Monday, Donald Trump Jr. published a series of tweets which included screen shots of Twitter private messages between himself and Wikileaks.
According to a report in The Atlantic, the messages, along with thousands of documents were turned over by Trump Jr.’s lawyers to the congressional committee investigating Russia’s meddling in the 2016 election.
The president’s son claimed someone on the committee had “selectively leaked” the conversation to the media and proceeded to publish the conversations.
By the looks of it, Trump was peppered with messages from Wikileaks, and as he pointed out, only responded three times.
Those tweets are here:
Given Wikileaks role in publishing classified information, Trump would’ve been better off blocking or at least ignoring their requests for link love. But, he didn’t. Definitely not his brightest moment.
Several outlets have honed in on the fact that right around the time Trump was responding to Wikileaks, Vice President to be Mike Pence was asked wether the campaign was “in cahoots” with Wikileaks. Pence responded saying, “nothing could be further from the truth.”
Pence may have known Trump Jr. was being inundated with messages from Wikileaks and fibbed, but that doesn’t seem likely. More likely? Pence was simply unaware. Frequent and unsolicited direct messages on a social media platform is not necessarily groundbreaking campaign news worthy of mass communication.
In examining Trump’s (Sr) tweets, Byron Tau of the Wall Street Journal found a troubling coincidence. Donald Trump tweeted about Wikileaks just 15 minutes after a request was sent to Trump Jr. via Twitter private message.
From The Atlantic:
“Strongly suggest your dad tweets this link if he mentions us,” WikiLeaks went on, pointing Trump Jr. to the link wlsearch.tk, which it said would help Trump’s followers dig through the trove of stolen documents and find stories. “There’s many great stories the press are missing and we’re sure some of your follows [sic] will find it,” WikiLeaks went on. “Btw we just released Podesta Emails Part 4.”Trump Jr. did not respond to this message. But just 15 minutes after it was sent, as The Wall Street Journal’s Byron Tau pointed out, Donald Trump himself tweeted, “Very little pick-up by the dishonest media of incredible information provided by WikiLeaks. So dishonest! Rigged system!”Two days later, on October 14, 2016, Trump Jr. tweeted out the link WikiLeaks had provided him. “For those who have the time to read about all the corruption and hypocrisy all the @wikileaks emails are right here: http://wlsearch.tk/,” he wrote.After this point, Trump Jr. ceased to respond to WikiLeaks’s direct messages, but WikiLeaks escalated its requests.
Though enough evidence to raise an eyebrow, it’s hardly enough to prove collusion.
According to The Atlantic‘s report, Trump Jr. turned over thousands of documents to the congressional committee. If there was widespread collusion beyond two suspiciously timed tweets, they’ll find it. Though it will probably be leaked to the press first.
Follow Kemberlee on Twitter @kemberleekaye
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