bdmetronews Desk ॥ Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard, who is running for the Democratic nomination, fired back Friday after Hillary Clinton suggested the Russians are “grooming” a candidate for a third-party run to disrupt the 2020 election. In an interview with CBSN on Friday night, Gabbard said Clinton “knows she can’t control me.”
“This is a message to every veteran in this country who has put their life on the line to serve our country, to every single American who believes strongly that we must end this long-standing foreign policy of being the world’s police and ending these regime-change wars, which is really the legacy of Hillary Clinton, then we are traitors to the nation that we love,” said Gabbard, who is a veteran.
Gabbard has often been criticized for her seeming support for Syrian dictator Bashar al Assad, which has included meeting with him and openly questioning U.S. intelligence conclusions that Assad carried out chemical weapons attacks on his own people.
In an interview with David Plouffe, the campaign manager for President Obama’s 2008 campaign, for his podcast Campaign HQ, Clinton discussed Russian interference in the 2016 election and likely intrusion into the 2020 election.
“They’re also going to do third party again. And I’m not making any predictions, but I think they’ve got their eye on somebody who’s currently in the Democratic primary. And they’re grooming her to be the third party candidate,” Clinton said presumably about Gabbard, referring to Russian efforts to support third party candidate Jill Stein in 2016.
“She’s the favorite of the Russians, they have a bunch of sites and bots and other ways of supporting her so far, and – that’s assuming Jill Stein will give it up, which she might not, because she is also a Russian asset — yeah, she’s a Russian asset! I mean totally!” Clinton continued. Clinton supporters have alleged that Stein served as a spoiler in the 2016 election.
“They know they can’t win without a third-party candidate. And so, I don’t know who it’s gonna be, but I can guarantee they’ll have a vigorous third party challenge in the key states that they most need it,” Clinton said about the Russians.
