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Re: How Russia hacked the Democrats email
Former special counsel Robert Mueller told U.S. lawmakers on Wednesday that the Russian campaign to interfere in the 2016 election and the Trump campaign’s embrace of that effort may have established a “new normal” in American politics, laying the groundwork for future meddling.
Mueller Fears Trump’s Embrace of Russian Interference Could Be a ‘New Normal’ – Foreign Policy
Mueller was unwavering on the fact that Russia sought to meddle in the elections and issued a stark warning to lawmakers that foreign interference—and its embrace by political campaigns—could become an established feature of U.S. politics.
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Democratic Senators forwarded three proposals this week to eliminate future potential political assistance from foreign govt's but Senate Majority leader Mitch McConnell blocked all votes from happening. These efforts earned him the new nickname "Moscow Mitch" .
Twitter Users Slam 'Moscow Mitch' After McConnell Kills Election Security Bills | HuffPost Canada
Last edited by SalesServiceGuy; 07-27-2019 at 03:01 AM.
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Re: How Russia hacked the Democrats email
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Re: How Russia hacked the Democrats email
In a world reliant upon GPS navigation to accurately guide all sorts of military and civilian machines, it is interesting to learn that GPS signals can be jammed by nation states wanting to degrade safe navigation.
Why fighter pilots will always be relevant to US military | Fox Business
Presently, it is suspected that Iran is jamming GPS navigation in the very busy Strait of Hormuz through which 25% of the world's oil passes every day. "This is a very congested waterway, a lot of ships. Not a lot of room for miscalculation"
Last edited by SalesServiceGuy; 08-09-2019 at 04:01 AM.
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Re: How Russia hacked the Democrats email
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Re: How Russia hacked the Democrats email
More Proof of the Russian Puppet
Trump could 'certainly' support Russia's return to what would be the G8
President Donald Trump expressed his support for reinstating Russia into the G7 days before the group of leading industrialized nations convenes for its annual summit in France.
"I think it's much more appropriate to have Russia in" the group, he said during a meeting in the Oval Office with the Romanian President.
"If somebody would make that motion, I would certainly be disposed to think about it very favorably," he added.
Trump's comments underscore the divide between the US, under his administration, and Washington's traditional closest allies.
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Re: How Russia hacked the Democrats email
Trump told Russian officials in 2017 he wasn’t concerned about Moscow’s interference in U.S. election
President Trump told two senior Russian officials in a 2017 Oval Office meeting that he was unconcerned about Moscow’s interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election because the United States did the same in other countries, an assertion that prompted alarmed White House officials to limit access to the remarks to an unusually small number of people, according to three former officials with knowledge of the matter.
The comments, which have not been previously reported, were part of a now-infamous meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak, in which Trump revealed highly classified information that exposed a source of intelligence on the Islamic State. He also said during the meeting that firing FBI Director James B. Comey the previous day had relieved “great pressure” on him.
A memorandum summarizing the meeting was limited to all but a few officials with the highest security clearances in an attempt to keep the president’s comments from being disclosed publicly, according to the former officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters.
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Re: How Russia hacked the Democrats email
Top officials at the National Rifle Association knew Russians were using their ties to the gun rights group to try to bolster their status with lawmakers or the winner of the 2016 presidential election.
Top NRA officials knew Russians were using ties to NRA to establish connection with next US President, report says - CNNPolitics
Russia believes that high level contacts with the NRA might be the BEST means of neutral introduction to either the next American President
Democrats raised questions about whether the gun rights group violated its nonprofit status, and concluded the NRA openly fostered relationships with Russian nationals who sought to build relationships in US political circles.
During the 2016 election, Russian nationals effectively used the promise of lucrative personal business opportunities to capture the NRA and gain access to the American political system.
This report concludes that some members of the NRA delegation traveled to Russia to cultivate future business opportunities. Some of these NRA members also met with sanctioned individuals
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Re: How Russia hacked the Democrats email
It's Back RUSSIA Russia RUSSIA
A GOP-led Senate intel committee report states the obvious: Russia favored Trump in 2016
The Republican-led Senate Intelligence Committee just released a report that states the obvious, but in these times is quite damning for President Donald Trump: Russia directed a disinformation campaign during the 2016 election to hurt Hillary Clinton and favor Trump.
The committee has spent three years conducting a bipartisan investigation into the extent of the Kremlin’s interference during the last presidential cycle. It released the first of its findings in July, showing that Moscow-linked hackers likely tried to access election systems in all 50 states.
On Tuesday, the Senate panel released its second set of conclusions focused on Russia’s use of social media during the last campaign season. What it discovered was what US intelligence agencies have long assessed: Trump was Russia’s favorite.
“The Committee found that the IRA sought to influence the 2016 US presidential election by harming Hillary Clinton’s chances of success and supporting Donald Trump at the direction of the Kremlin,” the report reads using an acronym for the Internet Research Agency, the name for the group of the Russian hackers.
They did this in multiple ways, according to the report. The IRA targeted African Americans more than any other group through Facebook pages, Instagram accounts, Twitter trends, and more. “By far, race and related issues were the preferred target of the information warfare campaign designed to divide the country in 2016,” the committee wrote. The IRA also got unwitting targets to hand over personal information, sign petitions, attend rallies, and even teach self-defense classes.
It makes sense why Russia would choose to weaponize anger around race. As my colleague P.R. Lockhart noted last December, race issues in 2016 could be exploited due to already existing tensions in the US that were amplified by Trump as a candidate. Russia’s efforts later evolved into attempts to influence racial justice activism after the election, as Russian groups contacted black activists running legitimate organizations and attempted to set up real-world events.
That’s just awful. But what’s arguably worse is that Russia may continue to do this.
“Russia is waging an information warfare campaign against the US that didn’t start and didn’t end with the 2016 election,” Sen. Richard Burr (R-NC), the committee chair, said in a statement concurrent with the report’s release. “Their goal is broader: to sow societal discord and erode public confidence in the machinery of government.”
Trump doesn’t think Russia interfered in the 2016 election
This is terribly inconvenient timing for Trump. He’s embroiled in an impeachment crisis started in part because he believes Ukraine — not Russia — greatly interfered in the 2016 election to help Clinton win. While there is some evidence to suggest Ukrainians did favor Clinton, there’s none showing they went to the lengths that the Russians did or were anywhere near as effective.
Which means Trump has a major problem: Even GOP-led Senate panels clearly show he had help during the 2016 election. But the US writ large has problems, too. The report makes clear US elections are vulnerable to foreign influence, and so far there is little reason to suggest the next vote will be freer from interference than the 2016 contest was.
“With the 2020 elections on the horizon, there’s no doubt that bad actors will continue to try to weaponize the scale and reach of social media platforms to erode public confidence and foster chaos,” Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA), the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, said in a Tuesday statement. “The Russian playbook is out in the open for other foreign and domestic adversaries to expand upon — and their techniques will only get more sophisticated.”
The question now is if Trump will suddenly have a change of heart, openly blame the Russians, and start to move the machinery of government to safeguard the 2020 election. The chances of that happening, though, are about as high as the chance Russia will stop meddling in American affairs: zero.
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Re: How Russia hacked the Democrats email
Giuliani associates who sought Biden dirt arrested in campaign finance scheme meant to boost Trump’s reelection bid
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A pair of Rudy Giuliani flunkies who played part in a shady effort to find political dirt on Joe Biden in Ukraine were charged Thursday in a complex campaign finance scheme that overlaps with the House impeachment inquiry and Russian financial interests.
Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman — a couple of big-money Republican donors who have been subpoenaed in the House probe into whether President Trump should be impeached — were arrested by FBI agents at Dulles International Airport outside Washington, D.C., as they tried to leave the country with one-way plane tickets Wednesday night, according to Manhattan U.S. Attorney Geoffrey Berman.
The pair was slapped with a four-count indictment accusing them and two other men, Andrey Kukushkin and David Correia, of orchestrating a sprawling influence scheme last year that included funneling $325,000 to America First Action, a super PAC backing Trump’s reelection, in violation of federal campaign finance laws, Berman, a Trump appointee, said at a press conference in lower Manhattan Thursday afternoon.
As part of the plot, Fruman and Parnas, who both live in Florida, sought political influence to advance their own financial interests and to further the political interests of an unnamed “Ukrainian government official," prosecutors said. They also acted on an unnamed Russian national’s behalf in pumping thousands of dollars into state and federal races in New York, Nevada and other states to facilitate retail marijuana licenses, according to court papers.
“This investigation is about corrupt behavior and deliberate law breaking,” said Assistant FBI Director William Sweeney.
The U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan — which was once led by Giuliani — has conducted the investigation into Fruman and Parnas, and Berman said the probe is “continuing.”
Fruman and Parnas, both American citizens born in the former Soviet Union, appeared in court in Virginia on Thursday afternoon and were expected to be released on $1 million bond each. They will be subject to home detention and GPS monitoring.
Kukushkin, who was mostly involved assisting the marijuana-related donations, was arrested in California. Correia, who was similarly working on the weed foray, was still at large late Thursday.
This combination of Wednesday, Oct. 9, 2019, photos provided by the Alexandria Sheriff's Office shows booking photos of Lev Parnas, left, and Igor Fruman. The associates of Rudy Giuliani, were arrested on a four-count indictment that includes charges of conspiracy, making false statements to the Federal Election Commission and falsification of records. The men had key roles in Giuliani's efforts to launch a Ukrainian corruption investigation against Biden and his son, Hunter.
This combination of Wednesday, Oct. 9, 2019, photos provided by the Alexandria Sheriff's Office shows booking photos of Lev Parnas, left, and Igor Fruman. The associates of Rudy Giuliani, were arrested on a four-count indictment that includes charges of conspiracy, making false statements to the Federal Election Commission and falsification of records. The men had key roles in Giuliani's efforts to launch a Ukrainian corruption investigation against Biden and his son, Hunter.
As part of their scheme, Parnas and Furman committed to raising $20,000 for a U.S. congressman, according to court papers.
After pledging the political cash, the Giuliani cronies — acting on the unidentified Ukrainian official’s behalf — asked the congressman to assist in an effort to push the Trump administration to remove ex-U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch.
The congressman wasn’t named in Thursday’s indictment, but the donations match campaign finance reports filed by Rep. Pete Sessions, a Texas Republican who lost his seat in the 2018 midterms.
Yovanovitch was abruptly recalled by Trump in May after clashing with the White House over Giuliani’s attempts on Trump’s behalf to pressure Ukrainians to investigate Biden and his son, Hunter, according to the anonymous CIA whistleblower complaint that sparked the House impeachment inquiry.
Yovanovitch is expected to be deposed in the inquiry behind closed doors Friday.
Giuliani, who’s also facing a subpoena for records and testimony in the impeachment investigation, supervised Parnas and Furman in their shady Ukraine activities, which were undertaken in an attempt to solicit foreign interference on Trump’s behalf in the 2020 election, according to the whistleblower.
[More Politics] Alec Baldwin offered free Broadway tickets so he’ll complain about Times Square hustlers — and prompt a city crackdown »
The ex-New York mayor had lunch with Parnas and Fruman at the Trump hotel in Washington, D.C., just hours before their arrest, according to The Wall Street Journal.
Hizzoner refused to comment on their arrest Thursday, and Giuliani’s lawyer, Jon Sale, said his client “has nothing to do with this indictment.”
“He believes he didn’t do anything wrong,“ Sale told the Daily News, adding that Giuliani has not yet decided how to respond to his House subpoena.
John Dowd, an attorney for Parnas and Fruman who previously represented Trump in the Mueller investigation, did not return multiple requests for comment. Jay Sekulow, Trump’s top lawyer in the impeachment inquiry, said neither Trump nor his reelection campaign knew anything about the alleged scheme.
As part of their Ukraine operation, Parnas and Fruman arranged meetings between Giuliani and at least two former prosecutors in Ukraine, according to the whistleblower.
The prosecutors gave Giuliani information that he used to concoct unsubstantiated conspiracy theories about the Bidens, including that the former vice president protected his son from prosecution in Ukraine, according to congressional testimony and the whistleblower.
Apparently acting on Giuliani’s intel, Trump leaned on Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky on a July 25 phone call to investigate the Bidens as well as similarly dubious claims that anti-Trump Ukrainians interfered in the 2016 election to help Hillary Clinton.
Trump’s infamous call with Zelensky is at the center of the House impeachment inquiry.
As part of the inquiry, Democrats issued yet another subpoena late Thursday to Energy Secretary Rick Perry, who has also been looped into the Ukraine scandal, along with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and other senior Trump officials.
According to Thursday’s indictment, Parnas, Fruman and the two other men primarily used a limited liability corporation, Global Energy Producers, to dump large political contributions to avoid making them in their own names.
The two men falsely claimed contributions came from GEP, which they described as a liquefied natural gas company even though it had no income or significant assets, according to court papers.
The big Trump PAC donation in May 2018 was part of a flurry of political spending tied to Parnas and Fruman, with at least $478,000 in donations flowing to GOP campaigns and political committees in little more than two months, prosecutors said.
The money appears to have enabled the relatively unknown entrepreneurs to quickly gain access to the highest levels of the Republican Party, including face-to-face meetings with Trump at the White House and Mar-a-Lago in Florida.
They also funneled cash to a fundraising committee backing former Florida Gov. Rick Scott’s successful 2018 Senate run for “the purpose of gaining influence with politicians."
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Re: How Russia hacked the Democrats email
For all of those who believed in the Uranium One story about how Hillary Clinton facilitated the sale of American uranium mines to Russia in exchange for a $2M contribution to the Clinton foundation. It is now proven that you fell victim to a classic Russian misinformation campaign not based on any truth and with the only objective to make her look greedy and corrupt.
The Invention of the Conspiracy Theory on Biden and Ukraine | The New Yorker
The entire current Ukraine story promoted by President Trump and leading Cable TV opinion broadcaster, Sean Hannity, has all of the markings of another Russian misinformation campaign designed to damage leading Presidential candidate Joe Biden. The accuracy of the story is not important, the more convoluted the better, its sole purpose is to discredit Joe Biden via the actions of his son.
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