Trump: Call for Russia to hack Clinton's emails was a joke

President Trump asserted Saturday his notorious call during the 2016 presidential election for Russia to find Hillary Clinton’s missing emails was made in jest and not intended to be taken seriously.

“With the fake news, if you tell a joke, if you’re sarcastic, if you’re having fun with the audience, if you’re on live television with millions of people and 25,000 people in an arena, and if you say something like, ‘Russia, please if you can, get us Hillary Clinton’s emails. Please, Russia, please. Please, get us the emails, please,’” Trump said during a wide-ranging speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Maryland, as chants of “Lock her up” broke out among the crowd.