Philadelphia
Donald Trump didn’t mean what he said when he encouraged the Russians to commit espionage against his opponent in the presidential race, Hillary Clinton. That’s according to two prominent Republicans, who told reporters at a press conference Wednesday that what Trump really meant to say was that if anyone has hacked Clinton’s private email server, those classified emails should be handed over the American authorities.
“What was said earlier by Mr. Trump was releasing the emails to the FBI, [there’s] a big difference between releasing emails to the FBI and releasing emails onto the internet. So what is very important, so that nothing gets misconstrued, the release of those emails to the FBI would be the proper channel,” said New York congressman Lee Zeldin at a press conference organized by the Republican National Committee.
“I think that Congressman Zeldin made clear that what Donald Trump would like to see done, as I would, is to have those emails given to the FBI,” said former New York City mayor Rudy Giuiani.
Set aside the bizarre idea that if Russians—or anyone with malice toward American officials—hacked Clinton’s email server that the hackers would agree to turn over the documents to the FBI rather than release them to the public or use them to extort Clinton. While the Trump campaign has since “clarified” that Trump was encouraging hackers to turn over information to the feds, that’s not what Trump said in his Wednesday morning press conference.
“Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing, I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press. Let’s see if that happens. That’ll be next,” Trump said.
When THE WEEKLY STANDARD pointed out that Trump was encouraging Russian hackers to provide potentially classified information in Clinton’s emails to the press, Giuliani asserted that’s not what Trump meant.
“I’m sure what he means is that they should be released to the FBI. I’m sure that’s what he would do. And I’m sure that’s what he would do if he were in charge,” he said.
Other Republicans have explained away or been slow to condemn Trump’s comments.
