Washington (AP) President Donald Trump said
he respects Vladimir Putin, and when an interviewer called the Russian leader
"a killer," Trump said the United States has many of them. "What
do you think? Our country's so innocent?" he told Fox's Bill O'Reilly in
an excerpt released by the network. The president's interview was to air Sunday
afternoon on the Super Bowl pregame show.
Trump has long expressed a wish for better
ties with Moscow, praised Putin and signaled that U.S.-Russia relations could
be in line for a makeover, even after U.S. intelligence agencies determined
that Russia meddled in the 2016 U.S. presidential campaign to help Trump win
against Democrat Hillary Clinton. Putin has called Trump a "very bright
and talented man."
During Putin's years in power, a number of
prominent Russian opposition figures and journalists have been killed. In the
interview, Trump says, "I do respect him," and then is asked why.
"I respect a lot of people, but that
doesn't mean I'm going to get along with him. He's a leader of his country. I
say it's better to get along with Russia than not. And if Russia helps us in
the fight against ISIS, which is a major fight, and Islamic terrorism all over
the world that's a good thing," Trump said, using an acronym for the
Islamic State group. "Will I get along with him? I have no idea." O'Reilly
then said about Putin: "But he's a killer, though.
Trump responded: "There are a lot of
killers. We've got a lot of killers. What do you think? Our country's so
innocent?" In the excerpt, Trump did not cite specific U.S actions. It was
unclear whether he expanded on the comment or added context later in the
interview. The Kremlin had no immediate comment. The Senate's top Republican, Mitch McConnell
of Kentucky, distanced himself from the president.
"Putin's a former KGB agent. He's a
thug. He was not elected in a way that most people would consider a credible
election. The Russians annexed Crimea, invaded Ukraine and messed around in our
elections. And no, I don't think there's any equivalency between the way the
Russians conduct themselves and the way the United States does," McConnell
told CNN's "State of the Union."
While saying he would not critique "every
utterance" by Trump, McConnell said he thinks "America's exceptional,
America is different, we don't operate in any way the way the Russians do. I
think there's a clear distinction here that all Americans understand, and no, I
would not have characterized it that way." "I obviously don't see
this issue the same way he does," McConnell said.
Vice President Mike Pence on Sunday denied
that Trump's comments were a false equivalency between Putin's actions and
those of US leaders, adding that Trump was trying to reset the U.S.
relationship with Russia, as he promised in the campaign.
"If we were able to work with Russia to
hunt down and destroy ISIS and confront radical Islamic terrorism, that would
be a good thing," Pence said on NBC's "Meet the Press." ''What
you have in President Trump is someone who is not going to look in the rearview
mirror so much as looking out the windshield."
O'Reilly also asked Trump to back up his
claims that some 3 million to 5 million illegal votes were cast in the
election. Trump didn't answer directly, but asserted that immigrants in the
U.S. illegally and dead people are on the voter rolls. "It's a really a
bad situation, it's really bad," Trump said.
There is no evidence of widespread voter
fraud in the Nov. 8 election. Trump won the Electoral College vote but lost the
popular vote by nearly 2.9 million votes to Clinton.
Trump recently announced on Twitter that he
would call for a "major investigation" into voter fraud, but the plan
for Trump to take some type of executive action on the issue has been delayed,
senior administration officials said last week. McConnell, meanwhile, said such
an investigation should be handled by the states, which historically have been
the ones to probe such allegations.
"There's no evidence that it occurred in
such a significant number that would have changed the presidential election,
and I don't think we ought to spend any federal money investigating that,"
McConnell told CNN. "I think the states can take a look at this
issue."
The Trump administration on Thursday revised
recent U.S. sanctions that had unintentionally prevented American companies
from exporting certain consumer electronic products to Russia. The change
allows companies to deal with Russia's security service, which licenses such
exports under Russian law.
The products were not intended to be covered
by the sanctions the Obama administration imposed on Dec. 29 after U.S.
intelligence agencies concluded that Russia interfered in the presidential
election. The White House denied it was easing sanctions.
Also last week, the U.S. ambassador to the
United Nations, Nikki Haley condemned Russia's "aggressive actions"
in eastern Ukraine and warned Moscow that U.S. sanctions imposed after its
annexation of Crimea will remain until the peninsula is returned to Ukraine.
But she tempered her criticism, saying it was
"unfortunate" that she had to condemn Russia in her first appearance
at the U.N. Security Council. "We do want to better our relations with
Russia," Haley said.
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