Donald Trump did not say the Russians didn't meddle in the U.S. election.  Remember that when you read heated statements from leftist shills or people like Jeff Flake and John McCain.  The left is in full lie mode, and leftists will say anything while assuming that their audience will never actually hear the truth.

Here's what really happened.  First Trump said:

During today's meeting, I addressed directly with President Putin the issue of Russian interference in our elections.

I felt this was a message best delivered in person.  I spent a great deal of time talking about it and President Putin may very well want to address it and very strongly, because he feels very strongly about it and he has an interesting idea.

Trump later followed up with this:

I have great confidence in my intelligence people but I will tell you that President Putin was extremely strong and powerful in his denial today and what he did is an incredible offer. 

He offered to have the people working on the case come and work with their investigators, with respect to the 12 people.  I think that's an incredible offer.  OK? 

Trump never said the Russians didn't meddle – only that he discussed the issue with Putin and Putin denied it.  Putin appears to be ready to back his claim up by providing Robert Mueller access to the 12 supposed hackers.

Putin could be lying, but nothing Trump said boils down to "the Russians didn't meddle."  Rather, Trump was being diplomatic and didn't directly call Putin a liar.

Remember when the left was saying Trump would be horrible in diplomacy because he would be out of control?  Well, now he uses diplomatic phrasing, and the left is screaming at him for not being more of a bull in the china shop.  It is objectively true that no matter what Trump does, the left will declare it's horrible.

Because the media were distorting what he'd said, Trump clarified his position with a subsequent tweet:

As I said today and many times before, "I have GREAT confidence in MY intelligence people."  However, I also recognize that in order to build a brighter future, we cannot exclusively focus on the past – as the world's two largest nuclear powers, we must get along!  #HELSINKI2018

Trump did raise a very interesting point: the intelligence agencies saying the Russians interfered in the U.S. elections have not to this day taken possession of Hillary's server.  That's similar to declaring someone guilty of murder without ever inspecting the crime scene.

Further, he pointed out the obvious truth: the left is using supposed Russian interference as a way to delegitimize Trump, even though no one is saying the Russians actually changed any vote counts.  If it turned out that the Russians didn't impact the results of the election, then the left's main tool to attack Trump would disappear.  Hence, the left is highly incentivized to lie about Russian interference.

It's important to keep in mind that the man who was heading the CIA when this Russian interference was going on called today for Trump to be impeached.  We also know that the head of the entire U.S. intelligence community when this interference was going on, James Clapper, has been virulently anti-Trump since day one.  We know that a piece of unverified intelligence paid for by Hillary and produced by a British citizen based on Russian sources was used to get a FISA warrant to spy on the Trump campaign.

There is every reason to believe that it's possible that the intelligence communities' assessment of what went on is biased. 

This is another example of how the left has completely abandoned any concern about the truth.  To leftists, it's existentially important that the result of any election they lose be tainted.  That's why they always talk about voter suppression when they lose but reject any idea of vote fraud when they win.

After eight years of Obama, leftists believed that they were the new fascist ruling elites, that elections were mere formalities.  Trump's election took away what the leftists prize most and what they believe they are entitled to due to the "fact" that they are smarter, kinder, and all around better than the rest of us – that is, the power to run our lives. 

The left will not rest until it controls every aspect of our lives: how many children we have, what marriage is, how much soda we can drink, how much plastic we can use, and what we must believe.

Because the left identifies as the better part of America, leftists are perfectly comfortable with any amount of lying to overturn an honest election.  To the left, the end always justifies the means.  That's why the left went from being an apologist for any crime committed by Russia, a role it held from 1918 to 2017, to foaming-at-the-mouth anti-Russian fanatics. 

Whatever crime one wishes to accuse Russia of, and there are many crimes that Putin has committed, they pale beside the crimes committed by the communist rulers of China.  Yet the left holds up China as a great place – Obama wished he could rule like the Chinese dictator – while suddenly condemning Russia.  The reality is that the left is using Russia to undermine American confidence in our elections and to effectively stage a coup by discrediting the 2016 election.

Tell your friends the truth; Trump didn't deny Russian interference, but he did question why Hillary's hacked server wasn't investigated.  Trump managed to get Putin to give Mueller access to the 12 Russians, and the very diplomatic phrasing used by Trump is what the left said he was incapable of just a few months ago.

You can read more of Tom's rants at his blog, Conversations about the obvious, and feel free to follow him on Twitter.