It’s time for Donald Trump Jr and Jared Kushner to panic
Friday’s Trump-Russia indictments serve as vindication for everyone out there who figured out a long time ago that Russian government agents (allegedly) hacked the Democratic Party during the election and gave those secrets to WikiLeaks and Donald Trump’s inner circle. Indictments aren’t legal proof of anything, but they do signify that there’s enough evidence to go trial. Trump’s pal Roger Stone is clearly in huge legal trouble – but it’s also time for a couple other big names to panic.
Special Counsel Robert Mueller is clearly taking the position that the Russian government agents, WikiLeaks, and the Trump campaign were involved in a criminal conspiracy. Roger Stone is the unnamed Trump associate referenced in these indictments. But Stone wasn’t the only member of Team Trump who had communications with WikiLeaks during the election. Donald Trump Jr was also communicating with WikiLeaks during the election. Jared Kushner was also communicating with WikiLeaks.
These communications were already legally questionable before these indictments put them in a new context. Lawfare did a lengthy write-up about whether Junior committed a crime simply by deciding to interact with WikiLeaks at all. Now we know that these communications took place amid a backdrop of Roger Stone allegedly conspiring with WikiLeaks and Russian government hackers. Were Junior and/or Kushner aware of what Stone was doing at the time? This is before getting to the infamous secret meetings that Donald Trump Jr and Jared Kushner had with Russian government representatives.
These things largely come down to intent – and the more you know about a criminal conspiracy, the more guilty you look for communicating with the active participants in that conspiracy. Donald Trump Jr and Jared Kushner are now faced with the prospect of having to make a straight faced argument that they were communicating with WikiLeaks and meeting with the Russian government on behalf of the Trump campaign, without knowing about the criminal conspiracy between WikiLeaks, the Russian government, and the Trump campaign. Good luck. It’s time for these two guys to panic.
