“The fact that the president feels compelled to tweet about the news here shows that his fundamental focus is not on the security of our forces, but rather if he seems to be paying no attention. So he says that nobody told me therefore I don’t You can blame it, “Bolton told CNN’s Jake Tapper in” State of the Union. ”
The former official added that he believed Trump’s motivation for denying a briefing is “because it looks bad if the Russians are paying to kill Americans and we are doing nothing about it.”
“So what is the presidential reaction? That is, it is not my responsibility, nobody told me,” Bolton said.
“It is about his personal position,” he said of Trump, noting that if the intelligence reports are true, this “is one of the most serious issues … that has come up in the Trump administration.”
The tweet was a step beyond a statement by the White House on Saturday, which did not deny the validity of the report, but said that Trump and Vice President Mike Pence were not informed “about the alleged Russian reward intelligence.”
CNN previously reported that Russian intelligence officers for GRU military intelligence recently offered money to Taliban militants in Afghanistan as a reward if they killed American or British troops there, according to that source. US intelligence concluded months ago that Russian military intelligence offered rewards amid peace talks, the Times said in its report.
Trump received information on the intelligence findings and the White House National Security Council held a meeting on the matter in late March, according to the Times, citing informed officials on the matter.
This story has been updated with additional comments from John Bolton on “State of the Union”.
CNN’s Sarah Westwood contributed to this report.
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