Donald Trump has said that he hoped Russian intelligence services had successfully hacked Hillary Clinton’s email, and encouraged them to publish whatever they may have stolen, essentially urging a foreign adversary to conduct cyberespionage against a former secretary of state.
“Russia,
if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that
are missing,” Mr. Trump said during a news conference here in an
apparent reference to Mrs. Clinton’s deleted emails. “I think you will
probably be rewarded mightily by our press.”
Trump’s call was another bizarre moment in the mystery of whether Vladimir Putin's government has been seeking to influence the United States’ presidential race.
His comments came amid questions about the hacking
of the Democratic National Committee’s computer servers, which American
intelligence agencies have told the White House they have “high
confidence” was the work of the Russian government.
At
the same news conference, Mr. Trump also appeared to leave the door
open to accepting Russia’s annexation of Crimea two years ago — which
the United States and its European allies consider an illegal seizure of
territory. That seizure, and the continued efforts of Russian-aided
insurgents to undermine the government of Ukraine, are the reason that
the United States and its allies still have economic sanctions in force
against Moscow.
When
asked whether he would recognize Crimea “as Russian territory” and lift
the sanctions, Mr. Trump said: “We’ll be looking at that. Yeah, we’ll
be looking.”
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