Countable Explains: Who's Who in the Russia Investigationn

Roger Stone

Role:

Political consultant

Former role:

Adviser to 2016 Trump presidential campaign; part of a pro-Trump super PAC

Former former role:

Nixon operative and self-described practitioner of political "black arts"

Quote:

"I actually have communicated with Assange."

— Stone, on whether he’s been in contact with WikiLeaks’ founder Julian Assange

Key Dates:

• 1979: Roy Cohn (chief counsel for Sen. Joseph McCarthy) introduces Stone to Trump.

• 2000: When Trump launches a presidential exploratory committee, Stone serves as chairman. He’d been wanting Trump to run for president since 1988.

• August 6, 2015: Stone leaves the Trump campaign; Stone says he quit, Trump says he fired him.

• March 29, 2016: Trump hires Stone’s former business partner, Paul Manafort, as his convention manager.

• June 15, 2016: "Guccifer 2.0" claims credit for hacking the Democratic National Committee, and begins posting private DNC documents on the Guccifer 2.0 website.

• July 2016: Guccifer 2.0 continues to post hacked DNC.

• July 22, 2016: on the eve of the Democratic National Convention, WikiLeaks releases a batch of emails stolen from the DNC. There begins to be rumors that WikiLeaks founder, Julian Assange, is in possession of hacked DNC documents that are damaging to Hillary Clinton—and that Assange plans to release them as part of an "October surprise."

• August 5, 2016: Stone writes an article for Breitbart arguing that Guccifer 2.0 has no connections to Russia.

• August 8, 2016: When Stone is asked about an "October surprise," he admits he’s “communicated with Assange.”

• August 12, 2016: Busy day for Stone (and maybe, later, Mueller): Stone tells right-wing radio host Alex Jones he’s "in communication with Julian Assange" but is “not at liberty to discuss what I have.” Later in the day, during a #MAGA podcast, Stone says, “I believe Julian Assange - who I think is a hero fighting the police state - has all of the emails that Huma [Abedin] and Cheryl Mills, the two Clinton aides, thought they had erased... I think Assange has them. I know he has them. And I believe he will expose the American people to this information in the next 90 days.”

• August 13, 2016: Guccifer 2.0’s Twitter and Wordpress accounts (which host the website) are suspended.

• August 14, 2016: Stone tweets, "Now Guccifer 2.0 –why are those exposing the truth banned?" Guccifer 2.0’s Twitter account is reinstated later that day. Stone sends a private message to Guccifer 2.0: “Delighted you are reinstated. Fuck the State and their MSM lackeys.”

• August, 2016: Stone gives a number of interviews praising Assange and claiming he’s been in communication with him. Throughout August, Stone also continues to exchange private messages with Guccifer 2.0. (In March 2017, Stone will admit he communicated with Guccifer 2.0.)

• August 21, 2016: Stone tweets "Trust me, it will soon the Podesta's time in the barrel. #CrookedHillary." John Podesta is Hillary’s campaign chairman.

• September 2016: Guccifer 2.0 posts a plethora of hacked documents throughout the month.

• September 16, 2016: Stone tells Boston Herald Radio that he expects "Julian Assange and the WikiLeaks people to drop a payload of new documents on Hillary on a weekly basis fairly soon. And that of course will answer the question of exactly what was erased on that email server."

• October 1, 2016: Stone tweets, "Wednesday@HillaryClinton is done. #Wikileaks." Six days later (a Friday, if you’re wondering), WikiLeaks releases emails that Russian hackers have gathered from Podesta’s email account.

• January 19, 2017: The New York Times reports that Stone is under investigation for possible links to Russia.

• February 17, 2017: the Senate Intelligence Committee sends Stone a letter, asking him to preserve any Russia-related documents.

• March 2017: the Senate Intelligence Committee’s chairman, Richard Burr, says Stone might need to testify. Stone (along with Carter Page and Paul Manafort) volunteers to be interviewed by the House Intelligence Committee.

• April 28, 2017: the chair and vice chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee send letters to several former Trump campaign advisers, including Stone. Among other requests, the letters ask for a "list of all meetings between you and any Russian official or representative of Russian business interests which took place between June 16, 2015, and Jan. 20, 2017."

• September 26, 2017: Stone spends three hours with the House Intelligence Committee having, he claims, "a very frank exchange" where he “answered all of the questions.” (Members of the committee disagree). The night before the hearing, Stone released a fiery 47-page opening statement.

Current mood:

Combative