A full 13 days after NRCC Chair Tom Emmer received a letter from DCCC Chair Cheri Bustos challenging him to join her in rejecting the use of hacked or stolen information in campaigns, Emmer is still dodging questions on the subject. New video shows Emmer scurrying away while being questioned about whether the NRCC intends to use stolen materials in its 2020 campaigns.
In this video, Emmer takes a laughably fake phone call while ignoring the questions “Will the NRCC be using hacked or stolen data in the 2020 reelection campaigns?” and “Why are you ignoring the DCCC’s calls to reject information stolen by Russia?”
Watch Emmer continue to ignore these crucial questions HERE.
“Washington Republicans are enabling Russia’s ongoing mission to infiltrate our elections by refusing to reject the use of hacked or stolen campaign intel,” said DCCC Spokesperson Jared Smith. “Tom Emmer cannot avoid answering this forever – he owes the American people a clear answer about whether the NRCC will continue accepting help from Vladimir Putin.”
Below is the full text of DCCC Chairwoman Cheri Bustos’ letter to NRCC Chairman Tom Emmer. You can view a signed copy here:
Dear Chairman Emmer,
I write you today in the hope that we can reach an agreement on an issue of critical importance to our democracy. With the release of the Mueller Report last week, Americans were reminded, in great detail, about how our democracy was attacked during the 2016 Presidential Election. Regrettably, in at least two instances, this information was used by Republican campaigns for political gain.
For example, in Florida’s 18th Congressional District during the 2016 election, information was stolen from the DCCC and released by Russian Intelligence through Guccifer 2.0. Later in the year, the NRCC used that stolen information to attack the Democratic candidate.
There is no question that agents of the Russian government and other bad actors will attempt to infiltrate both the DCCC and NRCC to steal information for malicious use again in this upcoming election.
Protecting our democracy must be a priority for all Americans as we head into the 2020 election – that begins by ensuring the sanctity of our election process. As the heads of two major party organizations in our nation, we have an obligation to send a clear and unified message that Democrats and Republicans reject foreign interference in our elections.
In this spirit, I am asking the NRCC to join the DCCC in committing to the following pledge:
- We will not participate, aid or encourage hackers or foreign actors in any attempt to influence American elections.
- We will never seek out stolen and/or hacked information for use in any operations.
- We will never use known stolen and/or hacked information, or promote or disseminate stolen and/or hacked materials to the press, regardless of the source and will report any receipt of, or offers to receive, stolen and/or hacked information to law enforcement.
- We will not support any campaign or allied groups that use known stolen and/or hacked information, or promotes or disseminates stolen and/or hacked materials to the press, regardless of the source and will encourage all campaigns to report any receipt of, or offers to receive, stolen and/or hacked information to law enforcement.
- Any foreign actors attempting to participate, operate, influence or contact the committee or any of our campaigns will be reported to appropriate law enforcement immediately.
- We call on the chief election officers in all states to ensure the most robust fortification and protection of elections systems leading up to, and during, the 2020 election.
We hope you will agree to these principles for the sake of our democracy. If you have suggestions about how we could strengthen this pledge, I would welcome a dialogue with you.
Kind Personal Regards,
Cheri Bustos
DCCC Chairwoman
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