President Donald Trump has finally publicly commented about the recently revealed Russian hacking operation targeting high-profile interests in the United States… and he has, perhaps unsurprisingly, offered cover for Russian officials. This occasion is not the first time that Trump has waffled on the issue of holding dictatorial regimes responsible for their behavior. Besides his own past dismissals of the significance of Russian meddling efforts surrounding the 2016 U.S. presidential election, Trump has even cast doubt on Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s role in the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, no matter the well-documented conclusion that the Saudi leader ordered the violence.
This time around, Trump dismissively suggested on Twitter that China may have been responsible for the recently revealed hacking operation, as if he is — for some reason — desperate to help Russian authorities evade serious scrutiny. He also sounds pointlessly contrarian, as if he’s prioritizing figuring out some way to use present circumstances to attack his perceived political opponents, like journalists.
Trump ranted as follows on Twitter this Saturday:
‘The Cyber Hack is far greater in the Fake News Media than in actuality. I have been fully briefed and everything is well under control. Russia, Russia, Russia is the priority chant when anything happens because Lamestream is, for mostly financial reasons, petrified of discussing the possibility that it may be China (it may!). There could also have been a hit on our ridiculous voting machines during the election, which is now obvious that I won big, making it an even more corrupted embarrassment for the USA.’
Trump also tagged Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, although Trump is (for now) the president of the United States and can, presumably, call up these officials at just about any time that he wants. Pompeo has already publicly acknowledged that Russia was “pretty clearly” behind the hacking operation.
….discussing the possibility that it may be China (it may!). There could also have been a hit on our ridiculous voting machines during the election, which is now obvious that I won big, making it an even more corrupted embarrassment for the USA. @DNI_Ratcliffe @SecPompeo
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 19, 2020
Trump’s suggestion that there’s at least some legitimate reason to believe that “could have been a hit on” voting machines in the U.S. during the recent presidential election is false. In a post-election statement, the Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency at the Department of Homeland Security confirmed that there is “no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes, changed votes, or was in any way compromised” during the election. There’s also simply no apparent legitimate evidence for his claim that China could have been behind the newly revealed hacking operation, and there’s also simply no apparent legitimate evidence for his insinuation that mainstream media outlets in the United States make coverage decisions around protecting the Chinese government… or something.
Check out Twitter’s response below:
