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[webfact]

CIA director expects Russia will try to target U.S. mid-term elections

 

FILE PHOTO: CIA Director Mike Pompeo delivers remarks at "Intelligence Beyond 2018," a forum hosted by the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, in Washington, U.S., January 23, 2018. REUTERS/Leah Millis/File Photo

 

LONDON (Reuters) - CIA Director Mike Pompeo said Russia will target U.S. mid-term elections later this year as part of the Kremlin's attempt to influence domestic politics across the West, and warned the world had to do more to push back against Chinese meddling.

 

Russia has been accused of meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential election and Special Counsel Robert Mueller is investigating the allegations, which Moscow denies, and whether there was any collusion involving President Donald Trump's associates.

 

In an interview with the BBC aired on Tuesday, U.S. intelligence chief Pompeo said Russia had a long history of information campaigns and said its threat would not go away.

 

Asked if Russia would try to influence the mid-term elections, he said: "Of course. I have every expectation that they will continue to try and do that.

 

"But I am confident that America will be able to have a free and fair election. That we'll push back in a way that is sufficiently robust that the impact they have on our election won't be great."

 

He also said the Chinese posed a threat of equal concern, and were "very active" with a world class cyber capability.

 

"We can watch very focused efforts to steal American information, to infiltrate the United States with spies, with people who are going to work on behalf of the Chinese government against America," he said.

 

"We see it in our schools, in our hospitals and medical systems, we see it throughout corporate America. These efforts we have to all be more focused on. We have to do better at pushing back against Chinese efforts to covertly influence the world."

 

GLOBAL INFLUENCE

 

The Kremlin, which under Vladimir Putin has clawed back some of the global influence lost when the Soviet Union collapsed, has denied meddling in elections in the West. It says anti-Russian hysteria is sweeping through the United States and Europe.

 

In the interview, Pompeo also repeated his message that North Korea was close to developing missiles which could be used in a nuclear attack on the United States.

 

"I think that we collectively, the United States and our intelligence partners around the world, have developed a pretty clear understanding of (North Korean leader) Kim Jong Un's capability," he said.

 

"We talk about him having the ability to deliver a nuclear weapon to the United States in a matter of a handful of months."

 

The CIA chief defended Trump over accusations from a book which suggested the president was unfocused, unprepared and unfit for his office.

 

"It's absurd, the claim that the president isn't engaged and doesn't have a grasp on these important issues is dangerous and false," Pompeo said.

Asked if Trump's use of Twitter posed any national security issues, he said: "Hasn't caused us any trouble."

 

He added: "We deliver nearly every day, personally, to the president the most exquisite truth that we know from the CIA. Whatever the facts may be we deliver them unvarnished as accurately and as forcefully as we can."

 

(Reporting by Guy Faulconbridge, editing by Michael Holden and Janet Lawrence)

 

-- © Copyright Reuters 2018-01-31

[Silurian]

2 hours ago, webfact said:

Asked if Russia would try to influence the mid-term elections, he said: "Of course. I have every expectation that they will continue to try and do that.

 

"But I am confident that America will be able to have a free and fair election. That we'll push back in a way that is sufficiently robust that the impact they have on our election won't be great."

 

Meaning, as long as the Russian influence helps the Republican party in the midterms, we are okay with that. Nothing has changed since the Russian interference of the 2016 election. Heck, the WH won't even implement the Russian sanctions that congress overwhelmingly passed. Russia sees now the sanctions are toothless and the WH is compliant to Russian wishes.

 

[IAMHERE]

Heck, I thought Russia tried to affect the 2016 elections in favor of Hillary; they screwed up and helped Trump instead. 

[boomerangutang]

If it works so well, don't change it.

Russia had such great and surprising successes in 2016, ....it's going to keep the ball rolling.  The more Republicans in power, the weaker the US becomes, and the less likely the US will implement sanctions against the Russians, .....for invading former USSR satellite states, ....or killing journalists, or doping athletes, or whatever.

 

The icing on the cake, for Russians, is now with anti-science, anti-environment people running things inside the Beltway, the Russians can more easily open up the Arctic to oil drilling, and sell nuclear tech to the Saudis.  From the hard right, money-is-God perspective, the Putin - Trump bromance is win-win.  Tree-huggers can go stuff themselves in a deep well, as far as Putin/Trump are concerned.

 

Right wingers are so easily duped by fake FB and Twitter tweets.  For right-wingers, it's full speed ahead.  If it (Russian influence on redneck voters) ain't broke, don't fix it.