The Democratic National Committee filed a multimillion-dollar lawsuit Friday against the Russian government, the Trump campaign and the WikiLeaks organization alleging a far-reaching conspiracy to disrupt the 2016 campaign and tilt the election to Donald Trump.

The complaint, filed in federal district court in Manhattan, alleges that top Trump campaign officials conspired with the Russian government and its military spy agency to hurt Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton and help Trump by hacking the computer networks of the Democratic Party and disseminating stolen material found there.

“During the 2016 presidential campaign, Russia launched an all-out assault on our democracy, and it found a willing and active partner in Donald Trump’s campaign,” DNC Chairman Tom Perez said in a statement.

“This constituted an act of unprecedented treachery: the campaign of a nominee for President of the United States in league with a hostile foreign power to bolster its own chance to win the presidency,” he said.

The suit asserts that the Russian hacking campaign — combined with Trump associates’ contacts with Russia and the campaign’s public cheerleading of the hacks — amounted to an illegal conspiracy to interfere in the election and caused serious damage to the Democratic Party.

[Read the DNC lawsuit against Russia and the Trump campaign]

Senate investigators and prosecutors for special counsel Robert S. Mueller III are still looking into whether Trump associates coordinated with any Russian efforts. Last month, Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee said they had found no evidence that President Trump and his affiliates colluded with Russian officials to sway the election or that the Kremlin sought to help Trump — a conclusion rejected by the panel’s Democrats.

In a statement, Trump Campaign Manager Brad Parscale said the Democrats’ lawsuit was without merit and likely to be dismissed.

“This is a sham lawsuit about a bogus Russian collusion claim filed by a desperate, dysfunctional, and nearly insolvent Democratic Party,” he said. “With the Democrats’ conspiracy theories against the President’s campaign evaporating as quickly as the failing DNC’s fundraising, they’ve sunk to a new low to raise money, especially among small donors who have abandoned them.”

The lawsuit echoes a similar legal tactic that the Democratic Party used during the Watergate scandal. In 1972, the DNC sued President Richard Nixon’s reelection committee seeking $1 million in damages for the break-in at Democratic headquarters in the Watergate building.

The suit was denounced at the time by Nixon’s attorney general, John Mitchell, who called it a case of “sheer demagoguery” by the DNC. But the civil action brought by the DNC’s chairman, Lawrence F. O’Brien, was successful, yielding a $750,000 settlement from the Nixon campaign that was reached on the day in 1974 that he left office.

Nick Akerman, a former Watergate prosecutor who specializes in computer-fraud cases, said he thought the Democrats’ suit had merit and, despite predictions from Trump-allied lawyers, was unlikely to go away anytime soon.

“There is no way it’s going to be dismissed,” said Akerman, a partner in the New York office of the Dorsey & Whitney law firm. “At least not on the computer-fraud part of the case, which is really the heart of it. The Democrats have every right to bring this suit as they are aggrieved. My question is: What took them so long?”

If allowed to proceed, the lawsuit would give the Democrats a chance to seek internal documents and testimony from the Trump campaign to help them learn more about interactions with Russia during the race.

Parscale noted that the Trump campaign, too, would be allowed to conduct discovery. He promised that the campaign would use the process to probe management decisions at the DNC, as well as the party’s involvement with commissioning the Trump dossier, a research document produced by a former British spy that alleged the Trump campaign conspired with Russia. Late Friday, Trump made a similar point, tweeting that the suit provided “good news in that we will now counter” for information from the Democrats including information from the party’s servers about a range of topics including Hillary Clinton’s emails.

Suing a foreign country may present legal challenges for the Democrats, in part because other nations have immunity from most U.S. lawsuits.

The lawsuit argues that Russia is not entitled to sovereign immunity in this case because “the DNC claims arise out of Russia’s trespass on to the DNC’s private servers . . . in order to steal trade secrets and commit economic espionage.”

The suit seeks millions of dollars in compensation to offset damage it claims the party suffered from the hacks. The DNC argues that the cyberattack undermined its ability to communicate with voters, collect donations and operate effectively as its employees faced personal harassment and, in some cases, death threats.

The suit also seeks an acknowledgment from the defendants that they conspired to infiltrate the Democrats’ computers, steal information and disseminate it to influence the election.

To support its case, the lawsuit offers a detailed narrative of the DNC hacks, as well as episodes in which key Trump aides are alleged to have been told Russia held damaging information about Clinton.

[Inside Trump’s financial ties to Russia and his unusual flattery of Vladimir Putin]

Russia engaged in a “brazen attack on U.S. soil” the party alleges, a campaign that began with the hack of its computer networks in 2015 and 2016. Trump campaign officials received repeated outreach from Russia, the suit says.

“Rather than report these repeated messages and communications that Russia intended to interfere in the U.S. election, the Trump campaign and its agents gleefully welcomed Russia’s help,” the party argues.

Ultimately, Trump’s associates entered into an agreement with Russian agents “to promote Donald Trump’s candidacy through illegal means,” the suit concludes.

It does not name Trump as a defendant. Instead, it targets aides who, during the campaign, met with people believed to be affiliated with Russia. The aides targeted include the president’s son Donald Trump Jr., his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, onetime campaign chairman Paul Manafort and Manafort’s deputy during the campaign, Rick Gates.

Manafort and Gates were charged with money laundering, fraud and tax evasion in a case brought by special prosecutors last year. In February, Gates pleaded guilty to conspiracy and lying to the FBI and is cooperating with investigators. Manafort has pleaded not guilty.

The DNC lawsuit also names as a defendant the Russian military intelligence service, the GRU, which has been accused by the U.S. government of orchestrating the hacks, as well as WikiLeaks, which published emails stolen from the DNC, and the group’s founder, Julian Assange.

Representatives for a number of the defendants named in the lawsuit, including the Russian Embassy, WikiLeaks and Assange, did not respond to requests for comment Friday. A Manafort spokesman declined to comment.

The lawsuit was also filed against Roger Stone, a longtime Trump confidant who claimed during the campaign that he was in contact with Assange.

[Roger Stone claimed contact with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange in 2016, according to two associates]

The Trump advisers and associates have denied assisting Russia in a hacking campaign. Stone has denied any communication with Assange or advance knowledge of the document dumps by WikiLeaks, saying his comments about Assange were jokes or exaggerations.

In an email, Stone rejected the suit as “a left-wing conspiracy theory dressed up as a law-suit.”

A few prominent Democrats also criticized the legal action.

David Axelrod, a former adviser to President Barack Obama, tweeted late Friday that the filing was “spectacularly ill-timed” and could abet the White House strategy of portraying Mueller’s criminal probe as partisan. “Everyone should chill out and let Mueller do his job,” Axelrod wrote.

The DNC argues that the Russian government and the GRU’s secret intrusion into the Democrats’ computer systems violated laws that include those protecting trade secrets, prohibiting wire tapping and preventing trespassing.

The party said the Trump defendants committed conspiracy through their interaction with Russian agents and their public encouragement of the hacking, with the campaign acting as a racketeering enterprise promoting illegal activity.

The complaint was filed on behalf of the party by the law firm of Cohen Milstein.

The suit contains previously undisclosed details, including the specific date when it is believed the Russians breached the DNC computer system: July 27, 2015, according to forensic evidence cited in the filing.

The analysis shows the system was breached again on April 18, 2016. The first signs that hackers were siphoning documents and information from DNC systems were spotted on April 22. The suit notes that four days later, on April 26, Trump foreign policy adviser George Papadopoulos was informed by Josef Mifsud, a London-based professor, that the Russians were in possession of thousands of emails that could be damaging to Clinton.

[Top campaign officials knew of Trump adviser’s outreach to Russia]

The defendants in the suit include Papadopoulos and Mifsud, as well as Aras and Emin Agalarov, the wealthy Russian father and son who hosted the Miss Universe Pageant in Moscow in 2013. Trump, who owned the pageant, attended the event.

The Agalarovs played a role in arranging a meeting for a Russian lawyer at Trump Tower in New York in 2016, at which Donald Trump Jr. had expected to be given damaging information about Clinton.

Scott Balber, an attorney for the Agalarovs, said the allegations about his clients were “frivolous” and “a publicity stunt.”

“They had absolutely nothing to do with any alleged hacking of any Democratic computer system or any interference in the U.S. election,” he said.

Lawyers for Papadopoulos declined to comment, citing their client’s ongoing cooperation with the special counsel.

“It is our hope that when all the facts are known, the plaintiff will voluntarily dismiss Mr. Papadopoulos from the complaint,” said the lawyers, Thomas Breen and Robert Stanley, in a written statement.

The lawsuit also describes how the Soviet Union paid for Trump to travel to Moscow in the 1980s and alleges that his personal and professional ties to Russia helped foster the conspiracy.

The DNC’s lawyers wrote that “long standing personal professional and financial ties to Russia and numerous individuals linked to the Russian government provided fertile ground for a conspiracy between the defendants to interfere in the 2016 elections.”

The lawsuit also details the history of Manafort and Gates, who worked for Russia-friendly factions in Ukraine before joining the Trump campaign. Prosecutors have said Manafort and Gates were in contact in 2016 with Konstantin Kilimnik, a former linguist in the Russian army whom the FBI has alleged had ties to Russian intelligence.

Alice Crites contributed to this report.</s>Luke covers lifestyle for Verdict. You can reach him at luke.christou@verdict.co.uk

US President Donald Trump reportedly paid $130,000 to former adult film star Stormy Daniels ahead of the 2016 election in an attempt to cover up an alleged affair.

Following the so-called Pussygate scandal, in which video footage was released of Trump making lewd comments about women, Trump was seemingly keen to protect his image from further damage.

One alleged pee tape, talk of Russian collusion and a tell-all book later, it would be hard for even the most heinous of stories to damage Trump’s reputation any more than it already has been.

If the allegations in the Wall Street Journal’s report are true, Trump is $130,000 poorer without much to show for it. However, luckily for the world leader, he has plenty to spare.

So how much is Donald Trump worth?

According to Forbes, Donald Trump’s net worth currently stands at $3.1 billion, making him the joint 766th richest man in the world.

President Trump refutes this. During his election campaign, Trump’s team claimed that he had filed a Personal Financial Disclosure with the federal government documenting his $10 billion fortune.

According to Oliver Williams of GlobalData WealthInsight, given the difficulty of estimating an individual’s net worth, both of these figures are likely wrong.

“Most billionaires will seek to downplay the size of their wealth. They will hide ownerships through corporate vehicles and houses through offshore companies in order to shy away from the limelight.” 3 Things That Will Change the World Today “Donald Trump, on the other hand, seems to do the exact opposite by claiming assets and wealth that is unproven and in constant flux.” “In both bases, estimating a billionaire’s wealth is an inexact science, with Forbes and other rich-list authors only guestimating the true size of the iceberg beneath.”

However, by looking at the property portfolio owned by Trump, Forbes does provide, at least, a general idea of Trump’s wealth.

Forbes estimates that just $134 million of the Trump fortune is in cash and liquid assets. Trump has another $156 million invested into personal property and assets. His possessions include the Donald Trump Tower penthouse and his collection of aircraft, including two private jets and three helicopters.

Trump’s personal property portfolio includes a country home in Bedford, New York, two homes in Palm Beach, Florida, a Beverly Hills mansion and a $15 million island property in the West Indies that he can’t seem to get rid of.

However, the rest of his wealth is in the form of businesses and real estate assets.

Much of his wealth is tied up in property. Armed with a small loan of $1 million from his father, Trump bought up property in Manhattan that has seen his initial investment grow substantially.

Trump is now the owner of a numerous multi-million dollar properties in New York. His portfolio includes the $545 million Trump Building on Wall Street. He also holds a $391 million stake in Avenue of the Americas skyscraper.

New York real estate, worth $1.5 billion, makes up the bulk of Trump’s fortune. Another $500 million is in property outside of the city, including his Hotels in Las Vegas, Washington and Chicago.

His numerous golf courses add another $560 million to Donald Trump’s net worth. Included is the $160 million Mar-a-Lago club that has continued to grow following Trump’s victory. Since the election, membership fees have climbed from $100,000 to $200,000. Revenue at the club grew by 25% in 2016.

Despite being recognised as the second most powerful person in the world, the Trump brand is worth significantly less than his property portfolio.

Trump’s licensing businesses, worth $180 million, saw their value drop by $54 million in 2017 as brands attempted to distance themselves from the divisive leader.

Trump’s Hotel Management & Licensing Business took the biggest hit, falling by $50 million. This is a result of numerous hotels removing the Trump name since he took to office.

If Forbes’ valuation is correct, Trump lost $400 million last year.

However, despite the numerous disputes, controversies and allegations against the President of the United States, this likely had more to do with property prices than a damaged image.

Some 64% of Trump’s wealth comes from real estate and 48% of it is in New York City. This means that movement in property prices in the city can cause big changes to Trump’s worth.

According to real estate company Douglas Elliman, property in Manhattan, the home of many of Trump’s most valuable assets, had its worst quarter in six years in the final quarter of 2017. The number of sales completed fell by 12% compared to the previous year.

Likewise, the average cost of a property fell below $2 million for the first time in two years. The luxury market in particular is suffering from falling prices.</s>The Democratic National Committee is suing the Trump campaign, Russia, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange and several associates of President Donald Trump alleging a grand racketeering, hacking and fraudulent conspiracy that harmed Democrats through WikiLeaks’ publication of internal party emails during the 2016 presidential campaign.

Those named in the lawsuit include several top Trump advisers who attended the now-infamous June 2016 meeting in Trump Tower, longtime Trump confidant Roger Stone, former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort and former campaign adviser George Papadopoulos and others.

The 66-page lawsuit filed in Manhattan federal court on Friday lays out how the Trumps curried favor in Russia through their family business, and then Russia allegedly worked with Trump advisers before the presidential election to disseminate the spoils from a cyberattack of the DNC.

The Democratic Party says the conspiracy and the hacking hurt their relationship with voters, chilled donations, disrupted their political convention and subjected their staffers to harassment. The lawsuit outlines nearly every known communication between Trump advisers and Russians.

The Washington Post first reported the lawsuit.

Special counsel Robert Mueller was appointed by Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein last year to investigate Russian efforts to interfere in the 2016 election. As part of that mandate, Mueller is empowered to investigate any links between the Russian government and Trump campaign associates.

The US intelligence community has concluded that Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered “an influence campaign” in 2016 with the goal of undermining public confidence in the US democratic process and eroding Hillary Clinton’s chances of winning the presidency.

Trump, however, has repeatedly insisted that there was no collusion between his campaign and the Russians, and has denounced the special counsel investigation as a “witch hunt.”

In the summer of 2016, the Democratic National Committee went public with claims that Russians hackers had gained access to their computer systems, obtaining emails and opposition research against Trump.

Then, just days before the Democratic National Convention when Clinton was set to receive the party’s presidential nomination, WikiLeaks published tens of thousands of hacked DNC emails.

The release of the emails, which included messages disparaging Bernie Sanders, threw the Democratic Party into turmoil at a moment when the party was supposed to be coming together in support of a nominee, and intensified in-fighting between supporters of Clinton and Sanders.</s>The Democratic National Committee filed a lawsuit Friday against the Trump campaign, Russia and WikiLeaks, accusing them of plotting to tilt the outcome of the 2016 presidential election.

The multimillion-dollar lawsuit, first reported by The Washington Post, claims that the three parties worked together to prop up President Trump and kneecap his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton.

The lawsuit accuses Russian intelligence services of hacking into the DNC computers and with the help of WikiLeaks distributed the stolen information to disrupt the election. The DNC alleges that the Trump campaign was aware of the effort, but instead of reporting it, “gleefully welcomed Russia’s help.”

“Indeed, the Trump campaign solicited Russia’s illegal assistance, and maintained secret communications with individuals tied to the Russian government, including one of the intelligence agencies responsible for attacking the DNC,” the lawsuit says. “Through these communications, the Trump Campaign, Trump’s closest advisors, and Russian agents formed an agreement to promote Donald Trump’s candidacy through illegal means.”

The lawsuit says that Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, shared the “goal of damaging the Democratic party in advance of the election” and released the stolen information, winning praise from then-candidate Trump.

Roger Stone, who worked with the Trump campaign, is also named in the lawsuit, but his attorney said he has not yet been served.

“Roger Stone did not conspire, collude, or take part in any action to subvert the electoral process. Sadly, these meritless lawsuits against Roger Stone will not be an effective form of therapy for loss the DNC suffered in 2016,” said Rob Buschel, who is representing Mr. Stone.

In a statement, DNC Chair Tom Perez told The Post that “Russia launched an all-out assault on our democracy, and it found a willing and active partner in Donald Trump’s campaign.”

“This constituted an act of unprecedented treachery: the campaign of a nominee for president of the United States in league with a hostile foreign power to bolster its own chance to win the presidency,” Mr. Perez said.

The Washington Times is switching its third-party commenting system from Disqus to Spot.IM. You will need to either create an account with Spot.im or if you wish to use your Disqus account look under the Conversation for the link "Have a Disqus Account?". Please read our The Washington Times is switching its third-party commenting system from Disqus to Spot.IM. You will need to either create an account with Spot.im or if you wish to use your Disqus account look under the Conversation for the link "Have a Disqus Account?". Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.</s>The Democratic National Committee on Friday sued President Donald Trump’s campaign, Trump’s son, his son-in-law, the Russian Federation and Wikileaks, saying they conspired to help Trump win the 2016 presidential election by breaking into DNC computers and stealing tens of thousands of emails and documents.

NEW YORK — The Democratic National Committee on Friday sued President Donald Trump’s campaign, Trump’s son, his son-in-law, the Russian Federation and Wikileaks, saying they conspired to help Trump win the 2016 presidential election by breaking into DNC computers and stealing tens of thousands of emails and documents.

The lawsuit in Manhattan federal court sought unspecified damages and an order to prevent further interference with DNC computer systems.

“During the 2016 presidential campaign, Russia launched an all-out assault on our democracy, and it found a willing and active partner in Donald Trump’s campaign,” DNC Chairman Tom Perez said in a statement. He called it an “act of unprecedented treachery.”

The lawsuit said Trump and his associates had existing relationships with Russia and Russian oligarchs that enabled creation of a Trump-Russia conspiracy.

Trump has said repeatedly that there was no collusion between his campaign and Russia.

The lawsuit alleges the “brazen attack on American democracy” began with a cyberattack on DNC computers and phone systems, allowing the extraction of tens of thousands of documents and emails. It said the assault enabled Russia to advance its own interests and support Trump.

The lawsuit accuses Donald Trump Jr. of secretly communicating with WikiLeaks, saying the president’s son was offered a password to an anti-Trump lawsuit in one exchange. The lawsuit blames the president too, saying he praised the illegal dissemination of DNC documents throughout fall 2016, making it a central theme of his speeches and rallies.

The lawsuit said Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, was part of the conspiracy as a senior adviser and key decision-makers in the campaign. It said he began in June 2016 to control all campaign data-driven efforts, beginning with establishment of a 100-person “data hub” in San Antonio, Texas, and by hiring Cambridge Analytica, the social media and analytics firm.

The lawsuit said the conspiracy “inflicted profound damage upon the DNC,” costing it donations and preventing it from communicating the party’s values and vision to voters and sowing discord inside the Democratic party.

“The conspiracy constituted an act of previously unimaginable treachery: the campaign of the presidential nominee of a major party in league with a hostile foreign power to bolster its own chance to win the presidency,” the lawsuit said. “And, in carrying out this effort, defendants’ conspiracy to disseminate documents stolen from the DNC in violation of the laws of the United States as well as the laws of the state of Virginia and the District of Columbia. Under the laws of this nation, Russia and its co-conspirators must answer for these actions.”</s>NEW YORK — The Democratic National Committee has sued President Donald Trump’s campaign, his son, his son-in-law, the Russian Federation and WikiLeaks, saying they conspired to help Trump win the 2016 presidential election.

The DNC filed the lawsuit Friday in federal court in Manhattan. It seeks unspecified damages and an order to prevent further interference with DNC computer systems.

The lawsuit says Trump and his associates had relationships with Russia that enabled creation of a Trump-Russia conspiracy.

The DNC says Russia “mounted a brazen attack on American democracy” beginning with a cyberattack on its computers.

It said the hack penetrated DNC computers and phone systems and extracted tens of thousands of documents and emails.

Trump has said repeatedly there was no collusion between his campaign and Russia.</s>The Democratic Party sued Russia, Republican President Donald Trump's campaign and WikiLeaks on Friday, charging that they conspired to disrupt the 2016 U.S. presidential election, a court filing showed.

WASHINGTON: The Democratic Party sued Russia, Republican President Donald Trump's campaign and WikiLeaks on Friday, charging that they conspired to disrupt the 2016 U.S. presidential election, a court filing showed.

The party alleges in the federal lawsuit in Manhattan that top Trump campaign officials conspired with the Russian government and its military spy agency to hurt Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton and tilt the election to Trump by hacking Democratic Party computers.

The lawsuit alleges that Trump's campaign "gleefully welcomed Russia's help" in the 2016 election and accuses the Trump campaign of being a "racketeering enterprise."

Four U.S. intelligence agencies reported last year that Russia sponsored the hacking of Democratic Party groups and other actions during the 2016 campaign. Part of the effort was to benefit Trump over Clinton, the agencies said.

The Democratic National Committee blames Russia for breaches of its computer systems in 2015 and the first half of 2016.

Hackers disseminated internal communications of party officials as the Democratic nominating convention got underway, and WikiLeaks released thousands of emails, some of which were embarrassing for the Clinton campaign.

The lawsuit names Donald Trump Jr., Trump associate Roger Stone and Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner, as defendants.

Most of the accusations appeared to be based on news reports and publicly available legal documents and offered little new information about alleged collusion with Moscow.

The White House did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Trump has repeatedly denied his campaign colluded with Russia. Russia has denied meddling in the election.

The Republican National Committee, the Trump campaign, Trump campaign manager Michael Glassner, WikiLeaks, Stone and attorneys for Trump Jr., former campaign chairman Paul Manafort, Manafort associate Rick Gates and former campaign aide George Papadopoulos also did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

The lawsuit, should it go forward, seems likely to help keep the spotlight on the issue of Russian election interference and possible collusion by the Trump campaign. Both are being investigated by Special Counsel Robert Mueller, whose office declined to comment on the Democratic lawsuit.

Through the process of legal discovery, lawyers for the Democratic Party could force the defendants to produce documents they say relate to the collusion issue.</s>
• The Democratic Party has filed a lawsuit in federal court against President Donald Trump’s campaign, the Russian government, and the organization WikiLeaks.
• The suit alleges the three defendants illegally conspired to hurt the Democratic Party by engineering the hack of the Democratic National Committee and disseminating stolen materials during the 2016 election.
• When the DNC filed a civil against former President Richard Nixon’s reelection committee in the 1970s, the Nixon campaign ultimately had to shell out $750,000 to settle the case.

The Democratic Party filed a lawsuit Friday against President Donald Trump’s campaign, the Russian government, and the controversial pro-transparency group WikiLeaks, The Washington Post reported.

The suit was filed in federal court in Manhattan and alleges the Trump campaign worked with WikiLeaks, the Russian government, and the GRU, Russia’s military intelligence unit, to hack into the Democratic National Committee in the summer of 2016 and disseminate stolen materials to the public.

The Democratic Party claimed the actions were taken specifically to hurt former Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton’s campaign, and that they amounted to an illegal conspiracy to maim the party and sway the election against the Democrats.

The Post reported that the party’s legal maneuver seems to mirror a civil action brought by then-DNC chairman Lawrence O’Brien against then President Richard Nixon’s reelection committee in 1972. The suit sought $1 million in damages for the break-in at the party’s headquarters in the Watergate complex.

In that case, the Nixon campaign ultimately had to settle for $750,000, paid on the day Nixon resigned from the presidency.

“During the 2016 presidential campaign, Russia launched an all-out assault on our democracy, and it found a willing and active partner in Donald Trump’s campaign,” DNC Chair Tom Perez said in a statement. “This constituted an act of unprecedented treachery: the campaign of a nominee for President of the United States in league with a hostile foreign power to bolster its own chance to win the presidency.”

The statement continued: “No one is above the law and the perpetrators of this attack must be held accountable. They successfully hacked the Democratic Party in 2016 and they will be back. We must prevent future attacks on our democracy, and that’s exactly what we’re doing today. This is not partisan, it’s patriotic. If the occupant of the Oval Office won’t protect our democracy, Democrats will. It is our obligation to the American people.”

In addition to the Democratic Party, the special counsel Robert Mueller is also focusing on the DNC hack and subsequent dissemination of emails as he investigates Russia’s interference in the election and whether the Trump campaign colluded with Moscow.

Because collusion, as Trump and his allies often point out, is a crime itself, Mueller’s approach to the inquiry is likely to be tethered to proving two key assertions: that a conspiracy to defraud the US took place by way of attempting to interfere in the election, and that Americans had knowledge of and acted to further that conspiracy.

In July 2016, the DNC announced that Russian hacking groups known as “Cozy Bear” and “Fancy Bear” had infiltrated its servers. The intrusions came after federal investigators warned the DNC in September 2015 that its servers had been breached, but the DNC failed to take action.

After gaining access to the DNC’s system in 2016, Fancy Bear and Cozy Bear disseminated thousands of emails via hacker Guccifer 2.0, who leaked the information to WikiLeaks. US intelligence agencies believe Guccifer 2.0 is a front for Russian military intelligence and that WikiLeaks is a propaganda tool of the Russian government. WikiLeaks published the first batch of DNC emails on July 22, one day before the Democratic National Convention.

A little over two months later, on October 7, WikiLeaks released a batch of emails from the account belonging to Clinton campaign manager John Podesta. The hack of Podesta’s emails came after Roger Stone, a Republican strategist and longtime confidant of President Donald Trump, tweeted in August 2016, “Trust me, it will soon the [sic] Podesta’s time in the barrel. #CrookedHillary.”

WikiLeaks continued releasing Podesta’s emails and published nearly 60,000 messages leading up to Election Day. Podesta said after the initial breach that Russian intelligence was responsible.

Stone, as well as Trump’s eldest son Donald Trump Jr., are known to have been in direct contact with WikiLeaks in the months leading up to the November 2016 election and shortly after. Trump Jr. also informed senior campaign staffers, like campaign CEO Steve Bannon and senior adviser Jared Kushner, that he was in touch with the organization.</s>By Tom Hamburger,Rosalind S. Helderman and Ellen Nakashima | The Washington Post

The Democratic National Committee filed a multimillion-dollar lawsuit Friday against the Russian government, the Trump campaign and the WikiLeaks organization alleging a far-reaching conspiracy to disrupt the 2016 campaign and tilt the election to Donald Trump.

The complaint, filed in federal district court in Manhattan, alleges that top Trump campaign officials conspired with the Russian government and its military spy agency to hurt Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton and help Trump by hacking the computer networks of the Democratic Party and disseminating stolen material found there.

“During the 2016 presidential campaign, Russia launched an all-out assault on our democracy, and it found a willing and active partner in Donald Trump’s campaign,” DNC Chairman Tom Perez said in a statement.

“This constituted an act of unprecedented treachery: the campaign of a nominee for President of the United States in league with a hostile foreign power to bolster its own chance to win the presidency,” he said.

The case asserts that the Russian hacking campaign – combined with Trump associates’ contacts with Russia and the campaign’s public cheerleading of the hacks – amounted to an illegal conspiracy to interfere in the election that caused serious damage to the Democratic Party.

Senate investigators and prosecutors for special counsel Robert S. Mueller III are still investigating whether Trump associates coordinated with the Russian efforts. Last month, House Intelligence Committee Republicans said they found no evidence that President Trump and his affiliates colluded with Russian officials to sway the election or that the Kremlin sought to help him – a conclusion rejected by the panel’s Democrats.

The president has repeatedly rejected any collusion or improper activity by his campaign. This week, he referred again in a tweet to the “phony Russia investigation where, by the way, there was NO COLLUSION (except by the Dems).”

Suing a foreign country may present legal challenges for the Democrats, in part because other nations have immunity from most U.S. lawsuits. The DNC’s complaint argues Russia is not entitled to the protection because the hack constituted a trespass on the party’s private property.

The lawsuit argues that Russia is not entitled to sovereign immunity in this case because “the DNC claims arise out of Russia’s trespass on to the DNC’s private servers…in order to steal trade secrets and commit economic espionage.”

The lawsuit echoes a similar legal tactic that the Democratic Party used during the Watergate scandal. In 1972, the DNC filed suit against then President Richard Nixon’s reelection committee seeking $1 million in damages for the break-in at Democratic headquarters in the Watergate building.

The suit was denounced at the time by Nixon’s attorney general, John Mitchell, who called it a case of “sheer demagoguery” by the DNC. But the civil action brought by former DNC chair Lawrence F. O’Brien was ultimately successful, yielding a $750,000 settlement from the Nixon campaign that was reached on the day in 1974 that Nixon left office.

The suit filed Friday seeks millions of dollars in compensation to offset damage it claims the party suffered from the hacks. The DNC argues that the cyberattack undermined its ability to communicate with voters, collect donations and operate effectively as its employees faced personal harassment and, in some cases, death threats.

The suit also seeks an acknowledgment from the defendants that they conspired to infiltrate the Democrats’ computers, steal information and disseminate it to influence the election.

To support its case, the lawsuit offers a detailed narrative of the DNC hacks, as well as episodes in which key Trump aides are alleged to have been told Russia held damaging information about Clinton.

Russia engaged in a “brazen attack on U.S. soil” the party alleges, a campaign that began with the cyberhack of its computer networks in 2015 and 2016. Trump campaign officials received repeated outreach from Russia, the suit says.

“Rather than report these repeated messages and communications that Russia intended to interfere in the U.S. election, the Trump campaign and its agents gleefully welcomed Russia’s help,” the party argues

Ultimately, Trump’s associates entered into an agreement with Russian agents “to promote Donald Trump’s candidacy through illegal means,” the suit concludes.

The suit does not name Trump as a defendant. Instead, it targets various Trump aides who met with people believed to be affiliated with Russia during the campaign, including the president’s son, Donald Trump Jr., his son-in-law Jared Kushner, his campaign chairman Paul Manafort and Manafort’s deputy, Rick Gates.

Manafort and Gates were charged with money-laundering, fraud and tax evasion in a case brought by special prosecutors last year. In February, Gates pleaded guilty to conspiracy and lying to the FBI and is cooperating with investigators. Manafort has pleaded not guilty.

The DNC lawsuit also names as a defendant the Russian military intelligence service, the GRU, which has been accused by the U.S. government of orchestrating the hacks, as well as WikiLeaks, which published the DNC’s stolen emails, and the group’s founder Julian Assange.

The lawsuit was also filed against Roger Stone, the longtime Trump confidante who claimed during the campaign that he was in contact with Assange.

The Trump advisers and associates have denied assisting Russia in its hacking campaign. Stone has denied any communication with Assange or advance knowledge of the document dumps by WikiLeaks, saying his comments about Assange were jokes or exaggerations.

The DNC lawsuit argues that the Russian government and the GRU violated a series of laws by orchestrating the secret intrusion into the Democrats’ computer systems, including statutes to protect trade secrets, prohibit wire tapping and prevent trespassing.

The party said the Trump defendants committed conspiracy through their interaction with Russian agents and their public encouragement of the hacking, with the campaign itself acting as a racketeering enterprise promoting illegal activity.

The complaint was filed on behalf of the party by the law firm of Cohen Milstein.

The suit contains previously undisclosed details, including that the specific date when the Russians breached the DNC computer system: July 27, 2015, according to forensic evidence cited in the filing.

The analysis shows the system was breached again on April 18, 2016. The hackers began siphoning documents and information from DNC systems on April 22. The suit notes that four days later, Trump foreign policy adviser George Papadopoulos was informed by Josef Mifsud, a London-based professor, that the Russians were in possession of thousands of emails that could be damaging to Clinton.

The list of defendants in the suit includes Papadopoulos and Mifsud, as well as Aras and Emin Agalorov, the wealthy Russian father and son who hosted the Miss Universe Pageant in Moscow in 2013. Trump, who owned the pageant, attended the event.

The Agalarovs also played a role in arranging a meeting for a Russian lawyer at Trump Tower in New York in 2016, at which Donald Trump Jr. had expected to be given damaging information about Clinton.

The suit alleges that Trump’s personal and professional ties to Russia helped foster the conspiracy.

The DNC’s lawyers wrote that “long standing personal professional and financial ties to Russia and numerous individuals linked to the Russian government provided fertile ground for a conspiracy between the defendants to interfere in the 2016 elections.”

The lawsuit describes how the then-Soviet Union paid for Trump to travel Moscow in the 1980s.

It also details the history of Manafort and Gates, who worked for Russian-friendly factions in the Ukraine before joining the Trump campaign. Prosecutors have said they were in contact in 2016 with Konstantin Kilimnik, a former linguist in the Russian army who the FBI has alleged had ties to Russian intelligence.

The Washington Post’s Alice Crites contributed to this report.</s>The Democratic National Committee (DNC) has filed a lawsuit against the Russian government, the Trump campaign and WikiLeaks, alleging they conspired to obstruct the 2016 election to tilt the outcome in favor of Donald Trump.

The lawsuit filed in a Manhattan court alleged top Trump campaign officials conspired with Russian government officials and its military intelligence agency to hurt Hillary Clinton, the Democratic candidate, by hacking into the DNC’s computer network and making public the stolen material, The Washington Post reported.

The lawsuit alleged that the Trump’s campaign “gleefully welcomed Russia’s help” in the 2016 election and accused the Trump campaign of being a “racketeering enterprise”.

The US has alleged the stolen material was disseminated through WikiLeaks, which, however, has denied Russia was the source of the leaked DNC documents it released close to the polls.

“During the 2016 presidential campaign, Russia launched an all-out assault on our democracy, and it found a willing and active partner in Donald Trump’s campaign,” DNC chairman Tom Perez said in a statement.

“This constituted an act of unprecedented treachery: the campaign of a nominee for President of the United States in league with a hostile foreign power to bolster its own chance to win the presidency,” he added.

The Post pointed out there is a precedent. The DNC had successfully sued the Richard Nixon campaign during the Watergate scandal for the break-in at its offices. It had collected $750,000 from the Nixon campaign, which was paid on the day President Nixon left office.

Four US intelligence agencies reported last year that Russia sponsored the hacking of Democratic Party groups and other actions during the 2016 campaign. Part of the effort was to benefit Trump over Clinton, the agencies said.

The lawsuit names Donald Trump Jr, Trump associate Roger Stone and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner as defendants.

The White House did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Trump has repeatedly denied his campaign colluded with Russia. Moscow has denied meddling in the election.
The Democratic National Committee file a lawsuit against Russia, the Donald Trump administration, and WikiLeaks alleging that the former conspired to interfere in the 2016 United States elections.