McMaster: Trump Has 'Made Good Decisions on Russia'

By Marisa Herman    |

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Former national security adviser for President Donald Trump H. R. McMaster touted the president's decision making when it comes to Russia during several media interviews on Tuesday.

During a Tuesday appearance on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” McMaster said the president has “made good decisions on Russia.”

"I felt it was my duty when I was there to present the president with the best analysis from across all departments and agencies," McMaster said. "What I found is: When presented with that analysis, he made good decisions on Russia. You might recall in that first year of his presidency he imposed a tremendous number of sanctions on [Russian President Vladimir] Putin and his criminalized patronage network."

McMaster said Trump has acted against Moscow when Putin has overstepped. The Trump administration extended sanctions that were put in place after Putin's takeover of parts of Ukraine in 2014. They sanctioned him over his support of the Assad regime in Syria as well as over his violation of the Global Magnitsky Act, according to the Free Beacon. In addition, the Countering America's Adversaries Through Sanctions Act, which passed in 2017, has been applied to Putin’s network of criminals and arms dealers several times.

"There have been really severe consequences on Putin," McMaster told MSNBC's "The 11th Hour" host Brian Williams. "I was really proud of the fact that the Trump administration imposed very high costs on Putin and … the oligarchs around him."

The Free Beacon reports that Putin had to reduce his defense budget by 5% due to the sanctions and current economic conditions amid the coronavirus pandemic.

McMaster agreed that Russian disinformation is a problem facing American national security. He said digital attacks on Americans have caused a larger polarization on hot topics such as race and gun control to occur.

"It’s a sustained campaign of political subversion … an attack on our confidence in who we are as Americans," he told Williams.