On Thursday, at the direction of President Trump, America’s national security and intelligence chiefs lined up and spoke from the White House briefing room to reassure the country that they were doing everything in their power to combat Russian meddling in our elections. It was something the liberal media had been crying about for a long time, but the liberal media can never be pleased as CNN and MSNBC hosts decried the timing, moving the goal post.
During CNN’s OutFront, host Erin Burnett seemed to suggest the press conference was nothing more than a “big show” to distract from recent Trump controversies. “An official telling CNN the President told his top security officials to step up and speak about his efforts to stop Russia from interfering in the U.S. elections. Now, the only person missing from the stage was President Trump himself,” she whined.
Burnett was clearly irritated and took out her frustration on the same national security and intelligence officials the media treated as sacrosanct for Trump’s criticisms. Their crime? Complimenting the President. “You see them all, no sign of the President. Instead, his cabinet praised the President for taking on election meddling,” she fumed.
“Leadership, a priority by this President regarding election meddling? It almost seems a bit of an alternate universe,” she chided after playing soundbites of DNI Director Dan Coats and others praising the President. She was skeptical of the timing as a whole:
Now here’s the bottom line, it is a great thing if the situation has changed, but why now? And why is the President all of a sudden so concerned that he called up Intel chiefs today and directed them to go out there publically and contradict what they had said before from the White House podium? After all, evidence of attacks on America's election is not new.
Burnett also repeated the misleading and debunked claim that Russia “hacked the American election.” That terminology is used by the liberal media to falsely suggest the Russians went in and changed vote totals to hand Trump the victory. There was no evidence that that had occurred.
And on MSNBC’s MTP Daily, host Chuck Todd was pretty hot under the collar after hearing from the U.S. officials. “And their message was essentially the same. The threat from Russia and other rogue actors is real, the attacks are ongoing and persuasive, our democracy is in the crosshairs, and this administration, they say, is on top of it,” he scoffed.
After ranting about previous events he found more preferable for their press conference (one of them was two days ago), Todd bitterly wondered “why now?” His explanation? It was designed to distract from the Mueller investigation:
We're less than 100 days from the midterms, and why did this happen the day after the President tweeted about obstructing the Russia investigation, as his campaign chief is on trial, as his former personal attorney is making serious allegations against him, and as there's a real risk Mueller could subpoena Mr. Trump for testimony.
Of course, Todd failed to mention that the trial of Trump’s former campaign chief Paul Manafort had nothing to do with either him or election and his former personal lawyer wasn’t the most trustworthy person.
The White House made it clear that stopping any future Russian meddling was a top priority for the administration and the liberal media couldn’t deal with it. Both Burnett and Todd might have to go see a chiropractor after Thursday because they may have thrown their backs out after moving that goal post.
The transcripts are below, click "expand" to read:
CNN's Erin Burnett OutFront
August 2, 2018
7:00 p.m. EasternERIN BURNETT: Good evening. I'm Erin Burnett. The breaking news tonight, President Trump to decide within days whether he will talk to Bob Mueller. Rudy Giuliani telling Politico tonight, that the President and his team will spend the weekend talking it over and Giuliani adds they’re on track for a decision in as little as a week.
This as the President puts on a big show at the White House to show he actually is fighting election meddling. An official telling CNN the President told his top security officials to step up and speak about his efforts to stop Russia from interfering in the U.S. elections. Now, the only person missing from the stage was President Trump himself. Instead, they all were there, the National Security Adviser John Bolton, Dan Coats the DNI, Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, the FBI Director Chris Wray, and the NSA Chief and Commander of U.S. Cyber Command General Paul Nakasone. You see them all, no sign of the President. Instead, his cabinet praised the President for taking on election meddling.
DAN COATS: The President has specifically directed us to make the matter of the election meddling and securing our election process a top priority.
JOHN BOLTON: The President has made it very clear I think what his priority is.
PAUL NAKASONE: I appreciate the leadership and support from the president.
BURNETT: Leadership, a priority by this President regarding election meddling? It almost seems a bit of an alternate universe. It has been more than 18 months since President Trump took office. That to be exact is 559 days. And we’re just hearing this now? In fact, just about five months ago it was a different story about President Trump's role in stopping election meddling from some of the same people who were on stage praising the President today.
(…)
BURNETT: To be clear that was February. As far as we know that was still the case at least until today. Now here’s the bottom line, it is a great thing if the situation has changed, but why now? And why is the President all of a sudden so concerned that he called up Intel chiefs today and directed them to go out there publically and contradict what they had said before from the White House podium?
After all, evidence of attacks on America's election is not new. The New York Times reported two weeks before Trump's inauguration that he was shown highly classified information that indicated Vladimir Putin himself was personally involved in ordering the attacks. The national intelligence community and the Senate intelligence committee both released reports, declaring Putin had hacked the American election.
(…)
MSNBC's MTP Daily
August 2, 2018
5:01 p.m EasternCHUCK TODD: We begin tonight by trying to make sense of what happened this afternoon and perhaps more importantly why it happened and today of all days. Look, we saw a surprise full-court press just a few hours ago from the White House on election security.
(…)
And their message was essentially the same. The threat from Russia and other rogue actors is real, the attacks are ongoing and persuasive, our democracy is in the crosshairs, and this administration, they say, is on top of it. SO, is the President?
In fact, they told us the President explicitly directed them to make this a top priority and to have this briefing. But folks, it's arguably because of this president that some are wondering why exactly they chose today to have this press conference and why the president himself wasn't there if this was so important to him.
Some may wonder why they didn't hold an election security like this immediately after Trump took office in 2017. Or, they could have done it when the intelligence community reaffirmed its conclusions about Russian interference months after he took office. Imagine the entire new national security team having that event together back in March or April. Or how about when Mueller indicted 13 Russian nationals for interfering in our election—to social media, that would have been a good day to do it. Or when Mueller indicted 12 Russian agents for hacking the DNC and the Clinton campaign, that also would have been a good day to do it. Or when the Senate intelligence committee issued its recommendations about election security. Or when Facebook announced it had uncovered new efforts to influence our elections. You get the drift.
Again, why now? We're less than 100 days from the midterms, and why did this happen the day after the President tweeted about obstructing the Russia investigation, as his campaign chief is on trial, as his former personal attorney is making serious allegations against him, and as there's a real risk Mueller could subpoena Mr. Trump for testimony.
Folks, the bottom line here is this. For some it's going to take more than one surprise briefing to convince them that what we heard today about cracking down on Russia has the full backing of the President, and it was not an effort by a white house communications team desperate to turn the page from the other headaches they had been asked about all week.
(…)
