As his White House meeting with his Ukrainian counterpart devolved into a stunning blowup, Trump leaned on a familiar refrain to explain his unique kinship with Putin.
Washington: As his White House meeting with his Ukrainian counterpart devolved into a stunning blowup, President Donald Trump leaned on a familiar refrain to explain his unique kinship with Russian leader Vladimir Putin.
“Putin went through a hell of a lot with me,” Trump said Friday, raising his voice and gesturing with his hands as he recounted the long-since-concluded saga of a federal investigation in which both he and the Russian president played starring roles.
“He went through a phony witch hunt where they used him and Russia. Russia, Russia, Russia, ever hear of that deal?” Trump said.
The reference to the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election underscored the extent to which Trump’s lingering fury over an inquiry he has misleadingly branded a “hoax” remains top of mind more than eight years after it began.
It also showed that Trump’s view of a war Russia launched against Ukraine three years ago is coloured not only by his relationship with Putin and the alliance he believes they share but also by his fraught past with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who was a central player in the first of two impeachment cases against Trump during his first four years in office.
Here’s a look at what the American president means when he says “Russia, Russia, Russia”:
Questions over Trump’s connections to Putin followed him into his first presidency and hung over him for most of his term, spurring investigations by the Justice Department and Congress and the appointment of a special counsel who brought criminal charges against multiple Trump allies.
While running for office, Trump cast doubt on the idea that Russian government hackers had stolen the emails of Democrats, including his 2016 rival Hillary Clinton, and orchestrated their public release in an effort to boost his candidacy and harm hers.
Then, as president, he broke with his own intelligence community’s firm finding that Russia and Russia alone was to blame for the hack.
