GOP's Cotton put on the spot by CNN's Bash over interview with Russian-backed influencer
During his appearance on CNN's "State of the Union," host Dana Bash put Sen. Tom Cotton (R) on the spot for having taken part in an interview with a far-right influencer who has been accused of taking Russian money to push Kremlin talking points.
Moments after the far-right Cotton dismissed former vice president Dick Cheney crossing the aisle to endorse Democrat Kamala Harris over Donald Trump, Cotton also claimed a Justice Department allegation that Russia has been paying off right-wing pundits was much ado about nothing.
That was when Bash reminded Cotton that he granted an interview in February with Dave Rubin who, among others, has been accused of taking hundreds of thousands of dollars to toe the Kremlin line.
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After Cotton told the CNN host, "I haven't seen any intelligence about this matter, I'll have seen the allegations.,' Bash countered, "It sounds to me like you're downplaying the fact that Vladimir Putin is using people like Dave Rubin, whose show you went on in February, as a tool for his propaganda."
"So I'm not downplaying Vladimir Putin's designs or Xi Jinping's designs, the ayatollah's designs to try to influence our election," Cotton pushed back. "But using money to try to promote memes or videos on the internet is not exactly going to make a huge difference."
"Again, you shouldn't knowingly do that," he quickly added. "And I don't know if any of these people..."
"Do you know young people?" Bash interrupted. "You know some people only get their information from those memes and videos."
"But Dana, what we're really would be catastrophic is if a foreign government say hacked into the voter registration system during voting, or hacked into election machines and erased votes or turned off the electricity in a big city on election day — those are things that are serious threats," he protested.
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