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In 2016, Trump and 18 associates had at least 140 contacts with Russian nationals & WikiLeaks, or their intermediaries
Last edited Fri Aug 1, 2025, 12:29 AM - Edit history (1)
...most of the media is too busy repeating Donald Trump's diverting bait about Russia, and dutifully turning it into a debate over the incomprehensibly tiny and unquestionably false claim Tulsi Gabbard was trying to sell to Americans about Barack Obama; delivered to the press with the same ignorant, toady, Orwellian twisting of truth that attracted the inveterate liar to hire her; too caught up in their own bullshit to bother to remind their viewers just how intertwined Trump and his camp had become with the Putin-led effort to sow chaos in the election.
...today, the media is (again) busy using Trump's diversions to rehash old news in which they allowed Trump's lies meant to distract from his own misconduct to become normalized as mere political positions:
The Washington Post @washingtonpost 3h The FBI investigated reports alleging that 2016 Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton approved a plan for her campaign to vilify President Trump by tying him to Vladimir Putin, but it was ultimately unable to verify that such a plot existed.
...why in the world would it be a 'plot' for ANY American to point to the collusion between Trump and Russian nationals, much of it open and arrogantly defended by the Trump campaign and their candidate; much less by his opponent in the campaign?
It's always amazing how Trump has been allowed to throw out all sorts of accusations with impunity, including just this week using Gabbard's phony accusations against Obama to accuse him of the un-evidenced crime of treason, but there always a media presumption made of gravity behind what are plainly baseless attacks on his Democratic opponents and rivals just to keep us from talking about his own crimes and abuses.
...for instance: Trump publicly called on Russia to “find” Clinton’s emails from her private server, which they released to Wikileaks the same day his pussy-grabbing comment was reported on.
Trump began using the stolen material in his interviews and appearances three days later and then daily for the remaining month of the campaign — even though he had learned in August that the material had been stolen by Russian spies.
Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort had deep ties to and secretly shared campaign information with a Russian intelligence officer with ties to the hack of DNC emails during that campaign.
“On numerous occasions over the course of his time on the Trump Campaign, Manafort sought to secretly share internal campaign information with Konstantin Kilimnik, a Russian Intelligence Officer” the Senate Intel Cmte. chaired by Marco Rubio wrote in their report.
The report provides a brief overview of Manafort’s “connections to Russia and Ukraine,” which date to “approximately 2004.” In brief, Manafort began work then for the Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska and pro-Russian oligarchs in Ukraine, which eventually led to his role in engineering the 2010 election to the Ukrainian presidency of pro-Russian candidate Viktor Yanukovych. While the Mueller report described Deripaska as “closely aligned with Vladimir Putin,” the committee’s report is much more direct: “The Russian government,” the committee writes, “coordinates with and directs Deripaska” in conducting influence operations, with which Manafort also assisted. At another point, the committee states that “Manafort’s influence work for Deripaska was, in effect, influence work for the Russian government and its interests.”
more,
Trump admitted Don Jr. met a Russian lawyer in June 2016 "to get information on an opponent", but argued it was legal.
"This was a meeting to get information on an opponent, totally legal and done all the time in politics- and it went nowhere."
in fact, Trump and 18 of his associates had at least 140 contacts with Russian nationals and WikiLeaks, or their intermediaries, during the 2016 campaign and presidential transition, according to a New York Times analysis.
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