Trump and surrogates are pretending its not illegal to communicate with foreigners regarding elections and thus Donald Trump Jr. communicating with Wikileaks is much ado about nothing since no laws were broken. It may be that laws were not broken, but that fact does not negate the fact that Donald Trump Jr. colluded with a foreign entity that the United States has identified as hostile to the country. Trump Jr. cannot pretend that he did not know the United States considers Julian Assange a threat to U.S. security and that Wikileaks has damaged the national interests of the United States.
Julian Assange has been hiding in the Ecuadorian embassy since June 19, 2012 in London because he fears extradition to the United States for releasing U.S. diplomatic cables in 2010. Wikileaks has since released other documents that the U.S. government has stated have hurt the country. These document releases were before the Hillary Clinton emails and the allegations of Russian collusion with the Donald Trump, Sr.
On August 21, 2013, Bradley Manning, now known as Chelsea Manning, was sentenced to 35 years of prison for several violations of the “Espionage Act” by providing Wikileaks the documents it published. Manning was released after serving 7 years after Barack Obama commuted Manning’s prison sentence. For about six years, the United States Department of Justice has had several open criminal investigations against both Julian Assange and Wikileaks.
Clearly, the United States government under both Barack Obama and Donald Trump consider the activities of Assange and Wikileaks to be both criminal and detrimental to the interests of the United States.
Thus, clearly and unequivocally, Donald Trump Jr. was colluding with an enemy of the United States when he communicated with them.
According to the Atlantic and Donald Trump Jr., himself, via Twitter, Wikileaks contacted Trump Jr. on September 20, 2016 through Twitter. The following day, Trump Jr. responded to Wikileaks. From that point on, Donald Trump Jr. was communicating with an enemy of the United States for about ten months.
Not only was Donald Trump Jr. talking to an enemy of the United States, he was accepting taskings from them. On October 3, 2016, Wikileaks tasked Trump Jr. with quoting Hillary Clinton’s comment about “just droning” Julian Assange. Trump, Jr. responded within two hours that he “already did that”. On October 12, 2016, Wikileaks again tasked Donald Trump Jr. to provide the link to the Wikileaks material. Two days later, Trump Jr. tweeted the link to the Wikileaks material through his Twitter feed.
The father, Donald Trump Jr. told a rally “I love Wikileaks!” on October 10, 2016.
Whether you believe that there was any Russian collusion with the Donald Trump campaign or what Julian Assange or what Wikileaks is doing is legal or illegal is immaterial, because it is the official policy of the United States government that Assange and Wikileaks are a dangerous to the welfare of the country.
That Donald Trump Jr. was communicating with them and that his father, Trump Sr. “love[s]” them is a treasonous act in that they are supporting an individual and an entity that has put and is putting America’s interests in danger.
Is this what Trump means when he wants to “Make America Great Again” – collusion with the enemy?
Here is the Twitter exchanges between Wikileaks and Donald Trump, Jr. as released by Trump through his Twitter feed:
