OH, OKAY

Putin: Maybe Jews Are Behind U.S. Election Meddling

Or Ukrainians, or Tatars. Either way, the Russian president “couldn’t care less.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin says he “couldn’t care less” if Russian citizens sought to interfere in U.S. elections, suggesting that maybe Jews or Ukrainians are to blame for meddling. “So what if they're Russians?” Putin said of the recent indictment against 13 Russian citizens accusing of conspiring to influence the 2016 presidential election. Speaking to NBC in an interview aired Saturday, he said, “There are 146 million Russians. So what? ... They do not represent the interests of the Russian state.“ “Why have you decided the Russian authorities, myself included, gave anybody permission to do this?” he said. “Maybe they are not even Russians, but Ukrainians, Tatars or Jews, but with Russian citizenship, which should also be checked. Maybe they have dual citizenship or a green card; maybe the U.S. paid them for this.”