Some news outlets have reported that the vulnerability came from Flynn discussing sanctions with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak, but Yates would not confirm that. Yates said she felt "it was important to get this information to the White House as quickly as possible".
It nevertheless took 18 days before the president, pressed by Pence and others, dismissed the retired army lieutenant general, who had advised him on security issues throughout the 2016 presidential campaign.
Flynn's undoing was set in motion when Russian ruler Vladimir Putin said Russia would not retaliate for sanctions Obama's administration imposed in December. Pence and the administration also needed to know they were making false statements based on information Flynn had given them, she said.
"We weren't the only ones that knew all of this", said Yates.
Trump fired Yates after she defied the White House on the travel ban, a policy that Trump said would help protect Americans from Islamist militants. "Ask Sally Yates, under oath, if she knows how classified information got into the newspapers soon after she explained it to W.H. Council", he tweeted Monday, before correcting the spelling of "counsel". She said she answered this by noting the potentially compromising nature of the lie.
The Obama administration fired Flynn in 2014 from his position as chief of the Defense Intelligence Agency.
"Certainly leading up to our notification on the 26th, it was a topic of a whole lot of discussion in DOJ and with other members of the intel community", Yates said Monday during her testimony.
Senator John Cornyn, the No 2 Republican in the Senate, questioned Yates heatedly about her objections to Trump's travel ban. He also asked why the Department of Justice would care if one White House official had lied to another.
Yates, a longtime federal prosecutor and Obama administration holdover, was sacked January 31 by Trump after refusing to defend the administration's travel ban. However, as CNN notes, Clapper also wasn't even aware of the FBI investigation into Trump until Comey announced it in March because guess what?
Initially, Clapper testified that before he retired from his post on January 20, he knew of no evidence of collusion between the Trump camp and Russian Federation during the 2016 election.
Sandeep, Axar set up Kings XI victory over RCB
If RPS gets the better of Kolkata Knight Riders on Wednesday evening, then it will be the final nail in the coffin of RCB . Narine praised Lynn as he said , "Lynn has full control of his ability and he takes o the pressure from the non-striker".
White House press secretary Sean Spicer acknowledged that Obama "made it known" that he wasn't "a fan" of Flynn's but put the burden back on the Obama administration.
Clapper said that he was not aware of the FBI's counterintelligence probe into Russian Federation meddling in the election during his time as head of the nation's 17 spy agencies.
Trump has disparaged the several investigations linking his campaign to Russian Federation, saying they are mere excuses for Democrats losing the election.
President Trump tweeted several times Monday evening that the "Russia-Trump collusion story is a total hoax" in an apparent reaction to the "Special Report" panel's comments on Yates's testimony.
The Associated Press reported last week that one sign taken as a warning by Obama officials about Flynn's contacts with Kislyak was a request by a member of Trump's own transition team made to national security officials in the Obama White House for the classified Central Intelligence Agency profile of Kislyak. "To state the obvious - you don't want your national security adviser compromised by the Russians". On Monday morning NBC News revealed that Obama warned Trump about hiring Flynn beforehand, advice that Trump reportedly thought was a joke.
The subcommittee meeting Monday is one of three congressional probes into the Russian Federation interference, along with House and Senate intelligence panels.
Though some Republicans on the panel engaged in such diversions - Ted Cruz raised the Anthony Weiner affair - the subcommittee chairman, Lindsey Graham, rose above partisanship.
Lt. Gen. Mike Flynn was interviewed at the White House by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Former U.S. President Barack Obama warned then-President-elect Donald Trump not to give the post of national security adviser in his administration to Michael Flynn who was eventually fired in a controversy about ties to Russian Federation, a former Obama aide said.
A former senior USA law enforcement figure said yesterday she warned President Donald Trump's White House in January about then-national security adviser Michael Flynn because she feared he could have been open to blackmail by Russian Federation.
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