Thomas Cochran, a top ACU official, said the whistleblower's account was inaccurate, attaching AT&T phone records that he said show Alex Copson did not get a text from Michael Flynn that day. | Saul Loeb/Pool Photo via AP Former Flynn associate says phone records contradict whistleblower's account

A former business associate of Michael Flynn told lawmakers that phone records contradict an anonymous whistleblower's allegation that the ex-national security adviser sent an Inauguration Day text declaring a controversial Middle East nuclear energy deal "good to go," according to a letter released Monday.

In an account provided to Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.) in June — but made public only last week — the whistleblower said Alex Copson, a top official at ACU Strategic Partners, bragged on Inauguration Day about his relationship with Flynn, at one point flipping around his phone to reveal the text about the deal to build nuclear plants across the Middle East.


The whistleblower also said Copson said sanctions against Russia would be "ripped up" to make room for the deal.

But in a letter to Cummings dated Friday, Thomas Cochran, a top ACU official, said the whistleblower's account was inaccurate, attaching AT&T phone records that he said show Copson did not get a text from Flynn that day.

“The only text message Mr. Copson received on Inauguration Day came at 1:49 p.m.,” Cochran said. He said that text was from a friend who attended the same function where the whistleblower claimed to witness Copson’s boasting.

“Since Mr. Copson did not receive a text message from General Flynn during the Inauguration, other allegations of the ‘whistleblower’ are equally false and unfounded,” wrote Cochran, who identified himself as a senior scientist at the company. He requested that Cummings share the new information with the media.

Cummings on Monday morning revealed that he was aware of the new information. He sent a letter to Copson on Friday asking him to submit to a transcribed interview and suggested Cochran’s response was insufficient to disprove the whistleblower's account.

“Of course, it is possible that you were using a messaging application that does not generate a telephone company record,” he wrote. “It is possible that the website printout you provided does not reflect all text messages. It is also possible that you were not being truthful when you claimed to the whistleblower that you received a text from General Flynn, or that you flashed your phone and showed the whistleblower an outgoing text from 12:12 p.m., which is listed on the document you provided.”

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Cummings said that the phone records also do not refute the rest of the whistleblower’s account. Cummings has sought to convince Republicans on the House oversight committee to hear the case from the whistleblower, but Chairman Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.) instead referred the matter to the House and Senate intelligence committees. He blasted Cummings for pursuing an issue he said falls squarely in the purview of special counsel Robert Mueller, who’s investigating Flynn’s potential criminal actions early in the Trump presidency. Gowdy’s response sparked a hostile back-and-forth that has ratcheted up the partisan tension on the committee.

Rep. Adam Schiff, the top Democrat on the House intelligence committee, told POLITICO that he’s interested in hearing from Cummings’ source but also believes the oversight committee should pursue its own investigation.

“I’d certainly like to have him come testify before the intel committee. But that doesn’t obviate the need for [oversight] to do its own investigation, which is broader than just the intel piece,” he said.

