was Hillary who gave the final nod on this or not.

Obama

A new report has surfaced that Obama was briefed by Brennan on Hillary’s plan to take Trump down via the Russian collusion narrative on August 3, 2016. Also reportedly present at the meeting were then-Vice President Joe Biden, then-FBI Director James Comey, then-Attorney General Loretta Lynch, and then-Director of National Intelligence James Clapper.

That meeting came only days after Operation Crossfire Hurricane was started, which was the investigation into the Russian collusion allegations against the Trump campaign. Recently declassified notes from that meeting read, "An exchange (REDACTED) discussing US presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s approval of a plan concerning US presidential candidate Donald Trump and Russian hackers hampering US elections as a means of distracting the public from her use of a private email server."

I also want to note that in those files, and this is new information for me, was that George Soros’ Open Society Foundation was linked to this, with emails from Leonard Berardo having been among those emails hacked. The appendix of the report stated,  "Two of the apparently hacked emails appear to have originated from the Open Society Foundations.” This goes to prove our allegations regarding how deeply embedded Soros is in the Democrat Party (we are not accusing the foundation of any wrongdoing here, just showing how deeply entrenched Soros was with the Hillary campaign).

In emails from Bernardo, who was the regional director for Eurasia at the Open Society Foundations, he wrote, "During the first stage of the campaign, due to lack of direct evidence, it was decided to disseminate the necessary information through the FBI-affiliated…technical structures… in particular, the Crowdstrike and ThreatConnect companies, from where the information would then be disseminated through leading U.S. publications.”

He continued, "The media analysis on the DNC hacking appears solid …. Julie (Clinton Campaign Advisor) says it will be a long-term affair to demonize Putin and Trump. Now it is good for a post-convention bounce. Later the FBI will put more oil into the fire."

Yet another email claimed, "HRC (Hillary Rodham Clinton) approved Julie’s idea about Trump and Russian hackers hampering U.S. elections. "This should distract people from her own missing email, especially if the affair goes to the Olympic level. The point is making the Russian play a U.S. domestic issue. Say something like a critical infrastructure threat for the election to feel manic since both POTUS and VPOTUS have acknowledge the fact IC would speed up searching for evidence that is regrettably still unavailable."

When you take into account that during the Obama-Trump meeting after the election, Obama warned Trump about General Michael Flynn, it seems fairly apparent that Obama was up to speed on this investigation from beginning to end and allowed it to take place. When you have a few moments, I highly encourage you to read the full report on Fox News, as it is quite eye-opening regarding how the Obama administration was working behind the scenes to push this narrative, as well as looking to implicate individuals who were known to be recruited by Trump to serve in his administration, General Flynn in particular.

About Jerry McConway

Jerry McConway is the Senior Editorial Director at American Digest Media, as well as the featured columnist on Real Talk Digest. He has been covering politics for more than a decade. His no-nonsense writing style makes him enemy number one in DC. His mission is to tell the truth to readers, good or bad, something the mainstream media has failed to do for decades. What sets Jerry apart from his competition is reader loyalty. They don't always agree with him, but they know he tells them the truth. Love him or hate him, you can't ignore him.

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