for 8 yearsThe belief of Trumpworld and the right-wing media world is that the Trump-Russia scandal was a hoax, a hoax concocted by nefarious Deep State actors and reinforced by conspirators in the media and the Democratic Party. Disrupt and destroy Donald Trump. Trump himself continues to rail against “Russia, Russia, Russia.” He pointed to this “witch hunt” as evidence of widespread corruption within the federal government’s intelligence and law enforcement agencies and called for criminal prosecution of those he accuses of promoting this diabolical plot against him.
So why not place in the top national security positions in the Cabinet two Republicans with access to top secret information that previously confirmed that Vladimir Putin attacked the U.S. election in 2016 to help elect President Trump, and that Trump failed to do so? How to explain his decision? Will any American leader acknowledge and condemn this vicious attack on our republic? One of those lawmakers also oversaw an investigation that concluded a top Trump campaign aide colluded with Russian intelligence officers during the Kremlin’s 2016 information war against the United States.
“I am concerned about some of the contacts between the Trump Organization and Russians and their proxies within the Trump campaign,” said Elise Stefanik, who was nominated by Trump to be ambassador to the United Nations in 2018.
These are Representative Ellis Stefanik (R-New York), whom President Trump nominated as UN Ambassador, and Senator Marco Rubio (Republican-Republican), who was nominated by Trump to be Secretary of State. They are each veteran members of the Chamber of Commerce’s Intelligence Committee on which they serve, and each holds some of the most sensitive secrets of American intelligence under wraps.
Since the 2016 primary, Trump has attempted to deceive the public about the Russian attack. This included a hacking and leak operation to disseminate stolen Democratic emails and materials to harm Hillary Clinton’s candidacy and a secret social media scheme to spread messages, memes and messages. Disinformation to sow discord and benefit Trump. Intelligence agencies and cybersecurity firms have concluded that the Kremlin waged a secret campaign against the United States to support Trump, but Trump has insisted that did not happen. He dismissed all talk of multiple contacts between the Trump campaign and Russian representatives during the 2016 primary. He also concealed during the campaign that he had secret business dealings with Russian developers and President Putin’s office, as well as secret meetings held between his senior campaign advisers and Moscow intermediaries.
Stefanik didn’t buy Trump’s shenanigans. In an interview withWatertown Daily TimesIn March 2018, she said, “Russia interfered in our election process.” And she pointed out that the Kremlin’s hoax was designed to benefit Trump. “We have seen evidence that Russia sought to harm the Hillary Clinton campaign.” Moreover, she fretted about Trump’s curious contacts with Russia. “I am concerned about some of the contacts between Russians and their proxies within the Trump Organization and the Trump campaign.”
A year later, with Trump still pushing his bogus “Russia hoax” claims, Stefanik disagreed with Trump’s position at a town hall meeting that the Moscow attack was no big deal. “It’s been much more systematic and much more targeted, with very sophisticated hacking efforts and disinformation efforts targeting specific campaigns,” she said. Stefanik added that the Trump administration needed to be pressured “to take the Russian threat very seriously.” She criticized the Trump campaign for holding secret meetings with Moscow matchmakers.
There was no Russian witch hunt, Stefanik insisted. In her view, Trump was spreading self-serving and false narratives about a critical issue of national security: foreign attacks on the United States.
Rubio went much further than this.
Rubio, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, released a massive 966-page report on the Russian attacks in August 2020. “For the past three years, the Senate Intelligence Committee has conducted a bipartisan, thorough investigation into Russia’s efforts to influence the 2016 election and undermine our democracy,” he said in a press release. We interviewed more than 200 witnesses and reviewed more than a million pages of documents. “There has never been a more thorough investigation into this matter.” And he said the committee “found irrefutable evidence of Russian interference.”
In other words, it’s not a scam.
The detailed report confirmed the conclusions made by other investigations. “Putin ordered Russia to hack computer networks and accounts associated with the Democratic Party and leak (via WikiLeaks) damaging information about Hillary Clinton and her presidential campaign. “Moscow’s intent was to harm the Clinton campaign, undermine the anticipated administration of President Clinton, aid the Trump campaign after he became the presumptive Republican nominee, and undermine the American democratic process.”
The report said Trump and his campaign sought to capitalize on the Russian attacks and aided and abetted them by denying that Russia was involved in such activities, thereby helping cover up Moscow’s efforts to subvert the U.S. election. The Trump campaign has sought to maximize the impact of these leaks to help Trump’s electoral prospects. Trump campaign staff sought advance notice of the WikiLeaks disclosures, anticipated the disclosures, created a messaging strategy to promote and share the material after it was released, and encouraged additional leaks. The Trump campaign has publicly undermined the attribution of the hacking and leaking campaign to Russia and has been indifferent to whether he and WikiLeaks are facilitating Russian election interference efforts.”
Rubio’s report was full of damning information about Trump.
There was a lot of focus on Paul Manafort, a senior member of the Trump campaign in 2016. The committee noted that Manafort, who was jailed in 2018 for committing fraud and money laundering (and pardoned by Trump in 2020), posed a “serious counterintelligence threat.” ” Because of his Russian connections. The report detailed his extensive dealings with a one-time business associate named Konstantin Kilimnik during his campaign. The committee described him as a “Russian intelligence officer.” The committee put it bluntly: “Kilimnik probably served as Manafort’s channel for Russian intelligence services.” Throughout the election period, Manafort “communicated directly and indirectly with Kilimnik, Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska, and several pro-Russian oligarchs in Ukraine,” according to the report.
After the report was released, Rep. Rubio said in a press release, “There is absolutely no evidence that then-candidate Donald Trump or his campaign colluded with the Russian government to interfere in the 2016 election.” But that was misleading. “The committee has received some information suggesting that Kilimnik may have been linked to (Russian intelligence) hacking and leak operations targeting the 2016 U.S. election,” the report said. That meant Trump’s campaign manager was in close contact with a Russian intelligence officer who may have been involved in Putin’s covert attack on the 2016 campaign. The committee also said it had uncovered “two pieces of information” that raised the possibility that Manafort himself was involved in the hacking and exfiltration operation. Perhaps there was collusion. However, the report’s discussion of that information has been redacted.
Rubio’s report was a slam-dunk counterattack against Trump-Russia deniers on the right and Trump himself, who have worked hard to turn this serious problem into a left-wing fantasy. Trump’s campaign was run by Russian intelligence officers and a clandestine counterintelligence threat, and Trump and his lieutenants have declared that they helped the Kremlin attack the United States, echoing Putin’s denials.
This report was proof that Trump had betrayed the country. This is the truth that he and his supporters in the Republican Party and the conservative movement have been trying to smother for years. To do so, they coined the concept of a deep state conspiracy and relentlessly mocked Democrats, liberals, journalists, and anyone who expressed concern or concern about Russian interference and Trump’s acquiescence in Moscow.
Now Trump has embraced two senior Republicans who have disputed Trump’s claims of fraud and confirmed the reality of the Trump-Russia scandal and Trump’s role in it. Were they part of the Deep State plan against Trump? Neither has renounced their previous statements. Rubio did not deny the report he once proudly welcomed. As the denizens of MAGA World and Trump himself should know, Rubio and Stefanik were part of a cabal of traitors pushing disinformation to take down Trump. In their eyes, Rubio went so far as to write a nearly 1,000-page report to further this treasonous fraud.
Their appointments demonstrate the absurdity of Trump’s efforts to deny Russia. Although these efforts were successful. Now Trump has included two prominent Republicans in his new administration who know he has been lying about Russia all along. Both Stefanik and Rubio were once critical of Trump, but like most Republicans, they are not reluctant to take the knee to protect President Putin and serve a colleague who cares more about his own political interests than the good of the country. security. Still, it would be worthwhile for Democrats to question Stefanik and Rubio about this issue during their Senate confirmation hearings. They should be questioned about their previous statements and Rubio’s report. This will probably result in a fair amount of squirming. More importantly, it will serve as a reminder that Trump got away with evil acts that profoundly shaped the country.
