Scarborough: contact me if you know of a presidential campaign receiving opposition research or support from any foreign power

On today’s Morning Joe, Joe Scarborough stared into the camera and invited people to contact him if they’re aware of a presidential campaign that accepted “oppo research or support” from a foreign power. The question was based on a quote, shown on the screen, from former Romney campaign strategist Stuart Stevens asking whether any other campaign in history had received “oppo from foreign interests.”

Joe’s invitation came in the context of a discussion of a meeting of senior Trump-campaign people with a Russian purportedly offering oppo info on Hillary Clinton. Of course, based on what’s now known, Trump’s campaign people didn’t actually receive oppo research, just an offer of such in order to get a meeting.

MIKA BRZEZINSKI: The chief strategists on the 2012 Romney-Ryan team wrote on Twitter, “If you can find someone in other presidential campaigns who has received oppo from foreign interests, please share.” JOE SCARBOROUGH: Let’s stop right there for one second on Stuart Stevens. Keep that up there. Because this is really the challenge. This is what — this is the challenge. We could have all of these people saying we’ve never done it, we’ve never done it, we’ve never done it, we’ve never done it. Stuart actually puts this the right way. If anybody who is listening to this show—and most the people who are influencers in Washington—a lot of them listen to this show. A lot of people who have run presidential campaigns listen to this show, watch this show. If you know, in your lifetime, a political campaign, a presidential campaign receiving opposition research or support from any political campaign — from any foreign power, especially a foreign power that’s hostile: Russia, China, Iran, Syria: let us know! Let Stuart Stevens know.

Seems like Scarborough conveniently forgot this Politico report about Hillary allies, including the DNC, receiving support from the Ukrainian government in the form of oppo research on Trump and his advisers [emphasis added]:

Ukrainian government officials tried to help Hillary Clinton and undermine Trump by publicly questioning his fitness for office. They also disseminated documents implicating a top Trump aide in corruption and suggested they were investigating the matter, only to back away after the election. And they helped Clinton’s allies research damaging information on Trump and his advisers, a Politico investigation found…. Ukrainian government officials tried to help Hillary Clinton and undermine Trump by publicly questioning his fitness for office. They also disseminated documents implicating a top Trump aide in corruption and suggested they were investigating the matter, only to back away after the election. And they helped Clinton’s allies research damaging information on Trump and his advisers, a Politico investigation found. A Ukrainian-American operative who was consulting for the Democratic National Committee met with top officials in the Ukrainian Embassy in Washington in an effort to expose ties between Trump, top campaign aide Paul Manafort and Russia, according to people with direct knowledge of the situation.

So, based on the Politico report, Hillary actually did get oppo research help from foreign interests, unlike Trump, who only received an offer of help that went nowhere fast.

And then there was Ted Kennedy. According to an internal KGB memo, in 1983, Kennedy didn’t just passively accept help from the Soviets: he took the lead in contacting them to propose a deal to aid his presidential ambitions:

From a Forbes article:

Kennedy’s message was simple. He proposed an unabashed quid pro quo. Kennedy would lend Andropov a hand in dealing with President Reagan. In return, the Soviet leader would lend the Democratic Party a hand in challenging Reagan in the 1984 presidential election.

[The title and featured image of this post were changed after publication]



