While President Trump's lawyers continue to assert the Russia investigation will be over soon, Special Counsel Robert Mueller's simultaneous pursuit of various relevant avenues, now including the Trump campaign's joint data operation with the Republican National Committee (RNC), indicates otherwise.
In just the last few weeks, his prosecutors have begun questioning Republican National Committee staffers about the party digital operation that worked with the Trump campaign to target voters in key swing states. They are seeking to determine if the joint effort was related to the activities of Russian trolls and bots aimed at influencing the American electorate, according to two of the sources.
In what is potentially another ominous sign for the White House, the lawyer for Jared Kushner, the president’s son in law and senior adviser who was in charge of the campaign’s digital operation, recently began searching for a crisis public relations firm to handle press inquiries — a step frequently taken by people who believe they may be facing criminal charges.
It is not surprising that federal investigators have begun to examine the possibility that Russia and the Trump campaign helped each other during the election. Investigators have been looking into whether Russia provided the campaign with voter information stolen by Russian hackers from election databases in several states, and whether the Trump campaign helped Russia target its political ads to specific demographics and voting precincts.
The general counsels for Facebook, Twitter, and Google gave enigmatic replies when asked by the House Intelligence Committee last month whether they had investigated "who was mimicking who" when it came to online ads promoted by both the Trump campaign and Russia during the election.
Business Insider notes the ongoing suspicion swirling around both Cambridge Analytica, the Trump campaign's data-mining and analytics firm, and Brad Parscale, the Trump campaign's digital media director:
Investigators have long wondered whether the data-mining and analysis firm Cambridge Analytica served as a link between the campaign's data operation and Russia.
That scrutiny intensified following revelations that Cambridge CEO Alexander Nix reached out to WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange in June 2016 asking for access to Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton's "stolen" emails.
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Parscale was asked about Cambridge during his interview with the House Intelligence Committee in October. The ranking members of the House Oversight and Judiciary committees sent him a separate letter that month asking whether his firm received "information from a foreign government or foreign actor" at any point during the election.
The letter was also sent to Nix and the heads of Deep Root Analytics, TargetPoint Consulting, and The Data Trust — firms hired by the Republican National Committee last year to bolster the Trump campaign's data operation.
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Whereas Deep Root, TargetPoint, and The Data Trust responded to the documents request, Nix did not.
Parscale's letter, meanwhile, mirrored those written by the RNC data firms and used virtually the same language — with one notable exception.
Whereas the firms' letters included a line denying that they had had contact with any "foreign government or foreign actor," Parscale's did not.
Mueller is reportedly zeroing in on the Trump campaign's data operation — and the RNC (Business Insider)
Mueller probe outgrows its ‘witch hunt’ phase (Yahoo News)