Former CIA analyst Marie Harf on Friday took on Fox News contributor Tomi Lahren after the conservative firebrand rattled off a familiar talking point about the Democratic National Committee’s so-called refusal to hand over its server to intelligence agencies following the 2016 email leak.
The “Outnumbered” cast members were discussing a civil lawsuit, filed Friday by the DNC, that seeks damages from Russia and Donald Trump’s campaign over the 2016 hacking.
Ari Fleischer, the former White House press secretary for George W. Bush, told the co-hosts he hopes the DNC are “successful in one regard.”
“If Russia hacked them, I hope they go after Russia,” Fleischer said.
“Why don’t they turn over the servers though?” Lahren demanded. “If you were hacked and you want to get to the bottom of it, why have they not turned over the servers? Something stinks!"
“That’s what makes it smell like it’s potentially politically,” Harris Faulkner insisted. “Because otherwise you would just give everything you have in the name of transparency.”
Harf explained that the intelligence community has already “concluded that Russia did hack both the DNC and private emails of people like John Podesta. These are nonpartisan, career officials who’ve determined that.”
“Yeah, so why not turned over the server?” Lahren shot back.
Harf said she was interested in the outcome of the civil suit, adding that “any of us should be concerned” with Russian entities hacking organizations in the United States.
“Yeah but then why won’t they turn over the servers?” Lahren repeated.
“I have no idea why they did or didn’t turn over servers, I think that’s a very small point in the larger point about Russian interference,” Harf replied.
“I think it’s a huge point!” Lahren exclaimed. “If you want integrity of our elections, we should get to the bottom of it.”
“And why didn’t the FBI subpoena them?” Fleischer wanted to know.
“Those are all questions—and as part of this lawsuit, maybe that’ll be part of discovery, I have no idea,” Harf said.
“Whether or not the DNC should have turned over their servers, or whether there was good reason for proprietary not to, I don’t know, I have no idea,” she continued. “The bigger point is Russia hacked into them, and that’s a problem.”
