Trump Must Cancel His Social Visit With Putin After Mueller Indicts 12 Russian Military Intelligence Officers For Election Interference
July 13, 2018
Trump Must Cancel His Visit With Putin After Mueller Indicts 12 Russian Military Intelligence Officers For Election Interference
Statement of Lisa Gilbert, Vice President of Legislative Affairs, Public Citizen
Note: U.S. Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein announced indictments against 12 Russian military intelligence officers for hacking DNC, DCCC and Hillary Clinton campaign accounts during the 2016 presidential election. President Donald Trump is recklessly moving forward to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin next week. Trump has consistently smeared his own U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) throughout the ongoing, clearly effective, special counsel probe into possible coordination between the Trump campaign and Russia.
Alarmed at Trump’s determination to ignore obvious Russian election interference, Americans from around the country will gather at democracy vigils next Wednesday night to confront corruption and demand democracy solutions to fix our system.
Donald Trump’s repeated claims that he believes Vladimir Putin’s denial of involvement in the 2016 U.S. election are, at face value, now dead in the water. Today’s indictments once again provide the American people and the Trump administration with specific and damning evidence that officials with the Russian government acted to negatively influence our democracy and tip the balance of voters’ choices.
For the sake of a functioning democracy we must allow the Mueller investigation to proceed and now it demands we work together to hold these perpetrators accountable. Trump meeting Putin abroad for a handshake and photo-op is exactly the wrong signal for accountability.
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