The Mueller Report Volume 1
A Government Report
by Robert Mueller, Special Counsel
With Summary
by Bob Smith
April 26, 2019
Last week, DOJ released The Mueller Report to the public. This is a 448-page document prepared by Special Counsel Robert Mueller who was tasked 22 months ago to investigate collusion and obstruction of justice by the Trump Presidential campaign in the 2016 election.
The summary of the redacted version makes it possible for you to get the substance of Mueller’s report in the fastest way possible. The summary is not as good as the original and the redacted version is not either, but it is better than nothing. I recommend reading the summary if you don’t have time to read the original and I also recommend you encourage your Congressmen to demand the unredacted version.
Russian Interference in the 2016 Presidential Election
Volume I of II
I. Special Counsel Investigation
On May 17, 2017, Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein -then serving as Acting Attorney General for the Russia investigation appointed the Special Counsel “to investigate Russian interference with the 2016 presidential election and related matters. “
To carry out the investigation and prosecution of the matters assigned to him, the Special Counsel assembled a team of 19 attorneys. These attorneys were assisted by Department lawyers and FBI personnel who screened materials before turning those materials over to investigators. The Special Counsel attorneys and support staff were co-located with and worked alongside approximately 40 FBI agents, intelligence analysts, forensic accountants, a paralegal, and professional staff assigned by the FBI to assist the Special Counsel’s investigation. Those “assigned” FBI employees remained under FBI supervision at all times; the matters on which they assisted were supervised by the Special Counsel.
During its investigation the Office issued more than 2,800 subpoenas under the auspices of a grand jury sitting in the District of Columbia; executed nearly 500 search-and-seizure warrants; obtained more than 230 orders for communications records; obtained almost 50 orders authorizing use of pen registers; made 13 requests to foreign governments pursuant to Mutual Legal Assistance Treaties; and interviewed approximately 500 witnesses, including almost 80 before a grand jury.
II. RUSSIAN “ACTIVE MEASURES” SOCIAL MEDIA
The first form of Russian election influence came principally from the Internet Research Agency (IRA), a Russian organization funded by Yevgeniy Viktorovich Prigozhin and companies he controlled, including Concord Management and Consulting and Concord Catering. The IRA conducted social media operations targeted at large U.S. audiences with the goal of sowing discord in the U.S. political system. These operations constituted “active measures” a term that typically refers to operations conducted by Russian security services aimed at influencing the course of international affairs.
The IRA and its employees began operations targeting the United States as early as 2014. Using fictitious U.S. personas, IRA employees operated social media accounts and group pages designed to attract U.S. audiences.
IRA employees posted derogatory information about several candidates in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. By early to mid-2016, IRA operations included supporting the Trump Campaign and disparaging candidate Hillary Clinton.
IRA-controlled Twitter accounts separately had tens of thousands of followers, including multiple U.S. political figures who retweeted IRA-created content.
Facebook estimated the IRA reached as many as 126 million persons through its Facebook accounts.
IRA information in the Mueller Report is largely redacted citing “Harm to Ongoing Matter and other causes.”
The IRA created accounts in the names of fictitious U.S. organizations and grassroots groups and used these accounts to pose as antiimmigration groups, Tea Party activists, Black Lives Matter protestors, and other U.S. social and political activists.
To reach larger U.S. audiences, the IRA purchased advertisements from Facebook that promoted the IRA groups on the newsfeeds of U.S. audience members. According to Facebook, the IRA purchased over 3,500 advertisements, and the expenditures totaled approximately $100,000.
Collectively, the IRA’s social media accounts reached tens of millions of U.S. persons. Individual IRA social media accounts attracted hundreds of thousands of followers. For example, at the time they were deactivated by Facebook in mid-2017, the IRA’s “United Muslims of America” Facebook group had over 300,000 followers, the “Don’t Shoot Us” Facebook group had over 250,000 followers, the “Being Patriotic” Facebook group had over 200,000 followers, and the “Secured Borders” Facebook group had over 130,000 followers. According to Facebook, the IRA-controlled accounts made over 80,000 posts before their deactivation in August 2017, and these posts reached at least 29 million U.S persons and “may have reached an estimated 126 million people.”
From June 2016 until the end of the presidential campaign, almost all the U.S. rallies organized by the IRA focused on the U.S. election, often promoting the Trump Campaign and opposing the Clinton Campaign.
The investigation identified two different forms of connections between the IRA and members of the Trump Campaign. (The investigation identified no similar connections between the IRA and the Clinton Campaign.) First, on multiple occasions, members and surrogates of the Trump Campaign promoted-typically by linking, retweeting, or similar methods of reposting pro-Trump or anti-Clinton content published by the IRA through IRA-controlled social media accounts. Additionally, in a few instances, IRA employees represented themselves as U.S. persons to communicate with members of the Trump Campaign to seek assistance and coordination on IRA-organized political rallies inside the United States.
Trump Jr. retweeted included allegations of voter fraud, as well as allegations that Secretary Clinton had mishandled classified information.
In sum, the investigation established that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election through the “active measures” social media campaign carried out by the IRA, an organization funded by Prigozhin and companies that he controlled. The Office concluded (and a grand jury has alleged) that Prigozhin, his companies, and IRA employees violated U.S. law through these operations, principally by undermining through deceptive acts the work of federal agencies charged with regulating foreign influence in U.S. elections.
III. RUSSIAN HACKING AND DUMPING OPERATIONS
Beginning in March 2016, units of the Russian Federation ‘s Main Intelligence Directorate of the General Staff (GRU) hacked the computers and email accounts of organizations, employees, and volunteers supporting the Clinton Campaign, including the email account of campaign chairman John Podesta. Starting in April 2016, the GRU hacked into the computer networks of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) and the Democratic National Committee (DNC). The GRU targeted hundreds of email accounts used by Clinton Campaign employees, advisors, and volunteers. In total, the GRU stole hundreds of thousands of documents from the compromised email accounts and networks. The GRU later released stolen Clinton Campaign and DNC documents through online personas, ” DCLeaks” and “Guccifer 2.0,” and through the organization WikiLeaks. The release of the documents was designed and timed to interfere with the 2016 U.S. presidential election and undermine the Clinton Campaign.
Two military units of the GRU carried out the computer intrusions into the Clinton Campaign, DNC, and DCCC: Military Unit.
GRU officers also sent hundreds of spearphishing emails to the work and personal email accounts of Clinton Campaign employees and volunteers.
The GRU spearphishing operation enabled it to gain access to numerous email accounts of Clinton Campaign employees and volunteers, including campaign chairman John Podesta, junior volunteers assigned to the Clinton Campaign’s advance team, informal Clinton Campaign advisors, and a DNC employee. GRU officers stole tens of thousands of emails from spearphishing victims, including various Clinton Campaign-related communications.
By no later than April 12, 2016, the GRU had gained access to the DCCC computer network using the credentials stolen from a DCCC employee who had been successfully spearphished the week before.
Unit 26165 implanted on the DCCC and DNC networks two types of customized malware, known as “X-Agent” and “X-Tunnel”; Mimikatz, a credential-harvesting tool; and rar.exe, a tool used in these intrusions to compile and compress materials for exfiltration.
X-Agent was a multi-function hacking tool that allowed Unit 26165 to log keystrokes, take screenshots, and gather other data about the infected computers (e.g., file directories, operating systems). XTunnel was a hacking tool that created an encrypted connection between the victim DCCC/DNC computers and GRU-controlled computers outside the DCCC and DNC networks that was capable of large -scale data transfers. GRU officers then used X-Tunnel to exfiltrate stolen data from the victim computers.
Officers from Unit 26165 stole thousands of documents from the DCCC and DNC networks, including significant amounts of data pertaining to the U.S. federal elections. Stolen documents included internal strategy documents, fundraising data, opposition research, and emails from the work inboxes of DNC employees
The GRU ‘s operations extended beyond stealing materials and included releasing documents stolen from the Clinton Campaign and its supporters. The GRU carried out the anonymous release through two fictitious online personas that it created-DCLeaks and Guccifer 2.0-and later through the organization WikiLeaks.
Starting in June 2016, the GRU posted stolen documents onto the website dcleaks.com , including documents stolen from a number of individuals associated with the Clinton Campaign. These documents appeared to have originated from personal email accounts (in particular, Google and Microsoft accounts), rather than the DNC and DCCC computer networks. The GRU released, through dcleaks, thousands of documents, including personal identifying and financial information, internal correspondence related to the Clinton Campaign and prior political jobs, and fundraising files and information.
On June 14, 2016, the DNC and its cyber-response team announced the breach of the DNC network and suspected theft of DNC documents. In the statements, the cyber-response team alleged that Russian state-sponsored actors (which they referred to as “Fancy Bear”) were responsible for the breach.
Apparently in response to that announcement, on June 15, 2016, GRU officers using the persona Guccifer 2.0, created a WordPress blog. In the hours leading up to the launch of that WordPress blog, GRU officers logged into a Moscow-based server used and managed by Unit 74455 and searched for several specific words and phrases in English, including “some hundred sheets,” “illuminati, ” and “worldwide known.” Approximately two hours after the last of those searches, Guccifer 2.0 published its first post, attributing the DNC server hack to a lone Romanian hacker and using several of the unique English words and phrases that the GRU officers had searched for that day.
In order to expand its interference in the 20I6 U.S. presidential election, the GRU units transferred many of the documents they stole from the DNC and the chairman of the Clinton Campaign to WikiLeaks. GRU officers used both the DCLeaks and Guccifer 2.0 personas to communicate with WikiLeaks through Twitter private messaging and through encrypted channels, including possibly through WikiLeaks ‘s private communication system.
IV. RUSSIAN GOVERNMENT LINKS TO THE TRUMP CAMPAIGN
The Office identified multiple contacts- “links,” with ties to the Russian government. The Office investigated whether those contacts constituted a third avenue of attempted Russian interference with or influence on the 2016 presidential election. In particular, the investigation examined whether these contacts involved or resulted in coordination or a conspiracy with the Trump Campaign and Russia, including with respect to Russia aiding the Campaign in exchange for any sort of favorable treatment in the future. Based on the available information, the investigation did not establish such coordination.
This Section describes the principal links between the Trump Campaign and individuals with ties to the Russian government, including some contacts with Campaign officials or associates that have been publicly reported to involve Russian contacts.
On approximately September 2015, Felix Sater, a New York based real estate advisor, contacted Michael Cohen, then-executive vice president of the Trump Organization and special counsel to Donald J. Trump. Sater had previously worked with the Trump Organization and advised it on several domestic and international projects. Sater had explored the possibility of a Trump Tower project in Moscow while working with the Trump Organization and therefore knew of the organization’s general interest in completing a deal there. Sater had also served as an informal agent of the Trump Organization in Moscow previously and had accompanied lvanka Trump and Donald Trump Jr. to Moscow in the mid2000s. Sater later contacted Rozov and proposed that I.C. Expert pursue a Trump Tower Moscow project in which l.C. Expert would license the name and brand from the Trump Organization but construct the building on its own. Sater worked on the deal with Rozov and another employee of l.C. Expert. Cohen was the only Trump Organization representative to negotiate directly with l.C. Expert or its agents.
Between approximately October 13, 2015 and November 2, 2015, the Trump Organization (through its subsidiary Trump Acquisition, LLC) and I.C. Expert completed a letter of intent (LOI) for a Trump Moscow property. The LOI, signed by Trump for the Trump Organization and Rozov on behalf of I.C. Expert. In approximately 2011, Silk Road Group and the Trump Organization entered into a licensing agreement to build a Trump-branded property in Batumi, Georgia.
The LOI contemplated a development with residential, hotel, commercial, and office components, and called for 250 first class, luxury residential condominiums,” as well as one first class, luxury hotel consisting of approximately 15 floors and containing not fewer than 150 hotel rooms.”
For the residential and commercial portions of the project, the Trump Organization would receive between 1% and 5% of all condominium sales, plus 3% of all rental and other revenue. For the project’s hotel portion, the Trump Organization would receive a base fee of 3% of gross operating revenues for the first five years and 4% thereafter, plus a separate incentive fee of 20% of operating profit. Under the LOI, the Trump Organization also would receive a $4 million “up-front fee” prior to groundbreaking.
Cohen recalled conversations with Trump in which the candidate suggested that his campaign would be a significant “infomercial ” for Trump-branded properties.
In sum, the investigation established multiple links between Trump Campaign officials and individuals tied to the Russian government. Those links included Russian offers of assistance to the Campaign. In some instances, the Campaign was receptive to the offer, while in other instances, the Campaign officials shied away. Ultimately, the investigation did not establish that the Campaign coordinated or conspired with the Russian government in its election-interference activities.
V. PROSECUTION AND DECLINATION DECISIONS
The Office evaluated whether the conduct of the individuals considered for prosecution constituted a federal offense and whether admissible evidence would probably be enough to obtain and sustain a conviction for such an offense.
On February 16, 2018, a federal grand jury in DC returned an indictment charging 13 Russian nationals and three Russian entities — including the Internet Research Agency (IRA) and Concord Management and Consulting LLC (Concord) — with violating U.S. criminal laws in order to interfere with U.S. elections and political processes.
The indictment does not charge any Trump Campaign official or any other U.S. person with participating in the conspiracy. That is because the investigation did not identify evidence that any U.S. person who coordinated with the IRA knew that he or she was speaking with Russian nationals engaged in the criminal conspiracy. The Office therefore determined that such persons did not have the knowledge or criminal purpose required to charge them in the conspiracy.
The Office’s investigation uncovered evidence of numerous links (i.e., contacts) between Trump Campaign officials and individuals having or claiming to have ties to the Russian government.
The investigation uncovered extensive evidence that Paul Manafort’s and Richard Gates’s pre-campaign work for the government of Ukraine violated FARA. Manafort and Gates were charged for that conduct and admitted to it when they pleaded guilty to superseding criminal informations in the District of Columbia prosecution.
In addition, the investigation produced evidence of FARA violations involving Michael Flynn. Those potential violations, however, concerned a country other than Russia (i.e., Turkey) and were resolved when Flynn admitted to the underlying facts in the Statement of Offense that accompanied his guilty plea to a false-statements charge.
Finally, the Office investigated whether one of the above campaign advisors — George Papadopoulos — acted as an agent of, or at the direction and control of, the government of Israel.
The Office considered whether to charge Trump Campaign officials with crimes in connection with the June 9 meeting. The Office concluded that, in light of the government’s substantial burden of proof on issues of intent (“knowing” and “willful”), and the difficulty of establishing the value of the offered information, criminal charges would not meet the Justice Manual standard that the admissible evidence will probably be sufficient to obtain and sustain a conviction.
On the facts here, the government would unlikely be able to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the June 9 meeting participants had general knowledge that their conduct was unlawful. The investigation has not developed evidence that the participants in the meeting were familiar with the foreign-contribution ban or the application of federal law to the relevant factual context. The government does not have strong evidence of surreptitious behavior or efforts at concealment at the time of the June 9 meeting.
The Office would also encounter difficulty proving beyond a reasonable doubt that the value of the promised documents and information exceeds the $2,000 threshold for a criminal violation, as well as the $25,000 threshold for felony punishment.
Obstruction of Justice. Three basic elements are common to the obstruction statutes pertinent to this Office’s charging decisions: an obstructive act; some form of nexus between the obstructive act and an official proceeding; and criminal (i.e., corrupt) intent. A detailed discussion of those elements, and the law governing obstruction of justice more generally, is included in Volume II of the report.
Investigators approached George Papadopoulos for an interview based on his role as a foreign policy advisor to the Trump Campaign and his suggestion to a foreign government representative that Russia had indicated that it could assist the Campaign through the anonymous release of information damaging to candidate Clinton. On January 27, 2017, Papadopoulos agreed to be interviewed by FBI agents, who informed him that the interview was part of the investigation into potential Russian government interference in the 2016 presidential election. During the interview, Papadopoulos lied about the timing, extent, and nature of his communications with Joseph Mifsud, Olga Polonskaya, and Ivan Timofeev.
Papadopoulos met Mifsud for the first time on approximately March 14, 2016, after Papadopoulos had already learned he would be a foreign policy advisor for the Campaign. Mifsud showed interest in Papadopoulos only after learning of his role on the Campaign. Mifsud told Papadopoulos about the Russians possessing “dirt” on candidate Clinton in late April 2016, more than a month after Papadopoulos had joined the Campaign and been publicly announced by candidate Trump.
Michael Flynn agreed to be interviewed by the FBI on January 24, 2017, four days after he had officially assumed his duties as National Security Advisor to the President. During the interview, Flynn made several false statements pertaining to his communications with the Russian ambassador.
First, Flynn made two false statements about his conversations with Russian Ambassador Kislyak in late December 2016.
Second, Flynn made false statements about calls he had previously made to representatives of Russia and other countries regarding a resolution submitted by Egypt to the United Nations Security Council on December 21, 2016. Specifically, Flynn stated that he only asked the countries’ positions on how they would vote on the resolution and that he did not request that any of the countries take any particular action on the resolution. That statement was false.
Flynn made these false statements to the FBI at a time when he was serving as National Security Advisor and when the FBI had an open investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election, including the nature of any links between the Trump Campaign and Russia.
Michael Cohen was the executive vice president and special counsel to the Trump Organization when Trump was president of the Trump Organization. From the fall of 2015 through approximately June 2016, Cohen was involved in a project to build a Trump-branded tower and adjoining development in Moscow. The project was known as Trump Tower Moscow.
In 2017, Cohen was called to testify before the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI) and the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI), both of which were investigating Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election and possible links between Russia and the presidential campaigns.
The Office concluded that the evidence was insufficient to prove that Sessions was willfully untruthful in his answers and thus insufficient to obtain or sustain a conviction for perjury or false statements. Consistent with the Principles of Federal Prosecution, the Office therefore determined not to pursue charges against Sessions and informed his counsel of that decision in March 2018.
Volume II of the Report is included in the next phase.
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