Politics Mueller asking if Trump knew about hacked Dem emails before release

Special counsel Robert Mueller's team is asking witnesses pointed questions about whether Donald Trump was aware that Democratic emails had been stolen before that was publicly known, and whether he was involved in their strategic release, according to multiple people familiar with the probe.

Mueller's investigators have asked witnesses whether Trump was aware of plans for WikiLeaks to publish the emails. They have also asked about the relationship between GOP operative Roger Stone and WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, and why Trump took policy positions favorable to Russia.

The line of questioning suggests the special counsel, who is tasked with examining whether there was collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia during the 2016 election, is looking into possible coordination between WikiLeaks and Trump associates in disseminating the emails, which U.S. intelligence officials say were stolen by Russia.

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/do...g-what-trump-knew-about-hacked-emails-n851941

 

APRIL - SEPTEMBER

• April 26, 2016 -- Papadopoulos learns that Russians have Clinton emails. Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos has breakfast in London with a professor who says he has just returned from meetings in Moscow with high-level Russian officials who claim to have "dirt" on Hillary Clinton and "thousands" of her emails, according to court filings.
  
  
• June 2016 -- Cambridge Analytica CEO emails WikiLeaks. CA started working for Trump over the summer of 2016. Some members of CA staff were incorporated in the Trump campaign's data operation team. Alexander Nix, the chief executive of data firm CA, emailed WikiLeaks’s Assange seeking access to emails from Clinton's private server so he could turn them into a searchable database for the campaign or a pro-Trump PAC. There is no evidence that Clinton's deleted emails were ever hacked or that WikiLeaks ever had possession of them.
  
  
• June 9, 2016 -- The Trump Tower meeting. Trump Jr., Kushner, and campaign chairman Paul Manafort attended a private meeting at Trump Tower with a Russian lawyer and others. The meeting was arranged after Trump Jr. was promised damaging information on Hillary Clinton.
  
  
• June 15, 2016 -- DNC claims it was hacked by Russian intelligence. The DNC & CrowdStrike revealed publicly for the first time that its servers were penetrated- it "identified two sophisticated adversaries on the network" that were associated with Russian intelligence services. Trump dismissed the notion that Russia was behind the hacks, saying "we believe it was the DNC that did the 'hacking' as a way to distract from the many issues facing their deeply flawed candidate and failed party leader. Too bad the DNC doesn't hack Hillary Clinton's 33,000 missing emails."
  
  
• July 22, 2016 -- WikiLeaks releases about 20,000 hacked DNC emails. WikiLeaks posted on its website nearly 20,000 emails that were stolen from the DNC servers. Many of the emails were sent by senior DNC officials. Some of the emails suggested that the DNC favored Clinton over Sen. Bernie Sanders in the primaries, leading to allegations that the primary was rigged.
  
  
• July 25, 2016 -- Trump says it's a 'joke' that Russia hacked the DNC. Trump weighed in on the DNC leaks, saying on Twitter: "The new joke in town is that Russia leaked the disastrous DNC e-mails, which should never have been written (stupid), because Putin likes me."
  
  
• July 26, 2016 -- NYT reports that the US believes Russia hacked the DNC. The NYT published a report that claimed US intelligence agencies told the White House that they were highly confident that the Russian govt was responsible for hacking the DNC. This was the first public report suggesting that the US govt agreed with the DNC's assessment.
  
  
• July 27, 2016 -- Trump publicly asks Russia to hack Clinton's deleted emails. At a news conference, Trump publicly called on the Russian govt to hack Clinton's private email server and reveal the deleted emails. Trump's campaign later said his comment was a joke.
  
  "If it is Russia -- which it's probably not, nobody knows who it is -- but if it is Russia, it's really bad for a different reason, because it shows how little respect they have for our country, when they would hack into a major party and get everything," Trump said. "But it would be interesting to see -- I will tell you this -- 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. Let's see if that happens. That'll be next.​

• Aug 8, 2016 -- Roger Stone says he was in touch with Assange. During a speech in Florida, former Trump campaign adviser Stone claimed to be in touch with Assange and predicted upcoming WikiLeaks releases: "I actually have communicated with Assange. I believe the next tranche of his documents pertain to the Clinton Foundation but there's no telling what the October surprise may be." He later clarified that while he was in contact with Assange, it came through an intermediary.
  
  
• Aug 14-17, 2016 -- Stone exchanges messages with Russian hackers. Stone exchanged direct Twitter messages with Guccifer 2.0, a self-proclaimed hacker who published stolen materials from the DNC earlier in the summer. (These DNC releases were separate from the DNC emails published by WikiLeaks.) The Twitter messages were about the contents of some of the stolen DNC materials that Guccifer posted online earlier that summer. Stone denies any wrongdoing or collusion. Months after these Twitter messages, the US intelligence community announced that Guccifer 2.0 was actually run by Russian intelligence operatives as part of the Kremlin's effort to meddle in the election.
  
  
• Aug 21, 2016 -- Stone predicts upcoming trouble for Podesta. Without specifically referencing emails, Stone predicts that Podesta will soon be in hot water. "Trust me, it will soon the Podesta's time in the barrel," he tweeted. Stone later claimed that he wasn't talking about the upcoming WikiLeaks releases but was alluding to an expose he was planning on his own.
  
  
• Sept 9, 2016 -- Stone exchanges more messages with Russian hackers. Stone exchanged direct Twitter messages with Guccifer 2.0. The emails were about the contents of some publicly released DNC materials. Stone denies any wrongdoing or collusion.
  
  
• Sept 16, 2016 -- Stone predicts WikiLeaks will release Clinton emails. Stone says in a radio interview that WikiLeaks will release new Clinton emails. "I expect Julian Assange and the WikiLeaks people to drop a payload of new documents on Hillary on a weekly basis fairly soon. And that, of course, will answer the question of exactly what was erased on that email server."
  
  
• Sept 21, 2016 -- WikiLeaks and Trump Jr. exchange private messages on Twitter. WikiLeaks reached out to Don Jr. just before midnight on September 20, 2016, regarding an anti-Trump website that it said was about to launch. WikiLeaks guessed the password and shared it with Trump Jr., who replied, "Off the record I don't know who that is but I'll ask around. Thanks."
  
  
• Sept 21, 2016 -- Trump Jr. emails senior campaign officials about WikiLeaks. Trump Jr. emailed a group of senior Trump campaign officials notifying them that WikiLeaks had reached out, according to The Atlantic. The email was sent to Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, then-campaign manger Kellyanne Conway, then-campaign CEO Steve Bannon and Brad Parscale, who ran the campaign's data operation. Kushner also forwarded the email to Hope Hicks, the communications aide who is now White House communications director, according to The Atlantic.

 

• Oct 2, 2016 -- Stone alludes to future WikiLeaks releases. Stone appeared to predict that WikiLeaks would soon post damaging materials about Clinton. He posted: "Wednesday @HillaryClinton is done. #WikiLeaks." Nothing materialized on the date Stone referred to, but two days later, WikiLeaks started releasing Podesta's emails.
  
  
• Oct 3, 2016 -- Trump Jr. and WikiLeaks exchange more private messages on Twitter. WikiLeaks sent a link about Clinton criticizing Assange to Trump Jr., asking him to share it. Trump Jr. replies: "Already did that earlier today. It's amazing what she can get away with." In a follow-up message, Trump Jr. asks, "What's behind this Wednesday leak I keep hearing about?" WikiLeaks does not respond to his question, which appears to reference Stone's post from the day earlier about upcoming releases.
  
  
• Oct 5, 2016 -- Stone says "payload coming" from WikiLeaks. "Libs thinking Assange will stand down are wishful thinking. Payload coming," Stone tweeted, two days before WikiLeaks began releasing thousands of emailed hacked from Podesta's email account.
  
  
• Oct 7, 2016 -- US formally blames Russia for DNC hacks. The US government broke its silence about the DNC hack. The Office of the Director of National Intelligence, which oversees the entire US intelligence community, announced that the Russian government was behind the hacked emails released by WikiLeaks. "The US Intelligence Community is confident that the Russian Government directed the recent compromises of e-mails from US persons and institutions, including from US political organizations," the statement said, adding that disclosures on WikiLeaks were consistent with Russian methods.
  
  
• Oct 7, 2016 -- WikiLeaks begins releasing Podesta emails. Shortly after the announcement blaming Russia for the DNC hacks, WikiLeaks began posting thousands of emails stolen from Podesta's Gmail account. WikiLeaks went on to release new Podesta emails on a near-daily basis, creating waves of negative headlines for the Clinton campaign in the closing weeks of the election. Trump regularly cited the latest Podesta releases during campaign rallies in October and November. The US government later said Russia was responsible for the hacks.
  
  
• Oct 10, 2016 -- Trump says "I love WikiLeaks.” At a rally in Pennsylvania, Trump expressed his admiration for the anti-secrecy website that was publishing dirt on his Democratic opponent, saying "This just came out. WikiLeaks! I love WikiLeaks."
  
  
• Oct 11, 2016 -- Trump encourages people to read WikiLeaks. Trump tweets about WikiLeaks: "I hope people are looking at the disgraceful behavior of Hillary Clinton as exposed by WikiLeaks. She is unfit to run."
  
  
• Oct 11, 2016 -- Trump Jr. speaks at dinner for Russia-friendly organization. Trump Jr. flew to France and spoke at a dinner hosted by the Center of Political and Foreign Affairs, according to the Wall Street Journal. The paper reported that Trump Jr. was paid for the speaking engagement. The think tank was founded by Fabien Baussart. He and his wife, Randa Kassis, hosted the event Trump Jr. attended in Paris. She leads a Moscow-endorsed Syrian opposition group and has met with many senior Russian officials. In December 2016, the think tank nominated Putin for the Nobel Peace Prize. 2016 Presidential Campaign Hacking Fast Facts
  
  
• Oct 12, 2016 -- WikiLeaks asks Trump Jr. to tweet about their latest releases. WikiLeaks sent a message to Trump Jr., which said: "Hey Donald, great to see your dad talking about our publications. Strongly suggest your dad tweet this link if he mentions us," the message said, along with an obscure domain that likely hosted an archive of the latest WikiLeaks releases. The website is now offline. Trump Jr. did not reply to the message.
  
  
• Oct 12, 2016 -- Trump says WikiLeaks isn't getting enough coverage. Trump tweets: "Very little pick-up by the dishonest media of incredible information provided by WikiLeaks. So dishonest! Rigged system!"
  
  
• Oct 14, 2016 -- Trump Jr. tweets the link that WikiLeaks gave him.Trump Jr. tweeted out the link that WikiLeaks had sent to him two days earlier via private message. His tweet said: "For those who have the time to read about all the corruption and hypocrisy all the @wikileaks emails are right here"
  
  
• Oct 14, 2016 -- Pence denies coordination between Trump campaign and WikiLeaks. Then-Governor Mike Pence, Trump's running mate at the time, gave an interview on Fox News and denied that the Trump campaign was coordinating with WikiLeaks. "WikiLeaks, some have suggested on the left all this bad stuff about Hillary, nothing bad about Trump, that your campaign is in cahoots with WikiLeaks," said the Fox News host. Pence replied, "Nothing could be further from the truth. I think all of us have, you know, have had concerns about WikiLeaks over the years and it's just a reality of American life today, and of life in the wider world." Responding to reports about Trump Jr.'s messages, a Pence spokesman said Monday that he was "never aware of anyone associated with the campaign being in contact with WikiLeaks."
  

 

It's going to be hilarious if Trump goes to jail over Hillary's emails.


Double bonus if they both go to jail over them.

 

We'll all chip in and buy Denny a half gallon of...

 

Wow, this explains Trump's actions recently.

 

so, um, did Hillary's "extreme carelessness" about classified emails actually lead to "grave damage" to the US? Asking for a friend.

 

Top Secret is the highest level of classified information.[4] Information is further compartmented so that specific access using a code word after top secret is a legal way to hide collective and important information.[5] Such material would cause "exceptionally grave damage" to national security if made publicly available.[6] Prior to 1942, the United Kingdom and other members of the British Empire used Most Secret, but this was later changed to match the United States' category name of Top Secret in order to simplify Allied interoperability.

The Washington Post reports in an investigation entitled Top Secret America, that per 2010 "An estimated 854,000 people ... hold top-secret security clearances" in the United States.[7]

 

Yes.

We ended up with this.

 

That's kind of where I'm this friend of mine is going with this...

 

I literally quoted the definition of the top secret classification. And day-old battle casualties from a place where top-secret operations were going on are still, you know, TS.
"Reported in the news" is not the definition. For instance, it's still a court-martial offense for me to look at WikiLeaks, b/c while I have some pretty interesting clearances, I don't have the need-to-know to know the classified info that I can (from what the news reports) find on there.