“The release of emails just as the Democratic National Convention is getting underway this week has the hallmarks of a Russian active measures campaign”, David Shedd, former head of the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency, told The Daily Beast.
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The FBI on Monday confirmed it has opened an investigation into allegations that the Wikileaks email dump of almost 20,000 Democratic National Committee emails over the weekend might be linked to the Russian government.
“Experts are telling us that Russian state actors broke into the DNC, took all these emails, and now are leaking them out through these websites”, Clinton’s campaign manager Robby Mook told ABC.
While the disruption at the Democratic National Convention, fueled by leaked emails, was absent in prime time coverage of the convention, security experts are concerned the DNC hack could have a far greater impact on the election.
The 70-year-old has never met Putin, but has praised the Russian leader several times when campaigning to become to Republican candidate for President. When asked by reporters about the allegation, he responded, “I don’t want to use four-letter words”, according to Reuters.
Trump’s son, Donald Trump Jr., denied that his father’s campaign had anything to do with encouraging Russians to hack the DNC. She said she had learned of Russian involvement not through intelligence briefings, but through other means. How concerned are you by the fact that in the polls coming out after the republican convention, Hillary Clinton’s unfavorables are now actually higher than Donald Trump’s?
Reported financial ties to Trump’s businesses and Russian backers, and comments last week that he might not come to the aid of North Atlantic Treaty Organisation allies under attack, if elected president. It’s a concern that an aggressive regime like Vladimir Putin’s could be trying to not just infiltrate the e-mail system of the democratic party but actually influence the outcome of the election. He also conducted meetings with Russian opposition figures – standard practice for a USA diplomat overseas but one that sparked suspicion in Moscow. And some argue that the Democrats and their presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton are looking to benefit from anti-Vladimir Putin sentiment.
A diplomat with experience working on Russian Federation said the Kremlin also might be betting that Clinton will win and is sending a shot across her bow. Putin did refer once to Trump as being a “bright” and “talented” person.
The hack is suspected to be part of a wider offensive of Russian cyber-attacks against political organisations in Washington.
Trump’s indifferent views on North Atlantic Treaty Organisation and alleged Russian aggression in Europe are in total discord with the geopolitical interests of Washington and its drive for hegemony. “I think it would be unprecedented in the United States”.
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Speaking at a rally in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, Trump dismissed any suggestion that Putin’s intelligence services might have had a hand in hacking the Democratic National Committee’s email system. Trump senior policy adviser Paul Manafort called the Clinton campaign statements “pretty desperate” and “pretty absurd”.
