READ MORE: Senate found ‘zero’ evidence of Trump-Russia collusion, time to do ‘other things’ – White House

Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr said that although his committee will not be investigating news organizations, it does plan on providing the public with the information needed to hold them responsible for what they reported.

“We’re not going to investigate news organizations, but we will use the findings of our report to let the American people hold every news organization accountable for what they portrayed as fact, in many cases without sources — at least, no sources that would admit to it,” Burr told Politico on Thursday. 

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“And I think, when we finish our report, we will find that quite a few news organizations ran stories that were not factual,” he added.

He went on to state that some incorrect news stories had also emerged since Wednesday’s news conference held by himself and Senator Mark Warner, which was aimed at providing an update on the status of the investigation into alleged Russian meddling.

Burr’s comments come after US President Donald Trump questioned why the Senate Intelligence Committee fails to investigate so-called “fake news.”

Trump has often criticized the mainstream media for its reporting of alleged Russian meddling in the presidential election, and has referred to the Senate Intelligence Committee’s investigation into the matter as a “hoax” and a “witch hunt.”

Russia, for its part, has consistently denied any interference in the election, with the deputy chairman of the Russian parliament’s committee on information technologies and communications recently accusing the US media of making up “scare stories” about Russia to undermine Trump.

“This hysteria and the spreading of pretty dirty smears against their own president, who fairly and squarely won the election, shows that trust in democracy is unfortunately undermined,” Andrey Svintsov said on Thursday.