In Tuesday’s White House press conference, Sarah Huckabee Sanders was asked to answer a question she’s waived away with an "I’ll get back to you” at an earlier conference: Just when did Donald Trump learn that the emails of the DNC and John Podesta were hacked by agents working for the Russian government?
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At the earlier conference, Sanders said she wasn’t sure when Donald Trump learned the source of the hacks—which is a very convenient bit of ignorance, considering Trump’s actions. On Tuesday, she answered that Trump didn’t know “until January” when he was briefed on the information.
Which is blatantly untrue—and also hugely important. Because the motivations of Donald Trump and his campaign are changed by the idea that he knew that the emails had been stolen, and knew it early.
The hacking of John Podesta’s email account took place on March 19. A month later, from George Papadopoulos’ statement of the offense:
On or about April 26, defendant Papadopoulous met the Professor for breakfast at a London hotel. During this meeting the Professor told the defendant that that he had just returned from a trip to Moscow where he met with high level Russian government officials. The Professor told defendant Papadopoulos that he learned on that trump that the Russians had obtained “dirt” on then-candidate Clinton. The Professor told defendant Papadopoulous, as defendant Papadopoulous later described to the FBI, that “they [the Russians] have dirt on her”; “the Russians have emails of Clinton”; “they have thousands of emails.”
What’s very notably not in Papadopoulos’ statement: What he did with that information. However, it is clear that Papadopoulos was in touch with a “High-ranking Campaign Official” the very next day. That person has been identified from other sources as Paul Manafort. The details of what he said—and of what Papadopoulos knew about the source of those emails—is deliberately not disclosed in the statement.
It wasn’t until June 14 that the first publication informed the public of the leak and the possibility that Russians were involved. It took until October 7 before President Obama made the results on an intelligence review official. But the Trump campaign knew months earlier that the Russians had thousands of emails stolen from Democratic sources—thanks to their Russian connections.
On June 14, 2016, The Washington Post published the first article indicating that the DNC emails had been stolen by groups that were thought to be Russian hackers. But by then, the Trump campaign had not just gotten at least a month’s worth of lead time by Papadopoulos, but the infamous Trump Tower meeting between Trump’s senior campaign staff and Russian representatives had already taken place. The whole premise of that meeting was that Russia had “dirt” on Hillary Clinton.
Rob Goldstone to Donald Trump Jr — 3 June 2016
… to provide the Trump campaign with some official documents and information that would incriminate Hillary and her dealings with Russia and would be very useful to your father.
This is obviously very high level and sensitive information but is part of Russia and its government’s support for Mr Trump …
That’s the email that generated an “I love it” response from Trump Jr.
Trump Junior’s response was informed by what the campaign already knew: Russia had hacked into Democratic sources and stolen thousands of emails that contained information the Trump campaign could use to embarrass Hillary Clinton.
The first batch of emails was published through WikiLeaks on July 22, 2016. Donald Trump began reading them to his rally crowds on the same day. Five days later, Trump made his call for Russia to find any additional letters from Hillary Clinton. That response came in response to questions about Trump’s use of material stolen by Russia.
Over the course of the campaign, from the time of the conventions on, both presidential candidates received regular briefings from the intelligence community. These briefings included information on the ties between Russia and the email thefts.
On October 7, President Obama revealed the consensus opinion of the United States intelligence community, which believed that the DNC and Podesta hacks had been carried out by groups working for the Russian government.
Finally, on January 11, 2017, Donald Trump attended a briefing after which he said for the first time that he believes that Russia was involved in stealing Democratic emails.
That last date is now the only one that Sarah Huckabee Sanders will admit to.
But the truth is that the Trump campaign knew Russia had hacked into Democratic emails before the first public statements, before Trump was asked about it, before the first article by Washington Post, and before they agreed to meet with Russian representatives in Trump Tower. They may have even known before the FBI figured it out. Because Russia told them directly.
That Sarah Huckabee Sanders still feels compelled to lie about that today is just one measure of how significant this could turn out to be.