"untruthful answer" is correct and usable in written English.
You can use it when you want to describe a response that is deliberately false or deceptive. For example: "When the witness was asked why he had gone to the bank that day, he gave an untruthful answer."
Clapper first said it was the "least untruthful" answer he could give publicly.
He first said it was the "least untruthful" answer he could provide in an unclassified hearing.
He later explained that was the "least untruthful" answer he could give in a public setting about a classified program.
In an interview on Sunday with NBC News, Mr. Clapper acknowledged that his answer had been problematic, calling it "the least untruthful" answer he could give.
After the Guardian's disclosures that the NSA collects and stores for five years the phone records of millions of Americans, Clapper conceded he provided the "least untruthful" answer he could in a public forum.
An assistant United States attorney, Carrie H. Cohen, elaborated in court, saying that Ms. Fisher had not simply provided an untruthful answer when questioned unexpectedly, but had engaged in a more deliberate deceit.
"They've got a candidate who has consistently given untruthful answers to simple questions.
If this administration wants to provide "the most truthful or least untruthful" answers, it might consider simply telling the truth.
Congress – working only with what the Guardian and Washington Post have put into the public domain – is clearly rousing itself to find answers, but has limited material with which to challenge a director of national intelligence who says he is content to give elected politicians the "least untruthful" answers.
Random untruthful answers are likely to lead to statistically non-significant results and potentially low internal consistency in measures.
They say Mr. Pryor may have been untruthful in answers to the committee about his role in soliciting political donations from tobacco, drug, energy and banking corporations that are often investigated by states and their attorneys general.
