After President Obama threw the hammer down on Russia for its unprecedented interference in the 2016 presidential election, former Trump campaign manager and future presidential counselor Kellyanne Conway stormed CNN to blame the U.S. government, the DNC, and the media – not the Russians – for the hacking.
Video:
.@KellyannePolls: … “We’re also not in favor of our intelligence interfering with elections after the fact” https://t.co/QCHiviRZ1U
— CNN (@CNN) December 30, 2016
Conway said:
This is really about the DNC’s breach. They didn’t have the proper security … and someone was able to hack the information, and we are not in favor of foreign governments interfering in our elections or interfering in our intelligence. We’re also not in favor of our intelligence interfering with our elections after the fact … To talk any further about it actually is to violate what everybody insists we have which is one president at a time.
While Conway is certainly right that we have one president at a time, it wouldn’t take a whole lot of effort for the man who will be president in less than a month to condemn a foreign country for interfering in a U.S. election.
Conway also repeated Trump’s line that it’s time to “move on” from the Russian hacking and even said that Obama’s moves today – the harshest ever in response to a foreign cyberattack – are “symbolic.”
Video:
Kellyanne Conway: Trump “believes that it’s time to move on,” and that some of Obama’s moves on Russia seem symbolic https://t.co/LMpi32siEc
— CNN (@CNN) December 30, 2016
Conway said:
I’ve been reading all the news reports about these retaliations, these sanctions put forward by President Obama and his administration, some of them seem largely symbolic … We’re yet to see all of the intelligence reports … so he’ll have that briefing next week, but in the meantime, he repeated today what he said last night to reporters here at Mar-a-Lago, which is he believes it’s time to move on to bigger and better things for the country.
Essentially, according to Trump and Conway, a foreign government that interferes in a U.S. election – especially if it helps your candidate win – should face no consequences. In their eyes, the American people and the media should quiet down and brush it under the rug.
In three weeks, these are the people who will be running our government.
Sean Colarossi currently resides in Cleveland, Ohio. He earned his Bachelor of Arts degree in Journalism from the University of Massachusetts Amherst and was an organizing fellow for both of President Obama’s presidential campaigns. He also worked with Planned Parenthood as an Affordable Care Act Outreach Organizer in 2014, helping northeast Ohio residents obtain health insurance coverage.
