Democratic emails: All about the hack, the leak, the discord

Associated Press

PHILADELPHIA

First came the hack, then the leak. Now, the Clinton and Trump campaigns are fighting over Russia’s role in the release of thousands of internal Democratic National Committee emails.

At least one thing is clear: The email uproar is an unwelcome distraction at the launch of the Democratic National Convention, inflaming the rift between supporters of Hillary Clinton and primary rival Bernie Sanders just when the party was hoping to close it.

As the Philadelphia convention got underway Monday, developments in the email story rolled out in rapid sequence:

Clinton’s campaign, citing a cybersecurity firm hired to investigate the leak, blamed Russia for hacking the party’s computers and suggested the goal was to benefit Donald Trump’s campaign.

Trump dismissed that idea as laughable, tweeting: “The new joke in town is that Russia leaked the disastrous DNC emails.”

Sanders supporters weren’t amused. Irate, in fact, that the emails confirmed their long-held suspicions the party had favored Clinton all along.

The FBI announced Monday it was investigating how the hack occurred.

A look at the hack, leak and fallout of the DNC email fracas:

THE HACK

Democrats have known about the hack since April, when party officials discovered malicious software on their computers.

They called in a cybersecurity firm, CrowdStrike, which found traces of at least two hacking groups on the Democrats’ network, both with ties to the Russian government.

Those hacks vacuumed up at least a year’s worth of chats, emails and research on Trump, according to a person who wasn’t authorized to discuss it publicly.

The party publicly acknowledged the hack in June.

THE LEAK

On Friday, the public got its first look at DNC emails when Wikileaks posted a cache of 19,000 internal communications, including some that suggested party officials had favored Clinton over rival Sanders during the primaries.

It wasn’t immediately clear how WikiLeaks got the emails – and WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange told Democracy Now! he’d never tell.

Was it from the Russians?

Clinton’s campaign didn’t hesitate to make the connection, with campaign manager Robby Mook saying cyber experts believed “Russian state actors were feeding the email to hackers for the purpose of helping Donald Trump.”

Trump’s team dismissed the purported Russian connection as outlandish.

THE FALLOUT

Whatever the source, the fallout from the leaked emails was swift and dramatic.

Democratic Party chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz resigned Sunday after Sanders’ campaign pounced on a number of leaked emails they said showed that party officials had favored Clinton during the primaries.

The disclosure set off devoted Sanders supporters, who already were having a hard time moving past the bitter primary battles to embrace Clinton as the nominee.

Sanders told his delegates Monday that Wasserman Schultz’s departure would “open the doors of the party to people who want real change.” But even after Sanders urged his supporters to back Clinton, some were flashing thumbs-down signals and waving signs that said, “not Hillary, not Trump.”