CNN’s Jake Tapper pressed National Security Advisor John Bolton on Monday over President Trump‘s reluctance to condemn Russia’s election interference the way top U.S. intelligence and security officials do.

As Tapper asked about how the White House is dealing with the latest news on Iran, he eventually brought up the recent press briefing ensemble where Bolton and his colleagues warned that Russia still threatens democratic institutions. Since Trump has never been able to condemn Russia to such a degree, Tapper cut to the chase and asked Bolton “why not? Why can’t President Trump condemn Russian election interference with the same vociferousness that you’re able to?”

“That’s simply inaccurate,” said Bolton, who insisted that Trump recognizes Russia’s actions and wants to stop it from happening again in the future. Bolton continued to say that he and his colleagues had their recent ensemble because Trump wanted them to tell America he’s serious about safeguarding the integrity of the electoral process.

From there, Tapper noted how Trump recently said former president Barack Obama didn’t try to stop to stop Russia’s election-meddling because it was all a “big hoax.” To that point, the CNN host asked Bolton “are you not concerned at all when the president calls a threat to the nation you take seriously a hoax?”

Watch Bolton’s answer above, via CNN.

[Image via screengrab]

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