Very canny strategy. From the New York Times:
WASHINGTON — Two Democratic Party donors and a former party staff member have filed an invasion of privacy lawsuit against President Trump’s campaign and a longtime informal adviser, Roger J. Stone Jr., accusing them of conspiring in the release of hacked Democratic emails and files that exposed their personal information to the public.
The case was organized by Protect Democracy, a government watchdog group run by former Obama administration lawyers. It filed the claim just short of a deadline under a one-year statute of limitations for privacy invasion lawsuits: WikiLeaks published the first archives of stolen Democratic National Committee emails, which intelligence agencies say Russia hacked to harm Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign and help Mr. Trump, last July 22.
Couldn’t happen to a bigger asshole than Roger Stone. The hack of the DNC created a firestorm of controversy and outrage that focused on a small handful of e-mails with pretty underwhelming content. Lost in all the media noise was that some people apparently had their personal information compromised:
Among the plaintiffs is Scott Comer, who was the chief of staff in the finance department of the Democratic National Committee, and whose hacked emails revealed to his grandparents that he was gay, which strained family relations, the lawsuit said.
Mr. Comer also received harassing and threatening phone calls, and was marginalized at work because of comments he had made about co-workers, and eventually left his job, it said.
The plaintiffs also include two Democratic Party donors, Roy Cockrum and Eric Schoenberg, whose Social Security numbers, dates of birth, home addresses, and other personal details became public when WikiLeaks published the files.
We still don’t have a full accounting of what happened to the DNC and who may have participated in or assisted the hack. It will be interesting to see if this lawsuit survives the standard legal challenges and continues on. Using the civil tort system seems like a saavy way to keep the pressure on the Trump organization in a manner that’s difficult for them counter with sheer political influence.
In addition to the invasion of privacy claim, the lawsuit contains two counts of other harms it said were a foreseeable consequence of the disclosure of the stolen emails: intentional infliction of emotional distress, and the violation of a statute that forbids conspiracies to intimidate classes of lawful voters from participating in the democratic process, or to injure them for having done so. The latter charge was brought under a federal statute that dates from a Reconstruction Era law to help combat the Ku Klux Klan. The lawsuit seeks unspecified compensatory and punitive damages.
Somebody did their homework. So much to keep track of right now, I know, but let’s continue to follow this small part of a much larger story.