Mueller's Indictment of 13 Russians - A Love Story

Do you know what Robert Mueller loves?  FACTS.  Dates. Times. Verifiable actions.  In an age when the President of the United States screams "fake news" at the slightest suggestion that he is not the best and most beloved leader in American history, it's nice to read Mueller's indictment of 13 Russian nationals who attempted to influence the outcome of the 2016 presidential election, if only because it reminds us that facts still matter to some of the people with power.

As you read the highlights of the indictment, please keep in mind that this is not "My Final Report on Everything I'm Done Now," by Robert Mueller.  You will note, for example, that there is no hacking of the DNC in this report, which is a thing that very famously, you know, happened.  Put another way, any Republican pundits claiming that this exonerates Trump or implicates the Democrats haven't read the indictment, or perhaps have read the indictment and just enjoy lying.  There are also pundits claiming that the FBI has pronounced that the Russians had no impact on election results.  The FBI has not said that, first of all, and second, read this and see if you agree.

When you see "organization," that refers to the Internet Research Agency LLC, "a Russian organization engaged in operations to interfere with elections and politician processes."

• "The ORGANIZATION sought, in part, to conduct what it called 'information warfare against the United states of America' through fictitious U.S. personas on social media platforms and other Internet-based media."  [Note that Mueller is clearly quoting a witness or a document from the organization.]
• "By in or around May 2014, the ORGANIZATION'S strategy included interfering with the 2016 U.S. presidential election, with the stated goal of 'spread[ing] distrust towards the candidates and the political system in general.'"  [Again, he's quoting, though we don't know whom or what.]
• "Defendant ALEKSANDRA YURYEVNA KRYLOVA worked for the ORGANIZATION from at least in or around September 2013 to at least in or around November 2014. . . . In 2014, KRYLOVA traveled to the United States under false pretenses for the purpose of collecting intelligence to inform the ORGANIZATION's operations." (8-9)
• "Defendant SERGEY PAVLOVICH POLOZOV worked for the ORGANIZATION from at least in or around April 2014 to at least in or around October 2016.  POLOZOV served as the manager of the IT department and oversaw the procurement of U.S. servers and other computer infrastructure that masked the ORGANIZATION's Russian location when conducting operations within the United States." (9)
• "Defendant GLEB IGOREVICH VASILCHENKO worked for the ORGANIZTION from at least in or around August 2014 to at least in or around September 2016.  VASILCHENKO was responsible for posting, monitoring, and updating the social media content of many ORGANIZATION-controlled accounts while posing as U.S. persons or U.S. grassroots organizations." (10)
• "Starting at least in or around 2014, Defendants and their co-conspirators began to track and study groups on U.S. social media sites dedicated to U.S. politics and social issues.  In order to gauge the performance of various groups on social media sites, the ORGANIZATION tracked certain metrics like the group's size, the frequency of content placed by the gorup, and hte level of audience engagement with that content, such as the average number of comments or responses to a post." (12)
• "KRYLOVA and BOGACHEVA, together with other Defendants and co-conspirators, planned travel itineraries, purchased equipment (such as cameras, SIM cards, and drop phones), and discussed security measures (including "evacuation scenarios") for Defendants who traveled to the United States."  (12) [Note that while we were oblivious, they had plans in case they got busted in the middle of their spy missions.]
• "KRYLOVA and BOGACHEVA received visas, and from approximately June 4, 2014 through June 26 2014, KRYLOVA and BOGACHEVA traveled in and around the United States, including stops in Nevada, California, New Mexico, Colorado, Illinois, Michigan, Louisiana, Texas, and New York to gather intelligence.  After the trip, KRYLOVA and BURCHIK exchanged an intelligence report regarding the trip." (13) [It sounds to me like Mueller might have a copy of that report, but who knows!]
• "[In] June 2016, Defendants and their co-conspirators, posing online as U.S. persons, communicated with a real U.S. person affiliated with a Texas-based grassroots organization.  During the exchange, Defendants and their co-conspirators learned from the real U.S. person that they should focus their activities on 'purple states like Colorado, Virginia and Florida.'  After that exchange, Defendants and their co-conspirators commonly referred to targeting 'purple states' in directing their efforts" (13)
• "Defendants and their co-conspirators also created thematic groups on social media sites, particularly on the social media platforms Facebook and Instagram.  ORGANIZATION-controlled pages addressed a range of issues, including: immigration (with group names including 'Secured Borders'); the Black Lives matter movement (with group names including 'Blacktivist'); religion (with group names including 'United Muslims of America' and 'Army of Jesus'); and certain geographic regions within the United States (with group names including 'South United' and 'Heart of Texas').  By 2016, the size of many ORGANIZATION-controlled groups had grown to hundreds of thousands of online followers." (14)
• "Defendants and their co-conspirators also created and controlled numerous Twitter accounts designed to appear as if U.S. persons or groups controlled them.  For example, the ORGANIZATION created and controlled the Twitter account 'Tennessee GOP,' which used the handle @TEN_GOP.  The @TEN_GOP account falsely claimed ot be controlled by a U.S. state political party.   Over Time, the @TEN_GOP account attracted more than 100,000 online followers." (15)
• "Defendants and their co-conspirators also regularly evaluated the content posted by specialists . . . to ensure they appeared authentic - as if operated by U.S.persons.  Specialists received feedback and directions to improve the quality of their posts." (15)
• "Defendants and their co-conspirators . . . contacted media outlets in order to promote activities inside the United States." (16)
• "By 2016, Defendants and their co-conspirators used their fictitious online personas to interfere with the 2016 U.S. presidential election.  They engaged in operations primarily intended to communicate derogatory information about Hillary Clinton, to denigrate other candidates such as Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio, and to support Bernie Sanders and then-candidate Donald Trump." (17)
• "Specialists were instructed to post content that focused on "politics in the USA" and to "use any opportunity to criticize Hillary and the rest (except Sanders and Trump - we support them)." (17)
• "On or about September 14, 2016, in an internal review of an ORGANIZATION-created and controlled Facebook group called 'Secured Borders' the account specialist was criticized for having a 'low number of posts dedicated to criticizing Hillary Clinton' and was told 'it is imperative to intensify criticizing Hillary Clinton' in future posts" (17)
• "Defendants and their co-conspirators also used false U.S. personas to communicate with unwitting members, volunteers, and supporters of the Trump Campaign involved in local community outreach." (17)
• "In or around the latter half of 2016, Defendants and their co-conspirators . . . began to encourage U.S. minority groups not to vote in the 2016 U.S. presidential election or to vote for a third-party U.S. Presidential candidate. . . . [On] October 16, 2016, Defendants and their co-conspirators used the ORGANIZATION-controlled Instagram account 'Woke Blacks' to post the following message: '[A] particular hype and hatred for Trump is misleading the people and forcing Blacks to vote Killary.  We cannot resort to the lesser of two devils.  Then we'd surely be better off without voting AT ALL." (18)
• "[In] the summer of 2016, Defendants and their co-conspirators also began to promote allegations of voter fraud by the Democratic Party" (18).
• "Starting in approximately June 2016, Defendants and their co-conspirators organized and coordinated political rallies in the United States.   To conceal the fact that they were based in Russia, Defendants and their co-conspirators promoted these rallies while pretending to be U.S. grassroots activists who were located in the United States but unable to meet or participate in person." (20)
• "In order to build attendance for the rallies, Defendants and their co-conspirators promoted the events through public posts . . . In addition, Defendants and their co-conspirators contacted administrators of large social media groups focused on U.S. politics and requested that they advertise the rallies." (21)
• "On or about July 23, 2016, Defendants and their co-conspirators usd the email address of a false U.S. persona, joshmilton024@gmail.com, to send out press releases to over thirty media outlets promoting the 'Down with Hillary' rally at Trump Tower in New York City" (26).
• They organized a series of rallies for Trump in the state of Florida called "Florida Goes Trump."  "Defendants and their co-conspirators purchased advertisements on Facebook and Instagram to promote the 'Florida Goes Trump' rallies. . . . Defendants and their co-conspirators asked one U.S. person to build a cage on a flatbed truck and another U.S. person to wear a costume portraying Clinton in a prison uniform.  Defendants and their co-conspirators paid these individuals to complete the requests" (22-23)
• "On or about August 18, 2016 the real 'Florida for Trump' Facebook account responded to the false U.S. persona 'Matt Skiber' account with instructions to contact a member of the Trump Campaign ('Campaign Official 1') involved in the campaign's Florida operations and provided Campaign Official 1's email address at the campaign domain donaldtrump.com" (27-28)
• "On or about August 31, 2016, Defendants and their co-conspirators, using a U.S. persona, spoke by telephone wiht a real U.S. person affiliated with a grassroots group in Florida.  That individual requested assistance in organizing a rally in Miami, Florida.  On or about September 9, 2016, Defendants and their co-conspirators sent the group an interstate wire to pay for materials needed for the Florida rally." (29)

Now here comes the part that will prove beyond all doubt (*coughing fit*) that the Russians didn't really want Trump to win.  This is the basis for insisting that the Russians just wanted to interfere generally, and not in favor of Trump.  Ready?

• AFTER the election, Defendants and their co-conspirators "used false U.S. personas to organize and coordinate U.S. political rallies in support of then president-elect Trump, while simultaneously using other false U.S. personas to organize and coordinate U.S. political rallies protesting the results of the 2016 U.S. presidential election." (23)

One more point of interest:

• Facebook announced in September of 2017 that it had discovered Russian expenditures on its platform and shared its findings with the DOJ.  "Defendants and their co-conspirators thereafter destroyed evidence for the purpose of impeding [the Special Counsel's] investigation.  On or about September 13, 2017, KAVERZINA wrote in an email to a family member: 'We had a slight crisis here at work: the FBI busted our activity (not a joke).  So, I got preoccupied with covering tracks together with colleagues."