Donald Trump, confronted by claims that Russian agents had gathered embarrassing and compromising information about him, has chosen to side with Russia and dismiss the allegations as "utter nonsense".
In a series of tweets on Wednesday morning, the President-elect posted a link to the Polizette website, run by conservative broadcaster Laura Ingraham, which carried a story dismissing the claims as unverified, and posting a video of Russian President Vladimir Putin saying claims of Russian hacking were false.
“Russia just said the unverified report paid for by political opponents is “A COMPLETE AND TOTAL FABRICATION, UTTER NONSENSE.” Very unfair!,” wrote Mr Trump, on this occasion mixing up his use of capital letters.
He added: “Russia has never tried to use leverage over me. I HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH RUSSIA - NO DEALS, NO LOANS, NO NOTHING!”
On Tuesday night, Mr Trump had dismissed as “fake news”, claims that Russian intelligence operatives had developed information against him that was both salacious and compromising. CNN said US intelligence officials had shared the information with Mr Trump and President Barack Obama last week.
A flurry of reports in the US media said the documents on which the claims were based, generated by a former British spy who now works in opposition political research, had been around for several months but that the claims could not be verified.
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