The following article by Aaron Blake was posted on the Washington Post website July 20, 2018:
Over the course of three days, President Trump commented on Russian election interference in ways that repeatedly contradicted his own intelligence officials. (Video: Peter Stevenson/Photo: Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)
Update: And now Trump, apparently unbowed, wants to invite Putin to Washington.
For the third time this week, President Trump has been forced to walk back something he said about Russia. First it was comparing his own intelligence community’s credibility to Vladimir Putin’s. Then it was his statement that Russia wasn’t still interfering in U.S. elections. And now it’s his apparent plan to allow Russia to interview Americans it accuses of crimes, including a former ambassador.
It was all one giant, self-inflicted wound. And it all did precisely what Putin hopes and what Trump seems to fear most: made Trump look weak and ineffectual.
The White House finally shot down that last idea Thursday afternoon — three days after Trump called it an “incredible offer” and nearly a full day after White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders inflamed congressional allies and even the State Department by suggesting it could actually come to fruition.