Hillary Clinton’s campaign pounced Wednesday evening after a noted Donald Trump surrogate revealed he’s in regular contact with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.
“It is disturbing that Roger Stone, a longtime Donald Trump confidante, has confirmed the fact that has ‘back-channel communications’ with WikiLeaks, an organization that is working with the Russian government to affect the American presidential election,” Hillary For America senior national spokesman Glen Caplin said in a statement provided to the Washington Examiner.
Stone told the Examiner he was not given advance notice of recent WikiLeaks email releases, including Democratic National Committee correspondence and emails purportedly stolen from the personal account of Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta.
However, Stone said in a separate interview that he is in constant communication with Assange.
“I do have a back-channel communication with Assange, because we have a good mutual friend,” Stone told CBS4 News. “That friend travels back and forth from the United States to London and we talk. I had dinner with him last Monday.”
Assange has been holed up in the Ecuadorian embassy in London since 2012. He claimed asylum there after he was wanted in Sweden on four alleged sexual offences.
Stone stressed in his interview with CBS4 News that he does not have direct contact with Assange.
“I have not talked to him,” Stone said. “I have not met with him.”
Podesta said Tuesday that Stone, who at one time served as an adviser to Trump, was likely involved in the WikiLeaks hacks and likely had advance notice before the damaging emails were published online.
“Stone pointed his finger at me, and said that I could expect some treatment that would expose me and ultimately sent out a tweet that said it would be my time in the barrel,” Podesta told reporters. “So I think it’s a reasonable assumption to — or at least a reasonable conclusion — that Mr. Stone had advance warning and the Trump campaign had advance warning about what Assange was going to do … I think there’s at least a reasonable belief that Mr. Assange may have passed this information onto Mr. Stone.”
Stone denies he had advance notice, but the Clinton camp isn’t buying it.
“It is also now clear that the illegal hack of John Podesta’s email is the work of the Russian government, according to the FBI. These are the facts, and it is time for the Trump campaign to answer for its possible ties to foreign espionage, and explain to the American people what is going on,” Caplin said in a statement Wednesday.
