Standing before the United Nations Security Council Wednesday, President Trump accused China of interfering in the upcoming U.S. midterm elections, but offered no evidence to back his claims.
"Regrettably we found that China has been attempting to interfere in our upcoming 2018 election, coming up in November," Trump said in his opening remarks, alleging that China does not “want me or us to win because I am the first president ever to challenge China on trade and we are winning on trade. We are winning on every level. We don't want them to meddle or interfere in our upcoming elections."
Shrugging during Trump’s remarks, China’s U.N. delegate later said, “China has all along followed the principle of not interfering in other countries’ domestic affairs.”
Last week, a day after imposing additional tariffs on China, Trump, without offering any evidence, laid into the nation in a tweet alleging attempted influence of the U.S. election.
“China has openly stated that they are actively trying to impact and change our election by attacking our farmers, ranchers and industrial workers because of their loyalty to me,” Trump tweeted.
The president has been engaged in a trade war with China for the last few months – earlier rounds of tariffs were met with the same by China.
In August he also accused China of hacking Hillary Clinton’s emails, but again offered no corroborating evidence.
“Hillary Clinton’s Emails, many of which are Classified Information, got hacked by China,” he tweeted then.
The president’s latest remarks came a day after his boasting drew laughter from world leaders gathered at the U.N. General Assembly in New York and noticeably excluded a rebuke of Russia for its cyberattacks and influence campaigns intended to exert influence on U.S. voters.
