April 11, 2019

Trump: “I Know Nothing About WikiLeaks.” Hmmm. Let’s Review the Tape.

Trump cheered on WikiLeaks more than 140 times during the 2016 campaign.

After WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was arrested in London on Thursday on a single computer hacking charge filed by US prosecutors, a reporter asked President Donald Trump at the White House: “Do you still love WikiLeaks?”

Trump’s response? “I know nothing about WikiLeaks. It’s not my thing.”

Hmmmm. Let’s review the tape.

During his 2016 presidential campaign, Trump repeatedly praised WikiLeaks, which released thousands of Democratic National Committee emails in an attempt to harm Hillary Clinton’s chance of winning the election. These weren’t isolated comments. Trump cheered on WikiLeaks more than 140 times. Loudly, and at great length.

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WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

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Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

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