• 3 days ago
During a press briefing on Monday, State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce was asked about the canceling of a grant for a Yale program that tracked the abduction of nearly 30,000 Ukrainian children by Russian forces.

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Transcript
00:00Following up on this story that happened last week about the termination of a grant to the
00:06Yale Initiative, research initiative in trying to track down Ukrainian children that have been
00:11taken by Russia, you mentioned last week in this room that the data exists, it's not been deleted.
00:18Correct. Correct.
00:20We also got a comment from the State Department saying that the department does not hold the data
00:25for the Conflict Exhibitory. The data resides on a platform owned by MITRE as part of the program,
00:32and we were referred to MITRE. In terms of evidence of where these children have gone,
00:38and when you're dealing with courts of law, is this data something that even if it's sitting
00:45somewhere on someone else's server like MITRE, is it overseen or controlled by the US government
00:51in terms of making sure that it's not being tampered with? And is there a concern that
00:56with that particular initiative, the grant to that initiative terminated,
01:01is there a concern that there's a delay in the work that these researchers were doing in terms
01:07of like more of a search and rescue of these particular 30,000 children now being hindered?
01:12Well, as you noted, and I will confirm again, is that the data exists.
01:17What I will say to your question is that we know it is secure, and that is all I'll discuss about
01:24the nature of where it sits and where it is it's secure. I will also mention something I'd mentioned
01:31to you actually earlier, which is that this data and this kind of a program, the grant has been
01:40stopped, of course, but it doesn't mean just because something has changed, as this has,
01:47that it disappears or stops or becomes something that we can't use. So I would just remind you
01:54that there's a variety of dynamics that are occurring when it comes to the world knowing
01:59about those missing children, the nature of, I know the President and President Trump's concern
02:05about those missing children, the world is concerned, and the fact, to say the least,
02:09Ukraine has been advocating for this. They've been passionate about saving their nation
02:15and certainly getting those children back from Russia. And I think that this is, when we think
02:23about now the nature of the negotiations or certainly the conversations, that is part of
02:28those conversations, and it's something that we all hope will be resolved sooner than later.
02:34Yes, sir.

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