Donald
Trump
claims
he meant
the
opposite
of what
he said
about
Russia
By
DANIEL
DALE
Washington
Bureau
Chief
TorontoStar.Com
WASHINGTON—That
stuff
U.S.
President
Donald
Trump
said
Monday
about
how he
thinks
Russia
didn’t
interfere
in the
2016
presidential
election?
An
accidental
slip of
the
tongue,
Trump
claimed
Tuesday.
What
he
really
meant to
say, he
insisted
against
all
evidence,
was that
he
thinks
Russia
did
interfere.
“In
a key
sentence
in my
remarks,
I said
the word
‘would’
instead
of
‘wouldn’t,’”
Trump
said
Tuesday
at the
White
House.
“The
sentence
should
have
been: ‘I
don’t
see any
reason
why it
wouldn’t
be
Russia.’
Sort of
a double
negative.
So you
can put
that in,
and I
think
that
probably
clarifies
things
pretty
good by
itself.”
Trump
offered
this
implausible
spin in
an
attempt
to limit
the
political
damage
from the
Monday
remarks
that
have
generated
a
national
furor.
But the
forgotten-contraction
defence
was
greeted
with
bafflement
and
amazement
by
Trump’s
critics
and by
U.S.
reporters
who
covered
the
Finland
summit
with
Putin.
“I’m
not
laughing,”
Michael
Hayden,
the
former
Central
Intelligence
Agency
director
and Air
Force
general,
wrote on
Twitter.
“Oh,
hell.
YES I
AM.”
The
explanation
was
especially
curious
because
Trump
was not
even
able to
get
through
the
supposed
clarification
without
again
demonstrating
that he
did not
believe
what he
had just
said.
Apparently
ad-libbing,
he again
made
clear
that he
is
doubtful
of U.S.
intelligence
agencies’
conclusion
on
Russia —
in the
two
sentences
immediately
following
the one
where he
said he
accepts
their
conclusion
on
Russia.
“I
accept
our
intelligence
community’s
conclusion
that
Russia’s
meddling
in the
2016
election
took
place.
Could be
other
people
also. A
lot of
people
out
there,”
he said,
appearing
to add
in the
last two
sentences
himself
after
reading
the
first
sentence
from his
text.
Trump’s
oscillation
between
what his
aides
want him
to say
and what
he
evidently
believes
himself
was
reminiscent
of the
aftermath
of his
controversial
comments
about
violence
at a
white
supremacist
rally in
Charlottesville,
Virginia
in 2017,
at which
a
protester
was
murdered.
Trying
to quell
the
outrage
over his
initial
Charlottesville
remarks,
in which
he
blamed
both
white
supremacists
and
protesters,
he
dutifully
recited
prepared
words
condemning
the
white
supremacists.
But he
soon
abandoned
the
pretense
and
returned
to his
initial
argument
that
both
sides
were at
fault.
Trump’s
Monday
remarks
about
Russia
drew a
chorus
of
condemnation
from
afar
more
than the
usual
suspects.
Even the
hosts of
his
favourite
morning
show,
the
reliably
fawning
Fox and
Friends,
were
unanimously
critical.
But on
Tuesday,
many
Republicans
appeared
eager to
forget
the
whole
thing.
“I’m
just
glad he
clarified
it,”
said
Florida
Sen.
Marco
Rubio,
according
to NBC
News. “I
can’t
read his
intentions
or what
he meant
to say
at the
time,
and
suffice
it to
say that
for me
as a
policymaker,
what
really
matters
is what
we do
moving
forward.”
Democrats,
though,
issued a
new
round of
scathing
criticism.
They
called
Trump’s
claims
obviously
inaccurate.
“Today
the
media
will be
tested.
Whether
they
describe
accurately
what
they are
seeing
and
hearing
with
their
own eyes
and
ears, or
report
an
obviously
dishonest
and
distorted
version,
is the
essential
question,”
Hawaii
Democratic
Sen.
Brian
Schatz
said on
Twitter.
Trump’s
Tuesday
claim
that he
had
merely
misspoken
a single
word did
not
explain
his
other
remarks
Monday
in
favour
of
Russia’s
positions.
Trump
had also
said
that he
thought
“President
Putin
was
extremely
strong
and
powerful
in his
denial
today.”
He had
held
“both
countries,”
including
a
“foolish”
United
States,
responsible
for
damaging
the
bilateral
relationship.
And he
spent a
significant
portion
of the
news
conference
attacking
the FBI
and
spreading
conspiracy
theories
about
the
investigation
into his
campaign’s
links to
the
Russian
government.
At no
point in
his
comments
did he
come
close to
saying
he
thought
Russia
was
indeed
at
fault.
And
this was
not the
first
time he
has
taken
Russia’s
side on
the
question
of
interference.
Trump
has
since
2016
questioned
the
conclusion
that
Russia
was the
perpetrator.
At one
presidential
debate,
he
famously
said, “I
mean, it
could be
Russia,
but it
could
also be
China.
It could
also be
lots of
other
people.
It also
could be
somebody
sitting
on their
bed that
weighs
400
pounds,
OK?”