“I don’t believe it,” Trump said in a pre-recorded interview that was broadcast Sunday on Fox News.

“I think it’s ridiculous,” Trump said, putting it down as an attempt by Democrats to find an excuse for their embarrassing election loss.

Two top Republican senators — John McCain and Lindsey Graham — joined leading Democrats Sunday in calling for greater public disclosure about “recent cyber attacks that have cut to the heart of our free society.”

“This cannot become a partisan issue. The stakes are too high for our country,” they said in a joint statement with Chuck Schumer, the incoming Democratic leader in the Senate, and Jack Reed, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee.

They pledged to work across party lines to have the incidents investigated, but other Republicans said the evidence does not support the conclusions that the Russian meddling was aimed at helping Trump.

Adam Schiff, the ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said the hacking was definitely the work of the Russians.

“This was not China. This wasn’t a 400-pound guy in New Jersey or anyone else,” Schiff said, mocking similar comments Trump has made. “This was the Russians.”

Trump’s willingness to disregard the intelligence community’s “overwhelming evidence” was “extraordinarily damaging,” he said.

What the CIA says it found

US intelligence has previously linked Russia to leaks of damaging email from Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton’s campaign, but saw it as a broad bid to undermine confidence in the US political process.

On Friday, however, the Washington Post reported that the CIA has since concluded that the aim of the cyber intrusions was to help Trump win the election.

The New York Times quoted senior administration officials as saying there was “high confidence” that the Russians hacked both the Democratic and Republican National Committees, but leaked only documents damaging to Clinton through WikiLeaks.

Reince Priebus, the Republican National Committee chairman and Trump’s incoming White House chief of staff, said the FBI had investigated and told the RNC it had not been hacked.

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has denied links with Russia’s government.

Trump dismissed the intelligence reports, asserting there is “great confusion” over the issue within the spy agencies.

“Nobody really knows,” he said. “They have no idea if it’s Russia or China or somebody. It could be somebody sitting in a bed some place. They have no idea.”

Trump suggested he had little confidence in the US intelligence agencies and would clean house once in office.

“We’re going to have different people coming in because we have our people, they have their people.”

Trump has kept the US intelligence community at arm’s length since his election, pointedly eschewing their daily briefing on world threats.

“I get it when I need it,” he said.

“You know, I’m a smart person. I don’t have to be told the same thing and the same words every single day for the next eight years.”