Trump Criticizes Obama For Not Acting Sooner On Russia Hacking
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WASHINGTON (CBSMiami) - President Donald Trump has criticized former President Barack Obama for not acting sooner when he learned Vladimir Putin ordered hackers to help the Trump campaign.
A report says the CIA first told Mr. Obama about the Russian President's order in August.
The President took to Twitter to voice his complaint on a subject that up until very recently he called a hoax.
The reason that President Obama did NOTHING about Russia after being notified by the CIA of meddling is that he expected Clinton would win..
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 26, 2017
...and did not want to "rock the boat." He didn't "choke," he colluded or obstructed, and it did the Dems and Crooked Hillary no good.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 26, 2017
Trump then went on.
The real story is that President Obama did NOTHING after being informed in August about Russian meddling. With 4 months looking at Russia...
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 26, 2017
..under a magnifying glass, they have zero "tapes" of T people colluding. There is no collusion & no obstruction. I should be given apology!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 26, 2017
On Friday, the Washington Post reported that the Obama administration knew the Russian government was interfering in the election in August but didn't publicly admit it until October 7th. They also hand intelligence confirming that the Russian goal was to defeat Hillary Clinton.
"Given the seriousness of this, I think the administration needed to call out Russia earlier," said Rep. Adam Schiff, a top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee.
While he's usually critic of President Trump, Schiff agrees with him on this issue.
"The Obama administration should have done more when it became clear that not only was Russia intervening, but it was being directed at the highest levels of the Kremlin," he said.
Former Obama spokesman Eric Schultz said the "situation was taken extremely seriously" as evident by Mr. Obama's "raising the issue directly with President (Vladimir) Putin."
The Obama administration also shut down two Russian government compounds and ejected 35 Russian diplomats in late December.
West Virginia Democrat Joe Manchin said both a public admission and response should have been more swift.
"What was known back in August and once it was verified and cross-checked should have been made public. It should have been made public, OK? That wasn't done," he said.
Former Obama administration officials reportedly said that they failed to act sooner because they didn't want to be seen as interfering in the election on the side of Hillary Clinton.