The report had to be released quickly to let the Russians know we were aware of their activities, and perhaps to inoculate Americans from further attempts. All countries use propaganda to shape public opinion in adversarial countries. The revelations from the emails were shocking mostly to those who wanted to be shocked, and for all the panic over fake news, it is nothing new. It was on the whole a clumsy intervention. The counter to both those arguments is that a foreign and adversarial power intruded into an American election. Obama is concerned with preserving his legacy, particularly with regards to health care, and he wants to weaken Trump’s authority. Obama wanted to control the content of the report and the timing of the its release, so that it would be made public while he is still in office. The more extreme charge will be that Obama ordered the CIA to release this report to weaken Trump politically. The charge will be made that the CIA released the report to cripple Trump, and make it impossible for him to reform the agency because it will appear like revenge. Trump’s National Security Adviser Michael Flynn has long distrusted the CIA’s performance from his days in Afghanistan, and the Trump transition team has openly discussed restructuring and downsizing the CIA. But Trump’s supporters may claim that the release was politically motivated. Some will answer this question by saying that the report was too important to be kept from the public. Some will raise the question of why this report was released with such urgency. That is a far reach, but not absurd.Īs this develops, another force might arise. It might weaken his presidency and even create a movement to use this as the basis for impeachment, regardless of whether there is any evidence of wrongdoing on his part. It was undoubtedly for this reason that Trump did not want the report made public. Nevertheless, Trump’s opponents will likely use the report to attempt to delegitimize the election and seek to block Trump’s foreign policy, particularly on Russia. However, the president not only has the right but the duty to frame his policies as he thinks best. President Barack Obama wanted better relations in the Islamic world and sometimes spoke of adversaries in ways others disapproved of. The fact that Trump had kind words for Russian President Vladimir Putin and wanted better relations with Russia indicates nothing. The president can be impeached, but nothing in the CIA report implies that Trump was guilty of any high crime or misdemeanor necessary for impeachment. There is no constitutional provision for overriding a presidential election. The report could create a constitutional crisis. His opponents already see him as illegitimate partly because he lost the popular vote and won the Electoral College only by narrow margins in the Rust Belt. The CIA carefully avoids making this conclusion, but those who regard Trump as an inappropriate president will likely use this to further delegitimize him. First, implicit in the CIA assertions is the idea that, except for Russian involvement, Trump would not be president. The report is potentially politically explosive in a number of ways. and fielded questions about effects of Russian government hacking on the 2016 presidential election. The intelligence chiefs testified to the committee about cyber threats to the U.S. Michael Rogers testify before the Senate Armed Services Committee in the Dirksen Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill on Jan.5, 2017. It is useful to look at it from that perspective, as it reveals some of the deeper vulnerabilities of the American political system at this moment.įrom left to right, Defense Undersecretary for Intelligence Marcel Lettre, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and United States Cyber Command and National Security Agency Director Adm. The report may or may not create a controversy, but if it does, it has the potential to cause significant turbulence in the American system. Also according to the report, the Russians favored Donald Trump for president. In addition, it says that the Russians engaged in propaganda and disinformation and had access to several state and local electoral boards, but did not tamper with the votes. The report asserts that the Russians stole emails belonging to the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and John Podesta to embarrass Hillary Clinton and cause her defeat. The CIA’s report on the Russian attempt to influence the American presidential election has been issued.
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