Politics

Pompeo: Russian Interference In US Elections Been Happening ‘For Decades Now’

Screenshot/Fox News

Saagar Enjeti White House Correspondent
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Secretary of State Mike Pompeo underscored that Russian interference in U.S. elections has been happening for decades, in a Thursday night interview with the Fox News Channel.

“It wasn’t just the 2016 election. Somehow America seems to forget the history of Russia’s efforts to undermine western democracy for decades now. It gets confused because there are those who want to make a partisan case of it with respect to the Mueller investigation,” Pompeo said of Russian interference.

The secretary of state continued, “The president understands what Russia did in our elections of 2016. He has empowered each of us to make sure that it doesn’t happen again in the 2018 or 2020 elections here in the United States as well.”

Pompeo’s comments were bolstered by Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein who said Thursday, “This is not a new phenomenon. Throughout the 20th century, the Soviet Union used malign influence operations against the United States and many other countries. In 1963, for example, the KGB paid an American to distribute a book claiming that the FBI and the CIA assassinated President Kennedy.”