Trial hears WikiLeaks admission
Donald Trump’s campaign viewed Roger Stone as an ‘‘access point’’ to WikiLeaks, and tried to use him to get advanced word about hacked emails damaging to Hillary Clinton, a former top presidential adviser has testified.
In reluctant testimony, former campaign CEO Steve Bannon told a federal court yesterday that Stone had boasted about his ties to WikiLeaks and its founder Julian Assange, alerting them to pending new batches of damaging emails.
‘‘The campaign had no official access to WikiLeaks or to Julian Assange,’’ Bannon told the court. ‘‘But Roger would be considered if we needed an access point.’’
It was the first time that anyone affiliated with the Trump campaign had acknowledged in court that they had actively sought material from WikiLeaks, which released emails that US intelligence agencies determined had been hacked by the Russian government in order to damage Clinton.
The White House immediate comment.
Stone, a colourful political operative and Trump ally, is on trial charged with witness tampering and lying to Congress about his attempts to contacts WikiLeaks about the damaging material during the 2016 presidential campaign.
As he left the had no courthouse,
Bannon griped about being subpoenaed by prosecutors and Congress in addition to being interviewed several times by special counsel Robert Mueller’s team as it investigated Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.
Bannon’s testimony came after comedian and radio talk show Randy Credico told jurors that Stone pressured him into backing up the lies he told Congress, threatening to take away his dog at one point.
Stone called a Credico a ‘‘rat’’ and a ‘‘stoolie’’ in a threatening April 2018 email. Credico also testified that Stone used repeated references from the movie The Godfather Part II to intimidate him into either backing up Stone’s testimony to Congress or refusing to testify.
Stone is accused of telling Congress that Credico was the source of his inside information about WikiLeaks. But Credico said he and Stone never discussed WikiLeaks before late August 2016.