National security adviser H.R. McMaster confirmed on Saturday what most Americans have been aware of for a while now — Russia did, in fact, interfere with the 2016 U.S. elections.
“As you can see with the F.B.I. indictment, the evidence is now really incontrovertible and available in the public domain, whereas in the past it was difficult to attribute,” McMaster said, speaking to an audience at the Munich Security Conference.
Trump spent over a year insisting not only that reports and the investigation looking into whether he colluded with Russia were a part of a politically-motivated witch hunt, but also that the whole story of Russia meddling in the elections at all was part of a hoax. Now, after the evidence has gotten too clear to deny, Trump and the White House are coming around to admitting that there was meddling but still insisting that there was no collusion.
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McMaster’s comments, which were part of a larger discussion on what the U.S. and its Western allies could to to combat Russia’s meddling in elections around the world, effectively undercut the Trump camp’s “hoax” narrative. No matter how many tweets Trump publishes trying to discredit the investigation with a new spin every day, credible officials around him are letting it be known that the Russia scandal isn’t an overblown drama created by the media.
Mueller’s indictment of 13 Russian nationals on Friday have made it evident that Putin’s government used sophisticated strategies to hurt Hillary Clinton’s campaign and push Trump to victory. With numerous of Trump’s former staffers having pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about their communication with Russians during the election, combined with mounting evidence that Trump himself has obstructed justice, impeachment is starting to become a real possibility.
