Former Obama bureaucrat and current CNN anchor Jim Sciutto was scuttling back to his Russiagate conspiracy-theorizing on Monday. It took deceptively editing some of Trump's press conferences to make the case Trump and Putin are back to being pals, and so the 2020 election is again in danger of being mangled by the Russians.
In a story he reported himself on CNN Newsroom, Sciutto declared "President Trump, you may have missed this, has been warming up of late to his old friend Russia's President Vladimir Putin. The two leaders have made a record number of phone calls to each other recently and some of the president's own former advisers say Putin may be using the coronavirus pandemic to realize his long-held goal of edging closer to Trump."
The video began with Trump at his April 14 press conference saying, "With tremendous credit going to Russia" and Sciutto adding, "A historic oil deal to try stabilize prices in the middle of the coronavirus pandemic."
The full context of Trump's quote was the Saudi-Russia oil price war that by most accounts, Russia lost, "It finished with a tremendous credit going to Russia and to Saudi Arabia, and it could be as much as 20 million barrels a day a cut so that we can get rid of some of the tremendous excess oil that’s been produced because of the fact that the virus just knocked out almost 50% of the business."
But, Sciutto was not finished with selectively editing Trump. He next played Trump on April 13, "I want to thank President Putin of Russia."
The full context again was not only included the Saudis, but also Mexico which had its own oil dispute with Saudi Arabia, "I want to thank Saudi Arabia and the king of Saudi Arabia, the crown prince of Saudi Arabia, both. I want to thank President Putin of Russia. And I want to thank a very good friend of mine, man who’s become a friend of mine, the president of Mexico showed great flexibility. President Lopez Obrador."
Sciutto used his out-of-context clips to warn:
There was a whirlwind of activity to get it done. For Trump, the art of the deal. For Putin, something very different. Russia appears to be using the pandemic crisis to get closer with the U.S. And in particular President Trump. Trump speaking to Russian President Vladimir Putin three times in four days, leading up to the oil deal announcement on Sunday. Including a call between the two leaders at the end of March, a record number of contacts between them in a two-week period during the Trump presidency."
Sciutto insisted Trump was going soft:
SCIUTTO: U.S. fighter jets intercepted two Russian aircraft flying near Alaska on March 9th and again on April 8th, just a day before one of the phone calls between Trump and Putin. And the U.S. intelligence community assesses Russia is again trying to interfere in the 2020 election, as it did in 2016.
STEVEN WEISS, CARNEGIE ENDOWMENT FOR INTERNATIONAL PEACE: It's the fact that Trump is allowing Putin to assert that U.S./Russian relations are back in business, and that basically we've turned the page, all is forgiven and that any Russian past behavior doesn't matter going forward in light of coronavirus.
Is Sciutto really going to condemn Trump for getting the Saudis, Mexicans, and Russians to work out their differences? Because, the world is going to need more of that cooperation in the coming days, as later on Monday, oil prices went negative.
Here is a transcript for the April 20 show:
CNN Newsroom with Poppy Harlow and Jim Sciutto
9:40 AM ET
JIM SCIUTTO: The Pentagon is confirming a Russian jet intercepted an American Navy aircraft in the Mediterranean. Even as Russia continues aggressive military maneuvers like this around U.S. warships, aircraft, U.S. Coast, President Trump, you may have missed this, has been warming up of late to his old friend Russia's President Vladimir Putin. The two leaders have made a record number of phone calls to each other recently and some of the president's own former advisers say Putin may be using the coronavirus pandemic to realize his long-held goal of edging closer to Trump.
BEGIN CLIP
DONALD TRUMP [APRIL 14]: With tremendous credit going to Russia.
SCIUTTO [VOICEOVER]: A historic oil deal to try stabilize prices in the middle of the coronavirus pandemic
TRUMP: We'll save hundreds of thousands of jobs for our energy industry, Texas and North Dakota, Oklahoma, all of our different energy states.
SCIUTTO [VOICEOVER]: With the present's praise going to?
TRUMP [APRIL 13]: I want to thank President Putin of Russia.
SCIUTTO [VOICEOVER]: There was a whirlwind of activity to get it done. For Trump, the art of the deal. For Putin, something very different. Russia appears to be using the pandemic crisis to get closer with the U.S. And in particular President Trump. Trump speaking to Russian President Vladimir Putin three times in four days, leading up to the oil deal announcement on Sunday. Including a call between the two leaders at the end of March, a record number of contacts between them in a two-week period during the Trump presidency.
