Right Wing Propaganda Sites Are Ignoring Trump's Latest Attempt to Collude With Putin

Just last week Donald Trump filed a lawsuit against Hillary Clinton, the Democratic National Committee and 26 other people and entities that he claims conspired to undermine his 2016 campaign by falsely claiming that he colluded with Russia. And then on Tuesday, during an interview with John Solomon, Trump openly attempted to collude with Russia. 

Trump calls for Putin to release dirt on the Biden family right now since now "he's not exactly a fan of our country" during new interview with Real America's Voice pic.twitter.com/Sp1gDVsSfr

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) March 29, 2022

Just for the record, Trump's claims about the former mayor of Moscow's wife giving Hunter Biden - much less "both Bidens" - $3.5 million is a lie that has been repeatedly debunked. 

It's also worth remembering that John Solomon, who nodded his head as Trump repeated that lie, was part of the team that laid the groundwork for Trump's attempt to extort Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. Before losing his job at The Hill, Solomon wrote articles that included smears against Ambassador Marie Yavanovitch, claims that Ukraine interfered in the 2016 election, and attacks on the Bidens. As I've written previously, he's not a journalist, but a political operative working on Trump's behalf.

Prior to the full interview with Trump being released, Solomon published a teaser titled "Trump calls on Putin to release info on Hunter Biden’s dealings with oligarchs." One can only guess that the assumption was that, as discussion about Hunter Biden's laptop heated up, this reminder from Trump would generate renewed interest in the allegations about ties to a Russian oligarch.

But a review of several right wing propaganda sites shows that, for the most part, they've completely ignored this story. There is no mention of Solomon's interview or Trump's call for Putin to release dirt on the Bidens at RealClearPolitics, The Federalist, or the New York Post. Over at Fox News, the only mention of Trump's request came in an article titled "MSNBC host claims 'Hunter Biden story' in 2020 was ‘fact-checked’ and deemed mostly ‘nonsense.’"

MSNBC host Jonathan Lemire claimed Wednesday that the "Hunter Biden story" was "fact checked" and deemed mostly "nonsense" back when the story first broke in 2020, not acknowledging the laptop or its contents have since been verified.

During an appearance on "Morning Joe," Lemire was asked by anchor Mika Brzezinski about a Tuesday interview in which former President Donald Trump claimed there was information on the laptop indicating that the mayor of Moscow gave the Bidens $3.5 million. Trump subsequently said that Russian President Vladimir Putin should release information related to that claim.

In other words, Fox tried to split hairs by playing up the angle on Hunter Biden and burying the part about Donald Trump openly colluding with Putin once again.

John Solomon thought he was feeding right wingers a story that would continue their smear campaign against a sitting President of the United States. But he didn't take into account the way that Putin's invasion of Ukraine has changed the political dynamics in this country. Back in 2016, when we learned that Russia had interfered in the presidential election to support Trump, Putin's favorable rating among Republicans rose from 16 to 37 percent. But currently, only 14% of Republicans view Putin favorably.

As much as they'd like to smear President Biden, Trump's enablers don't want this story to gain any traction because it points to the fact that, in light of current events, their leader is dancing way too close to the line of treason, as Charlie Sykes suggests.

Even as Trump spoke, Putin was waging a war of unremitting terror that has killed thousands of Ukrainians. The West has rallied to oppose him, and nearly every American political figure — from both parties — has denounced the Russian thug.

And it is at this moment, amidst a brutal war of aggression, that Trump once again reached out for Putin’s help in attacking the sitting American president and, by extension, this country.

Here’s where we come to the treasonous smoking gun: Trump explicitly frames his request to Putin as an act of retaliation not just against Biden, but against the United States itself.

Some accounts leave out the key phrase that Trump uses when he explains why Putin might help him.

"As long as Putin is not exactly a fan of our country... I would think Putin would know the answer to that. I think he should release it... you won't get the answer from Ukraine... I think Putin now would be willing to probably give that answer."

To summarize, Trump not only asked for Putin's help in smearing Biden, he framed it as a way for Putin to retaliate against the U.S. for our support of Ukraine. 

After all of these years of having to endure Trump, it is difficult to register shock at his depravity. But we can't look away. Right wingers want to ignore what their leader just said and pretend it never happened. But it did. 

In the end, Donald Trump is just one narcissistic sociopath. The only reason we have to pay attention to him is that his supporters refuse to abandon him no matter what he says/does. That's what gives him power. Right wing news sites don't want those supporters to know about this story because it just might be the one that finally tips the scale at a moment when Putin has become the most reviled man in the world.