From earlier today:
Trump is now defending himself not just by claiming he wasn’t briefed on that intelligence, or just by contesting the significance of that intelligence. Instead, he’s declaring that the entire story simply doesn’t exist — that is, he’s suggesting no intelligence ever actually indicated anything like this.
The damning tweet:Yet this defense is itself deeply self-incriminating. It only underscores what critics are saying — that at minimum, Trump should be taking this intelligence seriously and trying to get to the bottom of what it actually does indicate, even if the worst interpretation proves wrong. (our emphasis)
The Russia Bounty story is just another made up by Fake News tale that is told only to damage me and the Republican Party. The secret source probably does not even exist, just like the story itself. If the discredited @nytimes has a source, reveal it. Just another HOAX!— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 1, 2020
It should go without saying, but --
“A real president would have said, ‘These reports are highly disturbing, and we’re doing everything we can to get to the bottom of them,'” Ned Price, a former National Security Council and CIA official, told me. “That is not what we’ve heard.”
So, briefly, the ones denying the well- sourced Russian- bounties- for- American- lives scandal are Trump, Putin and the Taliban. In other words, Team Trump.
