October 25, 2017

The Head of the Trump Campaign’s Data Firm Offered Assange Help with Clinton Emails

The WikiLeaks founder declined the offer to work together.

Bill Clark/ZUMA

Get your news from a source that’s not owned and controlled by oligarchs. Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily.

The head of Cambridge Analytica, a data firm used by Trump’s presidential campaign, reached out to WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange last year to offer to help release a trove of some 30,000 of Hillary Clinton’s email messages from her time as Secretary of State. 

The Daily Beast reports Alexander Nix made the offer in an email, which Assange eventually rejected in favor of working on his own. It’s not clear if the emails in question were ever obtained by WikiLeaks or any other entity; they have never been published. (Assange confirmed the email to the Daily Beast; Cambridge Analytica declined a request for comment).

Clinton’s emails were a key campaign issue, with Trump frequently referring to them in order to rally his base. During a news conference in July 2016, Trump publicly called on Russia for help in tracking them down. “Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing. I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gNa2B5zHfbQ

Don’t just click away.

We need your help. We’re halfway through our Summer Membership Drive, and only $35,000 toward our $200,000 goal. But there’s good news: This week only, every donation will be doubled, up to $50,000, thanks to a generous reader.

That’s twice the impact for intrepid reporting that peels back the layers to publish the truth—and the context you need to break it all down. It’s twice the fuel for investigations on voting rights and justice, critical in this midterm election year. And it’s twice the power for exposing the chaos and corruption of a White House trying to control the narrative.

This is a pivotal moment in our nation, with democracy on the line, and we can only do this work because readers like you step up. Every donation, of any amount, makes a difference here. And every donation will be doubled.

We cannot do this work without you. Join the fight. Double your donation to defend democracy.

Don’t just click away.

We need your help. We’re halfway through our Summer Membership Drive, and only $35,000 toward our $200,000 goal. But there’s good news: This week only, every donation will be doubled, up to $50,000, thanks to a generous reader.

That’s twice the impact for intrepid reporting that peels back the layers to publish the truth—and the context you need to break it all down. It’s twice the fuel for investigations on voting rights and justice, critical in this midterm election year. And it’s twice the power for exposing the chaos and corruption of a White House trying to control the narrative.

This is a pivotal moment in our nation, with democracy on the line, and we can only do this work because readers like you step up. Every donation, of any amount, makes a difference here. And every donation will be doubled.

We cannot do this work without you. Join the fight. Double your donation to defend democracy.

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

INDEPENDENT. BECAUSE OF YOU.

Mother Jones has no billionaires calling the shots—just readers like you making fearless reporting possible

Donate