U.S. Intercepted Messages of Russian Leaders Congratulating Themselves for Trump Victory

U.S. officials say messages from Russian leaders intercepted by our intelligence agencies show them congratulating each other for Trump’s electoral victory.

From the Washington Post:

Senior officials in the Russian government celebrated Donald Trump’s victory over Hillary Clinton as a geopolitical win for Moscow, according to U.S. officials who said that American intelligence agencies intercepted communications in the aftermath of the election in which Russian officials congratulated themselves on the outcome.

The ebullient reaction among high-ranking Russian officials — including some who U.S. officials believe had knowledge of the country’s cyber campaign to interfere in the U.S. election — contributed to the U.S. intelligence community’s assessment that Moscow’s efforts were aimed at least in part at helping Trump win the White House.

Trump and his defenders had been demanding real evidence from the intelligence agencies who affirmed that they knew Russia interfered with our election, and this seems to be part of that response.

The report to be delivered to Trump on Friday, and later in a different form to the public, apparently also points to the identification of the people, apparently connected to the Russian government, who delivered the hacked emails to Wikileaks – something Julian Assange has denied. More circumstantial evidence is that they targeted Democrats more than Republicans.

You have to admit, catching Russians patting themselves on the back for electing Trump is pretty good reason to believe that they were trying to elect Trump.

And if memory serves me correctly, one narrative the Trump camp tried to deflect from the accusations was saying that Putin would rather have a weak Democrat like Hillary in the Oval Office. So much for that.