The top law enforcement official overseeing the probe of Russian meddling in the 2016 election is defending the prosecution of foreign agents who may never see the inside of a U.S. courtroom.

Speaking Thursday at the Aspen Security Forum in Colorado, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein also said the Justice Department will notify the U.S. public when it identifies efforts by foreign government to target U.S. politics. Rosenstein unveiled a report identifying the major cyber threats that the U.S. faces.

“Exposing schemes to the public is an important way to neutralize them,” he said. “The American people have a right to know if foreign governments are targeting them with propaganda.”

He offered a rebuttal to criticism that charging foreign agents involved in cyber-attacks or covert campaigns to sow dissent is futile if they are unlikely to be extradited.

“That is a shortsighted view,” he said.

Indictments as deterrent

The debate has been sparked by the probe of special counsel Robert Mueller, who has indicted more than two dozen Russian nationals on charges related to Russia’s meddling in the election.

Rosenstein said such indictments can act as a deterrent.

“People who thought they were safely under the protection of foreign governments when they committed crimes against America sometimes later find themselves in federal prisons,” he said.

He added that at a minimum, the indictments impede the suspects from traveling to other countries that might extradite them. He said revealing the charges also serves to air the allegations to the U.S. public, bolstering confidence in the justice system.

More active approach

Rosenstein signaled a more active approach by the Justice Department to counter foreign influence and cyber operations. The report outlines how the department will work to expose the foreign efforts without damaging counter-intelligence efforts or wading into U.S. politics.

“The challenge calls for the application of neutral principles,” he said.

More broadly, the report identifies six categories of cyber threats and current efforts to counter them.
…

National Intelligence Director Dan Coats’ drumbeat of criticism against Russia is clashing loudly with President Donald Trump’s pro-Kremlin remarks, leaving the soft-spoken spy chief in an uncomfortable – and perhaps perilous – seat in the administration.

Trump’s remarks after Wednesday’s Cabinet meeting, where he appeared to deny the longtime U.S. foe was still targeting American elections, are just the latest in a growing list of statements that conflict with Coats’. His job is to share the work of the 17 intelligence agencies he oversees with the president.

Coats, who will be speaking Thursday at a national security conference in Aspen, Colorado, is a former Republican lawmaker. He was banned from traveling to Russia in 2014 for calling out its annexation of Crimea, and he has continued to raise the alarm on Russia since his appointment by Trump as intelligence chief in March 2017.

That’s left Coats in a tight spot. Trump has been determined to forge closer ties with Russian President Vladimir Putin, culminating in this week’s extraordinary summit in Helsinki. The disconnect with Coats was laid bare after Trump sparked outrage back home by giving credence to Russia’s denial of interference in the 2016 U.S. election as he stood alongside Putin.

Back in Washington, Coats was quick to issue a statement Monday to rebut that position. He restated the U.S. intelligence assessment about Russian meddling and “their ongoing, pervasive efforts to undermine our democracy.”

Former intelligence officials say Coats is just speaking truth to power, a mantra often used in describing the intelligence agencies’ historical relationship with any president. But in the Trump administration, Coats could be walking into a minefield, given the president’s track record of firing officials who don’t toe his line.

Michael Morell, former deputy and acting director of the CIA, said Coats and other national security officials in the Trump administration are just doing their jobs, and the president undermines them and the institutions they lead when he makes “inaccurate statements.”

“By doing this, the president is undermining our national security,” Morell said.

Trump did walk back his post-Putin summit comments on Tuesday, saying he’d misspoken when he said he saw no reason why it was Russia that had interfered in the 2016 election. He also said he accepted the intelligence agencies’ conclusion of Russian meddling. But he added, “It could be other people also. A lot of people out there.”

The president’s mixed messaging grew even more confusing Wednesday. He was asked if Russia was still targeting the U.S. and answered “no”  – a statement that Morell contended was “flat-out wrong” because the Russians never stopped trying to interfere in the U.S. democracy.

White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said later that Trump does believe that Russia may try to target U.S. elections again and the “threat still exists.”

When asked Wednesday in a CBS News interview whether Trump agrees with Coats that the Russian threat is ongoing, the president said he did.

“Well, I accept. I mean, he’s an expert. This is what he does. He’s been doing a very good job. I have tremendous faith in Dan Coats, and if he says that, I would accept that. I will tell you though, it better not be. It better not be,” Trump said.

Trump has had a tense relationship with U.S. intelligence agencies since before he was elected, largely because of their conclusion that Putin ordered “an influence campaign” in 2016 aimed at helping the Trump campaign and harming his Democratic opponent, Hillary Clinton.

Earlier in the administration, Coats’ voice was drowned out by the more outspoken Mike Pompeo, who was CIA director before Trump tapped him as secretary of state. Now with Pompeo heading the State Department, Coats has been thrust into the limelight as the voice of the intelligence community. In Aspen on Thursday, he’s expected to outline the cyberthreats the U.S. faces from Russia as well as other countries, such as China, North Korea and Iran.

Coats, 75, has been immersed in Washington politics for years. He served in the House in the 1980s and the Senate in the 1990s and 2010s and was the U.S. ambassador to Germany from 2001 to 2005. In 2014, Coats, who was a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, denounced Russia’s interference in eastern Ukraine and was banned from Russia.

Coats blew it off: “Our summer vacation in Siberia is a no-go,” he joked.

Still, Coats is not known as being flippant. He’s prided himself as being a steady voice, but it’s clear he is no fan of Russia.

In comments at a Washington think tank last week, he said, “The Russian bear … is out of the cave, hungry and clawing for more territory, more influence and using the same tactics we saw in the Cold War and more.”

He said the “more” is cyberthreats that are targeting U.S. government and businesses in the energy, nuclear, water, aviation and critical-manufacturing sectors. He said that while there had not been the scale of electoral interference detected in 2016, “we fully realize that we are just one click on a keyboard away from a similar situation repeating itself.”

Those tough remarks came just days before the Trump-Putin summit – and that was not the first time Coats has made statements starkly at odds with his boss.

On June 8, when Trump suggested at a summit in Canada that Russia should be asked to rejoin the G-7 organization of industrialized nations, Coats was making a speech in Normandy, France. There, Coats offered a laundry list of what he said were recent malign activities by Moscow. Those included political hacking in France, Germany and Norway, a damaging cyberassault on Ukraine, and Russian agents’ alleged attempt to kill two people in Britain with a nerve agent.

“These Russian actions are purposeful and premeditated and they represent an all-out assault, by (Russian President) Vladimir Putin, on the rule of law, Western ideals and democratic norms,” he said.

 
…

National Intelligence Director Dan Coats’ drumbeat of criticism against Russia is clashing loudly with President Donald Trump’s pro-Kremlin remarks, leaving the soft-spoken spy chief in an uncomfortable – and perhaps perilous – seat in the administration.

Trump’s remarks after Wednesday’s Cabinet meeting, where he appeared to deny the longtime U.S. foe was still targeting American elections, are just the latest in a growing list of statements that conflict with Coats’. His job is to share the work of the 17 intelligence agencies he oversees with the president.

Coats, who will be speaking Thursday at a national security conference in Aspen, Colorado, is a former Republican lawmaker. He was banned from traveling to Russia in 2014 for calling out its annexation of Crimea, and he has continued to raise the alarm on Russia since his appointment by Trump as intelligence chief in March 2017.

That’s left Coats in a tight spot. Trump has been determined to forge closer ties with Russian President Vladimir Putin, culminating in this week’s extraordinary summit in Helsinki. The disconnect with Coats was laid bare after Trump sparked outrage back home by giving credence to Russia’s denial of interference in the 2016 U.S. election as he stood alongside Putin.

Back in Washington, Coats was quick to issue a statement Monday to rebut that position. He restated the U.S. intelligence assessment about Russian meddling and “their ongoing, pervasive efforts to undermine our democracy.”

Former intelligence officials say Coats is just speaking truth to power, a mantra often used in describing the intelligence agencies’ historical relationship with any president. But in the Trump administration, Coats could be walking into a minefield, given the president’s track record of firing officials who don’t toe his line.

Michael Morell, former deputy and acting director of the CIA, said Coats and other national security officials in the Trump administration are just doing their jobs, and the president undermines them and the institutions they lead when he makes “inaccurate statements.”

“By doing this, the president is undermining our national security,” Morell said.

Trump did walk back his post-Putin summit comments on Tuesday, saying he’d misspoken when he said he saw no reason why it was Russia that had interfered in the 2016 election. He also said he accepted the intelligence agencies’ conclusion of Russian meddling. But he added, “It could be other people also. A lot of people out there.”

The president’s mixed messaging grew even more confusing Wednesday. He was asked if Russia was still targeting the U.S. and answered “no”  – a statement that Morell contended was “flat-out wrong” because the Russians never stopped trying to interfere in the U.S. democracy.

White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said later that Trump does believe that Russia may try to target U.S. elections again and the “threat still exists.”

When asked Wednesday in a CBS News interview whether Trump agrees with Coats that the Russian threat is ongoing, the president said he did.

“Well, I accept. I mean, he’s an expert. This is what he does. He’s been doing a very good job. I have tremendous faith in Dan Coats, and if he says that, I would accept that. I will tell you though, it better not be. It better not be,” Trump said.

Trump has had a tense relationship with U.S. intelligence agencies since before he was elected, largely because of their conclusion that Putin ordered “an influence campaign” in 2016 aimed at helping the Trump campaign and harming his Democratic opponent, Hillary Clinton.

Earlier in the administration, Coats’ voice was drowned out by the more outspoken Mike Pompeo, who was CIA director before Trump tapped him as secretary of state. Now with Pompeo heading the State Department, Coats has been thrust into the limelight as the voice of the intelligence community. In Aspen on Thursday, he’s expected to outline the cyberthreats the U.S. faces from Russia as well as other countries, such as China, North Korea and Iran.

Coats, 75, has been immersed in Washington politics for years. He served in the House in the 1980s and the Senate in the 1990s and 2010s and was the U.S. ambassador to Germany from 2001 to 2005. In 2014, Coats, who was a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, denounced Russia’s interference in eastern Ukraine and was banned from Russia.

Coats blew it off: “Our summer vacation in Siberia is a no-go,” he joked.

Still, Coats is not known as being flippant. He’s prided himself as being a steady voice, but it’s clear he is no fan of Russia.

In comments at a Washington think tank last week, he said, “The Russian bear … is out of the cave, hungry and clawing for more territory, more influence and using the same tactics we saw in the Cold War and more.”

He said the “more” is cyberthreats that are targeting U.S. government and businesses in the energy, nuclear, water, aviation and critical-manufacturing sectors. He said that while there had not been the scale of electoral interference detected in 2016, “we fully realize that we are just one click on a keyboard away from a similar situation repeating itself.”

Those tough remarks came just days before the Trump-Putin summit – and that was not the first time Coats has made statements starkly at odds with his boss.

On June 8, when Trump suggested at a summit in Canada that Russia should be asked to rejoin the G-7 organization of industrialized nations, Coats was making a speech in Normandy, France. There, Coats offered a laundry list of what he said were recent malign activities by Moscow. Those included political hacking in France, Germany and Norway, a damaging cyberassault on Ukraine, and Russian agents’ alleged attempt to kill two people in Britain with a nerve agent.

“These Russian actions are purposeful and premeditated and they represent an all-out assault, by (Russian President) Vladimir Putin, on the rule of law, Western ideals and democratic norms,” he said.

 
…

President Donald Trump’s Supreme Court nominee, federal judge Brett Kavanaugh, can expect tough questions on a range of issues when he faces a Senate confirmation hearing sometime in the next few months.

Democrats are likely to pepper Kavanaugh with questions about his stance on abortion, gay rights and affirmative action. But another key area of interest is Kavanaugh’s expansive view of presidential power, something Democrats want to press him on with Trump in the White House.

When he was nominated at the White House earlier this month, Kavanaugh pledged to bring an independent mindset to the high court.

WATCH: Scope of Presidential Power Key Issue in Court Confirmation Fight

“I believe that an independent judiciary is the crown jewel of our constitutional republic,” he said. “If confirmed by the Senate, I will keep an open mind in every case, and I will always strive to preserve the Constitution of the United States and the American rule of law.”

Democrats have vowed to fight Kavanaugh’s nomination from the start, fearing his appointment could ensure a strongly conservative court for a generation. Several have also expressed concern about his views on executive power.

Kavanaugh’s experience

Before his confirmation as a federal judge in 2006, Kavanaugh got an up-close view of presidential power working in the White House of President George W. Bush. Before that, Kavanaugh worked with independent counsel Ken Starr in his investigation of President Bill Clinton in the late 1990s.

Reflecting on those experiences, Kavanaugh wrote an article in 2009 for the Minnesota Law Review that laid out his view on presidential power and the Constitution. Kavanaugh wrote that presidents “should be excused from the burdens of ordinary citizenship while serving in office.”

In Kavanaugh’s view, that includes excusing a president from having to deal with civil suits or criminal investigations while in office. 

“A president who is concerned about an ongoing criminal investigation is almost inevitably going to do a worse job as president,” he wrote.

​Skeptical Democrats

Democrats are expected to closely question him on the issue, especially in light of the ongoing Russia probe involving Trump and whether special counsel Robert Mueller might eventually try to compel the president to submit to an interview.

“Not only did Mr. Kavanaugh say that a president should not be subpoenaed, he said a president should not be investigated,” Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer said. “Mr. Kavanaugh, is the president above the law?”

Kavanaugh’s view of presidential power is not unusual among conservative legal scholars, Jonathan Turley of George Washington University said.

“Kavanaugh’s natural default position is Article II (of the Constitution) on presidential power. He tends to defer greatly to presidents,” Turley told The Associated Press. “That can only help President Trump if an issue goes before the court. But that is his philosophy. It does not mean he’s biased.”

Compelling a president

Some experts predict that if Kavanaugh is confirmed to the high court, he could find himself in the middle of a debate over whether a sitting president could be subpoenaed by an investigating special counsel like Mueller.

“So if, for example, the president chooses not to sit for a voluntary interview, and special counsel Mueller tries to subpoena the president,” ABC News legal analyst Kate Shaw said. “There is an open legal question about whether you can subpoena a sitting president, and that could end up very quickly going before the Supreme Court if there is a legal fight over it.”

Kavanaugh’s view worries liberal activists who will be pushing Democrats to press him during the confirmation process.

“Brett Kavanaugh has a very frighteningly wide view of presidential power, and I think that is something very much in play, given the investigations that are going on right now,” said Drew Courtney with People for the American Way, a liberal group that has lined up against Kavanaugh’s confirmation.

​Republican defenders

Kavanaugh’s Republican allies said they are prepared for a range of attacks on his record, including his stand on presidential power.

“That kind of cheap political fearmongering insults the intelligence of the American people, because Americans understand the difference between a political office and a judicial office,” Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said during a recent speech on the Senate floor.

A new POLITICO/Morning Consult poll shows Americans are divided along party lines when it comes to Kavanaugh’s confirmation. The poll found 71 percent of Republicans want Kavanaugh confirmed, while only 17 percent of Democrats support him.

A Quinnipiac poll from earlier this month found that American voters also want the Supreme Court to act as a check on Trump, by a margin of 65 percent to 24 percent. For Republicans, the poll found 48 percent supported that, while 37 percent did not.

Kavanaugh’s confirmation requires a majority vote in the Senate, where Republicans hold a narrow 51- to 49-seat margin over Democrats.

 
…

President Donald Trump’s Supreme Court nominee, federal judge Brett Kavanaugh, can expect tough questions on a range of issues when he faces a Senate confirmation hearing sometime in the next few months.

Democrats are likely to pepper Kavanaugh with questions about his stance on abortion, gay rights and affirmative action. But another key area of interest is Kavanaugh’s expansive view of presidential power, something Democrats want to press him on with Trump in the White House.

When he was nominated at the White House earlier this month, Kavanaugh pledged to bring an independent mindset to the high court.

WATCH: Scope of Presidential Power Key Issue in Court Confirmation Fight

“I believe that an independent judiciary is the crown jewel of our constitutional republic,” he said. “If confirmed by the Senate, I will keep an open mind in every case, and I will always strive to preserve the Constitution of the United States and the American rule of law.”

Democrats have vowed to fight Kavanaugh’s nomination from the start, fearing his appointment could ensure a strongly conservative court for a generation. Several have also expressed concern about his views on executive power.

Kavanaugh’s experience

Before his confirmation as a federal judge in 2006, Kavanaugh got an up-close view of presidential power working in the White House of President George W. Bush. Before that, Kavanaugh worked with independent counsel Ken Starr in his investigation of President Bill Clinton in the late 1990s.

Reflecting on those experiences, Kavanaugh wrote an article in 2009 for the Minnesota Law Review that laid out his view on presidential power and the Constitution. Kavanaugh wrote that presidents “should be excused from the burdens of ordinary citizenship while serving in office.”

In Kavanaugh’s view, that includes excusing a president from having to deal with civil suits or criminal investigations while in office. 

“A president who is concerned about an ongoing criminal investigation is almost inevitably going to do a worse job as president,” he wrote.

​Skeptical Democrats

Democrats are expected to closely question him on the issue, especially in light of the ongoing Russia probe involving Trump and whether special counsel Robert Mueller might eventually try to compel the president to submit to an interview.

“Not only did Mr. Kavanaugh say that a president should not be subpoenaed, he said a president should not be investigated,” Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer said. “Mr. Kavanaugh, is the president above the law?”

Kavanaugh’s view of presidential power is not unusual among conservative legal scholars, Jonathan Turley of George Washington University said.

“Kavanaugh’s natural default position is Article II (of the Constitution) on presidential power. He tends to defer greatly to presidents,” Turley told The Associated Press. “That can only help President Trump if an issue goes before the court. But that is his philosophy. It does not mean he’s biased.”

Compelling a president

Some experts predict that if Kavanaugh is confirmed to the high court, he could find himself in the middle of a debate over whether a sitting president could be subpoenaed by an investigating special counsel like Mueller.

“So if, for example, the president chooses not to sit for a voluntary interview, and special counsel Mueller tries to subpoena the president,” ABC News legal analyst Kate Shaw said. “There is an open legal question about whether you can subpoena a sitting president, and that could end up very quickly going before the Supreme Court if there is a legal fight over it.”

Kavanaugh’s view worries liberal activists who will be pushing Democrats to press him during the confirmation process.

“Brett Kavanaugh has a very frighteningly wide view of presidential power, and I think that is something very much in play, given the investigations that are going on right now,” said Drew Courtney with People for the American Way, a liberal group that has lined up against Kavanaugh’s confirmation.

​Republican defenders

Kavanaugh’s Republican allies said they are prepared for a range of attacks on his record, including his stand on presidential power.

“That kind of cheap political fearmongering insults the intelligence of the American people, because Americans understand the difference between a political office and a judicial office,” Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said during a recent speech on the Senate floor.

A new POLITICO/Morning Consult poll shows Americans are divided along party lines when it comes to Kavanaugh’s confirmation. The poll found 71 percent of Republicans want Kavanaugh confirmed, while only 17 percent of Democrats support him.

A Quinnipiac poll from earlier this month found that American voters also want the Supreme Court to act as a check on Trump, by a margin of 65 percent to 24 percent. For Republicans, the poll found 48 percent supported that, while 37 percent did not.

Kavanaugh’s confirmation requires a majority vote in the Senate, where Republicans hold a narrow 51- to 49-seat margin over Democrats.

 
…

A report in Wednesday’s edition of The New York Times reveals the extent of the intelligence U.S. President Donald Trump received about Russian President Vladimir Putin’s direct role in that country’s interference in the 2016 presidential election.

The report sheds light on President Trump’s consistent efforts to shift the focus away from any role Moscow played in his victory over Democrat Hillary Clinton, including his back-and-forth statements that at first contradicted, then accepted, the intelligence community’s findings since his meeting with Putin in Helsinki Monday.

​The Times says Trump first learned of Russia’s interference January 6, 2017, two weeks before his inauguration, during a meeting in New York at Trump Tower with then-CIA Director John Brennan; James Clapper, then-director of national intelligence; then-FBI Director James Comey; and Admiral Mike Rogers, then-director of the National Security Agency.

The high-ranking officials showed president-elect Trump highly classified information that Putin had personally ordered the hacking and disinformation campaign, including texts and emails from Russian military officers, and information from a top-secret source close to Putin himself, according to The Times.

The evidence included stolen emails from the Democratic National Committee that was key in swaying voters away from Clinton.

But after the briefing, Trump issued a statement spreading the blame among “Russia, China and other countries, outside groups and countries.”

The president has routinely dismissed the investigation into the Russian cyberattacks as both a hoax perpetrated by Democrats and a “witch hunt” aimed at undermining his presidency.
…

A report in Wednesday’s edition of The New York Times reveals the extent of the intelligence U.S. President Donald Trump received about Russian President Vladimir Putin’s direct role in that country’s interference in the 2016 presidential election.

The report sheds light on President Trump’s consistent efforts to shift the focus away from any role Moscow played in his victory over Democrat Hillary Clinton, including his back-and-forth statements that at first contradicted, then accepted, the intelligence community’s findings since his meeting with Putin in Helsinki Monday.

​The Times says Trump first learned of Russia’s interference January 6, 2017, two weeks before his inauguration, during a meeting in New York at Trump Tower with then-CIA Director John Brennan; James Clapper, then-director of national intelligence; then-FBI Director James Comey; and Admiral Mike Rogers, then-director of the National Security Agency.

The high-ranking officials showed president-elect Trump highly classified information that Putin had personally ordered the hacking and disinformation campaign, including texts and emails from Russian military officers, and information from a top-secret source close to Putin himself, according to The Times.

The evidence included stolen emails from the Democratic National Committee that was key in swaying voters away from Clinton.

But after the briefing, Trump issued a statement spreading the blame among “Russia, China and other countries, outside groups and countries.”

The president has routinely dismissed the investigation into the Russian cyberattacks as both a hoax perpetrated by Democrats and a “witch hunt” aimed at undermining his presidency.
…

The White House said Wednesday it believes Russia is continuing to target the United States with cyberattacks related to the upcoming November congressional elections.

“We believe that the threat still exists,” President Donald Trump’s spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders told reporters.

Her statement came hours after the U.S. leader appeared to contradict an assessment last week by Dan Coats, his director of national intelligence, that “the digital infrastructure that serves this country is literally under attack.” Coats singled out Russia as the “most aggressive foreign actor, no question.”

Trump, meeting with his Cabinet at the White House, shook his head and said “no” when asked by a reporter whether Russia was still attempting to interfere in U.S. elections. But Sanders later said Trump was saying “no,” he would not answer reporters’ questions.

Trump said, “We’re doing very well, probably as well as anybody has ever done with Russia. And there’s been no president ever as tough as I have been on Russia.”

Earlier, in a string of predawn Twitter comments, Trump boasted again about his Monday summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin, saying critics of his performance in Helsinki were suffering from “Trump Derangement Syndrome.”

“Some people HATE the fact that I got along well with President Putin of Russia,” Trump tweeted. “They would rather go to war than see this.”

“So many people at the higher ends of intelligence loved my press conference performance in Helsinki,” Trump said. “Putin and I discussed many important subjects at our earlier meeting. We got along well which truly bothered many haters who wanted to see a boxing match. Big results will come!”

The president’s Twitter comments came hours after he said he accepted the U.S. intelligence community’s conclusion that Russia meddled in the 2016 presidential election, walking back his Monday comments embracing Putin’s denial that Moscow had interfered.

“I accept our intelligence community’s conclusion that Russia’s meddling in the 2016 election took place,” Trump told reporters at the White House Tuesday.

But he then added: “Could be other people also. A lot of people out there,” an assessment of the possibility that other countries tried to interfere in the U.S. election that was not part of the intelligence community’s finding.

The U.S. holds congressional elections in November, when the entire 435-member House of Representatives is being contested and a third of the 100-member Senate.

On Twitter Wednesday, Trump wrote that his meeting with Putin could be more successful than the NATO summit in the long-term.

Trump’s revision of the comments he made as he stood alongside Putin at a news conference at the end of their summit came after a torrent of criticism from Republican and Democratic lawmakers alike, who said the U.S. leader appeared to be weak compared to his Russian counterpart.

Only a handful of Republican colleagues of Trump praised his performance.

Trump said that after he reviewed a transcript of his Helsinki remarks, he realized he misspoke.

“In a key sentence in my remarks, I said the word ‘would’ instead of ‘wouldn’t.’ The sentence should have been … ‘I don’t see any reason why it WOULDN’T be Russia” — that Russia interfered in the election, Trump said.

But he added that the Russian actions had no impact on the outcome of his victory over Democrat Hillary Clinton, a former U.S. secretary of state, and reiterated his frequent statement denying that there was any collusion between his campaign and Russian operatives.

U.S. special counsel Robert Mueller is continuing his 14-month criminal investigation of Russian interference.

Trump said his administration will do everything it can to thwart any Russian efforts to interfere with November’s U.S. congressional elections.

“We will stop it, we will repel it,” Trump vowed.

Before back-tracking, Trump said on Twitter he had a great summit with Putin and gave no ground in changing his statements about accepting Putin’s denial of interference in the U.S. election two years ago.

On Capitol Hill, House Speaker Paul Ryan, a Wisconsin Republican, responded to Trump’s initial rosy assessment.

“Let’s be very clear: Russia meddled in our election,” Ryan said. “We know they interfered with our elections, and we have passed sanctions on Russia to hold them accountable.”

When asked about election meddling during the joint news conference with Putin on Monday, Trump said, “President Putin was extremely strong and powerful in his denial today.”
…

President Donald Trump’s tumultuous trip across Europe, historians say, smashed the conventions of American leaders on the world stage.

Trump’s “America First” approach to foreign policy had him seeming to accept the word of a hostile power over his own intelligence agencies, insulting allies and sowing doubts about his commitment to the NATO alliance.

“We’ve never had a president go abroad and not only lecture to our NATO allies, but also to embarrass them,” said Russia expert William Pomeranz, deputy director of the Kennan Institute at the Wilson Center. “We’ve never had our president go on a foreign tour and categorize our allies as foes. And we’ve never had our president hold a joint news conference with a Russian leader where he assigned blame, from his perspective, to both parties, but in fact dedicated most of his time to blaming the U.S. Justice Department and intelligence services.”

While past presidents have had difficult foreign trips and been criticized for their summits with Soviet leaders, Trump’s behavior has few parallels, in the view of presidential historians and longtime Russia watchers.

Franklin Roosevelt was accused of “selling out” to Joseph Stalin at the Yalta Conference in 1945; John F. Kennedy and his aides admitted that he’d been unprepared for his 1961 Vienna summit with Nikita Khrushchev; the Reykjavik summit between Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev in 1986 was seen at the time to have ended in failure; and George W. Bush was mocked for telling reporters in 2001 after meeting with Putin that he had “looked the man in the eye” and “found him to be very straightforward and trustworthy.”

Trump’s trip was seen as different.

“Frankly, I don’t think those U.S. presidents at any point came off as not pursuing U.S. security interests, as being taken in by the Soviet leader they were meeting with,” said Alina Polyakova, a foreign policy fellow at the Brookings Institution. “I think even President George W. Bush’s meeting, where he had that famous quote about looking into Putin’s eyes and seeing into his soul — this summit dwarfs that by a factor of a thousand.”

Indeed, even before he departed Washington, Trump had made clear that he was itching for a fight. He criticized members of NATO, the decades-old military alliance, for failing to spend enough on defense and suggested he might not be interested in “paying for Europe’s protection” any longer.

Germany

In his first appearance at a pre-summit breakfast in Brussels, he went after German Chancellor Angela Merkel, claiming Germany was “totally controlled” by Russia and later asked on Twitter, “What good is NATO.” The summit ended in a whiplash-inducing proclamation from the president that NATO was stronger than ever, as he claimed he’d secured new commitments to defense spending, which those present later disputed.

United Kingdom

The drama continued as Trump headed to his next stop, the U.K. His first official visit was overshadowed by fallout from the rhetorical grenade he’d lobbed at British Prime Minister Theresa May before arriving. In a tabloid interview, he criticized May’s Brexit plans, said he might no longer be open to a trade deal with the U.K., and said one of May’s political rivals would be an excellent prime minister, undermining her at a time when her government is in turmoil.

Then came yet another interview, this one from one of his golf courses in Scotland, in which Trump categorized the European Union as a top geopolitical “foe.”

​Putin summit

Nothing, however, had quite prepared the world for Trump’s comments in Helsinki after hours of meetings with Russian President Vladimir Putin, whose government, U.S. intelligence officials have concluded, meddled in the 2016 election, hacked Democratic Party emails and disseminated them in an effort to help Trump win.

Standing on stage with the man accused of complicity in an attack on American democracy, Trump said his intelligence people “think it’s Russia. I have President Putin. He just said it’s not Russia. I will say this: I don’t see any reason why it would be.” He also went after his Justice Department, calling its investigation into Russia’s efforts and potential collusion with Trump’s campaign a “disaster for our country.”

It was a stunning comment from an American president — one that he partially tried to walk back 24 hours later by blaming a grammatical glitch. But he did not retreat from a number of his other comments giving credence to Putin’s denials of election interference.

“Trump 0 – Putin 1,” blared the front page of Finland’s Kauppalehti newspaper.

Douglas Brinkley, a presidential historian and professor at Rice University, compared Trump to “a bull carrying his own china shop around with him.”

“Just standing and selling your country downriver on foreign soil in front of your adversary — there’s no precedent for such disgraceful and irrational behavior,” Brinkley said.

Pomeranz said Trump had done himself political damage by suggesting both sides were to blame for the Russia probe that has hurt U.S. relations with Moscow — just as Trump did when he blamed both sides when responding to violent white supremacist protests in Charlottesville, Virginia.

Pomeranz said the damage Trump did by describing the E.U. as a foe and lecturing his NATO allies was significant.

“I think that is what’s going to be remembered from this week,” he said.
…

U.S. President Donald Trump boasted again Wednesday about his summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin, saying critics of his performance in Helsinki were suffering from “Trump Derangement Syndrome.”

“Some people HATE the fact that I got along well with President Putin of Russia,” Trump said on Twitter. “They would rather go to war than see this.”

“So many people at the higher ends of intelligence loved my press conference performance in Helsinki,” Trump tweeted in the predawn hours. “Putin and I discussed many important subjects at our earlier meeting. We got along well which truly bothered many haters who wanted to see a boxing match. Big results will come!”

The president’s Twitter comments came hours after he said he accepted the U.S. intelligence community’s conclusion that Russia meddled in the 2016 presidential election, walking back his Monday comments embracing Putin’s denial that Moscow had interfered.

“I accept our intelligence community’s conclusion that Russia’s meddling in the 2016 election took place,” Trump told reporters at the White House Tuesday. But he then added: “Could be other people also. A lot of people out there,” an assessment of the possibility that other countries tried to interfere in the U.S. election that was not part of the intelligence community’s finding.

On Twitter Wednesday, Trump said, “While the NATO meeting in Brussels was an acknowledged triumph, with billions of dollars more being put up by member countries at a faster pace, the meeting with Russia may prove to be, in the long run, an even greater success. Many positive things will come out of that meeting.”

The U.S. leader, referring to his demands that North Korea end its nuclear weapons program, said, “Russia has agreed to help with North Korea, where relationships with us are very good and the process is moving along. There is no rush, the sanctions remain! Big benefits and exciting future for North Korea at end of process!”

Trump’s revision of his comments he made as he stood alongside Putin at a news conference at the end of their summit came after a torrent of criticism from Republican and Democratic lawmakers alike, who said the U.S. leader appeared to be weak compared to the Russian leader. Only a handful of Republican colleagues of Trump praised his performance.

Trump said that after he reviewed a transcript of his Helsinki remarks, he realized he misspoke.

“In a key sentence in my remarks, I said the word ‘would’ instead of ‘wouldn’t.’ The sentence should have been…’I don’t see any reason why it WOULDN’T be Russia” that Russia interfered in the election, Trump said.

But he added that the Russian actions had no impact on the outcome of his victory over Democrat Hillary Clinton, a former U.S. secretary of state, and reiterated his frequent statement denying that there was any collusion between his campaign and Russian operatives. U.S. special counsel Robert Mueller is continuing his 14-month criminal investigation of Russian interference.

Trump said his administration will do everything it can to thwart any Russian efforts to interfere with November’s U.S. congressional elections.

“We will stop it, we will repel it,” Trump vowed.

Before back-tracking, Trump said on Twitter he had a great summit with Putin and gave no ground in changing his statements about accepting Putin’s denial of interference in the U.S. election two years ago.

On Capitol Hill, House Speaker Paul Ryan, a Wisconsin Republican, responded to Trump’s initial rosy assessment.

“Let’s be very clear: Russia meddled in our election,” Ryan said. “We know they interfered with our elections, and we have passed sanctions on Russia to hold them accountable.”

When asked about election meddling during the joint news conference with Putin on Monday, Trump said, “President Putin was extremely strong and powerful in his denial today.”
…

A federal judge in Virginia on Tuesday denied a motion by former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort to move a trial set to start next week from the Washington suburb of Alexandria to the city of Roanoke, Virginia.

Manafort had requested a change of venue on the grounds that local publicity about the case would make it hard to get a fair trial. But U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis denied the request, saying a questionnaire would ensure that a panel of impartial jurors could be selected.

The trial is one of two at which Manafort must defend himself against a number of charges ranging from bank fraud to failing to register as a foreign agent for lobbying work for pro-Russia politicians in Ukraine.

Manafort’s prosecution arose out of U.S. special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into possible collusion between Russia and U.S. President Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign. One trial is set for July 25 in Alexandria, Virginia, and the second case in Washington has a Sept. 17 trial date.

Judge Ellis, who is overseeing the Alexandria case, has yet to rule on Manafort’s motion to postpone proceedings until after the Washington trial is done.

Earlier on Tuesday, Mueller filed a series of sealed motions calling for immunity for five potential witnesses in the Alexandria trial.

Ellis last week denied Manafort’s bid to stay at a jail in rural Virginia where he said he was being treated like a “VIP,” and ordered him moved to a jail in Alexandria closer to his attorneys and his home.
…

A federal judge in Virginia on Tuesday denied a motion by former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort to move a trial set to start next week from the Washington suburb of Alexandria to the city of Roanoke, Virginia.

Manafort had requested a change of venue on the grounds that local publicity about the case would make it hard to get a fair trial. But U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis denied the request, saying a questionnaire would ensure that a panel of impartial jurors could be selected.

The trial is one of two at which Manafort must defend himself against a number of charges ranging from bank fraud to failing to register as a foreign agent for lobbying work for pro-Russia politicians in Ukraine.

Manafort’s prosecution arose out of U.S. special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into possible collusion between Russia and U.S. President Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign. One trial is set for July 25 in Alexandria, Virginia, and the second case in Washington has a Sept. 17 trial date.

Judge Ellis, who is overseeing the Alexandria case, has yet to rule on Manafort’s motion to postpone proceedings until after the Washington trial is done.

Earlier on Tuesday, Mueller filed a series of sealed motions calling for immunity for five potential witnesses in the Alexandria trial.

Ellis last week denied Manafort’s bid to stay at a jail in rural Virginia where he said he was being treated like a “VIP,” and ordered him moved to a jail in Alexandria closer to his attorneys and his home.
…

Democratic lawmakers joined scores of scientists, health providers, environmental officials and activists Tuesday in denouncing an industry-backed proposal that could limit dramatically the scientific studies the Environmental Protection Agency considers in shaping protections for human health.

If adopted by the Trump administration, the rule would allow an EPA administrator to reject study results in making decisions about chemicals, pollutants and other health risks if underlying research data is not made public because of patient privacy concerns or other issues.

Opponents said the move would throw out the kind of public-health studies that underlie enforcement of the Clean Air Act and other landmark environmental controls, since the studies drew on confidential health data from thousands of individuals.

Democratic Rep. Paul Tonko of New York said the proposed rule was “a thinly veiled campaign to limit research … that supports critical regulatory action.”

The rule was proposed by then-Administrator Scott Pruitt before his resignation earlier this month amid mounting ethics scandals.

At the public hearing Tuesday, opponents outnumbered supporters.

It “enables the public to more meaningfully comment on the science” behind environmental regulation, said Joseph Stanko, a representative of industry trade groups and companies affected by what he said were increasingly stringent air-pollution regulations.

Backers have expressed their own worries about how the broadly written rule would apply to confidential trade secrets. Ted Steichen of the American Petroleum Institute said his group supports the initiative to “enhance transparency while ensuring privacy.”

Rep. Suzanne Bonamici, D-Ore., said the EPA proposal was the latest version of years of “transparency” legislation for EPA that Congress had rejected. She called it “an administrative attempt to circumvent the legislative process.”

New York state officials and representatives of public and private universities were among others speaking against the proposal.

Opponents also included community health practitioners who had taken time off their jobs to speak at the hearing.

Researcher Pam Miller, who works with Alaska Native communities affected by toxins, said she traveled from Anchorage to speak at the meeting. Hospital nurse Erica Bardwell came from nearby Arlington, Virginia.

Health workers “care about patients and won’t surrender their confidentiality. Which means studies won’t get done,” Bardwell said after her testimony.

“Which is the point” of the proposal, Bardwell added.

Critics said the policy shift is designed to restrict the agency from citing peer-reviewed public-health studies that use patient medical records that must be kept confidential under patient privacy laws.

Such studies include the Harvard School of Public Health’s landmark Six Cities study of 1993, which established links between death rates and dirty air in major U.S. cities. That study was used by EPA to justify tighter air-quality rules opposed by industrial polluters.

While Pruitt introduced the proposal, the EPA is continuing the steps toward its formal adoption under the new acting administrator, former Pruitt EPA deputy Andrew Wheeler.

In an email, EPA spokesman James Hewitt indicated Tuesday that Wheeler wanted to balance transparency and privacy concerns.

“Acting Administrator Wheeler believes the more information you put out to the public the better the regulatory outcome. He also believes the agency should prioritize ways to safeguard sensitive information,” Hewitt said.

The proposal is open for public comment through mid-August before any final EPA and White House review.
…

Democratic lawmakers joined scores of scientists, health providers, environmental officials and activists Tuesday in denouncing an industry-backed proposal that could limit dramatically the scientific studies the Environmental Protection Agency considers in shaping protections for human health.

If adopted by the Trump administration, the rule would allow an EPA administrator to reject study results in making decisions about chemicals, pollutants and other health risks if underlying research data is not made public because of patient privacy concerns or other issues.

Opponents said the move would throw out the kind of public-health studies that underlie enforcement of the Clean Air Act and other landmark environmental controls, since the studies drew on confidential health data from thousands of individuals.

Democratic Rep. Paul Tonko of New York said the proposed rule was “a thinly veiled campaign to limit research … that supports critical regulatory action.”

The rule was proposed by then-Administrator Scott Pruitt before his resignation earlier this month amid mounting ethics scandals.

At the public hearing Tuesday, opponents outnumbered supporters.

It “enables the public to more meaningfully comment on the science” behind environmental regulation, said Joseph Stanko, a representative of industry trade groups and companies affected by what he said were increasingly stringent air-pollution regulations.

Backers have expressed their own worries about how the broadly written rule would apply to confidential trade secrets. Ted Steichen of the American Petroleum Institute said his group supports the initiative to “enhance transparency while ensuring privacy.”

Rep. Suzanne Bonamici, D-Ore., said the EPA proposal was the latest version of years of “transparency” legislation for EPA that Congress had rejected. She called it “an administrative attempt to circumvent the legislative process.”

New York state officials and representatives of public and private universities were among others speaking against the proposal.

Opponents also included community health practitioners who had taken time off their jobs to speak at the hearing.

Researcher Pam Miller, who works with Alaska Native communities affected by toxins, said she traveled from Anchorage to speak at the meeting. Hospital nurse Erica Bardwell came from nearby Arlington, Virginia.

Health workers “care about patients and won’t surrender their confidentiality. Which means studies won’t get done,” Bardwell said after her testimony.

“Which is the point” of the proposal, Bardwell added.

Critics said the policy shift is designed to restrict the agency from citing peer-reviewed public-health studies that use patient medical records that must be kept confidential under patient privacy laws.

Such studies include the Harvard School of Public Health’s landmark Six Cities study of 1993, which established links between death rates and dirty air in major U.S. cities. That study was used by EPA to justify tighter air-quality rules opposed by industrial polluters.

While Pruitt introduced the proposal, the EPA is continuing the steps toward its formal adoption under the new acting administrator, former Pruitt EPA deputy Andrew Wheeler.

In an email, EPA spokesman James Hewitt indicated Tuesday that Wheeler wanted to balance transparency and privacy concerns.

“Acting Administrator Wheeler believes the more information you put out to the public the better the regulatory outcome. He also believes the agency should prioritize ways to safeguard sensitive information,” Hewitt said.

The proposal is open for public comment through mid-August before any final EPA and White House review.
…

Former U.S. president Barack Obama Tuesday delivered the 16th Nelson Mandela Annual Lecture in Johannesburg. He urged people in South Africa and elsewhere to follow the late Nobel Peace Prize winner’s example and combat the politics of fear and division.

In his speech, Obama bemoaned what he described as the return of the old order of things. He said there is evidence of continued racism in both the U.S. and South Africa despite Mandela’s 67 years in confronting the issue.

Turning to diminishing democracy in some parts of the world, Obama urged leaders to follow the example Mandela set.

“Madiba guided this nation through negotiation, painstakingly, reconciliation, its first fair and free elections,” Obama said, referring to Mandela by his tribal name. “We all witnessed the grace, the generosity with which he embraced former enemies, the wisdom for him to step away from power once he felt his job was complete.”

Obama said it was sad that new wealth has compounded inequalities, with the captains of industry growing increasingly detached from the people around them.

He also reflected on global events, saying America’s interference in the Middle East and the growing influence of Russia and China were some of the worrying developments.

Obama sounded a warning, saying the politics of fear, resentment and retrenchment are growing stronger at a pace never seen before. However, he said, all hope was not lost.

I believe in Nelson Mandela’s vision…. I believe in a vision of equality and justice and freedom and multi-racial democracy built on the premise that all people are created equal and are endowed by our creator with certain inalienable rights.”

Obama’s speech was welcomed with applause, cheers and ululation.

Godfree Moketsi traveled 400 kilometers from the Limpopo Province to Johannesburg to see and hear Obama speak.

“Yah, Obama is on point,” he said. “He has been talking about capitalists who are enriching themselves. They forget about the poor and it’s not the reflection of Madiba. Economical radical transformation is what we want now and Obama touched those kinds of things.”

The other speakers of the day thanked Obama, saying he was a great inspiration to young people across the African continent.
…

Former U.S. president Barack Obama Tuesday delivered the 16th Nelson Mandela Annual Lecture in Johannesburg. He urged people in South Africa and elsewhere to follow the late Nobel Peace Prize winner’s example and combat the politics of fear and division.

In his speech, Obama bemoaned what he described as the return of the old order of things. He said there is evidence of continued racism in both the U.S. and South Africa despite Mandela’s 67 years in confronting the issue.

Turning to diminishing democracy in some parts of the world, Obama urged leaders to follow the example Mandela set.

“Madiba guided this nation through negotiation, painstakingly, reconciliation, its first fair and free elections,” Obama said, referring to Mandela by his tribal name. “We all witnessed the grace, the generosity with which he embraced former enemies, the wisdom for him to step away from power once he felt his job was complete.”

Obama said it was sad that new wealth has compounded inequalities, with the captains of industry growing increasingly detached from the people around them.

He also reflected on global events, saying America’s interference in the Middle East and the growing influence of Russia and China were some of the worrying developments.

Obama sounded a warning, saying the politics of fear, resentment and retrenchment are growing stronger at a pace never seen before. However, he said, all hope was not lost.

I believe in Nelson Mandela’s vision…. I believe in a vision of equality and justice and freedom and multi-racial democracy built on the premise that all people are created equal and are endowed by our creator with certain inalienable rights.”

Obama’s speech was welcomed with applause, cheers and ululation.

Godfree Moketsi traveled 400 kilometers from the Limpopo Province to Johannesburg to see and hear Obama speak.

“Yah, Obama is on point,” he said. “He has been talking about capitalists who are enriching themselves. They forget about the poor and it’s not the reflection of Madiba. Economical radical transformation is what we want now and Obama touched those kinds of things.”

The other speakers of the day thanked Obama, saying he was a great inspiration to young people across the African continent.
…

A liberal woman of color with zero name recognition and little funding takes down a powerful, long serving congressman from her own political party.

When Tahirah Amatul-Wadud heard about Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s stunning upset over U.S. Rep. Joe Crowley in New York’s Democratic primary last month, the first-time candidate saw parallels with her own longshot campaign for Congress in western Massachusetts.

The 44-year-old Muslim, African-American civil rights lawyer, who is taking on a 30-year congressman and ranking Democrat on the influential House Ways and Means Committee, said she wasn’t alone, as encouragement, volunteers and donations started pouring in.

“We could barely stay on top of the residual love,” said Amatul-Wadud, U.S. Rep. Richard Neal’s lone challenger in the state’s Sept. 4 Democratic primary. “It sent a message to all of our volunteers, voters and supporters that winning is very possible.” 

From Congress to state legislatures and school boards, Muslim Americans spurred to action by the anti-Muslim policies and rhetoric of President Donald Trump and his supporters are running for elected offices in numbers not seen since before the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, say Muslim groups and political observers.

Many, like Amatul-Wadud, hope to ride the surge of progressive activism within the Democratic Party that delivered Ocasio-Cortez’s unlikely win and could help propel the Democrats back to power in November. 

Still, the path to victory can be tougher for a Muslim American. Some promising campaigns already have fizzled out while many more face strong anti-Muslim backlash.

In Michigan, Democrat candidate for governor Abdul El-Sayed continues to face unfounded claims from a GOP rival that he has ties to the controversial Muslim Brotherhood, even though Republican and Democratic politicians alike have denounced the accusations as “conspiracy theories.”

In Rochester, Minnesota, mayoral candidate Regina Mustafa has notified authorities of at least two instances where anti-Muslim threats were posted on her social media accounts. 

And in Arizona, U.S. Senate candidate Deedra Abboud received a torrent of Islamophobic attacks on Facebook last July that prompted outgoing U.S. Sen. Jeff Flake, the Republican lawmaker Abboud is hoping to replace, to come to her defense on Twitter.

“I’m a strong believer that we have to face this rhetoric,” said Abboud, who has also had right-wing militant groups the Fraternal Order of Alt-Knights and the Proud Boys stage armed protests her campaign events. “We can’t ignore it or pretend like it’s a fringe element anymore. We have to let the ugly face show so that we can decide if that is us.”

There were as many as 90 Muslim-Americans running for national or statewide offices this election cycle, a number that Muslim groups say was unprecedented, at least in the post-9/11 era.

But recent primaries have whittled the field down to around 50, a number that still far exceeds the dozen or so that ran in 2016, said Shaun Kennedy, co-founder of Jetpac, a Massachusetts nonprofit that helps train Muslim-American candidates.

Among the candidates to fall short were California physician Asif Mahmood, who placed third in last month’s primary for state insurance commissioner, despite raising more than $1 million. And in Texas, wealthy businessman Tahir Javed finished a distant second in his Democratic primary for Congress, despite an endorsement from Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York.

Nine candidates for Congress are still in the running, according to Jetpac’s tally. At least 18 others are campaigning for state legislature and 10 more seek major statewide and local offices, such as governor, mayor and city council. Even more are running for more modest offices like local planning board and school committee.

The next critical stretch of primaries is in August. 

In Michigan, at least seven Muslim Americans are on the Aug. 7 ballot, including El-Sayed, who could become the nation’s first Muslim governor.

In Minnesota, the decision by Keith Ellison, the nation’s first Muslim congressman, to run for state attorney general has set off a political frenzy for his congressional seat that includes two Muslim candidates, both Democrats: Ilhan Omar, the country’s first Somali-American state lawmaker, and Jamal Abdulahi, a Somali-American activist.

But historic wins in those and other races are far from assured, cautions Geoffrey Skelley, an associate editor at Sabato’s Crystal Ball, a nonpartisan political analysis website run by the University of Virginia’s Center for Politics.

Omar’s chances of emerging from a field of five Democratic candidates in Minnesota’s Aug. 14 primary was bolstered by a recent endorsement from the state Democratic Party, but El-Sayed is an underdog in his gubernatorial race, he said.

Other Muslim-American candidates might fare better in Michigan, which has one of the nation’s largest Arab-American populations, Skelley added.

There, former state Rep. Rashida Tlaib has raised more money than her Democratic rivals in the race to succeed Democratic Rep. John Conyers, who resigned last year amid allegations of sexual misconduct. Former Obama administration official Fayrouz Saad is also running as a Democrat in the wide open race to succeed Republican Rep. David Trott, who isn’t seeking re-election. 

Either could become the first Muslim woman elected to Congress, which has only ever had two Muslim members: outgoing Ellison and Rep. Andre Carson, an Indiana Democrat seeking re-election.

Saad, who served most recently as director of Detroit’s Office of Immigrant Affairs, recognizes the importance of representing her community in an era of rising Islamophobia. 

The 35-year-old broke from the conservative Republican politics of her Lebanese immigrant parents following the 9/11 attacks because she felt Arabs and Muslims were unfairly targeted. 

“I felt the way to push back against that was to be at the table,” said Saad, adding that her parents’ political leanings have also since moved to the left. “We have to step up and be voices for our communities and not wait for others to speak on behalf of us.”

But not all Muslim candidates feel that way.

In San Diego, California, 37-year-old Republican congressional candidate Omar Qudrat declined to comment on how Islamophobia has impacted his campaign, including instances when his faith have been called into question by members of his own political party.

Instead, the political newcomer, who is one of at least three Muslim Republicans running nationwide this year, provided a statement touting his main campaign issues as faces Democratic U.S. Rep. Scott Peters in November: addressing San Diego’s high number of homeless military veterans, improving public education and expanding economic opportunities for city residents.

“Running for public office is about advancing the interests of your constituents and the American people,” Qudrat’s statement reads. “Nothing else.”
…

A liberal woman of color with zero name recognition and little funding takes down a powerful, long serving congressman from her own political party.

When Tahirah Amatul-Wadud heard about Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s stunning upset over U.S. Rep. Joe Crowley in New York’s Democratic primary last month, the first-time candidate saw parallels with her own longshot campaign for Congress in western Massachusetts.

The 44-year-old Muslim, African-American civil rights lawyer, who is taking on a 30-year congressman and ranking Democrat on the influential House Ways and Means Committee, said she wasn’t alone, as encouragement, volunteers and donations started pouring in.

“We could barely stay on top of the residual love,” said Amatul-Wadud, U.S. Rep. Richard Neal’s lone challenger in the state’s Sept. 4 Democratic primary. “It sent a message to all of our volunteers, voters and supporters that winning is very possible.” 

From Congress to state legislatures and school boards, Muslim Americans spurred to action by the anti-Muslim policies and rhetoric of President Donald Trump and his supporters are running for elected offices in numbers not seen since before the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, say Muslim groups and political observers.

Many, like Amatul-Wadud, hope to ride the surge of progressive activism within the Democratic Party that delivered Ocasio-Cortez’s unlikely win and could help propel the Democrats back to power in November. 

Still, the path to victory can be tougher for a Muslim American. Some promising campaigns already have fizzled out while many more face strong anti-Muslim backlash.

In Michigan, Democrat candidate for governor Abdul El-Sayed continues to face unfounded claims from a GOP rival that he has ties to the controversial Muslim Brotherhood, even though Republican and Democratic politicians alike have denounced the accusations as “conspiracy theories.”

In Rochester, Minnesota, mayoral candidate Regina Mustafa has notified authorities of at least two instances where anti-Muslim threats were posted on her social media accounts. 

And in Arizona, U.S. Senate candidate Deedra Abboud received a torrent of Islamophobic attacks on Facebook last July that prompted outgoing U.S. Sen. Jeff Flake, the Republican lawmaker Abboud is hoping to replace, to come to her defense on Twitter.

“I’m a strong believer that we have to face this rhetoric,” said Abboud, who has also had right-wing militant groups the Fraternal Order of Alt-Knights and the Proud Boys stage armed protests her campaign events. “We can’t ignore it or pretend like it’s a fringe element anymore. We have to let the ugly face show so that we can decide if that is us.”

There were as many as 90 Muslim-Americans running for national or statewide offices this election cycle, a number that Muslim groups say was unprecedented, at least in the post-9/11 era.

But recent primaries have whittled the field down to around 50, a number that still far exceeds the dozen or so that ran in 2016, said Shaun Kennedy, co-founder of Jetpac, a Massachusetts nonprofit that helps train Muslim-American candidates.

Among the candidates to fall short were California physician Asif Mahmood, who placed third in last month’s primary for state insurance commissioner, despite raising more than $1 million. And in Texas, wealthy businessman Tahir Javed finished a distant second in his Democratic primary for Congress, despite an endorsement from Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York.

Nine candidates for Congress are still in the running, according to Jetpac’s tally. At least 18 others are campaigning for state legislature and 10 more seek major statewide and local offices, such as governor, mayor and city council. Even more are running for more modest offices like local planning board and school committee.

The next critical stretch of primaries is in August. 

In Michigan, at least seven Muslim Americans are on the Aug. 7 ballot, including El-Sayed, who could become the nation’s first Muslim governor.

In Minnesota, the decision by Keith Ellison, the nation’s first Muslim congressman, to run for state attorney general has set off a political frenzy for his congressional seat that includes two Muslim candidates, both Democrats: Ilhan Omar, the country’s first Somali-American state lawmaker, and Jamal Abdulahi, a Somali-American activist.

But historic wins in those and other races are far from assured, cautions Geoffrey Skelley, an associate editor at Sabato’s Crystal Ball, a nonpartisan political analysis website run by the University of Virginia’s Center for Politics.

Omar’s chances of emerging from a field of five Democratic candidates in Minnesota’s Aug. 14 primary was bolstered by a recent endorsement from the state Democratic Party, but El-Sayed is an underdog in his gubernatorial race, he said.

Other Muslim-American candidates might fare better in Michigan, which has one of the nation’s largest Arab-American populations, Skelley added.

There, former state Rep. Rashida Tlaib has raised more money than her Democratic rivals in the race to succeed Democratic Rep. John Conyers, who resigned last year amid allegations of sexual misconduct. Former Obama administration official Fayrouz Saad is also running as a Democrat in the wide open race to succeed Republican Rep. David Trott, who isn’t seeking re-election. 

Either could become the first Muslim woman elected to Congress, which has only ever had two Muslim members: outgoing Ellison and Rep. Andre Carson, an Indiana Democrat seeking re-election.

Saad, who served most recently as director of Detroit’s Office of Immigrant Affairs, recognizes the importance of representing her community in an era of rising Islamophobia. 

The 35-year-old broke from the conservative Republican politics of her Lebanese immigrant parents following the 9/11 attacks because she felt Arabs and Muslims were unfairly targeted. 

“I felt the way to push back against that was to be at the table,” said Saad, adding that her parents’ political leanings have also since moved to the left. “We have to step up and be voices for our communities and not wait for others to speak on behalf of us.”

But not all Muslim candidates feel that way.

In San Diego, California, 37-year-old Republican congressional candidate Omar Qudrat declined to comment on how Islamophobia has impacted his campaign, including instances when his faith have been called into question by members of his own political party.

Instead, the political newcomer, who is one of at least three Muslim Republicans running nationwide this year, provided a statement touting his main campaign issues as faces Democratic U.S. Rep. Scott Peters in November: addressing San Diego’s high number of homeless military veterans, improving public education and expanding economic opportunities for city residents.

“Running for public office is about advancing the interests of your constituents and the American people,” Qudrat’s statement reads. “Nothing else.”
…

Russian President Vladimir Putin denied having any compromising information on U.S. President Donald Trump and called the idea that Russia meddled in 2016 U.S. presidential elections “utterly ridiculous.”

During a contentious interview with Fox News anchor Chris Wallace, Putin said, “Interference with the domestic affairs of the United States — do you really believe that someone acting from the Russian territory could have influenced the United States and influenced the choice of millions of Americans?”

The interview, which aired Monday night, came shortly after the Russian leader met with Trump in Helsinki for a highly anticipated summit.

He also refused to engage with Wallace on the subject of special counsel Robert Mueller’s indictment of a dozen Russian officials.

Wallace tried to offer Putin a copy of the indictment, which names 12 officials of the Russian military intelligence agency, the GRU. They are being accused of working to hack the servers of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, the Democratic National Committee and emails associated with former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign in 2016.

Putin neither commented on the indictment nor accepted a copy offered by Wallace.

Eventually, Putin questioned Mueller’s probe, questioning why the former FBI chief hadn’t reached out to the Russian government for help in the investigation, pointing to a treaty between the two countries regarding assistance in criminal investigations.

“Why wouldn’t special counsel Mueller send us an official request within the framework of this agreement?” Putin asked. “Our investigators will be acting in accordance with this treaty. They will question each individual that the American partners are suspecting of something. Why not a single request was filed?”

Putin also denied having “kompromat” or “compromising material” on Trump.

“I don’t want to insult President Trump when I say this — and I may come as rude — but before he announced that he will run for presidency, he was of no interest for us,” he said.

As for the summit, Putin pronounced it “the beginning of the path” back from the West’s past efforts to isolate Russia.

“I think you see for yourself that these efforts failed, and they were never bound to succeed,” he said.
…

Russian President Vladimir Putin denied having any compromising information on U.S. President Donald Trump and called the idea that Russia meddled in 2016 U.S. presidential elections “utterly ridiculous.”

During a contentious interview with Fox News anchor Chris Wallace, Putin said, “Interference with the domestic affairs of the United States — do you really believe that someone acting from the Russian territory could have influenced the United States and influenced the choice of millions of Americans?”

The interview, which aired Monday night, came shortly after the Russian leader met with Trump in Helsinki for a highly anticipated summit.

He also refused to engage with Wallace on the subject of special counsel Robert Mueller’s indictment of a dozen Russian officials.

Wallace tried to offer Putin a copy of the indictment, which names 12 officials of the Russian military intelligence agency, the GRU. They are being accused of working to hack the servers of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, the Democratic National Committee and emails associated with former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign in 2016.

Putin neither commented on the indictment nor accepted a copy offered by Wallace.

Eventually, Putin questioned Mueller’s probe, questioning why the former FBI chief hadn’t reached out to the Russian government for help in the investigation, pointing to a treaty between the two countries regarding assistance in criminal investigations.

“Why wouldn’t special counsel Mueller send us an official request within the framework of this agreement?” Putin asked. “Our investigators will be acting in accordance with this treaty. They will question each individual that the American partners are suspecting of something. Why not a single request was filed?”

Putin also denied having “kompromat” or “compromising material” on Trump.

“I don’t want to insult President Trump when I say this — and I may come as rude — but before he announced that he will run for presidency, he was of no interest for us,” he said.

As for the summit, Putin pronounced it “the beginning of the path” back from the West’s past efforts to isolate Russia.

“I think you see for yourself that these efforts failed, and they were never bound to succeed,” he said.
…

U.S. President Donald Trump and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin made a flurry of headlines in their meeting on Monday in Finland. But perhaps none bigger than their comments on Russia’s alleged meddling in U.S. politics, as VOA’s Bill Gallo reports from Helsinki.
…

At the beginning of 2017, one of Julian Assange’s biggest media boosters traveled to the WikiLeaks founder’s refuge inside the Ecuadorean Embassy in London and asked him where he got the leaks that shook up the U.S. presidential election months earlier.

Fox News host Sean Hannity pointed straight to the purloined emails from the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton’s campaign chairman.

“Can you say to the American people, unequivocally, that you did not get this information about the DNC, John Podesta’s emails, can you tell the American people 1,000 percent you did not get it from Russia or anybody associated with Russia?”

“Yes,” Assange said. “We can say — we have said repeatedly — over the last two months that our source is not the Russian government and it is not a state party.”

12 Russians indicted

The Justice Department’s indictment Friday of 12 Russian military intelligence officers undermines those denials. And if the criminal charges are proved, it would show that WikiLeaks (referred to as “Organization 1” in the indictment) received the material from Guccifer 2.0, a persona directly controlled by Russia’s Main Intelligence Directorate of the General Staff, also known as GRU, and even gave the Russian hackers advice on how to disseminate it.

Whether Assange knew that those behind Guccifer 2.0 were Russian agents is not addressed in the indictment. But it seems unlikely that Assange, a former hacker who once boasted of having compromised U.S. military networks himself, could have missed the extensive coverage blaming the Kremlin for the DNC hack.

Assange told Hannity he exercised exclusive control over WikiLeaks’ releases.

“There is one person in the world, and I think it’s actually only one, who knows exactly what’s going on with our publications and that’s me,” Assange said.

Timeline

On June 22, 2016, by which point the online publication Motherboard had already debunked Guccifer 2.0’s claim to be a lone Romanian hacker, WikiLeaks sent a typo-ridden message to the persona, saying that releasing the material through WikiLeaks would have “a much higher impact than what you are doing,” the indictment states.

“If you have anything hillary related we want it in the next (two) days pref(er)able because the DNC is approaching and she will solidify bernie supporters behind her after,” says a message from July 6, 2016, referring to the upcoming Democratic National Convention and Clinton’s chief party rival, Bernie Sanders.

The exchange appears to point to a desire to undercut Clinton by playing up divisions within the Democratic camp.

“we think trump has only a 25% chance of winning against hillary … so conflict between bernie and hillary is interesting,” the message says.

At that time in the campaign, there were simmering tensions between the supporters of Clinton and Sanders that would come to a head during the convention because of the hacked emails.

WikiLeaks and a lawyer for Assange, Melinda Taylor, did not return messages seeking comment on the indictment or the exchanges with Guccifer 2.0.

Reporter told to butt out

Assange’s eagerness to get his hands on the alleged material from GRU reflected in the indictment — and prevent anyone else from beating WikiLeaks to the punch — is also revealed in leaked messages to journalist Emma Best. She, like several other reporters, also was in communication with Guccifer 2.0.

In copies of Twitter messages obtained by The Associated Press and first reported by BuzzFeed, WikiLeaks demands that Best butt out.

“Please ‘leave’ their convers(a)tion with them and us,” WikiLeaks said on August 13, 2016, arguing that the impact of material would be “very substantially reduced” if Best handled the leak.

Best told BuzzFeed she dropped the matter. About an hour after the conversation ended, Guccifer 2.0 announced on Twitter that it was sending a “major trove” of data and emails to WikiLeaks.

Seth Rich theory put to rest

The indictment also puts to rest a conspiracy theory, carefully nurtured by Assange and his supporters, that slain DNC staffer Seth Rich was at the origin of the leaks.

Rich died in July 2016 in what police in the District of Columbia say was a botched robbery. But the tragedy became fodder for conspiracy theorists who pushed the unfounded allegation that Rich, 27, had been providing information to the hackers and was killed for it.

It was Assange who first floated the idea into the mainstream, bringing up Rich’s case in an interview with Dutch television the following month.

“What are you suggesting?” the startled anchor asked him.

“I’m suggesting that our sources take risks and they become concerned to see things occurring like that,” Assange answered.

The anchor pressed Assange repeatedly, eventually saying: “It’s quite something to suggest a murder. That’s basically what you’re doing.”

Over the next few months, WikiLeaks would continue to amplify the conspiracy theory — all while stopping short of endorsing it outright. During all this time, the indictment alleges, WikiLeaks knew full well that Guccifer 2.0 was its source, cajoling the account’s operators to hand it more data and ordering rival journalists to steer clear.

The conspiracy theory has been a source of deep pain for Rich’s family, who declined to comment on the indictment.

Lisa Lynch, an associate professor of media and communications at Drew University who has written about WikiLeaks, said the indictment highlighted the cynicism of WikiLeaks’ wink-wink support for conspiracy theories.

“We can see very well-intentioned people arguing about whether those documents should be published,” Lynch said of the DNC documents. “But the whole Seth Rich thing is incredibly venal.”
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A federal judge, responding to a plan to reunify children separated at the border, said he was having second thoughts about his belief that the Trump administration was acting in good faith to comply with his orders.

The Justice Department on Friday filed a plan to reunify more than 2,500 children age 5 and older by a court-imposed deadline of July 26 using “truncated” procedures to verify parentage and perform background checks, which exclude DNA testing and other steps it took to reunify children younger than 5.

The administration said the abbreviated vetting puts children at significant safety risk but is needed to meet the deadline. Chris Meekins, the deputy assistant Health and Human Services secretary for preparedness and response, filed a declaration that he is fully committed to meeting the deadline. However, he does not believe “the placing of children into such situations is consistent with the mission of HHS or my core values.”

Judge reconsiders ‘good faith’

U.S. District Judge Dana Sabraw took umbrage at Meekins’ statement, disputing the official’s interpretation of his orders and saying that safe reunification could and will occur by July 26.

“It is clear from Mr. Meekins’s declaration that HHS either does not understand the court’s orders or is acting in defiance of them,” he wrote late Friday. “At a minimum, it appears he is attempting to provide cover to defendants for their own conduct in the practice of family separation, and the lack of foresight and infrastructure necessary to remedy the harms caused by that practice.”

Sabraw, an appointee of President George W. Bush, said Meekins’ statement “calls into question” his comments in court hours earlier that the administration was acting in good faith.

Monitoring progress

Sabraw said in court Friday that the administration had largely complied with orders but, at the same time, he indicated he will be monitoring its actions ahead of the deadline.

The judge said the administration must provide a list of names of parents in immigration custody and their children by Monday and complete background checks for them by Thursday. He scheduled four hearings over the next two weeks for updates, including one Monday.

“The task is laborious, but can be accomplished in the time and manner prescribed,” he wrote in his order.
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Social networking site Twitter Saturday suspended two accounts linked to 12 Russian spies indicted by Special Counsel Robert Mueller for interfering in the 2016 U.S. presidential election.

On Friday, a federal grand jury charged the 12 Russian intelligence officers with hacking Democratic computer networks in 2016 in the most detailed U.S. accusation yet that Moscow meddled in the election to help Republican Donald Trump.

Twitter said Saturday it had suspended the accounts @DCLeaks_ and @Guccifer_2 that were named in the indictment, which alleges a wide-ranging conspiracy involving sophisticated hacking and staged release of documents.

The indictment alleges that from around June 2016 the conspirators released tens of thousands of stolen emails and documents “using fictitious online personas, including ‘DCLeaks’ and ‘Guccifer 2.0.’”

In a statement Saturday, a Twitter spokesman said: “The accounts have been suspended for being connected to a network of accounts previously suspended for operating in violation of our rules.”

Twitter in recent months has purged suspicious user accounts in a bid to prevent the dissemination of fake news and “encourage healthy conversation,” the company said this month.

Friday’s indictment was the first by Mueller that directly charges the Russian government with meddling in the election. The Kremlin denies it interfered.

Speaking at a cybersecurity conference in Philadelphia on Saturday, U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen said the indictments proved that the United States “will not tolerate interference with our democratic processes and that there will be consequences for foreign meddling.”
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