A top official in US President Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign requested proposals from an Israeli company to help defeat Republican primary opponents and former US secretary of state Hillary Rodham Clinton with online manipulation, the New York Times reported on Monday.
There was no evidence that the Trump campaign followed through on the proposals to use social media manipulation and intelligence gathering, the paper said.
Citing interviews and copies of the proposals, the Times said that the effort by Rick Gates seemed unrelated to Russian efforts to interfere in the election.
Gates is Trump’s former deputy campaign chief and among more than 30 people indicted by US Special Counsel Robert Mueller.
The Times reported that Gates sought a proposal to use bogus personas to target and sway delegates to the 2016 Republican National Convention by attacking US Senator Ted Cruz.
Another proposal described opposition research and “complementary intelligence activities” about Clinton, the report said.
A third proposal by the company Psy-Group, staffed by former Israeli intelligence operatives, outlined a plan to help Trump using social media to reinforce divisions among rivals, the report said.
Mueller’s team has obtained copies of the proposals and questioned Psy-Group, the Times said, adding that it was unclear whether the proposals would have violated laws governing foreign involvement in US elections.
In February, Gates pledged to cooperate with Mueller as he pleaded guilty to defrauding the US by failing to report offshore bank accounts and to one count of lying about his work as a foreign agent for Ukraine.
The same month, Mueller indicted 13 Russians and three firms in connection with an enterprise to interfere with the US political system using social media.
Twelve Russian intelligence officers were then indicted in July over cyberoperations to interfere in the election by hacking Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign and the Democratic Party.
A string of rape and assault allegations against the son of Norway’s future queen have plunged the royal family into its “biggest scandal” ever, wrapping up an annus horribilis for the monarchy. The legal troubles surrounding Marius Borg Hoiby, the 27-year-old son born of a relationship before Norwegian Crown Princess Mette-Marit’s marriage to Norwegian Crown Prince Haakon, have dominated the Scandinavian country’s headlines since August. The tall strapping blond with a “bad boy” look — often photographed in tuxedos, slicked back hair, earrings and tattoos — was arrested in Oslo on Aug. 4 suspected of assaulting his girlfriend the previous night. A photograph
‘GOOD POLITICS’: He is a ‘pragmatic radical’ and has moderated his rhetoric since the height of his radicalism in 2014, a lecturer in contemporary Islam said Abu Mohammed al-Jolani is the leader of the Islamist alliance that spearheaded an offensive that rebels say brought down Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and ended five decades of Baath Party rule in Syria. Al-Jolani heads Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which is rooted in Syria’s branch of al-Qaeda. He is a former extremist who adopted a more moderate posture in order to achieve his goals. Yesterday, as the rebels entered Damascus, he ordered all military forces in the capital not to approach public institutions. Last week, he said the objective of his offensive, which saw city after city fall from government control, was to
The US deployed a reconnaissance aircraft while Japan and the Philippines sent navy ships in a joint patrol in the disputed South China Sea yesterday, two days after the allied forces condemned actions by China Coast Guard vessels against Philippine patrol ships. The US Indo-Pacific Command said the joint patrol was conducted in the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone by allies and partners to “uphold the right to freedom of navigation and overflight “ and “other lawful uses of the sea and international airspace.” Those phrases are used by the US, Japan and the Philippines to oppose China’s increasingly aggressive actions in the
‘KAMPAI’: It is said that people in Japan began brewing rice about 2,000 years ago, with a third-century Chinese chronicle describing the Japanese as fond of alcohol Traditional Japanese knowledge and skills used in the production of sake and shochu distilled spirits were approved on Wednesday for addition to UNESCO’s Intangible Cultural Heritage list, a committee of the UN cultural body said It is believed people in the archipelago began brewing rice in a simple way about two millennia ago, with a third-century Chinese chronicle describing the Japanese as fond of alcohol. By about 1000 AD, the imperial palace had a department to supervise the manufacturing of sake and its use in rituals, the Japan Sake and Shochu Makers Association said. The multi-staged brewing techniques still used today are
RSS