Rep. Hurd: Attempted election interference Russia’s “greatest covert action campaign” because it drove “wedge” between WH, intel community. pic.twitter.com/G052aKjoUX
— This Week (@ThisWeekABC) March 19, 2017
On Sunday’s episode of This Week, Rep. Will Hurd (R-Texas) said that Russian interference of the 2016 presidential election was a huge deal, but not for the reasons people usually highlight.
Here’s what he said:
It’s going to go down in the history of Mother Russia as the greatest covert action campaign not because President Trump won—there was no manipulation of the vote tally machines. It’s going to go down as the greatest covert action because it created a wedge, whether real and perceived, between the White House, Intelligence community, and the American public.
He said the investigation into the problem had to be bipartisan, “thorough” and “thoughtful,” in order to combat the narrative the Russian government is trying to create.
United States officials have said since October that Moscow directed hacking efforts to influence the 2016 presidential election. In other words, this is how WikiLeaks got their hands on Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta’s emails. FBI and CIA leader reportedly agreed with this back in December, saying that the goal was to help Donald Trump win the White House.
Despite bad optics surrounding Attorney General Jeff Sessions and former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn, there remains no substantiated evidence of collusion between the president’s campaign, and Russia. They, and Trump have denied wrongdoing. Nonetheless, Moscow’s reported actions supply endless ammo for the POTUS’s critics.
Hurd, who never endorsed Trump during the election season, also called on him to apologize to Barack Obama and British intelligence for repeating unsubstantiated wiretapping claims as fact.
[Screengrab via This Week]
