Legacy of the 115th Congress: failing on Russia
Ryan Cahill, Opinion contributor Published 4:46 p.m. ET March 9, 2018
The Justice Department indicted 13 Russians and three Russian companies for interfering in the 2016 election. They stand accused of organizing pro-Trump rallies, stealing Americans’ identities, and leveraging social media to sow discord among a polarized electorate. A lawyer for former Trump campaign aide Rick Gates, who was indicted on a litany of charges in October, has pleaded guilty to lying to federal investigators. Meanwhile, Gates and his former boss, Paul Manafort, who served as Trump’s campaign chairman in 2016, were charged (again) by the Justice Department in a sealed indictment. All of this happened in the past few weeks.
... Republican leaders in Congress have failed.
... Before election day in 2016, when the intelligence community came to the conclusion that Russia was intervening in our election on behalf of then-candidate Trump, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell refused to participate in a bipartisan statement condemning such behavior. More recently, House Speaker Paul Ryan has resorted to verbal jujitsu when asked about the president’s behavior as it relates to the Russia investigation, calling the legitimate attempts to safeguard our democracy a “political distraction.” Not to be outdone, however, is Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee Devin Nunes, who is using his power to throw chaff at the Mueller investigation with cherry-picked and misleading information – all in the face of objections from the FBI and Trump’s Justice Department ...
... the paralysis is even more alarming. Last summer, the Senate and the House voted overwhelmingly (something they hardly do on anything lately) to impose tougher sanctions on Russia in the wake of their brazen election interference. Trump, facing the threat of a veto-override, issued a damning statement (that included a boast about the value of the Trump Organization), signed the bill out of public view, and then simply refused to enforce it ...
https://www.cincinnati.com/story/opinion/contributors/2018/03/09/opinion-failing-russia-legacy-115th-congress/388679002/
= new reply since forum marked as read
