I guess I might as well fess up to being wrong and be done with it. Here is our president complaining about all those people who think he shouldn’t accept campaign dirt from foreigners:
I meet and talk to “foreign governments” every day. I just met with the Queen of England (U.K.), the Prince of Wales, the P.M. of the United Kingdom, the P.M. of Ireland, the President of France and the President of Poland. We talked about “Everything!” Should I immediately…call the FBI about these calls and meetings? How ridiculous! I would never be trusted again. With that being said, my full answer is rarely played by the Fake News Media. They purposely leave out the part that matters.
In Trump’s interview yesterday with George Stephanopoulos, neither man explicitly mentioned getting oppo from foreign “governments.” I figured this was negligent on Stephanopoulos’s part and deliberate on Trump’s part, but obviously that’s not the case. In today’s tweet, Trump specifically said he thought it was just fine for him to talk to “foreign governments.” Since the context is campaign oppo, he’s saying that it’s OK for a presidential candidate to accept scuttlebutt from an agent of a foreign government.
I didn’t think that even Trump would admit to that, but as usual, it turns out that he’s even worse than I ever thought.
UPDATE: For fuck’s sake:
President Trump’s 2020 reelection campaign will handle damaging information on political opponents provided by foreign governments and entities on a “case by case basis,” according to the campaign’s top spokesperson.
Asked about Mr. Trump’s assertion that he would be receptive to dirt on rivals offered by foreigners, Kayleigh McEnany, the national press secretary for the president’s reelection bid, told CBSN’s “Red & Blue” that campaign staff should take the president’s comments as a “directive” to handle foreign dirt through a two-pronged approach. “The president’s directive, as he said, [it’s] a case by case basis. He said he would likely do both: Listen to what they have to say, but also report it to the FBI,” McEnany said.
They are really intent on digging themselves an ever deeper hole on this. I guess that’s what happens when you’re constitutionally incapable of ever admitting that you’re wrong.
