Just as President Trump sat down with Russian President Vladimir Putin for a meeting Friday, former acting Attorney General Sally Yates tweeted for just the second time ever to criticize Trump's "inexplicable refusal" to acknowledge that Russia meddled in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Yates, whom Trump fired after she refused to defend his travel ban, contended that Trump's hesitancy to embrace U.S. intelligence agencies' consensus that Russia interfered was not just insulting, it could have consequences down the road:
In Poland on Thursday, Trump contradicted U.S. intelligence by claiming that "nobody really knows for sure" if Russia meddled in the election. "I agree, I think it was Russia, but I think it was probably other people and/or countries," Trump said.
Trump was asked Friday as he sat beside Putin whether he would press the Russian president on election interference during their meeting. HuffPost's Jennifer Bendery reported the president refused to answer the question, instead saying "'something to Putin, who chuckled.'"