A post G-20 tweet storm
WASHINGTON — Fresh off a G-20 summit that included a meeting with Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin, President Trump continued to send mixed messages Sunday about the Russia hacking investigation that shadows the 2016 election and Trump’s White House.
“I strongly pressed President Putin twice about Russian meddling in our election, ” Trump tweeted Sunday. “He vehemently denied it. I’ve already given my opinion…”
Trump equivocated on the hacking issue during his recent trip to Poland and Germany, telling reporters that “it very well could be Russia” that hacked top Democrats, “but I think it could very well have been other countries … No one really knows for sure.”
Russian officials said Trump accepted Putin’s denial of Russian hacking and claims that political enemies are exaggerating the issue — claims that U. S. officials did not dispute a day after the high-profile meeting on the sidelines of the G-20 summit in Hamburg, Germany,
However, during an interview on Fox News Sunday, White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus said Trump does not believe Putin’s denials, and repeatedly pressed the Russian president on election meddling before moving on to other issues.
As a special counsel and congressional committees investigate Russian election meddling — and any links there may have been to the Trump campaign — the president also used Twitter to again attack Democrats and the news media over the many questions surrounding his 2016 race against Hillary Clinton.
Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., expressed dismay Trump’s analysis of the meeting, saying Putin is simply not to be trusted.
“Partnering with Putin on a ‘Cyber Security Unit’ is akin to partnering with Assad on a ‘Chemical Weapons Unit.'” Rubio tweeted.
An rival of Trump’s during last year’s Republican primaries, Rubio also said: “We have no quarrel with Russia or the Russian people. Problem is with Putin & his oppression, war crimes & interference in our elections.”
Trump also made a point of tweeting that he and Putin did not talking about lifting a series of U. S. economic sanctions imposed on Russia after last year’s election and after 2014 military activities in Ukraine, including annexation of the Crimea region.
“Nothing will be done until the Ukrainian & Syrian problems are solved!” Trump tweeted regarding sanctions.
U. S. and American officials also gave different stories about the hacking flap after the Trump-Putin meeting.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said the U. S. president accepted Putin’s denial about the hacking. U. S. officials did not dispute Lavrov’s statement, more or less confirming it.
During his Sunday tweet storm, Trump said that he and Putin “discussed forming an impenetrable Cyber Security unit so that election hacking, & many other negative things” would be “guarded and safe.”
Asked about Lavrov, Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin said: “You know, we’re not going to make comments about what other people say. President Trump will be happy to make statements himself about that.”
In other posts, Trump criticized the Democrats for poor cybersecurity of their own, President Barack Obama for not moving against the Russians during the election season, and the news media for its coverage of the various investigations.
The president also expressed a desire to work with Putin and Russia on global issues: “We negotiated a ceasefire in parts of Syria which will save lives. Now it is time to move forward in working constructively with Russia!”
