During the press conference, one reporter asked Conway if President Donald Trump considered election security to be a serious problem. Conway responded that the administration wants to protect elections from any threat, including American journalists.
“Well, we want secure elections,” she said. “We don’t want anyone to interfere with them, whether they are a foreign government or the domestic press corps.”
Another reporter immediately asked Conway what that is supposed to mean and the White House official said: “You know what it means.” She pointed to the media’s coverage of the 2016 election, during which most national polling showed that Hillary Clinton was going to defeat Trump.
“You’re not covering what your own polling says is important to the people you’re talking to across this country,” she said.
Members of the press pushed back on Conway’s accusations, saying that they simply wanted to know how the Trump administration is going to secure the 2020 election from foreign influence. The questioning followed Wednesday’s testimony from former special counsel Robert Mueller, who told lawmakers that Russia’s election interference was the biggest threat to our democracy.
“Over the course of my career, I’ve seen a number of challenges to our democracy,” Mueller said in his opening remarks. “The Russian government’s effort to interfere in our election is among the most serious. As I said on May 29, this deserves the attention of every American.”
“Well we just want to know if you’re going to secure the elections in 2020 and will you work with Mitch McConnell to make sure legislation passes,” one reporter told Conway.
On Thursday, Senate Majority Leader McConnell blocked two election security bills designed to deter interference by Russia and other states. McConnell said he opposed the legislation because he thought it was “highly partisan” and came from the same lawmakers who “hyped up a conspiracy theory” about the Trump campaign colluding with Russia in 2016.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer called out McConnell for his inaction. “We need to act,. So why have @SenateMajLdr McConnell and Senate Republicans buried commonsense election security bills in their legislative graveyard?” he wrote on Twitter.
Republican Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith blocked similar election security legislation put forth by Democrats on Wednesday evening. Unlike McConnell, she did not state her reason for opposing the measures. Two of the bills blocked by Hyde-Smith would have required campaigns to report to federal authorities any attempts by foreign powers to interfere with U.S. elections.
Conway, in a response to the reporter, argued that Trump administration would “work with everyone” to increase election security ahead of the next presidential election. She then turned the situation on former President Barack Obama.
“We would have worked with President Obama, who damn well knew that the Russians were trying to interfere but didn’t talk up about it because he was convinced the other person would win.”
“But you guys are in office now!” one reporter said.
