Trump adviser denies ties to Russia meddling
WASHINGTON — Longtime Donald Trump associate Roger Stone said Tuesday he’s “aware of no evidence whatsoever” that Trump’s campaign coordinated with Russians during the 2016 election.
Stone spoke to the House intelligence committee for more than three hours as part of the panel’s investigation into Russian interference in the election.
Afterward, he told reporters that the majority of lawmakers’ questions focused on his communications with Guccifer 2.0, the unnamed hacker who has taken credit for breaking into Democratic National Committee email servers. He said questions also focused on communications he had through an intermediary with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.
Stone has long denied that he worked with Russian officials to influence the presidential election. In a lengthy and combative statement released Monday night ahead of the interview, Stone said “there is one ‘trick’ that is not in my bag and that is treason.”
Stone, a Republican strategist who informally advised him during the 2016 campaign, has denied that he had advance knowledge of the leak of former Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta’s emails and says he never colluded with Assange, who released Podesta’s emails on his website.
Stone also released a series of supporting documents Monday evening, including direct messages he exchanged with Guccifer that he calls “innocuous.”
The messages on Twitter, exchanged over a monthlong period, show Stone congratulating Guccifer for being reinstated on Twitter after he was kicked off, and asking that the account retweet a tweet about how the election could be rigged against Trump. Guccifer writes, “I’m pleased to say that u r great man … please tell me if I can help u anyhow.”
Stone doesn’t respond again until weeks later, when Guccifer asks him about an article on a Democratic turnout model. Stone replies “pretty standard.”
On WikiLeaks, Stone said he was kept apprised of Assange’s plans to release the Podesta emails by a journalist he said served as an “intermediary.”
He said that he wouldn’t release the name of the journalist.