Trump cites WikiLeaks chief to dispel hacking findings

By Michael Hernandez

WASHINGTON (AA) - President-elect Donald Trump has turned to WikiLeaks chief Julian Assange to back up his rejection of Russia’s cyber intervention in the 2016 election.

In a series of tweets Wednesday morning, Trump suggested that the Democratic National Committee (DNC) was to blame for its own hacking, as well as the hacking of top Hillary Clinton advisor John Podesta.

"Julian Assange said 'a 14-year-old could have hacked Podesta' - why was DNC so careless?" he wrote on the social media site, later repeating Assange's claim that Russia did not provide his organization with emails that it made public.

Assange has maintained that the documents did not come from a government.

Trump's comments put him at odds with the U.S.' intelligence community which has determined that Russia was behind the hacks. That assessment has largely been shared by top Democrat and Republican lawmakers.

The president-elect went on to assert that the DNC did "not have 'hacking defense'" like its Republican counterpart, saying the DNC has not responded to the "terrible things they did and said" such as allegedly providing Hillary Clinton with debate questions ahead of time to give her an edge.

Former DNC chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz resigned from her post after it came to light that the party was biased against Democratic candidate Bernie Sanders during the primaries, despite its pledge to remain neutral.

On Tuesday, Trump wrote on Twitter that his "intelligence" briefing on the matter, which he put in quotation marks, has been delayed until Friday.

"Perhaps more time needed to build a case. Very strange!" he said.

The Associated Press reported that intelligence officials said there was no change to Trump's briefing schedule.

President Barack Obama has ordered a comprehensive review of hacking related to America's presidential campaigns going back to 2008. The results of the investigations are expected to be released soon.

Intelligence officials are expected to brief Congress on their inquiry on Thursday.