Mueller Investigated Roger Stone, Julian Assange and Wikileaks over Russian hacks of the Democrats in 2016 but did not prosecute, previously secret sections of the special counsel's report reveal
The US Justice Department has released a less-redacted version of the 2019 Robert Mueller report.
It shows that Mueller investigated Roger Stone, WikiLeaks and WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange over the Russian government's hack of the Democrats in the 2016 election.
However he did not find proof beyond reasonable doubt that Stone or Assange should have faced criminal conspiracy charges.
The new details of special counsel Robert Mueller's decision not to charge Stone, Assange and WikiLeaks for their role in influencing the 2016 election emerged just a day before voters head to the polls for the 2020 election.
It shows that Mueller investigated Roger Stone and WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange over the Russian government's hack of the Democrats in the 2016 election. Stone pictured above
Julian Assange faces charges in the US for a hacking conspiracy, in a case that is unrelated to the 2016 election
The special counsel's team said that communication between WikiLeaks and officers in Russia's main GRU spy agency took place 'via encrypted chats.'
'The lack of visibility into the contents of these communications would hinder the Office's ability to prove that WikiLeaks was aware of and intended to join the criminal venture comprised of the GRU hackers,' it read.
The newly released segment of the Mueller report, seen by BuzzFeed News, read: 'While the Office cannot exclude the possibility of coordination between Stone and WikiLeaks or that additional evidence could come to light on that issue, the investigation did not obtain admissible evidence likely to meet the government's burden to prove facts establishing such coordination beyond a reasonable doubt.'
The latest version of the report also revealed details about how Russians sought to harm Hillary Clinton and support Trump in 2016.
The latest version of the report was released on Monday in response to a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit, filed by BuzzFeed News and advocacy group Electronic Privacy Information Center.
The lawsuit had called on the government to release the report in its entirety.
The Justice Department was ordered to release relevant sections by November 2.
The fact that prosecutors chose not to file any charges is an apparent vindication for Assange and Stone, but Mueller did not completely clear either man.
He noted in a newly unredacted footnote that there were 'factual uncertainties' regarding their possible involvement in the hacking of Democratic National Committee servers.
The investigation by Mueller, which was first published in April 2019, had found multiple links between the Russian government and the Trump campaign.
However it stopped short of establishing that the Trump team conspired with Russia to influence the election.
Grant Smith, a defense attorney for Stone, told CNN that the new version of the report did vindicate him.
'No matter how hard the Mueller team tried, they could not make the case they tried to pin on Mr. Stone from the start. These newly unredacted sections are full of euphemisms for the ultimate conclusion that evidence simply did not exist of Stone's involvement,' Smith said.
Stone has been one of Trump's most fervent supporters for years and served on his presidential campaign in the last election.
The latest version of the report was released on Monday after the transparency group Electronic Privacy Information Center sued for it. Robert Mueller pictured above
The conservative political consultant and lobbyist abruptly left the campaign in 2015 under murky circumstances - Trump said he fired Stone and Stone said he quit. But Stone remained a prominent member of Trump's inner circle, serving as an informal adviser to the president.
The pair's relationship was thrust into the spotlight in November 2019, when Stone was indicted under Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into the Trump campaign's dealings with Russia.
Stone was sentenced to 14 months in federal prison, before Trump stepped in and commuted his sentence at the eleventh hour.
Trump has frequently dismissed Mueller's investigation as a 'witchhunt'.
Julian Assange faces charges in the US for a hacking conspiracy, in a case that is unrelated to the 2016 election. He is currently detained in the United Kingdom and fighting extradition.
'It is hardly surprising that Mr. Mueller decided not to indict Julian Assange. No one should be charged in the United States for publishing truthful information,' Barry Pollack, Assange's defense attorney in the US, said in response to the Mueller report release on Monday.
Two years of Mueller: How sprawling Trump-Russia probe unfolded in ultimate D.C soap opera
Here is a timeline of significant developments in Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into Russia's role in the 2016 U.S. presidential election and whether President Donald Trump's campaign conspired with Moscow.
2017
May 9: President Trump fires FBI Director James Comey and days later Trump attributed the dismissal to 'this Russia thing.'
May 17 - U.S. Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein appoints former FBI Director Mueller as a special counsel to investigate Russian meddling in the 2016 election and to look into any links and/or coordination between the Russian government and people associated with Republican Trump's campaign.
June 15 - Mueller is investigating Trump for possible obstruction of justice, the Washington Post reports.
October 30 - Veteran Republican political operative and former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort, who worked for the campaign for five pivotal months in 2016, is indicted on charges of conspiracy against the United States and money laundering as is his business partner Rick Gates, who also worked for Trump's campaign.
- Former Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos pleads guilty to a charge of lying to the FBI about his contacts with Russian officials.
December 1 - Michael Flynn, Trump's national security adviser for less than a month who also had a prominent campaign role, pleads guilty to the charge of lying to the FBI about his discussions in 2016 with the Russian ambassador to Washington.
2018
February 16 - Federal grand jury indicts 13 Russians and three firms, including a Russian government propaganda arm called the Internet Research Agency, accusing them of tampering to support Trump and disparage Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton. The accused 'had a strategic goal to sow discord in the U.S. political system, including the 2016 U.S. presidential election' according to the court document filed by Mueller.
- An American, Richard Pinedo, pleads guilty to identity fraud for selling bank account numbers after being accused by prosecutors of helping Russians launder money, buy Facebook ads and pay for campaign rally supplies. Pinedo was not associated with the Trump campaign.
February 22 - Manafort and Gates are charged with financial crimes, including bank fraud, in Virginia.
February 23 - Gates pleads guilty to conspiracy against the United States and lying to investigators. He agrees to cooperate and testify against Manafort at trial.
April 3 - Alex van der Zwaan, the Dutch son-in-law of one of Russia's richest men, is sentenced to 30 days in prison and fined $20,000 for lying to Mueller's investigators, becoming the first person sentenced in the probe.
April 9 - FBI agents raid home, hotel room and office of Trump's personal lawyer and self-described 'fixer' Michael Cohen.
April 12 - Rosenstein tells Trump that he is not a target in Mueller's probe.
April 19 - Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, a Trump supporter in the election campaign, joins Trump's personal legal team.
June 8 - Mueller charges a Russian-Ukrainian man, Konstantin Kilimnik, a Manafort business partner whom prosecutors say had ties to Russian intelligence, with witness tampering.
July 13 - Federal grand jury indicts 12 Russian military intelligence officers on charges of hacking Democratic Party computer networks in 2016 and staged releases of documents. Russia, which denies interfering in the election, says there is no evidence that the 12 are linked to spying or hacking.
July 16 - In Helsinki after the first summit between Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin, Trump publicly contradicts U.S. intelligence agencies that concluded Moscow had interfered in the 2016 election with a campaign of hacking and propaganda. Trump touts Putin's 'extremely strong and powerful' denial of meddling. He calls the Mueller inquiry a 'rigged witch hunt' on Twitter.
August 21 - A trial jury in Virginia finds Manafort guilty of five counts of tax fraud, two counts of bank fraud and one count of failure to disclose a foreign bank account.
- Cohen, in a case brought by U.S. prosecutors in New York, pleads guilty to tax fraud and campaign finance law violations. Cohen is subsequently interviewed by Mueller's team.
August 31 - Samuel Patten, an American business partner of Kilimnik, pleads guilty to unregistered lobbying for pro-Kremlin political party in Ukraine.
September 14 - Manafort pleads guilty to two conspiracy counts and signs a cooperation agreement with Mueller's prosecutors.
November 6 – Democrats gain control of the House in the elections, positioning the party to control panels with oversight authority of the Justice Department.
November 8 - U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions resigns at Trump's request. He had recused himself from overseeing the Mueller inquiry because of his contacts with the Russian ambassador as a Trump campaign official. Trump appoints Sessions' chief of staff Matthew Whitaker, a critic of the Mueller probe, as acting attorney general.
November 20 - Giuliani says Trump submitted written answers to questions from Mueller, as the president avoids a face-to-face interview with the special counsel.
November 27-28 - Prosecutors say Manafort breached his plea deal by lying to investigators, which Manafort denies. Trump says he has not ruled out granting Manafort a presidential pardon.
November 28 - Giuliani says Trump told investigators he was not aware ahead of time of a meeting in Trump Tower in New York between several campaign officials and Russians in June 2016.
November 29 - Cohen pleads guilty in the Mueller investigation to lying to Congress about the length of discussions in 2016 on plans to build a Trump Tower in Moscow. 'I made these misstatements to be consistent with individual 1's political messaging and out of loyalty to individual 1,' says Cohen, who previously identified 'individual 1' as Trump.
- The president criticizes Cohen as a liar and 'weak person.'
December 12 - Two developments highlight growing political and legal risks for Trump: Cohen sentenced to three years in prison for crimes including orchestrating hush payments to women in violation of campaign laws before the election; American Media Inc, publisher of National Enquirer tabloid, strikes deal to avoid charges over its role in one of two hush payments. Publisher admits payment was aimed at influencing the 2016 election, contradicting Trump's statements.
December 16 – President Trump tweets that Michael Cohen 'became a "Rat"' – using lingo associated with the mob for those who testify against higher-ups
2019
January 25 - Longtime Trump associate and self-proclaimed political 'dirty trickster' Roger Stone charged and arrested at his home in Florida. Stone is accused of lying to Congress about statements suggesting he may have had advance knowledge of plans by Wikileaks to release Democratic Party campaign emails that U.S. officials say were stolen by Russia.
February 21 - U.S. judge tightens gag order on Stone, whose Instagram account posted a photo of the judge and the image of crosshairs next to it.
February 22 - Manhattan district attorney's office is pursuing New York state criminal charges against Manafort whether or not he receives a pardon from Trump on federal crimes, a person familiar with the matter says. Trump cannot issue pardons for state convictions.
February 24 - Senior Democratic U.S. Representative Adam Schiff says Democrats will subpoena Mueller's final report on his investigation if it is not given to Congress by the Justice Department, and will sue the Trump administration and call on Mueller to testify to Congress if necessary.
February 27 - Cohen tells U.S. House Oversight Committee Trump is a 'racist,' a 'con man' and a 'cheat' who knew in advance about a release of emails by WikiLeaks in 2016 aimed at hurting rival Clinton. Trump directed negotiations for a real estate project in Moscow during the campaign even as he publicly said he had no business interests in Russia, Cohen testifies.
Cohen also testifies that he 'never asked for, nor would I accept' a pardon from Trump, forcing his lawyer to issue a clarifying statement that Cohen 'could have been clearer' and standing by statement Cohen didn't 'personally' ask for a pardon.
March 7 - Manafort is sentenced in the Virginia case to almost four years in prison. The judge also ordered Manafort to pay a fine of $50,000 and restitution of just over $24 million.
March 13 - Manafort is sentenced to about 3-1/2 more years in prison in the Washington case, bringing his total prison sentence in the two special counsel cases to 7-1/2 years.
- On the same day, the Manhattan district attorney announces a separate indictment charging Manafort with residential mortgage fraud and other New York state crimes, which unlike the federal charges cannot be erased by a presidential pardon.
March 22 - Mueller submits his confidential report on the findings of his investigation to U.S. Attorney General William Barr.
March 24 - Barr releases a summary of Mueller's report, saying the investigation did not find evidence that Trump or his associates broke the law during the campaign. White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders says the summary is a complete exoneration of Trump.
March 29 – After facing a backlash from Democratic critics, Barr tells Congress the report is nearly 400 pages long and that he will make a the report public, stating: 'Everyone will soon be able to read it on their own.' He writes that he is working on redactions including of material that could harm 'reputational interests of peripheral third parties.'
April 3 – Democratic-run House Judiciary Committee votes to subpoena the full Mueller report.
April 9 – Barr tells Congress he is reviewing FBI conduct that began the Mueller probe.
April 11 – WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is arrested in Britain on charges of conspiracy to hack U.S. government computers in 2010. The initial charge does not mention Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. elections.
April 18 – Attorney General William Barr makes public a redacted version of the Mueller report, according to the Justice Department.