Thread by @bradheath

These will be the first charges by Mueller's office that directly accuse the Russian government of meddling in the 2016 presidential election.

A grand jury has charged 12 Russian GRU officers with a sustained campaign to hack into the computers of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton's campaign; and releasing hacked emails.

Here is the indictment of 12 Russian officers for election interference
justice.gov/file/1080281/d…

The new indictment from Mueller's office specifically charges that the purposes of Russian intelligence efforts to hack emails and release them was "to interfere with the 2016 U.S. presidential election."

The effort to hack Democratic political operations began March 19, 2016.

The indictment describes a concerted hacking campaign by Russian intelligence units against Democratic political organizations, beginning in mid-March 2016.

The hackers sought out "information related to the 2016 U.S. presidential election." They searched for files that referenced hillary, cruz, trump and Benghazi.

As usual for special counsel indictments, this one hints that investigators have gathered a TON of information. For example, it says GRU officers referred to one of their machines as a "middle server."

Russian intelligence malware remained active on DNC computers until October 2016, a month before the presidential election.

In addition to creating the DC Leaks site and social media accounts, the indictment says the GRU created an account that tried to organize a "flash mob" with the hashtag #BlacksAgainstHillary.

Further suggestion about the breadth of the U.S. government's knowledge here: The indictment charges that Russian officers conducted specific searches on one of their servers on a particular day. The government knows the times and the phrases for which they searched.

Mueller's office said that in August 2016, Russian intelligence officers, posing as Guccifer 2.0, "received a request for stolen documents from a candidate for the U.S. Congress."

GRU officers "sent the candidate stolen documents related to the candidate's opponent."

A week later, Russian intelligence officers sent 2.5 gigabytes of stolen DCCC information "to a then-registered state lobbyist and online source of political news."

Russian intelligence officers also communicated with a "U.S. person who was in regular contact with senior members of the presidential campaign of Donald J. Trump." (It matches the timeline on Roger Stone: newsweek.com/how-stone-inte…)

The indictment alleges that "Organization 1" (@wikileaks) communicated with the GRU, posing as Guccifer 2.0, about when to release hacked emails "to heighten their impact on the 2016 U.S. presidential election."

The GRU mined its own bitcoin.

The indictment, once again, is here: justice.gov/file/1080281/d…

Big picture, today's indictment describes a concerted hacking campaign by Russian intelligence services that targeted Democratic Party political organizations for the purpose of influencing the 2016 presidential election.

Story: usatoday.com/story/news/pol…

DAG Rod Rosenstein, when he announced the indictment early this afternoon, said "the special counsel's investigation is ongoing."