On August 18, the First Committee of the House of Representatives published its two-part report on Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election. One of the things addressed in the report is Donald Trump’s phone conversations with veteran GOPs. operative Roger Stone during the election – and according to a August 19 article by New York Times reporter Julian E. Barnes, the First Chamber Intelligence report sheds even more light on those interactions than the Mueller report and the criminal case of Stone.
Barnes notes that according to court records, Stone and Trump had 39 phone calls from March-November 2016 – one of which Barnes describes as “an intriguing phone call, on October 6, 2016, to Mr. Trump.”
“According to the report of the House of Representatives,” Barnes explains, “Mr. Stone received a call that afternoon from a number who belonged to an aide to Mr. Trump, who regularly ‘used other people’s phones to make calls. The subject of the conversation was not known, First Chamber investigators wrote, but they noted that Mr. Stone was aiming for a potential release of WikiLeaks. “
The report from the House Intelligence Committee concludes, “It seems very plausible that Stone and Trump were talking about WikiLeaks.”
In October 2016, WikiLeaks published hacked Democratic emails stolen by Russians.
Barnes points out that the First Chamber Committee report “contained a wealth of evidence that Mr. Stone was targeting WikiLeaks. He and Mr. Trump had also a few days earlier, on September 29, Another aide of the campaign, Rick Gates, testified and told investigators that the two men discussed WikiLeaks. After that call, Mr. Trump told Mr. Gates that ‘more releases of harmful information will come ‘. “
The Times reporter also notes that Stone “said that the First Chamber’s conclusion that he had discussed WikiLeaks with the president was based solely on testimony from Mr. Gates and Mr. Trump’s former attorney, Michael D. Cohen: “Mr. Stone called her testimony tainted by agreements with prosecutors to answer her questions.”
Stone has admitted that he did not know that people affiliated with the Russian government were behind the stolen Democratic emails that WikiLeaks published in October 2016 – and that he never discussed WikiLeaks with Trump. Barnes, however, notes, “The First Chamber report made it clear that WikiLeaks, at least ‘probably’, knew that the emails came from Russian intelligence, and that Mr. Stone knew about the most critical WikiLeaks release before it happened. ‘
Stone is one of Trump’s many colleagues who have faced criminal charges: he was convicted by prosecutors, ranging from witnesses to tampering to lies to Congress and sentenced to 40 months in federal prison by Judge Amy Berman Jackson , an employee of Barack Obama. But Trump commuted Stone’s sentence in July, saving him from the prison sentence he was about to begin.
Barnes notes that the House Intelligence Committee “rejected Mr. Trump’s statement to prosecutors investigating Russia’s interference that he did not recall conversations with his longtime friend, Roger J. Stone Jr., about the emails that were later released by WikiLeaks. “
In the Mueller report, former special counsel Robert Mueller concluded that the Trump campaign’s interactions with Russians – however dubious – did not rise to the level of a full-fledged criminal conspiracy. And Barnes points out that the House Intelligence Report does not accuse Trump of lying. But Barnes also points out that the report “had extensive contacts between Trump advisers and Russians” and “detailed even more the president’s talks with Mr. Stone than were previously known, and raised questions about whether Mr. Trump was truthful. was with investigators for the special advice, Robert S. Mueller III, or her offender. “
