CNN’s Berman Takes On Trump’s Dispute With Russian Bounties Report: ‘How Can the President Not Be Told About That?’

CNN’s John Berman raised skepticism for President Donald Trump’s claim that he that he wasn’t briefed on Russia’s secret bounty offers to Taliban militias because the information on the matter wasn’t credible enough.

Berman held an interview on Monday with former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, which largely focused on Trump’s claim for why he wasn’t briefed on Russian military intelligence reportedly issuing payouts for the deaths of U.S. soldiers. Multiple news outlets have corroborated The New York Times’ original report on the bounty story, and Clapper said it would be a “pretty serious indictment” for Trump if he did, in fact, know about that Russian payouts were behind the deaths of servicemen.

“If this reporting is true, there are two options here,” Berman said. “Number one, the president was briefed and didn’t do anything about it. Now, he says he wasn’t briefed and it raises a whole ton of questions about why not? Because if U.S. troops are being killed… and the president wasn’t told about it, how can the president not be told about that?”

From there, Clapper noted that the Trump administration initially claimed that the president wasn’t briefed on the bounties, which Clapper called “a rhetorical guise for avoiding responsibility.”

“Russians are known to do things like this in other places, notably the U.K. and the Ukraine. So either way, it doesn’t look good,” Clapper continued. “And certainly, if there were deaths of U.S. service members caused by this, that’s pretty serious.”

The conversation went on with Clapper and Berman discussing how the Trump administration has not disputed the accusation against Russia, even with the question about the president’s daily brief.

Watch above, via CNN.