Democrats sue over alleged presidential election conspiracy

Target Trump campaign, Russia, WikiLeaks

WASHINGTON — Democrats gave U.S. President Donald Trump another potential legal headache Friday, filing a federal lawsuit that alleges an illegal election conspiracy between his presidential campaign, the Russian government, the WikiLeaks organization and others.

The lawsuit seeks unspecified financial damages, probably in the millions of dollars, for computer fraud, racketeering and other illegal activity that it says undermined the Democratic Party and Hillary Clinton’s campaign. The suit does not name Trump as a defendant.

“During the 2016 presidential campaign, Russia launched an allout assault on our democracy, and it found a willing and active partner in Donald Trump’s campaign,” Tom Perez, chairman of the Democratic National Committee, said in a statement. “This constituted an act of unprecedented treachery: the campaign of a nominee for president of the United States in league with a hostile foreign power to bolster its own chance to win the presidency.”

Trump’s campaign called the lawsuit, filed in federal court in Manhattan, “frivolous.”

“This is a sham lawsuit about a bogus Russian collusion claim filed by a desperate, dysfunctional and nearly insolvent Democratic Party,” said Brad Parscale, who was digital director of Trump’s 2016 campaign and now manages the president’s 2020 re-election bid.

The Democrats’ lawsuit echoes one filed against president Richard Nixon’s re-election campaign after five burglars were caught breaking into Democratic Party headquarters in the Watergate complex in Washington in June 1972, and investigations soon uncovered a web of illegal activities run from the White House. The case was settled for $750,000 US when Nixon resigned the presidency in August 1974.

The lawsuit suggests Democrats see a political advantage in the swirl of Russia-related allegations before November’s congressional elections.