A spokesman for the Trump campaign on Friday tried to distance the President’s reelection effort from Rudy Giuliani’s plan to urge the Ukrainian government to conduct investigations that could help Trump politically.
Yet throughout an interview on MSNBC, the spokesman, Marc Lotter, would not condemn Giuliani’s effort or commit to not using any information uncovered by a Ukrainian probe.
Giuliani told the New York Times on Thursday that he will travel to Ukraine and urge leaders there to investigate how the U.S. investigation into possible ties between the Trump campaign and Russia during the 2016 began, as well as allegations against former Vice President Joe Biden. Recently, it was alleged that Biden tried to quash a probe into his son’s appointment to the board of a Ukrainian gas firm, but so far there is little to no evidence to support the allegation.
Asked by MSNBC’s Hallie Jackson if he would disavow Giuliani’s plan, Lotter simply distanced the campaign from Trump’s personal lawyer.
“I can tell you that Rudy Giuliani is not doing this on behalf of the campaign. He’s doing it in his capacity as a private citizen,” Lotter said.
Yet, when asked if the campaign had tried to wave Giuliani off of his plan, Lotter said he did not feel it was his role to do so.
And when asked if it’s a “slippery slope” for someone to ask a foreign government to help find damaging information on a political opponent, Lotter indicated he was interested in the results of the potential probes.
“I believe if you’re going to have somebody running for president of the United States, if there is the possibility that something inappropriate happened, then it needs to be investigated,” he replied.
Jackson then asked Lotter if he would commit to not using any information uncovered by one of the probes Giuliani is pushing for in Ukraine.
“We don’t know what he’s going to find,” Lotter said.
Pressed on how he would feel comfortable using information obtained in that way, Lotter replied, “This is not foreign interference. This is someone who is going to get information, not a government trying to meddle inside an election.”
“I can tell you that Rudy Giuliani is not doing this on behalf of the campaign. He’s doing it in his capacity as a private citizen,” Lotter said.
Mark that down. I have a horrible feeling that we are going to come back to that statement quite often in the not too distant future.
One of the big problems I fear in the 2020 cycle, is the Trumpers blowing up election law, especially regarding foreign contributions…money and more importantly…“information”. They are laying down the groundwork for it here.
“I can tell you that Rudy Giuliani is not doing this on behalf of the campaign. He’s doing it in his capacity as a private citizen,” Lotter said.
“I believe if you’re going to have somebody running for president of the United States, if there is the possibility that something inappropriate happened, then it needs to be investigated,” he replied.
Oh, FFS, this is 110 percent a Trump Crime Family orchestrated treason tour.
““I can tell you that Rudy Giuliani is not doing this on behalf of the campaign. He’s doing it in his capacity as a private citizen,””
They HAVE to play let’s pretend in this manner.
What Giuliani is doing is going over to Ukraine to threaten or bribe with promises of abuse of the power of the President in order to solicit/force Ukraine to make an in-kind campaign contribution to Trump’s re-election in the form of a falsely pretexted criminal investigation of an American citizen he considers a political enemy. They know this. They know it is a deeply illegal felony, a violation of campaign finance laws AND COLLUSION WITH A FOREIGN POWER TO INFLUENCE OUR ELECTIONS IN BROAD DAYLIGHT. So yeah, this has to be “oh, this has nothing to do with the campaign organization” in the thinnest technical sense, so that if it winds up in a court, they’ll have provided the Trumpian conservative white nationalist black-robed KKKlown they’re in front of with the tiniest toe-hold of a legal argument for finding that no wrongdoing took place.
Can someone somewhere somehow hack into a computer to revoke Ghoulie’s passport before he gets back?
He’s an undesirable alien.
Julian, are you listening?