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Kurt Eichenwald: Trump’s baffling ties to Russia could blow up the US alliance with Britain and France

Kurt Eichenwald (CNN)
Travis Gettys
November 04, 2016

Britain and France are so concerned about Donald Trump's ties to Russia that they're beginning to consider the United States as a threat to their national security, according to Newsweek's Kurt Eichenwald.

Eichenwald appeared Friday morning on CNN's "New Day," where he discussed his on the Republican presidential nominee.

He said the U.S. intelligence community and their allies are certain that Russia was behind the sophisticated hacking of Hillary Clinton and the Democratic National Committee -- and they're absolutely stunned and terrified that Trump refuses to believe their evidence.

"We now have a situation where our allies, the intelligence services overseas, are investigating a presidential candidate trying to figure out why he's denying what the intelligence shows," Eichenwald said.

He said foreign intelligence officials have considered a variety of conspiracy theories for why Trump might publicly deny what their evidence shows, including the possibility that the GOP nominee is being blackmailed by Russia.

"It is known right now -- this is absolutely true -- that the Russians have gathered both video and audio tape of Trump when he was in Russia," Eichenwald said. "They have done the same thing with Hillary Clinton when she was there."

Intelligence officers are trying to determine what damaging information the Russians might have on Trump, if at all.

"It's like, what do they have? Is there something? Why is Donald Trump doing this?" Eichenwald said.

He stated flatly that the FBI was not investigating Trump's potential ties to Russia, saying the bureau had only examined potential criminal wrongdoing inside the U.S.

"That's a completely different thing," Eichenwald said. "That is a criminal investigation into activities that are done by people within the United States. This is national security. This is not, 'Can we bring an indictment?'"

Trump and his apparent ties to Russia have troubled Britain and France so greatly that they're worried their long-standing alliance with the U.S. could splinter.

"If we have somebody running for president of the United States who publicly denies the universally agreed intelligence that he has been told, and says, 'No, Russia (is) not the bad guys here -- it could be some 400-pound man sitting on a bed somewhere,' they are truly horrified," Eichenwald said. "They are launching into a situation where they're viewing the United States as a threat -- potential threat -- to their own national security."

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