13 Russians indicted in effort to subvert election
No accusations made against Trump, staff
WASHINGTON — The Justice Department charged 13 Russians and three companies on Friday in a sprawling indictment that unveiled a sophisticated network designed to subvert the 2016 election and to support the Trump campaign. It stretched from an office in St. Petersburg, Russia, into the social feeds of Americans and ultimately reached the streets of election battleground states.
The Russians stole the identities of American citizens, posed as political activists and used the flashpoints of immigration, religion and race to manipulate a campaign in which those issues were already particularly divisive, prosecutors said.
Some of the Russians were also in contact with “unwitting individuals associated with the Trump campaign,” according to court papers. Robert Mueller, the special counsel leading the investigation, made no accusation that President Donald Trump or his associates were knowing ly part of the conspiracy.
“The indictment alleges that the Russian conspirators want to promote discord in the United States and undermine public confidence in democracy,” Rod Rosenstein, the deputy attorney general overseeing the inquiry, said in a brief news conference. “We must not allow them to succeed.”
The 37-page indictment amounted to a detailed rebuttal of Mr. Trump, who has sowed doubts that Russia
interfered in the election and dismissed questions about its meddling as “fake news.”
The Justice Department said Mr. Mueller’s work was not complete. The indictment doesnot address the hacking of Democratic email systems or whether Mr. Trump tried to obstruct the FBI investigation into Russian interference.
Mr. Mueller is negotiating with the president’s lawyers over the terms of a possible interview.
The Russian operation began four years ago, well before Mr. Trump entered the presidential race, a fact that he quickly seized on in his defense. “Russia started their anti-US campaign in 2014, long before I announced that I would run for President,” he wrote on Twitter. “The results of the election were not impacted. The Trump campaign did nothing wrong — no collusion!”
But Mr. Trump’s statement ignored the government’s conclusion that, by 2016, the Russians were “supporting the presidential campaign of then-candidate Donald J. Trump” and disparaging Hillary Clinton, his opponent. Working out of the office in St. Petersburg, the Russians described waging “information warfare against the United States of America,” according to court documents.
Mr. Mueller has gathered extensive evidence of coordination between Russia and the Trump campaign: Mr. Trump’s eldest son met with a Russian lawyer in hopes of receiving political dirt on Ms. Clinton; one adviser has admitted being tipped off in advance to Russian hacking of Democratic emails; another was in contact with a Twitter account used by Russian hackers; a federal judge found probable cause that a third adviser was an unlawful Russian agent. And the Trump campaign repeatedly and falsely denied any contacts with Russia.
Whether any of that violated federal law is the weightiest question facing Mr. Mueller, and Friday’s indictment did not answer it. But it painted a picture of a Russian operation that was multipronged, well financed and relentless.
Russian operatives traveled across the United States to gather intelligence and foment political discord. They worked with an unidentified American who advised them to focus their efforts on what they viewed as “purple” election battleground states, including Colorado, Virginia and Florida, the indictment said.
In August 2016, prosecutors said, Russians posed as Americans and coordinated with Trump campaign staff to organize rallies in Florida. At one rally, an American demonstrator was asked to pose as Ms. Clinton locked in a cage — unwittingly at the behest of the Russians, prosecutors said.
Such anecdotes are rare examples of how intelligence agencies work covertly to influence political outcomes abroad.
The CIA has conducted such operations for decades, but both Mr. Mueller’s indictment and an intelligence assessment last year are startling examples of a foreign government working to help elect an American president.
The indictment does not explicitly say the Russian government sponsored the effort, but U.S. intelligence officials have publicly said that President Vladimir Putin of Russia directed and oversaw it.
The indictment notes that two of the Russian firms involved hold Russian government contracts.
“This is clearly a message document,” Robert S. Litt, the former general counsel to the director of national intelligence, said of the indictment. “Mueller wants to end the debate over whether there was Russian interference in the election.”
The Russian nationals were accused of working with the Internet Research Agency, which had a budget of millions of dollars and was designed to reach millions of Americans.