The main issue however remains the lack of objectivity of the coverage of the indictment. Stone has featured prominently in theories seeking “smoking gun” evidence of collusion. There is nothing smoking in this indictment. There is no suggestion of involvement or knowledge by Stone in the hacking. Stone has suggested that he was a conduit of hacked information from Wikileaks but he later insisted that he was not actually speaking to Julian Assange and that he had no direct knowledge that Russians were responsible for the Democratic hackings. The indictment does not contradict that later account.
The indictment clearly states that Stone told multiple campaign officials that he had such information and the question is who “directed” campaign officials to reach out to Stone. Obviously, many will want to know if that person was President Trump or his close aides. On the other hand, it also references people like Steve Bannon as not even returning his calls.
The important thing is that, even if Stone and the campaign did seek the email information, it would not be a crime.
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