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Robert Mueller's Team Reportedly Interviewed Facebook Staff As Part of Russia Probe (thehill.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Hill: Special counsel Robert Mueller's team has interviewed at least one Facebook employee tasked with helping the Trump campaign's digital operations during the 2016 campaign, Wired reported on Friday. The report, which cited a source familiar with the matter, does not say when the employee was questioned nor does it detail the focus of the interview. Mueller's team has been investigating for months any collusion between Trump campaign associates and Russia. During the election, Facebook deployed employees to embed with the Trump campaign to assist its digital operations. The company also worked with Hillary Clinton's campaign team but did not have employees embedded with them. The company has also been scrutinized by Congress for selling more than 3,000 ads to the Internet Research Agency, a Russian "troll farm" alleged to have carried out misinformation operations online during the campaign.

15 of 229 comments (clear)

  1. Hold on, let me get some popcorn by kenai_alpenglow · · Score: 3, Funny

    Let the Pro/Anti Trump fights begin!

    1. Re:Hold on, let me get some popcorn by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Oh dear, you actually believe that anything is going to happen to Trump don't you? Mueller is a special counsel, essentially a US Attorney. He can bring indictments against citizens for crimes but he cannot bring an indictment against an elected sitting US President or any Senate approved Cabinet appointees. That would be highly unconstitutional. All he can do is report what he thinks happened, and give that to the DoJ and Congress.

      The IC law expired many years ago - there will be no repeat of the Ken Starr and Clinton investigations. Congress may decide to Impeach, but Mueller can't do anything except report it.

      Also - there have been far less popular presidents in the past. I think you may be living in an echo chamber.

    2. Re:Hold on, let me get some popcorn by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      He's the least popular US President in recorded history.

      Trump current - 40% on RCP (or anywhere from 36% to 45% if you want to cherrypick polls to suit your agenda)

      Truman (Feb 1952) - 22%
      LBJ (Aug 1968) - 35%
      Nixon (Aug 1974) - 24%
      Ford (March 1975) - 37%
      Carter (June 1979) - 28%
      Reagan (Jan 1983) - 35%
      HW Bush (July 1982) - 29%
      Clinton (June 1993) - 37%
      W Bush (Nov 2008) - 25%
      Obama (Sept 2014) - 38%

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_approval_rating#Historical_comparison

      In the history of presidential job approval polls, only FDR, Eisenhower, and JFK were decisively *more* popular than Trump throughout their presidency.

    3. Re:Hold on, let me get some popcorn by PopeRatzo · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Trump came in off of 3 months of "TREASON!!" and "ELECTION FRAUD!!!" and "PEEPEE!!"

      And now we're learning why.

      --
      You are welcome on my lawn.
  2. Re: Trump Won by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I think we may just see /. continue to report on this nonsense through the next seven years of President Trump's presidency. Then they'll probably continue to report on it through all eight years of President Ivanka's presidency, too.

  3. Re:Trump Won by greenwow · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I've been a Newsweek subscriber for the vast majority of the years since the late-sixties, but even I though they were crazy for publishing that. Not going to happen.

  4. Re:show us the beef by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    the mainstream media and mainstream politicians are the ones who created the "collusion" narrative and very deliberately decided on the "collusion" phrasing instead of saying "conspiracy." conspiracy is obviously what they mean to say and should say, but ironically of course they have long since burned the "conspiracy" terminology, having trained the public to instead associate it with an untruth, a false narrative, with outlier schizophrenic lunatics being the only ones to think it true.

  5. Re:Nothing will come of it by rogoshen1 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    If you don't want to lose to someone like Trump, don't run someone like Hillary.

    (in south park terms: I see your turd sandwich, and raise you a giant douche)

    The election wasn't ideological at all-- it's just they took one of the most hated figures in modern american political history -- and ran her against a jingoistic, populist mouth-breather.

    Ignore the pollsters and the news, what did you really think would happen?? A large swath of the voting public voted against Hillary. the fact that they wound up voting for trump was happenstance.

  6. Re:Trump Won by greenwow · · Score: 4, Insightful

    This. If only pure votes counted, Trump probably would have only concentrated on NY, Chicago, and LA, and most likely still would have won. Instead, he had a smart strategy of trying to win important states instead of using the "50 state strategy" Hillary used. Damn, it hurts for me to admit that.

  7. Re:show us the beef by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

    Eh? That's not quite right. She, among others, approved the Uranium One deal, there's plenty of strange money flowing into the Clinton Foundation, one of their own people complained about such money going to things like Chelsea's wedding, and from what little they've revealed of supposedly Russian operations, they were supporting things like Black Lives Matter.

    It seems just a bit odd to categorize that as "pro-Trump" but then again we have so many articles were "sources" say any damn thing they want that I don't really believe anyone any more, and yes, that's including Trump.

    The whole lot of you are full of BS.

  8. You are advertising your idiocy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Stop embarrasing yourself.

    A person can only win a contest by winning according to the rules of that contest. The American electoral system uses an electoral college to protect against the tyranny of a few highly populated cities running the nation. According to the rules, Trump won, therefore no matter what you say with your fevered imagination, HILLARY LOST.

    You are like a fool who instsist that the team that lost the superbowl actually won because they had possession of the ball longer, scored points be damned!

  9. Re:Mueller by PopeRatzo · · Score: 5, Interesting

    He has 0/10ths because there was never anything to find.

    There have already been four arrests and two convictions. That happened in record time for this kind of investigation. There will be a parade of people flipping on Trump before this is over, and it's nowhere near over.

    Hell, Trump's own lawyer, Don McGahn has made the entire case for criminal obstruction just in the past few days. And Mueller is ignoring all the baiting and trolling by Trump and quietly and methodically building a case. For someone with nothing to hide, Trump is sure trying his best to hide, cover up his tracks and derail the investigation. It's no longer some case of "maybe he obstructed and maybe he didn't". There's a clear pattern of him trying to stop the investigation in which he is the primary target. The closer we get to the 2018 election, the more you'll see Republicans in congress start to wet themselves. You're already seeing all sorts of "secret society" conspiracy theories and calls for some made up "memo" to be released to try to derail the investigation, all of which never amount to anything. Remember, these are the same members of congress who couldn't even make a case against Hillary stick and they threw absolutely everything at her. We may still see some sitting members of Congress indicted for obstruction of justice along with Trump.

    I'm going to look back and miss the excitement of 2018.

    --
    You are welcome on my lawn.
  10. no luck involved by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The Mueller investigation IS the coverup.
    1. Mueller was running the FBI and is a long-time good friend of Comey.
    2. Mueller handed off the FBI to Comey and then was involved serving Hillary in the Uranium One deal during the Obama years.
    3. Mueller, Comey, and even Obama are all tangled-up in Uranium One (which transferred piles of cash from Russia through the Clintion org to who-knows-whom) and all three were communicating with Hillary via her illegal private server (so ALL are involved in her felonies, which explains why she was not prosecuted)
    4. They all expected none of this to come out because they were certain Hillary would win.
    5. Hillary funds an "October Surprise" intelligence report using a foreign spy who in-turn used russian spies as sources, and the document gets injected into the FBI where Comey uses if to get a FISA judge to OK spying on Trump and his team, and the FBI and team Obama leak fake tidbits from that "dossier" mixed with bits of info they got from the illegal wiretaps to their friends in the press, but it fails to stop Trump's election. This puts Comey and Obama in Nixon-like legal jeopardy if anybody finds out, so they need it to stay secret.
    6. After Hillary loses, she needs to blame SOMEBODY for her loss which cost over a billion dollars, she blames Russia even thoug in the months before the election the entire Democrat team including Obama have publicly scoffed at the idea our elections could be tampered with, particularly by Russia (you can find youtube vid of Obama mocking the very idea). Democrats begin demanding an investigation of "Russian collusion with Trump".
    7. The Democrats and the press demand Trump's AG Sessions recuse himself from the "collusion probe" because he worked on the Trump campaign as a volunteer and publicly met the Russian Ambassador when as a Senator he attended an event arranged by Obama's Stats dept - This is very "comvenient" becasue the Democrats have stalled Trump's appointments in the Senate and the #2 guy there is still an Obama person.
    8. When Trump fired Comey, a move that SHOULD have been universally-approved given that both Republicans and Democrats had been calling for his firing for months, Comey leaked classified info to a buddy to have him indirectly leak it to a friendly press outlet specifically to try to trigger a special prosecutor.
    9. When Sessions stepped aside, it left in-place Obama appointee Rosenstein, a friend of Comey who Comey could count on to name Meuller, which is what happened. While the laws that govern here require a crime to be listed in the documents authorizing the prosecutor, Rosenstein breaks this law and makes the commission open-ended with no specific law listed.
    10. Meuller's team was supposedly investigating whether Trump colluded with Putin, but has instead been on quite a fishing expedition and leaking furiously. Every time Trump seems to get traction on something, the Meuller team leaks something (such leaks are criminal acts under the governing statutes) to the New York Times or the Washington Post to start a new distraction - the current leak is a perfect example: Trump goes to Davos and gets some positive press, Meuller then leaks that Trump tried to fire Meuller (a non-story given that [a] Meuller was NOT fired and [b] Fox reported that incident months ago).

    It's rather apparent that Meuller's job is to try to keep a non-crime investigation bubbling along for as long as possoble both to immobilize Trump and to keep Trump's AG Sessions sidelined and unable to investigate Meuller, Comey, Clinton and Obama.

  11. Re: Trump Won by fafalone · · Score: 4, Interesting

    He's alluding to the problem that, from all indications, the Dems have learned nothing from losing to Trump and will find a way to do it again. Probably by trying to run Kamala Harris for instance. So they lose everyone not cool with 'equality is racism/sexism and white men are evil' and eliminating all due process for sex crimes (particularly on college campuses) to staying home or even going (R), then doubly alienate everyone concerned with civil rights (she's a "tough on crime" prosecutor notorious for shitting all over the 1st Amendment and trying to destroy Section 230 from the Backpage case- truly awash in misconduct; defending the conviction of a man based on a confession inserted into a transcript (and saying it wasn't prosecutorial misconduct to submit it when the prosecutor *knew* it was fraudulent), and fighting tooth and nail against improving prison conditions/reducing overcrowding when those were so bad it got ruled cruel and unusual punishment... I could go on).

    We're in a *lot* more trouble on the left with party-fracturing ideologies. There's a couple others that are at the top of the list that will have similar problems with getting people to vote instead of stay home (which is how Trump won; not from people switching sides, but so many many more Dems simply not voting over 2012/2008 then R's). Also consider that Trump absolutely 100% is enough of a megalomaniac nutjob to start a war with NK in his 3rd year because someone informs him that wartime presidents are a lock for re-election, which unfortunately is true. Dems would need to put up someone truly compelling, and the writing is already on the wall that they intend to do no such thing. So yeah, 7 more years of Trump. The best we can realistically hope for is taking back the house or senate to block the R's from their worst bs.

  12. Re: Hold on, let me get some prison for hillary by ClickOnThis · · Score: 4, Informative

    I do not watch or listen to those. Purely the facts from the investigation. If it walks and talks like a duck, it must be a duck. Many FBI agents are coordinating his take down. If that doesnt upset you, then wait to the tides turn and its a republican heavy FBI that takes down the next democrat president.

    LOL, right.

    - James Comey, a Republican, was head of the FBI until Donald Trump fired him.
    - Christopher A. Wray, a Republican, was confirmed as Comey's replacement in August 2017.
    - Rod Rosenstein, Deputy Attorney General, a Republican, appointed Special Counsel Robert Mueller.
    - Robert Mueller, a Republican, is conducting the investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 election.
    - Donald Trump, POTUS, a Republican, supposedly wanted to fire Mueller last June (shortly after firing Comey) but was talked out of it.

    Whatever it is that's motivating the FBI and the Department of Justice to investigate the Russian connection to the 2016 election, it isn't partisan politics.

    --
    If it weren't for deadlines, nothing would be late.