2016 ELECTION/DEMS/LEGAL/ROBERT MUELLER/RUSSIA INVESTIGATION/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT: “The special counsel investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election indicted 12 Russian intelligence officers on Friday [7-13-18] for hacking the Democratic National Committee and the Clinton presidential campaign. The indictment came just three days before President Trump is planning to meet with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia in Helsinki, Finland. The 29-page indictment is the most detailed accusation by the American government to date of the Russian state’s role in the 2016 election interference, and includes a litany of brazen Russian subterfuge operations designed to foment chaos in the months before the election. From phishing attacks to gain access to Democratic operatives, to money laundering, to attempts to break into state elections boards, the indictment details a vigorous and complex effort by Russia’s top military intelligence service to sabotage the campaign of Mr. Trump’s rival, Hillary Clinton. The timing of the indictment, by Robert S. Mueller III, the special counsel, added a jolt of tension to the already freighted atmosphere surrounding Mr. Trump’s meeting with Mr. Putin, and is all but certain to feed into the conspiratorial views held by the president and some of his allies that Mr. Mueller’s prosecutors are determined to undermine Mr. Trump’s designs for a rapprochement with Russia.”
-Mark Mazzetti and Katie Benner, “12 Russian Agents Indicted in Mueller Investigation, ” The New York Times online, July 13, 2018