Today’s edition of quick hits:
* Who’s going to believe this? “President Donald Trump attempted on Tuesday to clarify his widely criticized comments in Helsinki, saying that he had misspoken when he said a day earlier that he did not see why Russia would have meddled in the election. Trump said Tuesday he meant to say he did not see any reason why it wouldn’t have been Russia that interfered.”
* Developments in the Butina case: “Russian national Maria Butina was indicted by a federal grand jury Tuesday on charges of conspiracy against the U.S. and acting as ‘an agent of a foreign government.’”
* Developments in the Manafort case: “Special counsel Robert Mueller wants to give a form of immunity to five potential witnesses against former Trump campaign chief Paul Manafort, according to court papers filed Tuesday.”
* Priorities: “On the very same day that President Trump sided with Russia over election interference and called the special counsel investigation back home ‘a disaster for our country,’ a group of House conservatives escalated its campaign against the person overseeing that investigation, Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein.”
* He is nothing if not predictable: “Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Calif.) says he’s not sure whether he’s the congressman mentioned in Monday’s indictment of a Russian gun-rights activist for acting as an unregistered agent of the Kremlin — but he is sure that the charge against the woman is ‘bogus.’” * This is an odd one: “President Trump has never been one to just casually accept people’s accounts of their birthplaces. Apparently that now extends to his father. Despite his dad being born in the United States to German American parents, Trump has gone around in recent days suggesting — and even outright stating, bizarrely — that Fred Trump was born in Germany.” * I have a hunch Milbank had some fun writing this one: “My fellow Americans, we are a deeply stupid nation. I know this must be the case because President Trump has repeatedly informed us that we are a ‘stupid country’ — he offered this opinion on at least nine occasions since he launched his campaign for the presidency — and he should know. As he reminded us after his NATO meeting last week, he is a ‘very stable genius.’” Anything to add? Consider this an open thread.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past." Recommended
