White House spokesman Josh Earnest told Bloomberg's Justin Sink on Friday that it is not the responsibility of the president to make decisions regarding the Democratic National Committee.
Sink asked Earnest if the head of the Justice Department was disappointed that the DNC did not cooperate with the FBI's request for the committee to turn over its compromised servers. The DNC was hacked during the 2016 election, and the U.S. intelligence community has concluded Russia was behind the cyber attack. Federal authorities, including the FBI, subsequently investigated the matter.
"I'll let the Department of Justice speak to the level of cooperation they received from the DNC and other people who are part of this investigation," Earnest said. "Obviously this investigation was conducted separate from any White House influence. So, it would be inappropriate for me, even if the president did have concerns, to express them from here."
The FBI had repeatedly told DNC officials it was necessary for the agency to have direct access to the relevant servers and data that were breached, CNN reported. The DNC rebuffed the request well after the first breach. The FBI was left with the option to only rely on third-party information.
Eric Walker, deputy communications director for the DNC, told BuzzFeed that the committee did not receive a request for access to the servers from the FBI.
"The DNC had several meetings with representatives of the FBI's Cyber Division and its Washington Field Office, the Department of Justice's National Security Division, and U.S. Attorney's Offices, and it responded to a variety of requests for cooperation, but the FBI never requested access to the DNC's computer servers," Walker said.