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Bernie Sanders at a rally in Nevada on Friday.
Show caption
US elections 2020
Donald Trump pounces on reports Russia is seeking to help Bernie Sanders
President claims Democrats are rigging process
Trump calls Russian meddling on his behalf ‘a rumor’
Nevada: Democrats prepare to vote in most diverse state yet
Martin Pengelly in New York
@MartinPengelly
Sat 22 Feb 2020 12.47 EST
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As Democrats in Nevada went to the polls on Saturday, Donald Trump gleefully stirred the pot over reports that US intelligence believes Russia is trying to aid Bernie Sanders, the frontrunner for the nomination to face the president in November.
Bernie Sanders has invested big in Nevada. Will it pay off?
In a tweet, Trump said: “Democrats in the Great State of Nevada (Which, because of the Economy, Jobs, the Military & Vets, I will win …) be careful of Russia, Russia, Russia.
“According to Corrupt politician Adam ‘Shifty’ Schiff, they are pushing for Crazy Bernie Sanders to win. Vote!”
US intelligence has determined that Russian interference in the 2016 US elections not only supported Trump but included efforts to boost Sanders in his bitter primary against the eventual Democratic nominee, Hillary Clinton.
On Thursday, the Washington Post reported that the House intelligence committee had been briefed that Russia was once again trying to interfere in favour of Trump.
Schiff is the Democratic chairman of that committee and as a leading figure in Trump’s impeachment over his approaches to Ukraine has become a regular target for presidential vitriol.
Reports about the briefing described a furious reaction from Trump which led to the departure of Joseph Maguire, the acting director of national intelligence, and his replacement by a Trump loyalist, the ambassador to Germany, Richard Grenell.
Then, on Friday, the Post reported that Sanders, Trump and “lawmakers on Capitol Hill” had been briefed about “Russian assistance to the Vermont senator” this year, but said it was not clear what the effort involved.
In a statement, Sanders said: “I don’t care, frankly, who [Russian president Vladimir] Putin wants to be president. My message to Putin is clear: Stay out of American elections, and as president I will make sure that you do.
“In 2016, Russia used internet propaganda to sow division in our country, and my understanding is that they are doing it again in 2020. Some of the ugly stuff on the internet attributed to our campaign may well not be coming from real supporters.”
In Nevada, “ugly stuff” attributed to Sanders supporters has included abuse aimed at female leaders of the Culinary Workers Union, an influential presence in the state which opposes the Vermont senator’s plan for Medicare for All healthcare reform.
Nonetheless, Sanders seems set to win. On Saturday morning the realclearpolitics.com polling average for Nevada put the progressive star 16.5 points up on two moderates, Pete Buttigieg and Joe Biden.
Nationally, Sanders leads the same site’s average by 11.4 points, over Biden and the former New York mayor Michael Bloomberg, who is not competing in Nevada.
Some suggest Trump wants to face Sanders at the polls, rather than Biden or Bloomberg.
Rick Wilson, a former Republican consultant turned author and ardent Trump critic, recently told the Guardian Sanders, a self-described democratic socialist who sits in the Senate as an independent, would be “the easiest person in the world to turn into the comic opera villain Republicans love to hate, the Castro sympathiser, the socialist, the Marxist, the guy who wants to put the aristos in the tumbril as they cart them off to the guillotine”.
The special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election did not establish a conspiracy between the Trump campaign and Moscow but did lay out extensive contacts and numerous instances in which the president seemed to seek to obstruct the course of justice.
Trump has claimed vindication but the investigation remains a running sore and at a campaign rally in Las Vegas on Friday, he duly took aim at his political opponents.
“I see these phoneys, the do-nothing Democrats,” Trump said. “They said today that Putin wants to be sure that Trump gets elected. Here we go again. Here we go again. Did you see it? … Now I just see it again. I was told that was happening, I was told a week ago. They said you know they’re trying to start a rumor. It’s disinformation.”
In tweets and retweets after the event, the president loosed off shots at another favourite target, the media.
Referring to MSNBC as “MSDNC (Comcast Slime)”, he said that network and CNN “and others of the Fake Media, have now added Crazy Bernie to the list of Russian Sympathizers, along with Tulsi Gabbard [and] Jill Stein (of the Green Party), both agents of Russia, they say.”
Trump reportedly calls John Bolton a ‘traitor’ and wants to block his book
Gabbard, a Hawaii congresswoman still in the running for the Democratic nomination but not registering significantly in the polls, has sued Hillary Clinton for allegedly calling her a “Russian asset”.
Stein was the Green nominee for president in 2016, taking nearly 1.5m votes nationally (while the Libertarian Gary Johnson took more than 4m) in a contest Clinton won by nearly 3m. Trump took the White House in the electoral college.
Clinton beat Trump by two points in Nevada, a key swing state again this year.
On Twitter, Trump claimed the reason for media reports that “President Putin wants Bernie (or me) to win … is that the Do Nothing Democrats, using disinformation Hoax number 7, don’t want Bernie Sanders to get the Democrat Nomination, and they figure this would be very bad for his chances.
“It’s all rigged, again, against Crazy Bernie Sanders!”
Topics
US elections 2020
Bernie SandersDonald TrumpRussiaUS politicsNevadanews
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© 2020 Guardian News & Media
Lawmakers Are Warned That Russia Is Meddling to Re-elect Trump
A classified briefing to House members is said to have angered the president, who complained that Democrats would “weaponize” the disclosure.
American intelligence agencies concluded that Russia, on the orders of President Vladimir V. Putin, interfered in the 2016 election
Feb. 20, 2020Updated 10:44 p.m. ET
WASHINGTON — Intelligence officials warned House lawmakers last week that Russia was interfering in the 2020 campaign to try to get President Trump re-elected, five people familiar with the matter said, a disclosure to Congress that angered Mr. Trump, who complained that Democrats would use it against him.
The day after the Feb. 13 briefing to lawmakers, the president berated Joseph Maguire, the outgoing acting director of national intelligence, for allowing it to take place, people familiar with the exchange said. Mr. Trump cited the presence in the briefing of Representative Adam B. Schiff, Democrat of California, who led the impeachment proceedings against him, as a particular irritant.
During the briefing to the House Intelligence Committee, Mr. Trump’s allies challenged the conclusions, arguing that he had been tough on Russia and strengthened European security. Some intelligence officials viewed the briefing as a tactical error, saying that had the official who delivered the conclusion spoken less pointedly or left it out, they would have avoided angering the Republicans.
Though intelligence officials have previously told lawmakers that Russia’s interference campaign was continuing, last week’s briefing did contain what appeared to be new information, including that Russia intended to interfere with the 2020 Democratic primaries as well as the general election.
The intelligence official who delivered the briefing, Shelby Pierson, is an aide to Mr. Maguire who has a reputation of delivering intelligence in somewhat blunt terms. The president announced on Wednesday that he was replacing Mr. Maguire with Richard Grenell, the ambassador to Germany and long an aggressively vocal Trump supporter.
Though some current and former officials speculated that the briefing might have played a role in the removal of Mr. Maguire, who had told people in recent days that he believed he would remain in the job, two administration officials said the timing was coincidental. Mr. Grenell had been in discussions with the administration about taking on new roles, they said, and Mr. Trump had never felt a kinship with Mr. Maguire.
Spokeswomen for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and its election security office declined to comment. A White House spokesman did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
A Democratic House Intelligence Committee official called the Feb. 13 briefing an important update about “the integrity of our upcoming elections” and said that members of both parties attended, including Representative Devin Nunes of California, the top Republican on the committee.
In a tweet on Thursday evening, Mr. Schiff said that it appeared that Mr. Trump was “again jeopardizing our efforts to stop foreign meddling” by objecting to Congress being informed of interference attempts.
Mr. Trump has long accused the intelligence community’s assessment of Russia’s 2016 interference as the work of a “deep state” conspiracy intent on undermining the validity of his election. Intelligence officials feel burned by their experience after the last election, where their work became subject of intense political debate and is now a focus of a Justice Department investigation.
Part of the president’s anger over the intelligence briefing stemmed from the administration’s reluctance to provide delicate information to Mr. Schiff. He has been a leading critic of Mr. Trump since 2016, doggedly investigating Russian election interference and later leading the impeachment inquiry into the president’s dealings with Ukraine.
After asking about the briefing that the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and other agencies gave to the House, Mr. Trump complained that Mr. Schiff would “weaponize” the intelligence about Russia’s support for him, according to a person familiar with the briefing. And he was angry that no one had told him sooner about the briefing, the person said.
Mr. Trump has fixated on Mr. Schiff since the impeachment saga began, pummeling him publicly with insults and unfounded accusations of corruption. At one point in October, Mr. Trump refused to invite lawmakers from the congressional intelligence committees to a White House briefing on Syria because he did not want Mr. Schiff there, according to three people briefed on the matter.
The president did not erupt at Mr. Maguire, and instead just asked pointed questions, according to the person. But the message was unmistakable: He was displeased by what took place.
Ms. Pierson, officials said, was delivering the conclusion of multiple intelligence agencies, not her own opinion. The Washington Post first reported the Oval Office confrontation between Mr. Trump and Mr. Maguire, but not the substance of the disagreement.
The intelligence community issued an assessment in early 2017 that President Vladimir V. Putin personally ordered an influence campaign in the previous year’s election and developed “a clear preference for President-elect Trump.” But Republicans have long argued that Moscow’s campaign was intended to sow chaos, not aid Mr. Trump specifically.
And some Republicans have accused the intelligence agencies of opposing Mr. Trump, but intelligence officials reject those accusations. They fiercely guard their work as nonpartisan, saying it is the only way to ensure its validity.
At the House briefing, Representative Chris Stewart, Republican of Utah, who has been considered for the director’s post, was among the Republicans who challenged the conclusion about Russia’s support for Mr. Trump. Mr. Stewart insisted that the president had aggressively confronted Moscow, providing anti-tank weapons to Ukraine for its war against Russia-backed separatists and strengthening the NATO alliance with new resources, according to two people briefed on the meeting.
Mr. Stewart declined to discuss the briefing but said that Moscow had no reason to support Mr. Trump. He pointed to the president’s work to confront Iran, a Russian ally, and encourage European energy independence from Moscow. “I’d challenge anyone to give me a real-world argument where Putin would rather have President Trump and not Bernie Sanders,” Mr. Stewart said in an interview, referring to the nominal Democratic primary race front-runner.
Mr. Trump believes that Russian efforts to get him elected in 2016 have cast doubts about the legitimacy of his campaign victory.
Under Mr. Putin, Russian intelligence has long sought broadly to stir turmoil among adversaries around the world. The United States and key allies on Thursday accused Russian military intelligence, the group responsible for much of the 2016 election interference in the United States, of a cyberattack on neighboring Georgia that took out websites and television broadcasts.
The Russians have been preparing — and experimenting — for the 2020 election, undeterred by American efforts to thwart them but aware that they needed a new playbook of as-yet-undetectable methods, United States officials said.
They have made more creative use of Facebook and other social media. Rather than impersonating Americans as they did in 2016, Russian operatives are working to get Americans to repeat disinformation to get around social media companies’ rules that prohibit “inauthentic speech,” the officials said.
And the Russians are working from servers in the United States, rather than abroad, knowing that American intelligence agencies are prohibited from operating inside the country. (The F.B.I. and the Department of Homeland Security can, with aid from the intelligence agencies.)
Russian hackers have also infiltrated Iran’s cyberwarfare unit, perhaps with the intent of launching attacks that would look like they were coming from Tehran, the National Security Agency has warned.
Some officials believe that foreign powers, possibly including Russia, could use ransomware attacks, like those that have debilitated some local governments, to damage or interfere with voting systems or registration databases.
Still, much of the Russian aim is similar to its 2016 interference, officials said: search for issues that stir controversy in the United States and use various methods to stoke division.
One of Moscow’s main goals is undermining confidence in American election systems, intelligence officials have told lawmakers, seeking to sow doubts over close elections and recounts. Confronting those Russian efforts is difficult, officials have said, because they want to maintain American confidence in voting systems.
Both Republicans and Democrats asked the intelligence agencies to hand over the underlying material that prompted their conclusion that Russia again is favoring Mr. Trump’s election.
Although the intelligence conclusion that Russia is trying to interfere in the 2020 Democratic primaries is new, in the 2019 report of the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, there is a reference to Russian desires to help Mr. Sanders in his presidential primary campaign against Hillary Clinton in 2016. The report quoted internal documents from the Internet Research Agency, a troll factory sponsored by Russian intelligence, in an order to its operatives: “Use any opportunity to criticize Hillary and the rest except for Sanders and Trump — we support them.”
How soon the House committee might get that information is not clear. Since the impeachment inquiry, tensions have risen between the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the committee. As officials navigate the disputes, the intelligence agencies have slowed the amount of material they provide to the House, officials said. The agencies are required by law to regularly brief Congress on threats.
While Republicans have long been critical of the Obama administration for not doing enough to track and deter Russian interference in 2016, current and former intelligence officials said the party is at risk of making a similar mistake now. Mr. Trump has been reluctant to even hear about election interference, and Republicans dislike discussing it publicly.
The aftermath of last week’s briefing prompted some intelligence officials to voice concerns that the White House will dismantle a key election security effort by Dan Coats, the former director of national intelligence: the establishment of an election interference czar. Ms. Pierson has held the post since last summer.
And some current and former intelligence officials expressed fears that Mr. Grenell may have been put in place explicitly to slow the pace of information on election interference to Congress. The revelations about Mr. Trump’s confrontation with Mr. Maguire raised new concerns about Mr. Grenell’s appointment, said the Democratic House committee official, who added that the upcoming election could be more vulnerable to foreign interference.
Mr. Trump, former officials have said, is typically uninterested in election interference briefings, and Mr. Grenell might see it as unwise to emphasize such intelligence with the president.
“The biggest concern I would have is if the intelligence community was not forthcoming and not providing the analysis in the run-up to the next election,” said Andrea Kendall-Taylor, a former intelligence official now with the Center for a New American Security. “It is really concerning that this is happening in the run-up to an election.”
Mr. Grenell’s unbridled loyalty is clearly important to Mr. Trump but may not be ideally suited for an intelligence chief making difficult decisions about what to brief to the president and Congress, Ms. Kendall-Taylor said.
“Trump is trying to whitewash or rewrite the narrative about Russia’s involvement in the election,” she said. “Grenell’s appointment suggests he is really serious about that.”
The acting deputy to Mr. Maguire, Andrew P. Hallman, will step down on Friday, officials said, paving the way for Mr. Grenell to put in place his own management team. Mr. Hallman was the intelligence office’s principal executive, but since the resignation in August of the previous deputy, Sue Gordon, he has been performing the duties of that post.
Mr. Maguire is planning to leave government, according to an American official.
Adam Goldman reports on the F.B.I. from Washington and is a two-time Pulitzer Prize winner.
Julian E. Barnes is a national security reporter based in Washington, covering the intelligence agencies. Before joining The Times in 2018, he wrote about security matters for The Wall Street Journal.
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