Roger Stone’s trial ended with a clash between federal prosecutors and the longtime Republican hatchet man’s defense over whether the “dirty trickster” lied to Congress to protect President Trump.
“He knew if this information came out it would look really bad for his longtime associate, Donald Trump,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Jon Kravis said.
Prosecutors argued Stone tried to contact WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange about information damaging to Democrats by using conspiracy theorist Jerome Corsi and Randy Credico as conduits and misled the House Intelligence Committee’s 2016 investigation into Russian election interference by concealing monthslong WikiLeaks discussions with Corsi. Stone spoke with the Trump campaign about WikiLeaks throughout 2016.
But Stone’s lawyer, Bruce Rogow, repeatedly claimed that Stone didn’t lie in his congressional testimony and had no motive to protect the Trump campaign since Trump was already president by then.
“There could be no sensible motive in trying to protect the Trump campaign when the campaign was long over and when Trump was already president of the United States,” Rogow said.
Stone faces up to 20 years for the seven criminal charges, which include lying to Congress and tampering with a witness. Stone allegedly worked to stop Credico from telling the House the truth, calling him a “rat” and “stoolie” and telling him to “practice your Frank Pentangeli.”
Prosecutor Michael Marando reminded the jury that in 2017 special counsel Robert Mueller’s Trump-Russia investigation was ongoing and that “the truth looked bad to the Trump campaign and it looked bad to Mr. Trump.”
“There was an investigation going on into whether any nefarious activity had occurred during that campaign,” the prosecutor said.
Marando argued that Stone telling the truth would have revealed that the Trump campaign had been “fishing” for WikiLeaks information that may have been originally stolen by the Russians.
Stone, an on again, off again political ally and confidant of Trump for more than three decades who by the summer of 2016 was an informal adviser with Trump’s campaign attempted to reach out to Assange, suspected of having tens of thousands of stolen Democratic emails. Stone also communicated with the hacker Guccifer 2.0, a fictitious persona created by Russian intelligence that dealt with some of the stolen records.
Rogow claimed Stone hadn’t purposely misled the committee because, in Stone’s thinking, the issue of WikiLeaks was distinct from that of Russian election meddling.
“Russia. Russia. This whole thing was about Russia,” Rogow said.
The House investigation into Russian election interference was focused on what Russian cyberactivity and other active measures were directed against the U.S. and if those actions included links between Russia and people associated with political campaigns. It was widely known before Stone’s allegedly misleading September 2017 congressional testimony that the U.S. government believed WikiLeaks was inextricably linked to the issue of Russian interference.
Morando countered that Stone knew why he was there, pointing out that Stone himself mentioned to Congress what Stone called an “unproven theory” that Russia hacked the Democratic emails and provided them to WikiLeaks.
“The committee was investigating the whole thing — the hacking and the transfer,” the prosecutor said.
Kravis wove in texts, emails, and exhibits as he outlined what he saw as Stone’s “five categories of lies” to Congress: who his WikiLeaks intermediary was; that he never asked his alleged intermediary to do anything for him related to Assange; that he didn’t have discussions about WikiLeaks and this intermediary with Trump associates; that he did not have any records of communications such as emails or texts with his intermediary; and that he had no emails, no texts, and no documents of any kind related to WikiLeaks or Assange.
“After these lies, he engaged in a relentless campaign to silence the person who could expose these lies, Randy Credico,” Kravis said. And the prosecutor said Stone obstructed a congressional investigation, claiming that Stone “knew exactly why this committee and this investigation wanted information about WikiLeaks.”
Stone’s lawyer dismissed the idea that Stone actually had any insider information on WikiLeaks in 2016.
“I guess you could say that Stone played the campaign by letting them think he had some super connection,” Rogow said. And he rejected the idea that his client “intentionally and corruptly lied” to Congress, saying that an outreach to WikiLeaks wouldn’t have been illegal.
“So much of this case deals with that question: So what?” Rogow said.
“Well, if that’s the state of affairs that we’re in, I’m pretty shocked,” Marando said. “Truth matters. Truth still matters.”
During the trial, the jury heard testimony from Rick Gates, former deputy Trump campaign manager and business partner of campaign chairman Paul Manafort, on Tuesday. Gates strongly suggested that Stone told Trump about supposed upcoming WikiLeaks releases. Last week, former Trump campaign manager Steve Bannon testified that the Trump campaign saw Stone as the “access point” to WikiLeaks. Credico testified he was not Stone’s “intermediary” to WikiLeaks despite Stone’s claims. Margaret Kunstler, a one-time WikiLeaks lawyer, explained her role putting Credico in touch with Assange to help set up a radio interview, and former FBI agent Michelle Taylor laid out a timeline of Stone’s communications with Corsi, Credico, Trump associates, and Trump himself.
Jury deliberations begin Thursday morning.
