Readers React: Trump’s ludicrous assurance on accepting foreign help: Trust me

To the editor: President Trump has made it his policy to allow foreign governments, including his despot buddies, to interfere with our elections. Because, after all, everybody does it, “there’s nothing wrong with listening,” and “if I thought there was something wrong, I’d go maybe to the FBI.”

Maybe. Great.

What I would like to know is who told him that? Also, whose confirmation of the accuracy of the information given to him by a foreign actor would he believe? Certainly not our own intelligence agencies’, so whose?

And how will we, the American people, know if he is accepting information of value or not without the FBI investigating, which according to Trump has been spying on him?

Oh, I forgot, we are supposed to take his word for it because, as we know, he never lies to the American people.

Carolyn Chriss, Sherman Oaks

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To the editor: Trump’s stated willingness to exploit foreign agents’ dirt on political opponents shrouds a stark truth: Republicans are loath to grant that foreigners who seek to influence our elections strive to harm, not help, the cause of democracy.

Thus those agents will always favor the nominee they deem most likely to divide and weaken the nation. Their ideal president is not one who seems fully capable of strengthening the United States, but rather one who might stoke divisive culture wars.

Foreign agents’ enmity for progressive candidates may please our egoistic president and his benighted base. But all prescient voters, regardless of party affiliation, should take a cue from foreigners’ attempts to influence future elections: Whomever they malign surely merits the votes of all who want to preserve our democracy.

David Schaffer, Santa Monica

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To the editor: The media miss the obvious reason why Trump at first said he thought it was OK for a campaign to accept information from a foreign agent or country.

He was defending his campaign, his oldest son and probably himself for accepting a June 2016 meeting with a Kremlin-linked attorney at Trump Tower. If he answered correctly that it is illegal to accept such information and that the work of the Russians should have been immediately reported to the FBI, he would have admitted to wrongdoing and illegal activity.

Jerry Houser, Sierra Madre

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