Washington Post: Trump-Putin Revelations

News reports increasingly suggest that Donald Trump is serving Russian interests – an assertion that follows reports of Russian meddling during the 2016 presidential election including a social media campaign. “Trump’s connection to Putin has been out in the open for years, long before he decided to run for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination,” explains Washington Post columnist Anne Applebaum. She goes on to list Trump’s longtime praise for Putin and subservient demeanor around the Russian president, his business ties in Russia, and the hiring of a campaign manager with experience promoting Russian interests. Applebaum then questions why anyone is surprised. An investigation by Special Counsel Robert Mueller has been underway for more than a year, and Americans troubled by the reports must wait for indictments, impeachment,a determination by the vice president and half of the cabinet that the president is unfit, or the November 2020 election. The reports are discomforting, though transparency may constrain the operatives not acting in the nation’s interest. Countless history books will explore this case. Americans and the rest of the world already watch every move made by US government officials, assessing motives and roles. – YaleGlobal

Washington Post: Trump-Putin Revelations

Countless history books will examine Trump-Putin ties, and Americans already watch every move made by US government officials, assessing motives and roles
Anne Applebaum
Monday, January 14, 2019

Read the article from the Washington Post about the ties between Russia’s Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump.

Anne Applebaum is a Washington Post columnist, covering national politics and foreign policy, with a special focus on Europe and Russia. She is also a Pulitzer Prize-winning historian and a professor of practice at the London School of Economics.

Read “FBI Opened Inquiry Into Whether Trump Was Secretly Working on Behalf of Russia” from the New York Times: “Counterintelligence investigators had to consider whether the president’s own actions constituted a possible threat to national security. Agents also sought to determine whether Mr. Trump was knowingly working for Russia or had unwittingly fallen under Moscow’s influence. The investigation the F.B.I. opened into Mr. Trump also had a criminal aspect, which has long been publicly known: whether his firing of Mr. Comey constituted obstruction of justice.”

Read “Trump Has Concealed Details of His Face-to-Face Encounters With Putin” from the Washington Post: “President Trump has gone to extraordinary lengths to conceal details of his conversations with Russian President Vladi­mir Putin, including on at least one occasion taking possession of the notes of his own interpreter and instructing the linguist not to discuss what had transpired with other administration officials, current and former U.S. officials said… As a result, U.S. officials said there is no detailed record, even in classified files, of Trump’s face-to-face interactions with the Russian leader at five locations over the past two years. Such a gap would be unusual in any presidency, let alone one that Russia sought to install through what U.S. intelligence agencies have described as an unprecedented campaign of election interference.

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