[Keilar:] Russian intelligence officers are breaking into homes of U.S. diplomats, harassing their children and, in one case, even killing a family pet. These are the bizarre and scary claims outlined by the "Washington Post." We have CNN political analyst and "Washington Post" columnist, Josh Rogin. He broke this story. This is a list of things you detail in this very interesting column. What else are staff members reporting?
[Josh Rogin, Cnn Political Analyst:] Sure. Over the last two years, Russian intelligence and security services have been harassing U.S. diplomats not just in Moscow but in Europe. Some of the things are silly, like going into your house in the middle of the night and rearranging all your furniture and turn on all the lights and then go away.
[Keilar:] Like a fraternity prank. But a lot is serious.
[Rogin:] Exactly. Some is much more serious. They followed Ambassador Michael McFaul's children to school, and so closely that the children were aware of it. In the first term of the Obama administration, they went into the House of the U.S. defense attache and killed his dog. These incidents have been going on for a while, but since the 2014 invasion of Ukraine and the U.S. sanctions that followed, the Russian FSB has been increasing its harassment and intimidation of U.S. diplomats to unprecedented levels.
[Keilar:] And it's not like the Russian government is trying to keep this a secret. They're out there about this. They're defending it.
[Rogin:] It's kind of crazy. John Kerry raised it with Vladimir Putin directly in his trip to Moscow in March. I asked the Russian embassy about it. They didn't deny it. They said the U.S. caused the downturn in relations and that these sanctions have consequences. They call it reciprocity. But U.S. intelligence and diplomatic officials assure me what they're doing to us is more serious and more dangerous than what we're doing to them.
[Keilar:] What is their aim with this?
[Rogin:] It's twofold. One, they want to disrupt U.S. officials doing their jobs in all these countries. If you go out and you're reporting on what the Russians are doing in Europe, they want to stop you from doing that. And they'll do that by scaring you. Two, they want to register their displeasure with U.S. policy. They want to make it clear, if we hit them with sanctions, they'll hit us by harassing our diplomats. It's a tit-for-tat game that reminds everybody of the Cold War.
[Keilar:] And it comes from the top, right?
[Rogin:] Well
[Keilar:] Is that the expectation? Is that what you think?
[Rogin:] It's not a coincidence that we sanctioned Putin's friends and the businesses that are close to him and, right after that, then the harassment of U.S. diplomats all over Europe increases significantly. There is a relationship between what we're doing to Putin and his friends and what his intelligence services are doing to our diplomats in the field.
[Keilar:] I know the U.S. government is tracking what's going on. What are they doing to make sure these staff members are safer?
[Rogin:] It's interesting. The State Department has done a lot. They set up meetings to train all diplomats who are headed to Europe that this is going to happen to them, how to report it, how to respond. But in the end, they've made a decision, they had a debate about it, not to do these same things back to the Russians. That leads some in Congress to say that we're not doing enough. That there have been no consequences for Russia. And I can tell you the U.S. ambassadors to these countries are still complaining, especially to the Obama administration, that they want them to do more.
[Keilar:] A fascinating column. I urge our viewers to take a look at it in the "Washington Post." Josh Rogin, thanks so much.
[Rogin:] Thank you.
[Keilar:] And just in to CNN, House Democrats releasing their own version of a probe into the 2012 Benghazi terror attack that killed four Americans, and blasting Republicans for embracing, quote, "conspiracy theories." We'll have the details next.