Is this Trump's Benghazi?
Russia's reported bounties on American troops — and the idea that President Trump knew about them — is starting to ring some historical bells.
That's what some Democrats and liberals have started to suggest as more information corroborates reports that Russia offered the Taliban bounties for killing U.S. troops in Afghanistan, resulting in at least one death. They're calling for an investigation into the matter and, in some cases, comparing the bounties to the 2012 Benghazi attack that Republicans have been laser focused on for years now.
Trump claimed he "never got a briefing" regarding the bounties, but The New York Times has since reported that American officials gave Trump a written briefing on the subject in February. In response to that report, Brian Beutler, the editor-in-chief of the left-wing Crooked Media, called the Russian bounty report essentially Benghazi "but not fake."
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Paul Begala, who was a top adviser to former president Bill Clinton, called out several Republican senators and asked if they'd have "even one investigation" of the Russian bounty reports, given that "there were eight separate investigations into Benghazi."
The Times also reported Tuesday that financial transactions between Russia and a Taliban account backed up the bounty evidence, prompting Julia Ioffe of GQ to suggest a nickname for the scandal: "Afghazi."
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Kathryn is a graduate of Syracuse University, with degrees in magazine journalism and information technology, along with hours to earn another degree after working at SU's independent paper The Daily Orange. She's currently recovering from a horse addiction while living in New York City, and likes to share her extremely dry sense of humor on Twitter.
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