Officials apparently avoid talking about Russia in briefings with Trump


President Trump is so consistently irritated by Russia talk that officials avoid discussing the country during the president's daily intelligence briefings, The Washington Post reported Thursday — despite the fact that all U.S. intelligence agencies agree that the Kremlin launched a concerted disruption operation during the 2016 election.
"If you talk about Russia, meddling, interference — that takes the [briefing] off the rails," a former intelligence official told the Post. In the event that officials do have to deliver Trump potentially upsetting information about Russia, they carefully structure their briefings in order to "soften the impact" of the information, the Post reported.
The issue, the Post explained, is that Trump feels that he cannot accept that Russia meddled in the 2016 election without invalidating his electoral victory:
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
Holding impromptu interventions in Trump's 26th-floor corner office at Trump Tower, advisers [...] sought to convince Trump that he could affirm the validity of the intelligence without diminishing his electoral win, according to three officials involved in the sessions. More important, they said that doing so was the only way to put the matter behind him politically and free him to pursue his goal of closer ties with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
[...] But as aides persisted, Trump became agitated. He railed that the intelligence couldn't be trusted and scoffed at the suggestion that his candidacy had been propelled by forces other than his own strategy, message, and charisma. [The Washington Post]
Trump's reluctance to hear damning information about Russia has forced officials to get creative when they try to make him take a stand against Putin. In one case, the Post reports, officials tried to convince Trump not to return Russian compounds seized by former President Barack Obama by presenting the issue through the familiar lens of real estate and briefly getting him to consider selling the properties for profit.
Read more about Trump's Russia reticence at The Washington Post.
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
Kelly O'Meara Morales is a staff writer at The Week. He graduated from Sarah Lawrence College and studied Middle Eastern history and nonfiction writing amongst other esoteric subjects. When not compulsively checking Twitter, he writes and records music, subsists on tacos, and watches basketball.
-
Why can't France hold on to its prime ministers?
Today's Big Question Spiralling debt, ageing population and cultural refusal to accept budget cuts – despite high welfare spending – have been turbocharged by Emmanuel Macron
-
The runners and riders for the Labour deputy leadership
The Explainer Race to replace Angela Rayner likely to come down to Starmer loyalist vs. soft-left MP supported by backbenchers and unions
-
Tom Phillips: the manhunt for forest fugitive and his abducted children
In the Spotlight Three children recovered safely after four-year manhunt ends in police shootout
-
South Korea to fetch workers detained in Georgia raid
Speed Read More than 300 South Korean workers detained in an immigration raid at a Hyundai plant will be released
-
DC sues Trump to end Guard 'occupation'
Speed Read D.C. Attorney General Brian Schwalb argues that the unsolicited military presence violates the law
-
RFK Jr. faces bipartisan heat in Senate hearing
Speed Read The health secretary defended his leadership amid CDC turmoil and deflected questions about the restricted availability of vaccines
-
White House defends boat strike as legal doubts mount
Speed Read Experts say there was no legal justification for killing 11 alleged drug-traffickers
-
Epstein accusers urge full file release, hint at own list
speed read A rally was organized by Reps. Ro Khanna and Thomas Massie, who are hoping to force a vote on their Epstein Files Transparency Act
-
Court hands Harvard a win in Trump funding battle
Speed Read The Trump administration was ordered to restore Harvard's $2 billion in research grants
-
Florida aims to end all state vaccine requirements
Speed Read Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. continues to cut vaccine access and install anti-vaccine activists at the FDA and CDC
-
US kills 11 on 'drug-carrying boat' off Venezuela
Speed Read Trump claimed those killed in the strike were 'positively identified Tren de Aragua Narcoterrorists' shipping drugs to the US