Sean Hannity has reportedly been advising Trump on the Nunes memo

(Image credit: Nicholas Kamm/AFP/Getty Images)

last updated 2 February 2018

Why listen to the FBI and Department of Justice when you can get Fox News host Sean Hannity's opinion on national security?

President Trump has been in regular contact with Hannity over the past few weeks, The Daily Beast reports, with the pair discussing the controversial memo put together by Republicans that purports to expose corruption at the FBI. The FBI and Justice Department have warned that the memo cherry-picks classified information and could harm intelligence gathering efforts, with the FBI even making a rare statement saying it has "grave concerns" about the document's release and accuracy.

On Monday, Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee voted to make the memo public, and Trump is expected to release it Friday. Three people who spoke to The Daily Beast said that during the conversations, Hannity has been pushing Trump to release the memo, echoing comments he's made on his show (he declared the saga is "the biggest political scandal in American history"). Trump is known to pay close attention to Fox News programs and his views are shaped by the shows he watches, and one person close to him joked to The Daily Beast that Hannity is now a "senior counselor to the president." The White House did not respond to requests for comment, and Hannity declined to comment to The Daily Beast. Catherine Garcia

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Update Feb. 2: Hannity denied The Daily Beast's story on Twitter on Thursday night, calling it "fake news."

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Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.