Mueller is reportedly investigating whether the Trump campaign coordinated voter outreach with Russian trolls
Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election will churn on, Yahoo News reported Wednesday, as Mueller has apparently taken an interest in the online advertising operation built by the Trump campaign and Republican National Committee last year.
The investigation will reportedly seek to determine whether the Trump campaign and the RNC worked in conjunction with Russian-backed social media accounts that posted false or inflammatory political content. Business Insider's Natasha Bertrand pointed out that Russian hackers reportedly stole private voter records from several state and local election boards throughout the United States during the 2016 election. Curious minds in Congress have wanted to know about the fate of those stolen records since June.
Now, Mueller is reportedly considering the possibility that the Trump campaign and the RNC coordinated their voter outreach in swing states using Russian-acquired information. "Investigators have been looking into whether Russia provided the campaign with voter information stolen by Russian hackers," Bertrand explained, "and whether the Trump campaign helped Russia target its political ads to specific demographics and voting precincts."
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
Brad Parscale, the head of the Trump campaign's digital team, has said that the idea of coordination with Russia is "a joke," but Bertrand notes that Parscale did not exactly deny having interactions with a "foreign government or foreign actor" in a response to a letter he received earlier this month from congressional investigators.
President Trump reportedly expects Mueller's investigation to end imminently, but a source told Yahoo News that the president's thinking was "fanciful."
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
Kelly O'Meara Morales is a staff writer at The Week. He graduated from Sarah Lawrence College and studied Middle Eastern history and nonfiction writing amongst other esoteric subjects. When not compulsively checking Twitter, he writes and records music, subsists on tacos, and watches basketball.
-
Judge halts Trump’s DC Guard deploymentSpeed Read The Trump administration has ‘infringed upon the District’s right to govern itself,’ the judge ruled
-
Trump accuses Democrats of sedition meriting ‘death’Speed Read The president called for Democratic lawmakers to be arrested for urging the military to refuse illegal orders
-
Court strikes down Texas GOP gerrymanderSpeed Read The Texas congressional map ordered by Trump is likely an illegal racial gerrymander, the court ruled
-
Trump defends Saudi prince, shrugs off Khashoggi murderSpeed Read The president rebuked an ABC News reporter for asking Mohammed bin Salman about the death of a Washington Post journalist at the Saudi Consulate in 2018
-
Congress passes bill to force release of Epstein filesSpeed Read The Justice Department will release all files from its Jeffrey Epstein sex-trafficking investigation
-
Trump says he will sell F-35 jets to Saudi ArabiaSpeed Read The president plans to make several deals with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman this week
-
Judge blasts ‘profound’ errors in Comey caseSpeed Read ‘Government misconduct’ may necessitate dismissing the charges against the former FBI director altogether
-
Ecuador rejects push to allow US military basesSpeed Read Voters rejected a repeal of a constitutional ban on US and other foreign military bases in the country



