‘4,700 on Google ads – that’s it? We never found evidence of Russian collusion’

Published time: 13 Dec, 2018 14:47Edited time: 13 Dec, 2018 16:59

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Sundar Pichai, Chief Executive Officer of Google, testifies before the United States House Committee on the Judiciary © Global Look Press / Ron Sachs

The goal of ‘Russian collusion’ hearings is not the truth – the Democrats are still trying to explain the people who gave a lot of money to Hillary Clinton why she lost, Lionel told RT.

The CEO of Google, Sundar Pichai, gave some specific numbers on alleged Russian meddling in the 2016 US election as he was questioned by the US House Judiciary Committee on Tuesday.

“Does Google now know the full extent to which its online platforms were exploited by Russian actors in the election two years ago?” New York Democratic Rep. Jerry Nadler asked Pichai.

The tech giant’s CEO responded:

We undertook a very thorough investigation, and, in 2016, we now know that there were two main ad accounts linked to Russia which advertised on Google for about $4,700 in advertising.

Google, along with Facebook and Twitter, have been under scrutiny for the past two years over the Russian meddling claims. The companies have extensively probed the activity Russia-linked accounts, but no direct proof of meddling has been revealed so far.

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Legal and media analyst Lionel said that the latest testimony by Google casts doubt over the entire investigation.

“This was their star witness, Google, they could have done so much, had he said the right thing,” he said.

“Jerrold Nadler, Democrat head at House Judiciary Committee, the same committee that is going to immediately try to impeach President Trump – this was his moment once and for all to have the head of Google to come and say ‘yes, there was enormous pressure, influence and ads on the part of the ‘Russians.’ That is it – $4700? And he furthermore said that in some of the other ads that were purchased they had nothing to do with Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump per se, but dealt with larger issues. That was the story that the mainstream corporate media never mentioned,” he continued.

Being a lawyer, Lionel suggested if he had the head of Google as a witness and he knew he is going to testify that there was less than $5,000 in ads by the “Russians”, he would have not asked him that question: “I would have passed or I would have let someone else talk to him. I would not have brought that up.”

Lionel explained that the role and the goal of this investigations and hearings “is not the truth”:

The bigger question is why these people still persist when since 2016 they have not found one example, not one bit of evidence, not one centile of fact showing that Russia actually significantly affected the election: not influenced, not sowed discord, not made people think but actually changed numbers, changed data – something substantial. That is what I think when I think of collusion. We never found any of that and they are still asking the question today.

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He is puzzled “when will the Democrats, in particular, leave this ridiculous issue alone and go on to running the country doing things for [a] constituency, for citizens and voters, that matter – infrastructure, health care, crime. Why are they insisting upon trying to dig up something in an issue when there is nothing there?”

According to Lionel, the reason why the Democrats are still trying to find some evidence of Russian collusion or interference is to explain how Hillary Clinton had lost the election.

“She had to explain to a lot of rich and powerful people who were very angry at her, who gave her a lot of money, she made a lot of promises that she was going to win.”

Lionel reminded that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result: “I don’t know how many times the Democrats need to be told there was no Russian collusion.”