Trump-Russia Probe: Good Time to Pause, Double Check, and Review Key Events to Date

Trump's view of the whole Russian probe

How'd I Do Donald: очень хорошо или нет
(very good or not)

Before reading the following post, and I hope you do, please watch this 6:00 minute video from the Washington Post which sets the scene.

This video clip is a great review of the Trump-Russian probe to date:

The main post and those four key parts:

1.  Fact checking Trump's error-filled tweetstorm about the Russia probe from the Washington Post

2.  Whatever Trump is hiding is hurting all of us now from the NY Times

3.  Trump stays quiet on shooting victims, fumes over Russia from The AP

4.  Trump's “no collusion” goes beyond what indictment says from FactChecking.org

A press release issued by White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders echoed points made by Dep AG Rod Rosenstein (* Feb 16 – about 9 minutes from C-SPAN below). 

But what Sanders said is not what Rosenstein, or the indictment presented by the U.S. special counsel’s office, stated.

Rosenstein merely stated that there was no allegation in “this indictment” that any Americans — including those in the Trump campaign — wittingly participated in “this illegal activity.” According to Rosenstein, the Russians “recruited and paid real Americans to engage in political activities, promote political campaigns and stage political rallies. The defendants and their co-conspirators pretended to be grassroots activists. According to the indictment, the Americans did not know that they were communicating with Russians.”

Later, Rosenstein noted that, “the nature of the scheme was the defendants took extraordinary steps to make it appear that they were ordinary American political activists, even going so far as to base their activities on a virtual private network here in the United States so, if anybody traced it back to that first jump, they appeared to be Americans.”

In other words, those who may have been paid by the Russians for social media ads, or to stage rallies, did not knowingly collude with the Russians.

Key Note: Trump’s tweet goes beyond what Rosenstein and the indictment stated. His tweet assumes there is no investigation beyond what was revealed in the February 16 indictment. And we just don’t know one way or the other what other things Mueller may be investigating.

Bloomberg reported after the indictment was announced that, “Special Counsel Robert Mueller and his prosecutors haven’t concluded their investigation into whether President Donald Trump or any of his associates helped Russia interfere in the 2016 election, according to a person with knowledge of the probe.”

Key Note: As for Trump’s claim that the indictment indicates that “the results of the election were not impacted,” that also goes beyond what Rosenstein said.

Again, Rosenstein said, “There is no allegation in the indictment that the charged conduct altered the outcome of the 2016 election.” That’s consistent with a declassified intelligence report from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence that was released on Jan. 6, 2017. That report accused Russia of meddling in the 2016 election on Trump’s behalf, but it “did not make an assessment of the impact that Russian activities had on the outcomes of the 2016 election.”

According to that DNI report, “The US Intelligence Community is charged with monitoring and assessing the intentions, capabilities, and actions of foreign actors; it does not analyze US political processes or US public opinion.”

Key Note: Vice President Mike Pence recently repeated the false talking point that U.S. intelligence agencies came to the “universal conclusion” that Russia’s meddling had no impact on the election results.

Key Note: The intelligence community has not concluded one way or the other if Russia’s influence campaign affected the election outcome.

In this case, Rosenstein acknowledged there was “no allegation” in the indictment that the Russians’ social media campaign or rallies swayed votes. The impact of these activities is possibly unknowable.

Finally: I agree with that last statement and I have said this all along: Many Americans who voted for Trump and at the time they cast their vote for him may NOT have not known the depth the fake and false Ads etc. for him and against Hillary Clinton.

That makes perfect sense in light of the massive and purposeful and slick effective Russian effort and input they made to influence and control as much as possible the outcome of what they wanted from in the November 2016 election:

Simple: They wanted Donald J. Trump to win.

– For what future purpose and benefit the Russians wanted as a reward for that effort – well that remains to be seen.

So, with this all in mind just know this is still a long way from being over. Thus, stay tuned and stay sharp to the events and facts surrounding this truly historical chain of events in life still unfolding.

Thanks as usual for stopping by.