BY PRIYANKA ARIBINDI, BRIAN BEUTLER
& CROOKED MEDIA

Tuesday, July 17th, 2018

—Mitch McConnell, one of the most powerful people in our government, coming down hard on Russian interference in American democracy. Not.

DOUBLY NEGATIVE

The White House and its allies spent Tuesday trying and failing to clean up the damage President Trump caused in Helsinki, Finland on Monday, when he said he believes Russian President Vladimir Putin’s denials over the U.S. intelligence community’s conclusion that Russia interfered in the 2016 election on his behalf.

At a brief White House press availability, Trump claimed he misspoke: When he said, “I don't see any reason why it would be” Russia that interfered in the election, he really meant to say, “I don’t see any reason why it wouldn’t be” Russia that interfered in the election.

Trump’s walkback was ludicrous because:

• It makes no sense in context.
• He immediately contradicted himself again: "I accept our American intelligence community's conclusion that Russia's meddling in the 2016 election took place,” he added. “Could be other people also. There’s a lot of people out there." Ain’t that the truth…
• If Trump really misspoke, he would have clarified his comments immediately, not over 24 hours later, and he wouldn’t have had to read the clarification from a script.
• It’s the dumbest bullshit we have ever seen.

At the same time, conservatives parroted White House talking points by attributing Trump’s conduct to his egotism: He refuses to acknowledge Russian meddling, they say, because he worries it would tarnish his legitimacy.

This justification is just as ludicrous because:

• Trump (or at least his campaign) knew the Russians were meddling on his behalf during the campaign, and publicly welcomed the help.
• Trump was covering for Russian election meddling and other bad Russian acts before the election.
• Denying that Russians did the meddling doesn’t enhance his legitimacy at all. The damage to his legitimacy stems from the fact that someone committed crimes on his behalf, not from the specific identities of the criminals.

From Brian: Both the justification and the clarification are absurd on their own terms, but they also are incompatible with one another. The White House is simultaneously arguing that Trump sided with Putin to defend his legitimacy, and that he didn’t actually side with Putin at all. Neither story checks out, and the failed effort to spin away Monday’s catastrophe only reinforces the more straightforward implication that Trump is compromised by the Russian government, and wants Putin to interfere on his behalf again.  

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Republicans are limiting their proposed response to President Trump’s Helsinki meltdown to imposing additional sanctions on Russia. Speaker of the House Paul Ryan said they have and “can continue...to put sanctions on Russia”—sanctions that Trump has so far ignored.

Barack Obama gave a speech in South Africa to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Nelson Mandela’s birth in which he warned against “strongman politics,” and condemned growing sentiments of racism, xenophobia, and bigotry throughout the U.S. and around the world. “Elections and some pretense of democracy are maintained… but those in power seek to undermine every institution or norm that gives democracy meaning.” We noticed that too!

Trump’s private businesses made over $65,000 from U.S. taxpayers during his trip to his Scotland golf club and properties.

House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy has said the House won’t vote on Democrats’ Abolish ICE bill on Wednesday. Republicans seemingly came around to the view that letting vulnerable Democrats vote against abolishing ICE would complicate the bigger lie that all Democrats are for open borders.

MGM Resorts International is suing more than 1,000 victims of the shooting rampage in Las Vegas last October and their relatives in federal court, in an effort to quash their liability claims.

Amazon warehouse workers in Europe went on strike and walked off the job on Prime Day—Amazon’s highest grossing single day of the year—to protest working conditions, low wages, and poor health coverage. At the same time Jeff Bezos, Amazon’s CEO, became the richest person in modern history, with a net worth of more than $150 billion.

Air Force One is getting a makeover, because Trump complained she was only a 4/10.

Happy World Emoji Day (or 🎉🌎😊📅—take your pick)!

On Pod Save the People: DeRay, Sam, Clint, and Brittany discuss what white, middle-class parents report saying to their children about racial tension (which you might remember from this very newsletter), and the Trump administration’s new message to undermine anti-poverty programs.

Then, New York’s 14th congressional district Democratic primary winner Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez joins DeRay and discusses what it means to be a democratic socialist, the future of healthcare, and her historic victory.

Listen →

The Treasury Department is protecting dark money donors with new rules that "will no longer require certain tax-exempt organizations including politically active nonprofit groups, such as the National Rifle Association and Planned Parenthood, to identify their financial donors to U.S. tax authorities.” Those donors are already protected from political backlash by the absence of public disclosure laws.

The country’s top voting machine vendor, Election Systems and Software, has admitted that it installed remote-access software on systems it sold to “a small number of customers” between 2000 and 2006. The software, which allows “immediate access to the customer’s data and network system from a remote location,” had a source code that was stolen by hackers in 2006, as well as a “critical vulnerability...that would allow an attacker to seize control of a system that had the software... without needing… a password.” This vulnerability raises questions about whether hackers could change the results of American elections.

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