Trump knows Russia’s help put him over the top — and now he thinks he has been exposed as illegitimate: Ex-FBI counter-intel chief

President Donald Trump has a guilty conscience about his legitimacy as president of the United States, the former FBI assistant director for counter-intelligence detailed on MSNBC.

Anchor Nicolle Wallace played a clip of Trump speaking to reporters on the White House lawn.

"Russia did not help me get elected. You know who got me elected? You know who got me elected? I got me elected," Trump claimed. "Russia didn’t help me at all. Russia, if anything, I think helped the other side."

"That was part of the cleanup of something Donald Trump let slip out this morning when he essentially agreed with one of the central conclusions of the Mueller report -- shhh, don’t tell him -- that the Russians worked to assist his campaign in 2016," Wallace explained. "It’s actually something his own intelligence community has been telling him for his entire presidency."

"And Donald Trump seemed to agree -- for about an hour -- when he tweeted this, 'I had nothing to do with Russia helping me to get elected.' He typed that," she reported.

For analysis, Wallace interviewed Frank Figliuzzi, who directed counter-intelligence for the FBI.

"We can joke and smile about this, what we think is a slip of a tweet that happened this morning, but I don’t think it was," Figliuzzi said. "I don’t think it’s a mistake."

"I think it’s a reflection of what the president thinks. Let me be careful here, just as Mueller is measured. I’m not saying that there’s evidence that the Russians put Trump over the top in the election. But what I’m saying clearly is I think Trump thinks that, and I think he’s scared out of his mind that that perception is going to get out there," he deduced.

"So when we see no press conference being called on how to deal with the threat to our election system in 2020, we don’t see a strike force put together, we don’t see strong leadership standing together saying here’s the money, the resources and the plan, what we’re really seeing is the fear of this administration, if they align themselves with any effort that acknowledges what the Russians did, they’re admitting they got help," he continued.

The counter-intelligence expert reminded that Russia helping the Republican Party is not the only threat going into the 2020 election cycle.

"I’m here to tell you, it’s not just Russia we should be worrying about it, it’s North Korea, China, Iran -- any other nation with a sophisticated cyber capability that decides whenever they want to, to support whoever they want to. And next time it may not be Trump and it may not be the Republicans, it may be someone else," he reminded.

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