Oh, all the recent twists and turns in this story I have to admit this isn’t one I specifically expected, but then on the other hand it’s not really that surprising.
CNN is reporting that Russia tried to infiltrate President Donald Trumps campaign using former foreign policy advisor Carter Page as someone assigned to keep an eye on them. However, the officials were not able to say whether or not Page knew Russia was using him.
The information comes from the FBI, which gathered the intelligence on the act in the summer of 2016, around the time Paul Manafort took over the campaign.
The information also revealed that Russia tried to use backdoor channels to communicate with Trump staff and the inner circle of the Trump campaign. Page was just one of many found to have been in contact with Russian officials.
This is on top of the information that Russia’s previous recruitment attempts targeting Page which ended in a prison term from some of their agents, the fact that the FBI put in a FISA surveillance warrant targeting Page partially based on information contained in the Steele Dossier.
And it wasn’t just Page they targeted, it was several people within the Trump campaign.
Naturally Page denies any of this, but the point is — when spies are trying to exploit you, the last thing they’ll do is let you know that.
These officials made clear they don't know whether Page was aware the Russians may have been using him. Because of the way Russian spy services operate, Page could have unknowingly talked with Russian agents.
Page disputes the idea he has ever collected intelligence for the Russians, saying he helped the US intelligence community. "My assumption throughout the last 26 years I've been going there has always been that any Russian person might share information with the Russian government ... as I have similarly done with the CIA, the FBI and other government agencies in the past."
But the intelligence suggests Russia tried to infiltrate the inner-workings of the Trump campaign by using backdoor channels to communicate with people in the Trump orbit, US officials say.
All of this has to be taken in context, because we’ve also recently had reports that GCHQ and other intelligence agencies detected contacts between the Russians and Trump campaign that also match the Steele Dossier and one source involved in that story says they have confirmed evidence that Trump associates and the Russia Intelligence coordinated their efforts in regards to the election.
A source close to the investigation into President Donald Trump’s campaign and its ties to Russia says that there is now “specific concrete and corroborative evidence” that individuals within Trump’s immediate orbit coordinated with Russian intelligence operatives during the election.
The Guardian said on Thursday that the U.K.’s Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) has been watching the Trump camp since late 2015, having noticed suspicious “interactions” between Trump associates and well-known Russian agents.
And on top of this a “How To Plan” for manipulating the U.S. Election by a Russian think tank with ties to Putin and intelligence agencies was also revealed.by Reuters.
A Russian government think tank controlled by Vladimir Putin developed a plan to swing the 2016 U.S. presidential election to Donald Trump and undermine voters’ faith in the American electoral system, three current and four former U.S. officials told Reuters.
They described two confidential documents from the think tank as providing the framework and rationale for what U.S. intelligence agencies have concluded was an intensive effort by Russia to interfere with the Nov. 8 election. U.S. intelligence officials acquired the documents, which were prepared by the Moscow-based Russian Institute for Strategic Studies [en.riss.ru/], after the election.
The institute is run by retired senior Russian foreign intelligence officials appointed by Putin’s office.
Hacking information from the DNC and email of associates of Hillary Clinton was only the first step, this plan outlines how then used that stolen data and mixed it with twisted rumors and lies intended to damage her campaign and help Trump using their own Kremlin controlled media arms, RT and Sputnik news, and also laundered through a legion of cyber trolls and social media bots.
Russia Today and Sputnik published anti-Clinton stories while pro-Kremlin bloggers prepared a Twitter campaign calling into question the fairness of an anticipated Clinton victory, according to a report by U.S. intelligence agencies on Russian interference in the election made public in January. [bit.ly/2kMiKSA]
Russia Today’s most popular Clinton video - “How 100% of the 2015 Clintons’ ‘charity’ went to ... themselves” - accumulated 9 millions views on social media, according to the January report. [bit.ly/2os8wIt]
…
Neither of the Russian institute documents mentioned the release of hacked Democratic Party emails to interfere with the U.S. election, according to four of the officials. The officials said the hacking was a covert intelligence operation run separately out of the Kremlin.
The overt propaganda and covert hacking efforts reinforced each other, according to the officials. Both Russia Today and Sputnik heavily promoted the release of the hacked Democratic Party emails, which often contained embarrassing details.
We’re now well past the issue of whether or not Russia tried to steal the election from Clinton, they did, and it doesn’t even really matter whether this was the deciding factor or not — what matters is how can we prevent it in the future particular when it’s possible people within the Trump campaign were covertly complicit and coordinated with the Russian effort. I mean, it’s not like any of them have come forward and said they wouldn’t never accept the help, have they?
All they’ve done is claimed it didn't happen — but it did.
Trump says he has “no connections” to Russia when he’s made $98 Million selling condos to Russian Oligarchs in South Florida, and $Millions more renting to them in Trump Tower, including an illegal gambling ring run by Russian mobsters on the entire 51st Floor and a money laundering ring on the 63rd. So his word can’t be trusted.
We don’t yet know if Page knew what was really going on, or if any of them fully understood it all — but if just one of them did — that’s huge.
Unlike Trump’s claims that the Obama personally ordered the “Wiretap of Trump Tower” where the evidence continues to evaporate, this pile of confirmation is only getting higher and higher.
