Clinton: White House slow-walking Russia sanctions
Hillary Clinton accused President Trump’s administration of slow-rolling the implementation of new sanctions on Russia, arguing that the president is emboldening the country after its meddling in the 2016 presidential election.
“It’s the first time we’ve had an adversary attack us that we did not respond to,” Clinton said Thursday during an event in Washington, D.C.
“Congress passed overwhelmingly new sanctions on Russia and Putin’s cronies, oligarchs and others, forcing the president to sign it, but he hasn’t implemented it. What’s the lesson from that? The lesson is you can get away with attacking America, sewing discord and divisiveness, affecting our elections and this president and administration are not going to hold you accountable.”
Her criticism builds on bipartisan concern among lawmakers after the administration last month failed to list those who could be targeted by sanctions by an Oct. 1 deadline. The State Department ultimately released the list last week, more than three weeks later than specified by the law.
Clinton made the comments at a packed reception at the Woman’s National Democratic Club in D.C., where she accepted the group’s “Democratic Woman of the Year” award. She spoke as part of an interview conducted by Sen. Diane Feinstein (D-Calif.), a former colleague of hers in the Senate. {mosads}
A handful of notable faces could be seen spread among the crowd of enthusiastic supporters in the downtown townhouse, including former Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.) and the Rev. Jesse Jackson.
The former Democratic presidential nominee spoke at length about her analysis of what led to her electoral loss almost exactly one year ago.
She blamed former FBI Director James Comey for her loss, due to his decision just days before the election to disclose that the agency found more emails pertinent to its investigation into her use of a private email server as secretary of State. To underscore that point, she rattled off the decline at the polls among key electoral groups in Pennsylvania.
And while she argued that the weaponization of her emails scandal was a “very clear plan” by political opponents, she admitted that she wasn’t sure “how witting Comey himself was.”
As she’s done numerous times since the election, she highlighted a number of additional factors she believes kept her from the White House, including “the weaponization of WikiLeaks, turning them into fake news,” as well as accusations of voter suppression.
Riffing off the title of her book, “What Happened,” Clinton said that America needs to get to the bottom of the election in order to prevent similar circumstances in the future.
“It’s not just about what happened, it’s about what will keep happening if we don’t stop it,” she said.
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