National security adviser said the effort did not have ‘any real effect’ on the vote during visit to discuss INF treaty withdrawal

This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

US national security adviser John Bolton has said he told senior Russian officials that the Kremlin’s efforts to influence the 2016 US presidential elections had little impact on the results of the vote.

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The remarks appeared to be an attempt to confront Russia over election meddling without putting into doubt the 2016 electoral victory of Donald Trump, who appointed Bolton to his position in March.

Speaking on the Echo Moskvy radio station on Monday, Bolton said: “The point I made to Russian colleagues today was that I didn’t think, whatever they had done in terms of meddling in the 2016 election, that they had any effect on it. But what they have had an effect on in the United States is to sow enormous distrust of Russia.”

The remarks came during a visit to Moscow by Bolton to discuss US plans to pull out of the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces (INF) treaty. Bolton is expected to meet with Putin during two days of talks in Moscow, where the Kremlin has said it will demand explanations for the US withdrawal.

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It was not clear whether Bolton’s remarks came in meetings on Monday with Russian security council head Nikolai Patrushev or the foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov.

Bolton went on to say that while the impact of the interference was minimal, Russia’s attempt to influence the US vote would nonetheless harm the country’s reputation among Americans.

“It’s a major obstacle to achieving agreement on issues where our national interest may converge,” Bolton continued, “so I said, just from a very cold-blooded cost benefit ratio, that you shouldn’t meddle in our elections because you’re not advancing Russian interest, and I hope that was persuasive to them.”

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The US government last week charged a 44-year-old Russian woman with conducting “information warfare” against the United States by managing the finances for a St Petersburg-based operation seeking to interfere in the upcoming 2018 midterm elections. The operation is tied to Yevgeny Prigozhin, a close ally of Vladimir Putin’s.

The United States has also charged a dozen Russian citizens and alleged members of Russian military intelligence for hacking the Democratic National Committee during the 2016 electoral campaign.

Bolton has earned a reputation as a foreign policy hawk and had spoken out more forcefully about Russian elections meddling before he joined in the Trump administration.

In 2017, he called the interference a “casus belli, a true act of war, and one Washington will never tolerate”.

