News breaks Friday during my “American Horror Story” binge-night that U.S. intelligence officials have assessed that Russia interfered in the nation’s electoral process to help Donald J. Trump win the 2016 presidential race.
Two days later, the president-elect of the United States is mocking the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in a Fox News television interview saying that he doesn’t believe the intelligence. “I think it’s ridiculous. I think it’s just another excuse,” Trump said.
The president-elect told Fox, “I think the Democrats are putting it out because they suffered one of the greatest defeats in the history of politics in this country.”
How can anyone who claims to care about democracy not support a full bipartisan forensic investigation and airing of the findings to the public surrounding Russia’s interference in our electoral process? Through sophisticated cyber-mischief and Lord knows what else, Russia tinkered with our election. That should send chills down American spines, regardless of political leaning.
Wake up people! Recognize that the very essence of our democracy is at stake here. President-elect Trump’s dismissive and politically insecure reaction is not only childish, it’s dangerous.
During the campaign, Mr. Trump casually dusted off talk of Russian meddling saying there was no conclusive proof.
Then came an October 2016 joint statement from the Department of Homeland Security and CIA saying they were confident the Russian government directed the recent compromises of e-mails from US persons and institutions, including from US political organizations.
Russians licking their chops over the prospect of a Trump presidency shouldn’t come as a surprise. Billions of dollars are at stake if sanctions surrounding Russia’s thuggish behavior in the Ukraine are eased or lifted.
On November 14, the chairman of the Russian parliamentary International Affairs Committee, Leonid Slutsky, told Russian reporters, “Regarding Trump’s position on recognition of Crimea and Sevastopol as part of Russia, I would very much like to hope [for it].”
Trump is surrounded by advisors with strong economic ties to Russia like former campaign manager Paul Manafort.
In August 2016, The New York Times reported that “Handwritten ledgers show $12.7 million in undisclosed cash payments designated for Mr. Manafort from Mr. Yanukovych’s pro-Russian political party from 2007 to 2012, according to Ukraine’s newly-formed National Anti-Corruption Bureau.”
That same month, the Associated Press reported that Manafort helped a pro-Russian governing party in Ukraine secretly route at least $2.2 million in payments to two prominent Washington lobbying firms in 2012, and did so in a way that effectively obscured the foreign political party’s efforts to influence U.S. policy.
All that reporting led to a swirl of questions. By August 2016, Manafort was replaced.
One name to watch and listen for is the mysterious New York City-based Carter Page who until recently Trump called one of his foreign policy advisors. Self-described Russia wonk, Politico reporter Julia Ioffe dove in on Page during an exhaustive September expose. She concludes that “the American press has been twisting itself in knots trying to explain men like Carter Page and Paul Manafort, and, through them, to answer the questions of whether Putin is trying to destroy America by their hands, and is Trump a Kremlin stooge or a just a useful idiot, and is there even a difference?”
In November, CNN reported that the FBI also has looked into alleged meetings former Trump adviser Carter Page had in Russia related to individuals under US sanctions.
On December 9, Page said “There is a high level of interest amongst US as well as European companies to get back to the Russian market. This interest cuts across a diverse array of sectors,” according to a report from Russian government-controlled news website Sputnik International.
“The hostile efforts to punish Rosneft (an integrated oil company majority owned by the Russian government) and their senior management team through Western sanctions have primarily hurt Western companies, rather than their intended target,” Page told Sputnik.
Page is talking about the 2014 sanctions signed by President Obama after Russia’s invasion and disruption of democracy in Ukraine. The sanctions, among other things, suspended U.S. arctic offshore or shale projects that have the potential to produce oil in the Russian Federation, or in maritime area claimed by the Russian Federation and extending from its territory, and that involve five major Russian energy companies.
The New York Times reported on December 8 that Page, who founded a firm called Global Energy Capital, drew attention during the summer for a speech that criticized the United States and other Western nations for a “hypocritical focus on ideas such as democratization, inequality, corruption and regime change” in Russia.
If you were looking for another piece of motive behind why Russia was jumping for joy after Donald Trump was elected President of the United States, have a close look at Trump’s potential new secretary of state, Exxon Executive Rex Tillerson.
Tillerson has been good buddies with Vlad Putin and Russia for decades. The Wall Street Journal reported on December 10 that in 2011, ExxonMobil began a $500 BILLION partnership with Rosneft. Two years later, Putin presented Tillerson with the Order of Friendship, one of Russia’s highest civilian honors.
Tillerson opposed American sanctions of Russia, calling them ineffective. Bloomberg wrote “in September 2014 that “the costliest well in the company’s history had struck oil a mile beneath the icy seas off the Siberian coast. It was what the industry likes to call an elephant—as much as a billion barrels, then worth about $97 billion.”
Then came Ukraine, the sanctions, and soon enough Exxon went home before any drilling happened.
Morality has been known to fly out the window when it comes to oil thirsty titans. Now, a bipartisan group of senators is calling for an investigation. The American people deserve a full airing of Russia’s mischief. They should also find out why Russia saw the idea of a Trump presidency as such a delicious possibility.