July 18, 2018

Trump Rejects US Intelligence Agencies Day After Claiming He Backed Them

The White House later attempted to clarify Trump’s “no” response.

Update, 4:10 pm EST: In a press briefing shortly after Trump’s cabinet meeting, White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders claimed that Trump was responding “no” to taking more questions from reporters—not to the question of whether Russia continues to target US elections, as US intelligence agencies have definitively concluded.

President Donald Trump told reporters that Russia is no longer threatening US elections, despite repeated assessments from intelligence officials, including most recently his own director of national intelligence, Dan Coats, that the Kremlin is doing exactly that.

“No,” was Trump’s simple response after being asked if Russia is targeting upcoming elections during a Wednesday cabinet meeting. The president’s curt answer flies in the face of Coats’ warning last week that signs of Russian meddling are “blinking red again.”

Trump continued on to claim that no president in US history has been more “tough” against Russia. “All you have to do is look at the numbers, look at what we’ve done. Look at sanctions, look at ambassadors not here. Look unfortunately at what happened in Syria recently,” he explained. He also insisted that Russian President Vladimir Putin is unhappy with various actions taken by the US.  

Trump’s response comes after several head-spinning public remarks this week concerning Russian interference, beginning when he sided with Russia over US intelligence and law enforcement agencies during a Helsinki press conference alongside Putin on Monday. One day later, amid blistering criticism over his performance in Finland, Trump read from a prepared statement that claimed he had simply misspoken . “In a key sentence in my remarks, I said the word ‘would’ instead of ‘wouldn’t,'” Trump said. “The sentence should have been, ‘I don’t see any reason why I wouldn’t’ or ‘why it wouldn’t be Russia.’”

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

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And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

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