President Donald Trump now says he was joking at a rally when he called on Russia to hack into Hillary Clinton’s emails during the 2016 presidential campaign.
Trump on Saturday claimed he was “in an arena” at the time, telling a joke, being “sarcastic” and “having fun with the audience” when he called on Moscow to hack his campaign rival in the now-infamous moment.
But as MSNBC’s Katy Tur pointed out on Monday, none of that is true.
Trump didn’t make the comments at a rally, and he wasn’t “having fun with the audience.”
He made the comments at a news conference. And when given an opportunity at the time by Tur to back away from calling on a foreign power to help his campaign against Clinton, Trump didn’t indicate he was joking at all.
He doubled down:
See her full analysis and the video footage, along with a discussion with Michael McFaul, former U.S. ambassador to Russia, in the clip above.
(h/t Mediaite)