POTUS Argues Putin Wanted Clinton To Win In Wake Of Don Jr. Email Release

President Donald Trump speaks during an energy roundtable with tribal, state, and local leaders in the Roosevelt Room of the White House, Wednesday, June 28, 2017, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
President Donald Trump speaks during an energy roundtable with tribal, state, and local leaders in the Roosevelt Room of the White House, Wednesday, June 28, 2017, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
Start your day with TPM.
Sign up for the Morning Memo newsletter

In a Wednesday interview with the Christian Broadcasting Network, President Donald Trump pushed back on the U.S. intelligence community’s assessment that the Russian government wanted to help Trump win the 2016 election.

Trump claimed that Russia actually would have wanted Hillary Clinton to win, arguing that her policies would have been more favorable to Russia. Trump’s claims about Russian President Vladimir Putin’s preferences came after the stunning revelation that his son, Donald Trump Jr., met with a Kremlin-linked lawyer who supposedly had dirt on Clinton. Emails disclosed by Trump Jr. show that a publicist noted that the meeting would be part of the Russian government’s efforts to help Trump.

“We are the most powerful country in the world and we are getting more and more powerful because I’m a big military person. As an example, if Hillary had won, our military would be decimated. Our energy would be much more expensive. That’s what Putin doesn’t like about me. And that’s why I say, why would he want me? Because from day one I wanted a strong military, he doesn’t want to see that,” Trump told CBN’s Pat Robertson.

“And from day one I want fracking and everything else to get energy prices low and to create tremendous energy. We’re going to be self-supporting, we just about are now. We’re going to be exporting energy – he doesn’t want that,” the President continued. “He would like Hillary where she wants to have windmills. He would much rather have that because energy prices would go up and Russia as you know relies very much on energy.”

Trump said that there are “many things” he supports that are “the exact opposite” of what Putin wants.

“So what I keep hearing about that he would have rather had Trump, I think ‘probably not,’ because when I want a strong military, you know she wouldn’t have spent the money on the military,” Trump said. “When I want tremendous energy, we’re opening up coal, we’re opening up natural gas, we’re opening up fracking, all the things that he would hate, but nobody ever mentions that.”

 

Latest Livewire
176
Show Comments

Notable Replies

  1. Avatar for zsak zsak says:

    Makes perfect sense. Trump asks Russia to hack Clinton to help her win.

  2. I understand Trump has dementia and all that, but even so…!

  3. While I hate this time and the horrible way our nation is acting right now as it strives to barf out this contagion, I will always love that Hillary beat him in the only metric he actually cared about.

    Popularity.

    Suck it, loser.

  4. but nobody ever mentions that.

    Nobody ever mentions it, you stupid fucking ape, because that whole riff is so incredibly stupid that only one of your incredibly stupid devotees could take one millimeter of a step down the road to believing it. Keep on arguing that people should believe you and not their own lying eyes, you stupid fat son of a bitch. See how much good it does.

  5. Piss off. Your presidency is effectively over. The hounds are at your heels.

Continue the discussion at forums.talkingpointsmemo.com

170 more replies

Participants

Avatar for valgalky23 Avatar for austin_dave Avatar for srfromgr Avatar for littlegirlblue Avatar for ncsteve Avatar for mattinpa Avatar for imkmu3 Avatar for bluestatedon Avatar for steviedee111 Avatar for squirreltown Avatar for mickeyg Avatar for sickneffintired Avatar for ralph_vonholst Avatar for lastroth Avatar for geofu54 Avatar for thunderclapnewman Avatar for jonney_5 Avatar for antisachetdethe Avatar for tsp Avatar for tiowally Avatar for zsak Avatar for captaintangent Avatar for justruss Avatar for kenga

Continue Discussion
Masthead Masthead
Founder & Editor-in-Chief:
Executive Editor:
Managing Editor:
Deputy Editor:
Editor at Large:
General Counsel:
Publisher:
Head of Product:
Director of Technology:
Associate Publisher:
Front End Developer:
Senior Designer: