Rift Between Republicans and President-Elect Trump Grows Over Russia Hack Allegations

The rift between President-elect Donald Trump and Senate Republicans grew Monday over allegations that Russia was behind the hacking of the Hillary Clinton campaign and Democratic party email servers. While Republicans say it should be a non-partisan issue that should be investigated, a spokesman for the transition says "bitter" people are behind the charge.

"Russia is not our friend," Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said at a Monday morning press conference. "Any foreign breach of our cybersecurity measures is disturbing, and I strongly condemn any such efforts."

McConnell says that "it defies belief" that any Republican in the Senate would not want to investigate this issue fully.

"It's an important subject and we intend to review it on a bipartisan basis," he added.

His message apparently did not sit well with the presidential transition team.

On a conference call soon after, Trump spokesman Jason Miller brushed aside McConnell's assertions, saying that questions about Russian involvement in hacking are attempts to "delegitimize" Trump's election by people "bitter" over Clinton's loss, lumping it together with Green Party candidate Jill Stein's calls for a recount.

Meanwhile, Trump took to Twitter to attack the question of Russian involvement and, in doing so, said something that was demonstrably untrue.

It was brought up before the election — repeatedly.

Clinton brought it up in all three debates.

Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson and Director of National Intelligence James Clapper did so in a joint statement.

"We believe, based on the scope and sensitivity of these efforts, that only Russia’s senior-most officials could have authorized these activities," they said.

Even Vice-President-elect Mike Pence — as a candidate — said in October that there is "more and more evidence that implicates Russia" in the hacking.

McConnell, meanwhile, said he supports a Congressional probe into the allegations of Russian involvement. At this press conference, he welcomed an investigation by the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee chaired by Trump ally Sen. Richard Burr of North Carolina.

He did, though, say he would also support the involvement of Sen. John McCain who chairs the Armed Services Committee and has had an occasionally fractious relationship with the president-elect.

Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR), a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee who has been calling for the declassification of information related to Russian involvement since Clapper and Johnson released their statement in October, renewed that call on Monday.

"It's time to get the facts out of the shadows," said Wyden, adding that statements by Trump associates on this issues have been "wild, almost conspiracy-type theories.

"It's time to get the facts out."

Trump's tweets on Monday followed a weekend of statements from him and his staff belittling the CIA and their assessment.

"Ridiculous," was Trump's response to Fox News. "I don't believe it."

On Friday, the Transition team released a statement calling the CIA "the same people who said that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction," which they had actually not said.