Previous U.S. intelligence assessments dating to 2016 concluded that Russia sought to weaken support for the Democratic Party and boost Donald Trump’s candidacy.
It started with Bill Browder and the Magnitsky Act. The timelines are so close together that it’s hard to separate, but I think that the Magnitsky Act was when the real motivation came in on the Russian side, and Snowden (and any possible additional fuckin with they were able to do because of intel they gathered from him; I won’t say you are wrong) came afterwards, as their efforts were just first starting to gather momentum. But I definitely remember that as of Snowden getting asylum, they were already heavily actively engaged in ways to fuck with us, in a way I don’t think they were prior to 2012.
It’s sad and ironic and displeasing. The Magnitsky Act was a very rare instance of the US doing something on the world stage that really was motivated at least in part by simple concern for human rights. And we paid the biggest price for it - up to and including this present godawful clusterfuck of a well-funded and -equipped GOP explicitly trying to destroy America and making pretty good progress on it so far - far more than any consequences we ever face for doing our standard war criminal geopolitical evil.
It started with Bill Browder and the Magnitsky Act. The timelines are so close together that it’s hard to separate, but I think that the Magnitsky Act was when the real motivation came in on the Russian side, and Snowden (and any possible additional fuckin with they were able to do because of intel they gathered from him; I won’t say you are wrong) came afterwards, as their efforts were just first starting to gather momentum. But I definitely remember that as of Snowden getting asylum, they were already heavily actively engaged in ways to fuck with us, in a way I don’t think they were prior to 2012.
It’s sad and ironic and displeasing. The Magnitsky Act was a very rare instance of the US doing something on the world stage that really was motivated at least in part by simple concern for human rights. And we paid the biggest price for it - up to and including this present godawful clusterfuck of a well-funded and -equipped GOP explicitly trying to destroy America and making pretty good progress on it so far - far more than any consequences we ever face for doing our standard war criminal geopolitical evil.