He accepts intelligence findings of interference
WASHINGTON – Seeking to quell the furor over his support of Vladimir Putin, President Donald Trump said Tuesday that he accepts the U.S. intelligence community’s assessment that Russians interfered with the 2016 election – but that others could have been involved as well.
“I accept our intelligence community’s conclusion that Russia’s meddling in the 2016 election took place – could be other people also,” Trump said at the White House.
“A lot of people out there,” he said. Trump spoke before a meeting with Republican members of the House Ways and Means Committee a day after he faced bipartisan criticism for pro-Putin comments at Monday’s summit in Helsinki.
The president said both the United States and Russia were to blame for frosty relations, and he accepted Putin’s denial of Moscow’s interference in the election despite the conclusions of the U.S. intelligence community.
“I have great confidence in my intelligence people,” Trump said Monday in Helsinki with the Russian president at his side, “but I will tell you that President Putin was extremely strong and powerful in his denial today.”
Trump said he reviewed a video of his remarks with Putin after seeing the negative attention they received. He said that he misspoke during the news conference and that he meant to say he saw no reason why it “wouldn’t” be Russia that interfered in the election.
Citing “a key sentence in my remarks,” Trump said, “I said the word ‘would’ instead of ‘wouldn’t.’ ... The sentence should have been ‘I don’t see