President Trump on Saturday delivered remarks at the Conservative Political Action Conference.
The crowd at the conservative CPAC conference erupted into a chant of "lock her up" after President Trump claimed he was joking about asking Russia to access Hillary Clinton's emails during the 2016 presidential election.
Trump told attendees Saturday: "With the fake news, if you tell a joke, if you're sarcastic, if you're having fun with the audience...if you say something like, Russia, please if you can, get us Hillary Clinton's emails. Please, Russia, please. Please, get us the emails, please."
Amid chants of "lock her up," Trump added: "So everybody is having a good time, I'm laughing, we're all having fun. And then that fake CNN and others say, 'He asked Russia to go get the emails. Horrible.'...These people are sick, and I'm telling you, they know the game and they play it dirty, dirtier than anybody has ever played the game."
The controversy began in July 2016.
"Russia, if you're listening, I hope you're able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing, I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press," then-candidate Trump said during a news conference.
Despite Trump's claim that he was not serious about his call for Russia to hack Clinton's accounts, U.S. investigators reportedly found a subsequent surge in activity by Russians targeting her campaign's email addresses.