White House agrees Russia meddled in US polls, but denies role in Trump win

White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders acknowledged on Tuesday that Russia attempted to interfere in the 2016 elections but said the efforts didn’t play a role in President Donald Trump’s victory.

“It’s very clear that Russia meddled in the election. It’s also very clear Russia didn’t have an impact on the election,” Sanders said at a briefing today. "And it’s also very clear that the trump campaign didn’t collude with the Russians in any way for this process to take place."
The president spent much of the holiday weekend tweeting about the Russia investigation after Special Counsel Robert Mueller indicted 13 Russian nationals on charges that they carried out a multimillion-dollar operation to depress support for Democrat Hillary Clinton and boost backing for Trump in the 2016 election.

Trump was criticized for not speaking out against Russia after the indictment. He instead focused on comments by Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein that the indictment didn’t contain evidence that Trump’s campaign willingly collaborated with Russian efforts. He also rebuked his national security adviser for not defending the legitimacy of his election.

Facebook, Twitter, Google under scrutiny for 'Russian meddling'

Facebook, Twitter and Google lawyers defended themselves to US lawmakers probing whether Russia used social media to influence the 2016 Presidential election.

The three firms faced hard questions at a Senate panel on Tuesday on crime and terrorism about why they missed political ads bought with Russian money, BBC reported on Wednesday.

Lawmakers are eyeing new regulations for social media firms in the wake of Russia's alleged meddling in 2016. The firms said they would tighten advertising policies and guidelines.

Senator Al Franken, a Democrat from Minnesota, asked Facebook -- which absorbed much of the heat from lawmakers -- why payment in Russian rubles did not tip off the firm to suspicious activity.

"In hindsight, we should have had a broader lens," said Colin Stretch, general counsel for Facebook. "There are signals we missed."

A day earlier, Facebook said as many as 126 million US users may have seen Russia-backed content over the last two years.

Lawyers for the three firms are facing two days of congressional hearings as lawmakers consider legislation that would extend regulations for television, radio and satellite to also cover social media platforms.

The firms said they are increasing efforts to identify bots and spam, as well as make political advertising more transparent.

Facebook, for example, said it expects to have 20,000 people working on "safety and security" by the end of 2018 -- double the current number.
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