On Wednesday, President Donald Trump appeared to downplay Russia’s efforts to interfere[1] with US democracy for a third time this week.
The first had come during a joint press conference[2] with Russian president Vladimir Putin in Helsinki, a 45-minute exercise in kowtowing to a hostile foreign leader. The second, remarkably, came during the “clarification” of those remarks; on the heels of reading a prepared comment acknowledging Russia’s actions in 2016, Trump improvised that it “could be other people also. There’s a lot of people out there.”
And then came Wednesday, when a reporter asked Trump before a Cabinet meeting if Russia is still targeting the US. The correct answer, according to repeated warnings from US intelligence officials, is absolutely. Trump said “no.”
Later in the day, press secretary Sarah Sanders framed the answer differently, suggesting that Trump in fact meant “no more questions.” Given the broader context of his almost pathological resistance to admitting Russia meddled in the 2016 election, that explanation seems wanting. And even if it’s a correct interpretation, Trump still declined an opportunity to assertively back up the intelligence community he has repeatedly spurned.
It’s an unprecedented time in our nation’s history.
Clint Watts, Foreign Policy Research Institute
Trump’s denials of Russian interference go back more than two years[3], and have been largely steadfast despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. (It was only after the Putin press conference backlash that he squarely blamed Russia, both in his prepared remarks Tuesday and an interview with CBS[4] that aired Wednesday night).
Meanwhile, every relevant US intelligence agency has said that Russia did interfere and continues to[5]. On Friday, Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats told[6] a gathering at the Hudson