Former Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates on Monday denied knowing who leaked to the media former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn’s classified conversation with Russian Ambassador Sergei Kislyak after she brought it up to the White House counsel.
Responding to a question by Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) on whether she or Director of National Intelligence James Clapper knew who leaked that conversation to the Washington Post, Clapper said, “That’s a great question.”
“Nor do I know the answer to that,” Yates said.
Yates said she had notified White House Counsel Don McGahn on January 26 about Flynn’s conversation with Kislyak in December, since she was concerned it put Flynn in a compromised position with Russia.
Yates said Flynn had told Vice President Mike Pence that he had not discussed U.S. sanctions on Moscow with Kislyak, when he actually had, putting him in a potential blackmail situation with Russia.
“We told him that the vice president and him were entitled to know,” she said. She said she was also concerned the American people were being misled.
She said she had several follow-up conversations with McGahn, and that she had taken a senior member of the Justice Department national security division who was overseeing the matter with her to see McGahn, and that one of McGahn’s aides was present during those conversations.
Although she denied leaking classified information to the media, or authorizing anyone else to leak to the media, she said Flynn’s conversations was a subject of debate at the Department of Justice before she left her position as acting attorney general.
Someone leaked the contents of the classified call between Flynn and Kislyak to the Washington Post, which published an article on it on February 9. Flynn later stepped down after it was revealed he had discussed sanctions with the Russian ambassador.