The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Trump to Russians: Find Clinton emails
Critics say he’s encouraging espionage.
DORAL, FLA. — Donald Trump on Wednesday challenged Russia to find deleted emails from Hillary Clinton’s tenure as secretary of state — setting off a debate over whether he was encouraging cyberspying by an adversarial foreign power.
“Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing,” Trump said, staring directly into the cameras during a news conference. “I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press.”
Trump’s call was an extraordinary moment at a time when Russia is being accused of meddling in the U.S. presidential election. His comments came amid questions about the hacking of the Democratic National Committee’s computer servers, which U.S. intelligence agencies have told the White House they have “high confidence” was the work of the Russian government.
Later in the news conference, when asked if he was really urging a foreign nation to hack into the private email server of Clinton, or at least interfere in the nation’s elections, he dismissed the question.
“That’s up to the president,” Trump said, before finally telling the questioner to “be quiet.” “Let the president talk to them.”
The Clinton campaign immediately accused Trump of both encouraging Russian espionage against the United States and meddling in domestic politics.
“This has to be the first time that a major presidential candidate has actively encouraged a foreign power to conduct espionage against his political opponent,” said Jake Sullivan, Clinton’s chief foreign policy adviser. “This has gone from being a matter of curiosity, and a matter of politics, to being a national security issue.”
A spokesman for House Speaker Paul Ryan, the nation’s top elected Republican, responded to Trump’s remarks by criticizing Russia’s behavior.
“Russia is a global menace led by a devious thug,” said the spokesman, Brendan Buck. “Putin should stay out of this election.”
Trump has largely dismissed assertions that Russia was behind the Democratic committee breach as conspiracy theories — a view he reiterated again when he said the hacker was “probably not Russia.”
But at one of his Florida golf courses, as the third day of the Democratic National Convention was set to begin in Philadelphia, the Republican presidential nominee refused to unequivocally call on Vladimir Putin, Russia’s president, to stay out of the election.
“I’m not going to tell Putin what to do,” Trump said. “Why should I tell Putin what to do?”
He added that if Russia, or any foreign government, was, in fact, behind the hack, it simply showed just how little respect other nations have for the current administration.
“President Trump would be so much better for U.S.-Russian relations” than a President Clinton, Trump said. “I don’t think he respects Clinton.”