Trump struggles as furor grows over reported Russian bounty offer to kill U.S. troops
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Trump struggles as furor grows over reported Russian bounty offer to kill U.S. troops
President Trump, confronted with a damaging report that Russia offered bounties to Taliban-linked militants to kill American and allied troops in Afghanistan, declared Sunday on Twitter that he was never briefed about the finding by U.S. intelligence.
Democrats including Trump’s prospective presidential rival, Joe Biden, and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi sharply criticized Trump’s seeming indifference to the explosive report in Friday’s New York Times. Neither Trump nor other administration officials have specifically denied the report, which has since been confirmed by several other news organizations.
On Sunday, Republican Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming joined in the criticism, saying that if the information was genuine, the White House needed to explain why Trump was not told, and why the administration has done nothing in response.
The core of the story is that U.S. spy agencies concluded several months ago that a Russian military intelligence unit had offered secret bounties for attacks on coalition troops. The matter was discussed in late March by the National Security Council, and European allies including Britain were also made aware of the findings, the story said. On Sunday, the New York Times reported that the first word of the Russian plan came as early as January from military and intelligence officials in Afghanistan.
Sunday, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who helped run Trump’s 2016 campaign, said on ABC’s “This Week” that "he will lose" his reelection bid “if he doesn’t change course, both in terms of the substance of what he is discussing and the way that he approaches the American people.”
So far, the White House response to the story has not been to lay out any response to Russia, but simply to insist that Trump had not been personally briefed.
The office of Trump’s handpicked director of national intelligence, John Ratcliffe — who has been in his post for only a month, and was a controversial choice because of his lack of relevant experience and his avid partisanship as a congressman from Texas — released a statement late Saturday saying that neither Trump nor Vice President Mike Pence was “ever briefed on any intelligence” described in the story.
But intelligence experts suggested that the White House defense appeared to be largely a semantic one, perhaps resting on the material being included in the written daily intelligence brief that the president is known to avoid reading, rather than presented to him orally.
David Priess, a former CIA analyst and intelligence briefer, described several scenarios under which Trump and those around him could have been made aware of the assessment. The striking part, he said in a Twitter posting, was that the White House had not addressed the substance of the report, nor publicly expressed determination to get to the bottom of it.
“Why hasn’t the commander in chief responded to such a grave development?” he asked.
Trump, who spent Sunday at his Virginia golf property, referred in a pair of tweets to the “so-called attacks on our troops,” attacked the report as “Fake News” and wrote that “nobody briefed me or told me.”
But while avoiding a direct denial of the report’s underlying assertions, the president seemed to suggest the information might not trouble him much even if true.
“There have not been many attacks on us,” he wrote.
At least nine U.S. troops have been killed in Afghanistan this year, and 20 last year, out of nearly 2,400 American military fatalities in the course of the long conflict.
Biden hit Trump on the issue Saturday, saying that if the report was true, Trump’s inaction represented “a betrayal of the most sacred duty we bear as a nation, to protect and equip our troops when we send them into harm’s way.”
The former vice president described the episode as a continuation of Trump’s “embarrassing campaign of deference and debasing himself” before Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Biden, whose campaign is centered on virtual appearances because of the coronavirus pandemic, made his remarks at an online town hall.
Pelosi, interviewed Sunday on "This Week," said the Russian bounty report revived longstanding questions about Trump’s affinity for Putin, which date back to U.S. intelligence findings that Moscow interfered on his behalf in the 2016 presidential election.
Trump has on many occasions gone out of his way to publicly defer to the Russian leader, and in recent weeks, he has pressed to restore Russia to the meetings of the Group of Seven leading industrial nations, from which it was excluded after its invasion of Crimea in 2014.
“This is as bad as it gets, and yet the president will not confront the Russians on this score,” Pelosi said of the bounty report, suggesting that the president might be behaving under some sort of duress.
“I don’t know what the Russians have on the president — politically, personally, financially, or whatever it is,” said the San Francisco Democrat. “Now he is saying this is fake news – why would he say that? Why wouldn’t he say, ‘Let’s look into it and see what this is?’”
Cheney, writing on Twitter, said the White House needed to disclose “who did know and when?” about the intelligence assessment, and to detail “what has been done in response to protect our forces & hold Putin accountable.”
Former national security advisor John Bolton, who was ousted from the White House last September, said on CNN’s “State of the Union” that Trump’s “fundamental focus” was not on national security, or protecting American troops.
“So what is the presidential reaction?” asked Bolton, author of a scathing White House memoir.
“It’s to say, ‘It’s not my responsibility. No one told me about it.’”
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President Trump, confronted with a damaging report that Russia offered bounties to Taliban-linked militants to kill American and allied troops in Afghanistan, declared Sunday on Twitter that he was never briefed about the finding by U.S. intelligence.
Democrats including Trump’s prospective presidential rival, Joe Biden, and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi sharply criticized Trump’s seeming indifference to the explosive report in Friday’s New York Times. Neither Trump nor other administration officials have specifically denied the report, which has since been confirmed by several other news organizations.
On Sunday, Republican Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming joined in the criticism, saying that if the information was genuine, the White House needed to explain why Trump was not told, and why the administration has done nothing in response.
The core of the story is that U.S. spy agencies concluded several months ago that a Russian military intelligence unit had offered secret bounties for attacks on coalition troops. The matter was discussed in late March by the National Security Council, and European allies including Britain were also made aware of the findings, the story said. On Sunday, the New York Times reported that the first word of the Russian plan came as early as January from military and intelligence officials in Afghanistan.
trumpski is required by putin to look the other way as a stipulation of his russian loan agreements and having the first lady's russian film collection dumped on pornhub before the election would be a bit .................... inconvenient.
not for me
lol
Donald Trump = The Enemy of the American People
Claire McCaskill , former US senator now a television pundit, says this is a bigger scandal than Benghazi. Way bigger.
"Benghazi" was a Republican witch hunt. The 4 American deaths there were terrible, and disgracefully used by the Republicans as propaganda. This scandal is so damning to Trump it is off the charts.
Trump "declared Sunday on Twitter that he was never briefed about the finding by U.S. intelligence."
why do i partially believe him...?
Trump still thinks that Putin is his buddy and that they have a "deal" probably involving dodgy financial deals. Trump really does not get it.
Putin did not work that hard to cover up interference in the 2016 elections. Chances are he didn't work that hard to cover up the bounties to the Taliban. He wants us to know. Any where there is a fault line in America, look for Putin's handy work at amplifying it.
Putin doesn't care that much about who wins American elections. He does care about encouraging strife among Americans and distrust in the election process - to bring about Krushchev's "prophesy" of destroying the American system of government.
As an after thought - Putin is devious enough to not offer the bounties - just plant the rumors. Same effect on American politics with out paying out the money.
Putin = Rocket Surgeon while Trump attempts to remove 'Wrenched Ankle' from his big mouth, as he wants to be Kinged for his checker past, as he's a pawn for Putins' bare chess as he rides whorses till the Russian Pro makes her mess, Chubby checkers vs International Mind Fck, what could possibly go a fowl besides Putins' testicalities bumping Trump's tonsilectomies ... where is Trump's defenders of everything and all... gotta see this shit show deflection infection slurpee straw man whataboutism projection from those screened in the sun room washing open windows that their tongues are stuck too
It appears that tRump has made deals with the devil and now they are coming due
I can't believe Beelzebub paid for Trump's soul.
It must have been really cheap...
He got a good deal from two Corinthians...
Trump is such a deal maker he probably ended up negotiating a big TRUMP sign over the gates of hell.
He'll bankrupt that too
He was probably hoping to build a hotel there.
He would have to have it air conditioned really well. (What's the boiling point of pee? Is it the same as water?)
Maybe Putin will get Deutche Bank to bail him out again.
I think that's why the turd in chief is so desperate - he's called in all his markers
I love this clip.
He sold his soul to the devil - he wasn't using it
You're obviously a great fan of "Outer Limits".
There was a time - but I'm kind of a Heinlein sorta guy.
But I don't think it's the working class that will bury America. Right now, it's the rich and powerful who destroying America
I don't think we are going to bury ourselves but it would be Putin's little wet dream. The working class are supposed to be good little proletariat Marxist and revolt against the bourgeoisie capitalists in a glorious revolt establishing a workers paradise. I'm not seeing that but the ever growing disproportionate division of wealth is not sustainable. Something's gotta give.
Hi TG - long time since Newsvine.
It has been a long time. It's good to see you again. Hope you are well.
Well...I'm no Marxist because I do believe in healthy capitalism. What we've got right now is not healthy. What happens when the proles can no longer hold up the top?
If it was Obama or Hillary they'd already be impeached.
Oh, that is right, Trump has already been impeached...
Shit, Trump probably chipped in since we know he is jealous of people who actually serve.
i feel your pain, but i couldn't vote that one up. Every time U think there is NO FGKN WAY he could outdue this one, it's already outdone. WTF does it take for people to realize how frckd up it is, that they constantly defend EVERYTHING this treasonous piece of trash can , do, and they over due again and again when will it be when, oh when ?
I've stopped being angry at Trump - he is truly mentally ill. For me, that takes care of the anger but it multiplies the fear of what he may do in the next seven months. My anger is for what the Republican Party has become. For an explanation of his followers behavior - Google "cults".
no doubt mentally ill
Even if there was no bounty, wth is Trump doing brokering an oil deal FOR RUSSIA?!?!?
possibly monetarily incentivized , as that is all he is
True. With the famous ignoramus it is about the money.
There was a written report so it's possible he didn't receive it since he can't read.
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If its such a secret-- then how come you know about it?
What makes you so special that you have access to government secrets that no one else does?
And if its top secret-- aren't you worried that by posting it on an Internet site you might be liable to persecution for posting state secrets?
(Or..maybe...it isn't really a secret after all...and that you are posting "Fake News?)
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