DNC hacksTrump urges Russia to hack, release Clinton’s e-mails
Donald Trump on Wednesday said he hoped Russia would hack Hillary Clinton’s e-mails, and release them to the press. In a press conference at his Doral golf course, Trump said: “Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 e-mails that are missing,” he said. “I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press.” Analysts note that Trump’s breathtaking call for a foreign power to hack the e-mails of a major U.S. political party or the server of a former secretary of state was as extraordinary as it was unprecedented.
Donald Trump on Wednesday said he hoped Russia would hack Hillary Clinton’s e-mails, and release them to the press.
In a press conference at his Doral golf course, Trump said: “Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 e-mails that are missing,” he said. “I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press.”
Analysts note that Trump’s breathtaking call for a foreign power to hack the e-mails of a major U.S. political party or the server of a former secretary of state was as extraordinary as it was unprecedented.
Private cybersecurity firms have found incontrovertible evidence that Russian government hackers were behind the hack of the DNC’s computer networks, and U.S. intelligence agencies concur with this conclusion.
The FBI is now investigating the hack.
The Russian hackers gave the e-mails to WikiLeaks, which released them last Friday, on the eve of the Democratic Party convention, as part of a campaign to weaken Hillary Clinton and increase the chances of Trump’s victory in November.
Trump, when pressed by NBC’s Katy Tur about whether he has any qualms about a foreign government like Russia employing hackers to find Hillary Clinton’s e-mails, declared: “No.”
The New York Times reports that when Tur asked whether he was really urging a foreign nation to hack into Clinton’s private e-mail server, and meddle in the U.S. presidential elections, Trump dismissed the question. “That’s up to the president,” Trump said, before curtly telling her to just “be quiet — let the president talk to them.”
While saying he hoped Russian government hackers would hack Clinton’s e-mails, Trump refused unequivocally to call on Putin not to meddle in the U.S. presidential election.
“I’m not going to tell Putin what to do,” Trump said. “Why should I tell Putin what to do?”
Trump also declared: “I think that President Obama has been our most ignorant president in our history.”
Leading Republicans, including Mike Pence, the Republican candidate for vice-president, were quick to distance themselves from Trump.
“The FBI will get to the bottom of who is behind the hacking,” Pence wrote. “If it is Russia and they are interfering in our elections, I can assure you both parties and the United States government will ensure there are serious consequences.”
House speaker Paul Ryan’s chief communications adviser has distanced the speaker from Donald Trump’s comments encouraging Russia to hack Hillary Clinton’s emails and release them. “Russia is a global menace led by a devious thug. Putin should stay out of this election,” Brendan Buck told the Guardian.
The Clinton campaign immediately accused Trump of both encouraging Russian espionage against the United States and meddling in domestic politics.
“This has to be the first time that a major presidential candidate has actively encouraged a foreign power to conduct espionage against his political opponent,” said Jake Sullivan, Clinton’s chief foreign policy adviser. “This has gone from being a matter of curiosity, and a matter of politics, to being a national security issue.”