McCabe: Trump Trusted Putin, Not U.S. Intelligence, on North Korean Missile Capabilities
“I don't care. I believe Putin,” Trump allegedly said.

Aaron Bernstein/Reuters
Former acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe claimed on 60 Minutes late Sunday that President Trump trusted Vladimir Putin more than his own country’s intelligence services when it came to North Korea’s nuclear capabilities. “Essentially, the president said he did not believe that the North Koreans had the capability to hit us here with ballistic missiles in the United States,” McCabe told correspondent Scott Pelley. “And he did not believe that because President Putin had told him they did not. President Putin had told him that the North Koreans don't actually have those missiles.” When he was told that U.S. intelligence thought otherwise, McCabe claimed that Trump responded, “I don't care. I believe Putin.”
“It's just an astounding thing to say,” McCabe told Pelley. “To spend the time and effort and energy that we all do in the intelligence community to produce products that will help decision makers and the ultimate decision maker, the President of the United States— make policy decisions, and to be confronted with an absolute disbelief in those efforts and an unwillingness to learn the true state of affairs that he has to deal with every day was just shocking.”
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