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Hillary Clinton offered one of her most direct rebukes of President Trump in months on Thursday after Trump accused her of colluding with Russia during the 2016 presidential election at his campaign rally in Pennsylvania Wednesday night. At the rally Wednesday night, Trump told an arena of supporters that there was "collusion between Hillary, the Democrats and Russia" during the 2016 election, despite offering no evidence for his claim. An intelligence community assessment in 2017 concluded that Russia's efforts were aimed at undermining the Clinton campaign. "There was a lot of collusion with them and Russia and lots of other...

Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats told MSNBC's Andrea Mitchell Thursday that he felt he "needed to correct the record" following President Trump's comments during the Helsinki summit with Russia President Vladimir Putin, adding that he wished Trump had "made a different statement" as it is "undeniable that the Russians are taking a lead on this." Our thought bubble: It was a STUNNING interview ... and is already catching heat and attention among Trump loyalists. I've already had two phone calls from sources close to Trump expressing their astonishment. The fact that Trump’s own intelligence director is saying these things...

**SNIP** The Russia-interference-was-no-big-deal crowd also clings to the fact there’s no evidence of the greatest fear when it comes to election stealing — that hackers accessed electronic voting systems on election night and changed vote totals to hand the contest to Trump. And yet — buried beneath the headlines on Friday’s indictments — were two largely new revelations that dramatically elevated the possibility that Russian meddling wasn’t just morally and criminally wrong but actually went a long way toward snatching victory away from Clinton and handed it to Trump on Election Day. — Hacking of state voter rolls. — The...

WASHINGTON (AP) — As the American presidential election entered the final stretch in 2016, a dozen Russian military intelligence officers were scattered throughout Moscow, unleashing a massive cyber operation to disrupt the vote. That’s according to an indictment issued Friday that says the officers developed malicious computer code known as malware, hacked into Democratic Party computers and silently watched as unknowing staffers typed. The Russians stole the Democrats’ secret files. They took snapshots of their screens. They used fake emails to dupe Hillary Clinton’s staffers into exposing their passwords. And then, the indictment says, the Russians released their stolen information...

An American company that ships cherries to a coastal province in southeast China recently encountered a new hurdle at the border: Customs officers ordered a load into quarantine for a week, so it spoiled and was sent back to the United States. American pet food-makers, meanwhile, say they're facing more rigorous inspections at ports, which delay goods from reaching shelves and ultimately hurt sales. And a U.S. manufacturer that exports vehicles to China recorded a 98% jump in random border inspections over the past month, throwing the firm behind schedule. American business leaders fear these are the "qualitative measures" China...

White House chief of staff John Kelly has loosened his grip amid a worsening relationship with President Trump, Politico reported late Sunday.The news outlet reported that Kelly has essentially given up on trying to control the president’s impulses. He told at least one person that he will let the president do what he wants, even if it results in impeachment. Kelly, who served as the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary prior to becoming chief of staff, reportedly warned current DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen against attending Monday's White House press briefing. Nielsen fielded questions on the Trump administration's "zero tolerance"...

President Donald Trump has repeatedly hurled insults at the FBI agents working on special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into the 2016 campaign. Rudy Giuliani, a former U.S. attorney who’s now Trump’s lawyer, has attacked them as “stormtroopers.” The vitriol is unsurprising. The agents are powering an investigation that has shadowed Trump’s entire presidency — and they are mostly unknown to the public, making them easy targets. They are a mix of bureau veterans and relative newcomers handpicked by Mueller and his prosecutors to handle the highest-profile and most sensitive federal investigation in a generation. To assemble this portrait of Mueller’s...

Donald Trump’s claim, in the aftermath of the Florida school shooting, that these events are the result of violent video games, resurrects old arguments about whether young people emulate the games they play. The World Health Organisation’s (WHO) recent decision to consider video game addiction an official illness shows comparable concern. However, these responses demonstrate anxiety about the right things for the wrong reasons. Gaming cultures are connected to violence – but should be considered in terms of the rise of far right political discourse and the prominence of “alt-right” misogyny and racism. While Trump is firmly on the right...

Sen. John McCain’s return to Washington during key legislative deliberations has been curbed in part by concerns over the deadly flu season, his daughter Meghan said Wednesday. In an interview with Politico’s “Women Rule” podcast, the Arizona Republican’s daughter said her father, recovering from chemotherapy for aggressive brain cancer and a viral infection in December, is taking precautions that are keeping him in Arizona. “Part of the problem, too, is like it’s this deadly, crazy flu season,” said Meghan McCain, a co-host of “The View” on ABC. “And his immune system is so down, everybody is worried about him getting...

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson on Sunday again declined to clearly say he hadn't called President Donald Trump “a moron,” but he did deny a Republican senator's claim that he had been castrated as the nation's top diplomat. Tillerson twice refused to say that he had not called the president “a moron,” as reported by NBC News, instead punting on the question and saying he would not dignify it with a response. “I call the president ‘Mr. President,’” Tillerson said on CNN’s "State of the Union." “At the end of the day, he makes decisions. I go out and try...

The Trump administration argued over the weekend that back-channel communications are acceptable in building dialogue with foreign governments, part of an effort to minimize fallout over White House adviser Jared Kushner’s reported discussion about creating a secret conduit to the Kremlin at a Russian diplomatic compound. But some former administration officials on Sunday criticized the use of such secret channels...

Jared Kushner, the president's son-in-law and one of his senior advisers, has come under FBI scrutiny in the Russia investigation, multiple U.S. officials told NBC News. Investigators believe Kushner has significant information relevant to their inquiry, officials said. That does not mean they suspect him of a crime or intend to charge him. The FBI's scrutiny of Kushner places the bureau's sprawling counterintelligence and criminal investigation not only on the doorstep of the White House, but in the Trump family circle. The Washington Post first reported last week that a senior White House official close to Trump was a "person...

Tom Godat, a union electrician who has always voted for Democrats, cast his ballot for Donald Trump last year as “the lesser of two evils” compared to Hillary Clinton. He’s already a little embarrassed about it. There’s a lot that Godat likes about President Trump, especially his pledge to make the country great again by ignoring lobbyists, challenging both political parties and increasing the number of good-paying jobs.

Donald Trump entered the East Room on Thursday reeling from a week filled with resignations, withdrawals and continued questions surrounding his campaign's contacts with Russia. What followed was an hour-long, full-throated attack on Trump's favorite foil: the media. “Many of our nation's reporters will not tell you the truth,” Trump said. “The press honestly is out of control,” Trump said. “The level of dishonesty is out of control,” Trump said. And that was before he even took a single question! It was a return for Trump to what worked for him during the course of the 2016 campaign: A circuslike...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The leaks are real. But the news about them is fake. The White House is a fine-tuned machine. Russia is a ruse. For its stunning moments and memorable one-liners, Donald Trump's first solo news conference as president has no rivals in recent memory. For all the trappings of the White House and traditions of the forum, his performance was one of a swaggering, blustery campaigner, armed with grievances and primed to unload on his favorite targets.

To hear President Trump tell it, he "inherited a mess" and has replaced it with "a fine-tuned machine." That's not what it looked or sounded like inside the East Room of the White House on Thursday during a rambling, defensive and at times angry performance by the leader of the free world. In one of the wildest presidential press conferences on record, Trump lashed out at the media, Hillary Clinton, the intelligence community, judges and Democrats — among many others. It was a spectacle for the ages — one that his most loyal supporters probably loved, but which political insiders...

An Arizona woman who has lived in the U.S. for more than two decades was arrested Wednesday night after her regular check-in with immigration officials and has been deported to Mexico. She was sent to Nogales, Mexico, on Thursday, reports Katherine Fritcke of member station KJZZ. Guadalupe Garcia de Rayos' deportation — which has been protested by dozens of activists, some of whom were arrested late Wednesday — is a glimpse of how immigration enforcement is changing under the Trump administration. She had had a deportation order against her for several years but was not considered a priority for deportation...

NEW YORK (AP) -- After incorrect or unprovable statements made by Republican President Donald Trump and some White House aides, one truth is undeniable: Sales of George Orwell's "1984" are soaring. First published in 1949, Orwell's classic dystopian tale of a society in which facts are distorted and suppressed in a cloud of "newspeak" topped the best-seller list of Amazon.com as of Tuesday evening. The sales bump comes after the Trump administration's assertions his inauguration had record attendance and his unfounded allegation that millions of illegal votes were cast against him last fall.

As reported moments ago, CNN is leading with a story about a 35-page dossier compiled by a former member of British intelligence, which had been distilled into a 2-page appendix presented to Trump last Friday by the US intel community, and which contains "explosive, but unverified, allegations" that the Russian government has been "cultivating, supporting and assisting" President-elect Donald Trump for at least 5 years and "endorsed by Putin" gained compromising information about him, with the aim of "encouraging splits and divisions in the western alliance." ... the documents have circulated for months, and were available to the Clinton campaign...

Denver — Some 500 conservative activists convened here over the weekend for the annual RedState Gathering, an event that traditionally functions as a pep rally for the Republican grassroots. This year, though, it felt like a funeral. The mood was decidedly dour as attendees spoke — from the main stage, at their tables, and over adult beverages — in disbelieving tones about the state of the presidential race and the inadequacies of their party’s nominee, Donald Trump. The event offered a unique window into how conservative activists are coping with 2016, and how they might hope to pick up the...