Special counsel Robert Mueller has begun to question Republican National Committee staffers about the party’s 2016 campaign data operation, which helped President Donald Trump’s campaign team target voters in critical swing states.
Two sources told Yahoo News that Mueller’s team is examining whether the joint RNC-Trump campaign data operation — which was directed on Trump’s side by Brad Parscale and managed by Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner — “was related to the activities of Russian trolls and bots aimed at influencing the American electorate.”
The FBI has been scrutinizing Kushner’s contacts in December 2016 with the Russian ambassador to the US and the CEO of a sanctioned Russian bank.
The special counsel’s office declined to comment on its ongoing investigation. Multiple requests to various current and former RNC officials on Wednesday went unanswered. A source close to one of the Trump campaign’s data firms said they were “unaware of anyone being questioned.”
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.
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Mueller's team has reportedly begun to question Republican National Committee staffers about the GOP's joint data operation with the Trump campaign, and whether there was any coordination with Russia https://t.co/aFAaWlkczb
— Natasha Bertrand (@NatashaBertrand) December 27, 2017
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