Donald Trump is meeting Russian President Vladimir Putin today for an ill-advised Trump-Putin summit — a mere 3 days after 12 Russian hackers were charged with meddling in the 2016 presidential election.
Top News Today
The CIA, the FBI, and the NSA are among the multiple US intelligence agencies that concluded Russia meddled in the 2016 presidential election. US Senate and House intelligence committees also agreed with the findings. However, the lone holdout who continuously refuses to believe Russia hacked American democracy is none other than Donald Trump himself. According to Trump, Putin said he didn’t hack the election and that was good enough for “The Donald” (after all, why would Putin ever admit it?). For Trump, he’d rather believe the former KGB operative Putin over his own intelligence agencies.
On Friday, the US government announced the blockbuster indictment of 12 military intelligence officers inside the Vladimir Putin-led Russian government who interfered with the intent to influence the 2016 US presidential election. According to the report, the attack was coordinated and run by the Russian military hacking team known by the moniker “Fancy Bear.”
The 12 Russian intelligence officers named in the indictment are Viktor Borisovich Netyksho, Boris Alekseyevich Antonov, Dmitriy Sergeyevich Badin, Ivan Sergeyevich Yermakov, Aleksey Viktorovich Lukashev, Sergey Aleksandrovich Morgachev, Nikolay Yuryevich Kozachek, Pavel Vyacheslavovich Yershov, Artem Andreyevich Malyshev, Aleksandr Vladimirovich Osadchuk, Aleksey Aleksandrovich Potemkin, and Anatoliy Sergeyevich Kovalev.
So, 12 Russian government intelligence officers were indicted by the US government for meddling in an American election — and what did Donald Trump do about it? He jetted off 3 days later to attend a Trump-Putin summit.
Understandably, senior Senate Democrats expressed an urgent plea for “The Donald” to cancel the Trump-Putin summit in light of the indictment — a plea the defiant Trump chose to completely ignore. Democrats then launched an 11th-hour effort via a letter to Trump on Saturday urging him to not meet with Putin alone.
“Mr. Putin is a trained KGB intelligence veteran who will come to this meeting well-prepared,” Democrats wrote. “As the Kremlin said last week, a one-on-one meeting with you ‘absolutely suits’ him. There must be other Americans in the room.”
The letter was signed by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, as well as the top Democrats on the Senate Intelligence, Armed Services, Foreign Relations and other national security-related committees.
With Trump already in Helsinki and seemingly anxious to get cracking inside the Trump-Putin summit, it’s apparent he ignored the Democratic letter as well.
Top News Today
Over the weekend, Democrats continued to plead with Trump via the press that if he is hell-bent on attending the Trump-Putin summit, he should at least press Putin to extradite the 12 Russian military intelligence officials indicted on Friday.
“These individuals must be brought to the United States so that they can stand trial, and you should demand that Mr. Putin hand them over,” the senators said.
However, proving that he is indeed Putin’s puppet, Trump did what he does best and deflected blame while making the very weak argument that there’s nothing he can do to force Putin’s hand.
“The stories you heard about the 12 Russians yesterday took place during the Obama Administration, not the Trump Administration,” Trump tweeted. “Why didn’t they do something about it, especially when it was reported that President Obama was informed by the FBI in September, before the Election? Because he thought Crooked Hillary Clinton would win, that’s why. Had nothing to do with the Trump Administration, but Fake News doesn’t want to report the truth, as usual!”
– Donald Trump
If anyone was reporting “Fake News” it was Donald Trump with his Twitter rant. The fact is, Mr. Obama personally warned Vladimir Putin against meddling in the election. Additionally, he imposed sanctions on several Russian individuals and entities, kicked 35 Russian diplomats out of the country and closed 2 of the Kremlin’s compounds in the United States.
Still, Donald Trump doesn’t want to blame Vladimir Putin for his blatant attack on American democracy. He doesn’t want to present the Russian leader with the threat that he will face American justice if he ever attempts to interfere in a US election again. He doesn’t want to criticize Putin EVER, or condemn Russia’s actions, or even verbally admit their successful involvement in tainting an American election. He only wants to be BFF’s with Putin, never anger him (since Putin clearly has some damning info on Trump), appear important at the Trump-Putin summit, and sit alone in a room with Putin under the egotistical belief that he (Trump) can somehow hold his own with one of the greatest KGB agents in Russian history.
Will the Trump-Putin summit come and go without even a whimper? Will Donald Trump flub the meeting as badly as he flubbed the summit with North Korea’s Kim Jong Un? Will Trump provide Putin with concessions that may create permanent damage and conceivably place the United States in imminent danger?
.
What does Putin have over Trump that makes him out to be a puppet? It’s like Putin is inside the White House. This summit should not be happening right now with Russians just indicted. We are basically rewarding the enemy and telling them they can do whatever they want and won’t face any consequences.
“What does Putin have over Trump that makes him out to be a puppet?”
BD, I’d say -in addition to the fact that Trump truly admires authoritarian tough-guys, there is no doubt in my mind the most significant leverage Putin holds over Trump is directly related to years of Corrupt business dealings between Trump (including his 3 oldest kids and Jared) and Russian oligarchs. For example, I suspect Trump and his family are up to their necks in money laundering activities that has benefited the Trumps, Putin and those Russian Oligarchs.
Which brings us back to “Follow.The.Money.”
Btw- everything that Trump does (and I do mean Everything) is in service to Trump…and only Trump. It’s not about America or American democracy. It’s not about American interests or Our national security. And it sure as heck ain’t about serving the American people (including his base). It’s about Trump. That’s it.
Re: the U.S. government’s own history of meddling in the elections of other sovereign nations
WE (Americans) do ourselves no favors by dismissing or ignoring the troubling fact that there is indeed “a long history of the U.S. interfering with elections around the world.” And frankly, I find the arrogance and hypocrisy of the U.S. leadership on this glaring double-standard (to say nothing of the U.S. news media) to be absolutely stunning.
“The long history of the U.S. interfering with elections elsewhere”
Full Read: The Washington Post, Oct. 13, 2016
“US Interfered in Elections of at Least 85 Countries Worldwide Since 1945”
Excerpt:
Yet, neither country is a stranger when it comes to directly trying to sway the election of other nations.
In fact, the U.S. has a long and stunning history of attempting to influence foreign presidential elections, recent research by political scientist Dov Levin shows. Levin, a postdoctoral fellow at the Institute for Politics and Strategy at Carnegie-Mellon University, found that the U.S. attempted to influence the elections of foreign countries as many as 81 times between 1946 and 2000. […] – Global Research, Dec. 30, 2016
Comment: That’s just till 2000! The US has gone nuts since then. […]
TAC Reader:
More likely, our deal-maker President, who apparently sees the EU as just as big a “foe” as either Russia or China, will make some deal which he’s convinced by Putin will give a US-Russia partnership leverage over both the EU and China.
And then Putin will take the parts of the deal that Trump doesn’t understand, enhance economic and military cooperation with China in order to secure his eastern borders, and then use his newfound power in the west as the EU and NATO fall prey to bickering and dissolve to expand Russia’s influence if not borders.
And Trump will watch each move by Putin and declare it another step in making America great again. [….]
TAC Reader:
America is going to deflate shockingly fast at this rate. In the not distant future, people will wonder how come leadership was so atrocious? […]
This meeting is a total embarrassment. Ronald Reagan must be turning over in his grave right now.
This fool is crazy.
Yahoo:
President Trump emerged from his historic summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Helsinki on Monday saying he doesn’t believe that Russia interfered in the 2016 U.S. presidential election.
“I don’t see any reason why it would be,” Trump said during a joint press conference with Putin following their discussions. “President Putin was extremely strong and powerful in his denial today.”
But Putin himself acknowledged that he preferred Trump over Hillary Clinton in the election. “Yes, I did,” he said. “Because he talked about bringing the U.S.-Russia relationship back to normal.”
Trump said the pair “spent a great deal of time” in their discussions on Moscow’s alleged meddling.
Putin told reporters that Trump raised the issue of so-called election interference in their one-on-one talks.
“The Russian state has never interfered and is not going to interfere into internal American affairs, including election process,” Putin said through a translator. “Any specific material, if such things arise, we are willing to analyze together.”
Putin’s denial, and Trump’s seeming acceptance of it, flies in the face of the conclusion of six top U.S. intelligence agencies that Russia interfered in the 2016 U.S. election. In early January 2017, the office of the director of national intelligence released a report concluding with “high confidence” that Putin “ordered an influence campaign in 2016 aimed at the U.S. presidential election.” Putin’s goals, the report said, were to “undermine public faith in the U.S. democratic process, denigrate Secretary Clinton, and harm her electability and potential presidency” — and to boost Trump’s election chances.
So following that disgraceful spectacle in Helsinki today, on full display for ALL Americans and the entire world to see, a growing consensus from ALL corners seems to be this:
“…with this pathetic response, throwing his own people under the bus, Trump basically made himself into Putin’s prison bride. What a disgusting performance, utterly devoid of self-respect and even a minimal sense of patriotism.” – Rod Dreher, TAC writer
Source: “Trump Capitulates To Putin”
“The Trump & Putin Presser Was A Disgrace And Should Be Condemned (But Too Many Won’t)” – Kimberly Ross, Redstate writer
“Vladimir Putin Uses And Abuses President Trump In Helsinki” – Streiff, Redstate writer