“How stupid does he think we are?” Rep. Brad Sherman (D-Calif.) said when asked about President Trump’s attempts to clarify his comments on Russian interference in the 2016 election.
“I mean, he said what he said. Now he goes back, he waits 24 hours and says ‘no, I said the exact opposite’ I mean, if you believe that, you believe he’s been faithful to all three of his wives. We’re not just that stupid,” Sherman, who was previously endorsed by Bill Clinton, told C-Span viewers Wednesday morning.
After returning to the U.S. from the Helsinki, Finland summit with Vladimir Putin, President Trump clarified comments on the intelligence community’s assessment that Russia meddled in the 2016 presidential election, saying that he agrees with their conclusion.
“I thought that I made myself very clear by having just reviewed the transcript. Now I have to say I came back, and I said, what is going on? What’s the big deal? So I got a transcript. I reviewed it. I actually went out and reviewed a clip of an answer that I gave, and I realize that there is a need for some clarification,” Trump explained.
“I thought it would be obvious, but I would like to clarify just in case it wasn’t. In a key sentence in my remarks, I said the word ‘would’ instead of ‘wouldn’t.’ The sentence should have been: ‘I don’t see any reason why I wouldn’t’ or ‘why it wouldn’t be Russia,’” the president said.
“So just to repeat it, I said the word ‘would’ instead of ‘wouldn’t,’ and the sentence should have been - and I thought I would be maybe a little bit unclear on the transcript or unclear on the actual video - the sentence should have been, I don’t see any reason why it wouldn’t be Russia. Sort of a double negative,” he said.
“So you can put that in, and I think that probably clarifies things pretty good by itself. I have on numerous occasions noted our intelligence findings that Russia attempted to interfere in our elections,” Trump added.