US expels 60 Russian intelligence officers in response to ex-spy's poisoning

source: abcnews

President Trump is expelling 60 Russian intelligence officers from the United States and ordered the closure of the Russian consulate in Seattle, the White House announced Monday.

The expulsions are in response to the poisoning of a former Russian spy and his daughter in Salisbury, U.K., earlier this month.

Of the 60 Russians, 48 are members of the Russian embassy, while 12 are stationed at the Russian mission to the United Nations, where senior administration officials said they were operating under the guise of diplomacy but were deemed to be conducting covert activities.

"Today’s actions make the United States safer by reducing Russia’s ability to spy on Americans and to conduct covert operations that threaten America’s national security," White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said in a statement. "With these steps, the United States and our allies and partners make clear to Russia that its actions have consequences. The United States stands ready to cooperate to build a better relationship with Russia, but this can only happen with a change in the Russian government’s behavior."

A senior administration official said the expulsions will remove a "large number of the unacceptably numerous Russian intelligence officers who abide in the United States" but noted that more Russian intelligence operatives remain on U.S. soil. The officials didn't rule out future actions to address the remaining operatives.

Although the Russian government has been notified of the expulsions, the issue did not come up when Trump and Russian President Vladmir Putin spoke by phone last week.

The Russian operatives being expelled will be given seven days to leave the country, according to senior administration officials.

These officials defended the administration's delay in announcing the move, saying that time was necessary to make sure the actions were taken properly and in coordination with other allies who are also announcing disciplinary responses to the Russian attack in the United Kingdom.

"We do not act alone, we take these actions in concert with similar steps by our allies and partners around the world," said one U.S. official.

"It's been three weeks since the attack, and we're looking at this point at more than a dozen allies who are acting in coordination with us," the official noted. "That takes time and it needed to be done the right way, so I think the way that we've gone about it is the way it needed to be handled."

The expulsions are the second in less than two years. In December of 2016 President Obama expelled 35 Russian diplomats and intelligence officials and shut down two diplomatic compounds in response to Russian meddling in the U.S. presidential election.