Special counsel issues indictment against 13 Russian nationals over 2016 election interference

BipolarFuk

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Special counsel Robert Mueller has indicted 13 Russian nationals and three Russian entities for allegedly meddling in the 2016 presidential election, charging them with conspiracy to defraud the United States, the Department of Justice has announced.

In addition, three defendants were charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud and bank fraud, and five defendants with aggravated identity theft.

Mueller has been investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election as well as any connections between Russia and Trump campaign associates.

Beginning as early as 2014, the Russian organization Internet Research Agency began operations to interfere with the US political system, including the 2016 elections, according to the indictment, which was released by Mueller's office Friday.

The defendants allegedly posed as US persons, created false US personas, and operated social media pages and groups designed to attract US audiences, the indictment reads.

The Internet Research Agency had a "strategic goal to sow discord in the US political system" including the election, according to the indictment.

Russians posted "derogatory information about a number of candidates," and by mid-2016 they supported Trump and disparaged Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton. They bought ads and communicated with "unwitting" people tied to Trump campaign and others to coordinate political activities.

Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein will announce the multiple indictments against Russian nationals and entities Friday afternoon, according to a Justice Department source.
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C'mon with the TEH MUELLER HATES TRUMP BS!
 

bbgun

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can't wait till he indicts Soros for meddling with Brexit. fair is fair.
 

BipolarFuk

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can't wait till he indicts Soros for meddling with Brexit. fair is fair.
I could give a shit less if he goes after Soros, but don't act like motherfuckers like you wouldn't be throwing a party if Mueller were fired to protect our precious cunt of a president.
 

BipolarFuk

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Trump staffers retweeted the Russians' fake Twitter accounts

Deputy attorney general Rod Rosenstein stressed that no American knowingly participated in the Russians’ election meddling campaign. But some, including people in Trump’s staff, may have unwittingly interacted with the fake accounts they created.

One of the Twitter accounts the Russians created was for the Tennessee GOP, which intended to make Americans believe they were following the Tennessee Republican Party. It got about 100,000 followers.

Both President Trump’s son Donald Trump Jr. and his campaign adviser Kellyanne Conway retweeted messages from the account.
_____________________

Some genius operatives in that Trump team and family, I tell ya.
 

L.T. Fan

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Trump staffers retweeted the Russians' fake Twitter accounts

Deputy attorney general Rod Rosenstein stressed that no American knowingly participated in the Russians’ election meddling campaign. But some, including people in Trump’s staff, may have unwittingly interacted with the fake accounts they created
One of the Twitter accounts the Russians created was for the Tennessee GOP, which intended to make Americans believe they were following the Tennessee Republican Party. It got about 100,000 followers.

Both President Trump’s son Donald Trump Jr. and his campaign adviser Kellyanne Conway retweeted messages from the account.
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Some genius operatives in that Trump team and family, I tell ya.
Don’t you read your own posts? “that no American knowingly participated in the Russians’ election “
 

boozeman

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So, what do we have here?

Oh, they found that Russian bots on social media influenced our very very stupid American populace?



And yes, I used a gif with words against my general principles.
 

boozeman

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Don’t you read your own posts? “that no American knowingly participated in the Russians’ election “
That is important to note and I believe it.

Stuff like this went over the heads of idiotic bimbos like Kellyanne Conway and Trump's version of Stephen Jones.
 

bbgun

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voters didn't need Russian bots to tell them Hillary was awful
 

bbgun

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But apparently they are needed to remind them of that fact, almost daily. Weird.
Sounds to me like a waste of money. In any event, the Trump-Russia collusion narrative is dead -- something Bipo is loathe to admit.
 

Smitty

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So, what do we have here?

Oh, they found that Russian bots on social media influenced our very very stupid American populace?



And yes, I used a gif with words against my general principles.
Moral of the story: stop getting political on social media, sheeple. Use it for baby pics and food porn as God intended.
 

BipolarFuk

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Mueller tells a compelling story of Russian intrigue that was designed to elect Trump

Mueller tells a compelling story of Russian intrigue that was designed to elect Trump

As both a prosecutor and defense attorney, I have written and reviewed many indictments. Though often brimming with legalese, they are designed by prosecutors to tell a compelling and detailed crime story. The indictment announced Friday in the Mueller investigation told just such a story -- of Russian attempts to sabotage the American presidential election.

If the allegations of the indictment prove true, it seems probable that the Russians were successful in their multimillion-dollar effort to influence the election of Donald Trump as president of the United States. Of course the answer to this complex question will never be definitively known. Polling cannot tell us whether voters might have chosen differently if the Russian influence operation hadn't happened.

What is known, however, is that the election was close and voter shifts in just a few significant states could have changed the Electoral College vote count in a presidential election in which Hillary Clinton won the popular vote.

The President, of course, has consistently been assuring the American public that the investigation led by Special Counsel Robert Mueller is all about a "hoax" and that it's a "witch hunt" largely supported by the forces of "Crooked Hillary Clinton" and the "fake news," which can roughly be defined as any news organization that offers any coverage that reflects badly on Donald Trump.

Mueller quietly and effectively disposed of those claims in his detailed explanation of how the Russian government literally sought to hack and hijack America's most important election by creating truly fake social media posts and protests designed to support the candidacy of Donald Trump (and in the primaries, Bernie Sanders) while sabotaging the candidacy of Hillary Clinton. The indictments revealed Russia's use of an assortment of dirty tricks in heavily funded efforts to deceive the American public.

The President responded to the Mueller indictments with a variation on his customary "hoax" claim, conceding a Russian effort to influence the American election but with a petulant hedge:
"Russia started their anti-US campaign in 2014, long before I announced that I would run for president. The results of the election were not impacted. The Trump campaign did nothing wrong - no collusion!"

Translation: the President now believes that even if there was a Russian effort to influence the American election, it started in 2014 and therefore has nothing to do with him. The indictment, though, is chock-full of specific facts that the Russian efforts were all about him. More specifically: all about electing him.

The indictment notes, for instance, at paragraphs 63 and 64, that in June of 2016, the defendants and their co-conspirators sought to stir up anti-Muslim sentiment and voters by placing ads on Facebook promoting a "Support Hillary. Save American Muslims" rally. They carefully used some of their millions in July of that year to produce a poster embossed with a quote they falsely attributed to Hillary Clinton, "I think Sharia Law will be a powerful new direction of freedom." The phony quote was in wide circulation during the presidential campaign.

What was Trump saying in July of 2016? He was sending a shocking plea to the Russians by publicly saying about Hillary Clinton's emails:

"Russia, if you're listening, I hope you're able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing," he said. "I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press."
Paragraph 34 of the indictment notes:

"Defendants and their co-conspirators also created thematic group pages on social media sites, particularly on the social media platforms Facebook and Instagram. ORGANIZATION-controlled pages addressed a range of issues, including: immigration (with group names including 'Secured Borders'); the Black Lives Matter movement (with group names including 'Blacktivist'); religion (with group names including 'United Muslims of America' and 'Army of Jesus') ..... By 2016, the size of many ORGANIZATION-controlled groups had grown to hundreds of thousands of online followers."

Paragraph 46 says:

"In or around the latter half of 2016, Defendants and their co-conspirators, through their ORGANIZATION-controlled personas, began to encourage U.S. minority groups not to vote in the 2016 U.S. presidential election or to vote for a third-party U.S. presidential candidate.

"a. On or about October 16, 2016, Defendants and their co-conspirators used the ORGANIZATION-controlled Instagram account 'Woke Blacks' to post the following message: [A] particular hype and hatred for Trump is misleading the people and forcing Blacks to vote Killary. We cannot resort to the lesser of two devils. Then we'd surely be better off without voting AT ALL.

b. On or about November 3, 2016, Defendants and their co-conspirators purchased an advertisement to promote a post on the ORGANIZATION-controlled Instagram account 'Blacktivist' that read in part: 'Choose peace and vote for Jill Stein. Trust me, it's not a wasted vote."

Regarding the President's claim that the "results of the election were not impacted," there has never been an iota of proof that this claim is true.

The fact that Vice President Mike Pence and some of the Trump-controlled agencies of the federal government have said there's no evidence that the Russian interference influenced the election is meaningless. In fact, no comprehensive, objective study of the topic has been conducted to date. That is, until now.

Friday's indictments strongly suggest that the millions of Russian rubles spent to support and give credibility to Trump's anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim, anti-black activist themes had to have had an impact in such an extremely close presidential election. After all, Trump adopted these very themes because he thought they would help him win the election. When the Russians, pretending to be Americans, funded Hillary Clinton opposition groups using Trump-manufactured "Make America Great Again" themes, the President says, "No impact." Who is he kidding?

Hillary Clinton defeated Trump in the popular vote by nearly 2.9 million votes but he was carried into office as a result of winning a majority in the Electoral College. The Electoral College results were: Trump 306 to Clinton's 232, or a margin of 74 votes (excluding several electors who failed to vote as their states dictated).

The indictment suggests the Russians had their eye on "purple" states including Florida, which went for Trump, giving him 29 electoral votes. Trump won by razor-thin margins in Pennsylvania with 20 electoral votes, Michigan with 16 and Wisconsin with 10. A shift of a mere 38 electoral votes from some combination of states and Hillary is president.

Given what the indictments reveal, there is a strong probability that Russia's surreptitious and illegal support handed Trump the presidency.

But there is good news for the President: He wasn't indicted, nor were any of the "unwitting individuals associated with the Trump Campaign" who cooperated with the Russian operatives in sabotaging the American election (indictment, paragraph 6). At least not yet.

And about that favorite presidential mantra, "no proof of collusion," the indictment actually suggests that there was possible collusion but of an "unwitting" and therefore non-criminal nature -- at least according to what we know so far.
We will not know for sure until Mueller finally concludes his ongoing investigation -- including the part the President probably really fears, the part that might focus on the Trump Organization.
 

L.T. Fan

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Pure twisted BS by the author. The claim by Trump was and continued that there was no collusion by him with the Russians. That has apparently been determined. Now this author has chosen to include other claims and lay them at the feet of Trump. Pathetic presentation by the author.
 

BipolarFuk

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Trump blames everyone but Russia

Trump blames everyone but Russia

President Donald Trump, ensconced in his opulent private club of Mar-a-Lago this weekend, had a screed of combative thoughts.

None, however, offered answers.

Here in South Florida, the weekend air was filled with raw emotion in the wake of the deadliest school shooting since Sandy Hook. Local television broadcasts featured searing calls to action and demonstrations from students and parents alike.

Trump, inside his estate and restrained from golfing for two straight days for fear of bad optics, was seemingly following along - and unleashed on Twitter.

Just 40 miles north of Parkland, the President blasted the FBI for missing warning signs about the shooter — and promptly turned the subject back to himself by suggesting the bureau was too preoccupied with the Russia investigation and could have prevented the shooting.

The string of rants - which aides were given no heads up about - made clear that if anyone was preoccupied by Russia, it was surely the President.

With a pair of national crises before him — another deadly shooting and another wave of evidence that Russia interfered in an American election — Trump demonstrated Sunday morning which was occupying more of his attention: Rather than outlining steps to protect the nation against more shootings or tampering in upcoming elections, he made the moment about himself.

Trump has yet to detail what he or his administration plan to do to punish Russia for meddling in the 2016 election. Special counsel Robert Mueller, in a thorough indictment released Friday, detailed how hundreds of Russian operatives -- including a close associate to Russian President Vladimir Putin -- interfered in the election by organizing political events and used social media to tout Trump and criticize Hillary Clinton.

In a series of tweets -- over a dozen since the indictment was revealed -- Trump has repeatedly said his 2016 campaign did not collude with Russian operatives ("no collusion!" he wrote), labeled Adam Schiff, the ranking member on the House Intelligence committee, a "leakin' monster of no control" and lamented the fact that "they are laughing their asses off in Moscow."

The tweets come hours before Trump will meet with House Speaker Paul Ryan, a lawmaker who has tried to avoid commenting on the President's Twitter missives. The messages threaten to overshadow a previously planned meeting on the party's legislative agenda and mid-term election outlook.

And they are a sign that neither embattled White House chief of staff John Kelly — on property for the weekend at Mar-a-Lago — or other advisers who met with the president on Saturday can keep him on track.

"If it was the GOAL of Russia to create discord, disruption and chaos within the U.S. then, with all of the Committee Hearings, Investigations and Party hatred, they have succeeded beyond their wildest dreams. They are laughing their asses off in Moscow," he wrote. "Get smart America!

The messages shed light on a President who has been almost entirely focused on the past -- how the Russian allegations impact the legitimacy of his presidency and accusations against his 2016 campaign -- and not how he will work to stop Russia from meddling in the future.

In a written statement released Friday, Trump's prescription for combating Russia was for the country to "come together as Americans" and "stop the outlandish partisan attacks, wild and false allegations, and far-fetched theories, which only serve to further the agendas of bad actors, like Russia, and do nothing to protect the principles of our institutions."

The statement did not detail how his administration would penalize the country for their 2016 efforts.

The weekend messages also show that there is little Trump won't use to undercut Mueller's investigation.

Late on Saturday night, Trump linked the admitted mistake by the FBI around last week's school shooting in Parkland with the Russia investigation. The Wednesday shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School killed 17 people.

"Very sad that the FBI missed all of the many signals sent out by the Florida school shooter. This is not acceptable," he wrote. "They are spending too much time trying to prove Russian collusion with the Trump campaign - there is no collusion. Get back to the basics and make us all proud!"

The FBI announced on Friday that they failed to act on a tip about Nikolas Cruz, the confessed shooter in the Parkland school massacre. A person close to Cruz, according to the FBI, contacted them on February 5 to report concerns. But the bureau did not appropriately follow established protocols in following up on the tip.

Trump echoed Fox News and other conservative media who seized on the admitted mistake, using it as the latest data point in the President's months long campaign to undercut Mueller's investigation.

Trump's issues with Mueller have long been clear: He views any suggestion that Russia helped tip the election in his favor as an insinuation that he isn't a legitimate president, a charge that openly frustrates him.

But by ignoring Russia's impact on the election, Trump has done little to confront Putin for meddling.

The Trump administration decided last month not to impose new sanctions on Russian individuals for meddling in the 2016 election, bucking Congress by instead putting out a "name and shame" list of prominent Russian business and political figures.

Trump has raised questions as to whether Russia actually meddled in the election by repeatedly calling it a hoax and CNN reported this month that Trump remains unconvinced that Russia interfered in the 2016 election, even as his intelligence chiefs unanimously told a Senate panel Tuesday that Russia meddled in 2016 and is planning to do so again in 2018.

The President also told reporters in Vietnam last year that he accepts Putin's denials on 2016 meddling.

Trump even went as far as to undercut his own national security adviser via Twitter this weekend, telling his 48 million followers that "General McMaster forgot to say that the results of the 2016 election were not impacted or changed by the Russians and that the only Collusion was between Russia and Crooked H, the DNC and the Dems."

McMaster told an audience in Munich, Germany, that the Mueller indictments released Friday show evidence of Russian meddling in the 2016 election is "now really incontrovertible."

The burst of tweets may offer a window into the president's thinking. His decision to go after his national security adviser, H.R. McMaster, underscored what aides have been describing in recent days as a souring relationship.
 

boozeman

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Pretty strong and relevant statement if you ask me.

But I am sure the Trumpanzees will have fun with it.
 

bbgun

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remind me: who was President from 2014-2016 when all of this was going on?
 

jsmith6919

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remind me: who was President from 2014-2016 when all of this was going on?
Hey Obama told Putin to cut it out
 

L.T. Fan

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Some people were pissed when Trump won the election and couldn’t get over it so they resorted to lies and dirty tricks to try to unseat him. Now that Trump has begun to be exhonorated and the dishonest borderline treasonist have begun to be exposed instead of being glad the leader of the country didn’t sink to their levels of deceit and dishonesty they are pissing and moaning again. Such prejudice has never reached these heights in the history of this country. It’s both comical and disgusting.
 

bbgun

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The Left needs to admit that Russian shenanigans didn't change one vote or dramatically affect the election in Trump's favor. Trump needs to admit that Russian interference is a serious offense worthy of punitive actions like more sanctions. The end.
 
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