Republicans avoid crossing Trump over hacking
MOST REPUBLICANS RELUCTANT TO CONTRADICT PRESIDENT-ELECT’S STATEMENTS DURING U.S. SENATE PANEL HEARING ON FOREIGN CYBERTHREATS
ASenate panel hearing Thursday on foreign cyberthreats quickly became a politically charged affair, with Democrats eagerly questioning intelligence officials about Russian interference in the election while most Republicans seemed keen to avoid drawing links between president-elect Donald Trump and the Russian government.
The prevailing Republican posture during the Senate Armed Services Committee hearing highlighted the reluctance among many in the GOP to cross Trump, who has voiced skepticism about the CIA’s assessment that Russia interfered to help him defeat Hillary Clinton.
Such reluctance comes after years of widespread Republican distrust of Russia and their openly questioning the intentions of President Vladimir Putin and other state leaders.
There were two exceptions Thursday: The committee’s chairman, John McCain, and Sen. Lindsey Graham, two longtime national security hawks who did not hold back from sounding alarms about Russia’s meddling in the election and the implications for the future.
“Every American should be alarmed by Russia’s attacks on our nation,” said McCain in his opening remarks. “There is no national security interest more vital to the United States of America than the ability to hold free and fair elections without foreign interference. That’s why Congress must set partisanship aside, follow the facts and work together to devise comprehensive solutions to deter, defend against and when necessary, respond to foreign cyberattacks.”
Other Republicans peppered Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and two other officials with queries about intrusions from other nations, including an instance of Chinese hackers breaching the Office of Personnel Management’s database in 2015, general questions about the nation’s security apparatus and skepticism about why Russia would want Trump to win.
Clapper has pushed back against a barrage of criticism levelled against U.S. intelligence agencies by Trump in recent days and the president-elect’s apparent embrace of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.
During an exchange with Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill, Clapper said “there is an important distinction here between healthy skepticism” and “disparagement.” He said the intelligence community is an organization of human beings and isn’t perfect. But he said U.S. spy agencies also don’t get the credit they deserve for foiling terrorist plots and other successes too secret to discuss.
In new tweets early Thursday, Trump backed away from Assange. He blamed the “dishonest media” for portraying him as agreeing with the WikiLeaks founder, whose organization has been under criminal investigation for its role in classified information leaks.
Republican Sen. Tom Cotton, a veteran of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, questioned the notion that Russia would want to help Trump.
“Donald Trump has proposed to increase our defence budget, to accelerate nuclear modernization, to accelerate ballistic missile defences, and to expand and accelerate oil and gas production, which would obviously harm Russia’s economy. Hillary Clinton opposed or at least was not as enthusiastic about all those measures,” he said.
Republican Sen. Thom Tillis cited research that concluded the United States has involved itself in 81 elections abroad since the Second World War. He said Russia has done it about 36 times.
“We live in a big glass house and there are a lot of rocks to throw,” he said.
Their lines of questioning stood in contrast to the Democrats, who were bent on repeatedly raising Russian interference in the election.
McCaskill accused Trump of “trashing” the intelligence community. Trump has disparaged the work of U.S. spy agencies and forgone many daily briefings they have offered. He said in December that he did not believe the CIA’s conclusion that Russia interfered in the election to help him win. Trump has also praised Putin.
“I assume that the biggest benefactors of the American people having less confidence in the intelligence community are, in fact, the actors you have named today; Iran, North Korea, China, Russia and ISIS,” said McCaskill, using an acronym for the Islamic State.