Obama apparently warned Trump not to hire Michael Flynn
Former President Barack Obama explicitly warned President Trump against hiring ousted National Security Adviser Michael Flynn, NBC News reported Monday. Three former Obama administration officials said that Obama offered the advice in an Oval Office meeting "less than 48 hours" after Trump won the presidency.
Trump went ahead and hired Flynn as his national security adviser anyway, only to fire him after three weeks for misleading Vice President Mike Pence about his conversations with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak. The Obama administration had fired Flynn in 2014 as head of the Defense Intelligence Agency because of "mismanagement and temperament issues," NBC News reported.
The revelation about Obama's warning came as former acting Attorney General Sally Yates and former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper are poised to testify Monday before a Senate Judiciary subcommittee about Flynn. Yates has said she also gave the Trump administration a warning about Flynn, in regards to his conversation about sanctions with Kislyak.
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Earlier Monday, Trump tried to toss blame on the Obama administration for Flynn's missteps. Becca Stanek
Making sense of the week's political news, delivered every Wednesday