In a wide-ranging interview at the Atlantic Festival in Washington, the ex-secretary of state and Donald Trump’s Nemesis, Hillary Clinton, drew a parallel between the 9/11 terrorist attacks and Russia’s alleged interference in the 2016 election.
READ MORE: Lavrov Trolls Spain at UN, Says Russia 'Busy Meddling in Catalonia's Elections'
The 2016 Democratic presidential nominee maintained that in both cases a foreign power had attacked the United States, but in the second, the president had “done nothing.”
“It is the first time…that we have been attacked by a foreign power and have done nothing. I mean it would be like—I can't even imagine—it's a horrible example but after 9/11 George W. Bush said, well, you know, I don't have time to meet—I don't have time to worry about this,” she said.
Clinton has yet again reiterated her claims that Moscow’s alleged role and a number of other factors “certainly altered the outcome” of the vote in some parts of the country.
“I believe that the combination of the Russian campaign, the WikiLeaks being the cutout for Russian stolen information, the role that Cambridge Analytica and other organizations like that played in connection with the Republican apparatus, the [Republican] National Committee and other allies and the Trump campaign certainly altered the outcome in enough places that we have to ask, ‘What really happened?’”
Clinton’s controversial remarks couldn’t remain unnoticed on social media, having sparked a new round of discussions on Russia’s alleged interference, as well as the appropriateness of her comparison.
READ MORE: Trump Signs Order to Sanction States Responsible for Election Meddling – Bolton
The overwhelming majority of users believe that the analogy was disgusting and many dismissed her as “nuts”:
And somehow @HillaryClinton compared her loss in a presidential election to 9/11. She's nuts. Time for her to go away. #SheLost
— Conservative VA (@OldDominionPost) 3 октября 2018 г.
Yes. Disclosure of your e-mails containing proof of your rigging the primaries, promoting Trump, and using the State Dept for personal business was exactly like 2,977 people being murdered by terrorists.#NeverHillary #BWHW #GoAwayhttps://t.co/d1A9tnb6A9
— 🕉 Scap🌹☮ (@scapelliti) 3 октября 2018 г.
"I didn't win so it's like terrorism."
— Pete LaPlace (@hothotcocoa05) 3 октября 2018 г.
— Hillary Clinton
She has so little regard for the people who died on September 11th that she is going to trivialize their deaths to score points. Just when I think I can't possibly dislike Clinton any more than I already do, she finds a way.
— Tom Thompson (@Tommy2thePoint) 3 октября 2018 г.
This is an insult to every single 9/11 victim
— Billy B (@HomoWMD) 3 октября 2018 г.
However, some appeared to support her views, suggesting that it was an apt comparison:
She said "that in both cases, a foreign power had attacked the United States, but that in the latter, the president had 'done nothing.'” I agree with her 100%. The future will see Trump's acts in 2016 & going forward as one of history's biggest betrayals.https://t.co/NWzS5KMq4Y
— HRC persists (@HRCpersists) 3 октября 2018 г.
It is an attack on our Democracy. It continues and digital warfare is underway.
— Illinois4JB&Juliana (@IL4Hillary) 2 октября 2018 г.
And she is correct.
— david (@realDavidPena) 2 октября 2018 г.
This is not the first time that Clinton has compared the alleged Russian meddling to the deadliest terrorist attack in the history of the United States. In an interview with BuzzFeed News a year ago, she called her loss to Trump a “cyber 9/11.”
“We had really well-respected security, intelligence veterans saying this was a cyber 9/11, in the sense it was a direct attack on our institutions. That may sound dramatic, but we know that they probed and tried to intrude into election systems – not just the social media propaganda part of their campaign,” she said.
In July, the US intelligence community concluded that Russia interfered in the 2016 election and that President Vladimir Putin had personally approved the efforts to change the outcome of the vote and boost Trump’s chances. Both Trump and Putin denied the “collusion,” with the US president dismissing the claims as “witch hunt.”
