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Comment by smsm42 | Hacker News Reader

> Mueller describes a sweeping, years-long, multimillion-dollar conspiracy by hundreds of Russians aimed at criticizing Hillary Clinton and supporting Senator Bernie Sanders and Trump

Since when criticizing Hillary Clinton and supporting Senator Bernie Sanders and Trump is a crime one can be indicted for? I know millions of Americans engaged in multibillion-dollar conspiracy aimed at criticizing Hillary Clinton and supporting Senator Bernie Sanders and Trump (the last two probably not at the same time :).

I can get why hacking into private email is something worth indictment. I don't see how "criticizing Hillary Clinton" can even appear in indictment as something that is worth being prosecuted for.

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This is exactly the kind of straw man argument that you will see on things like Fox News. No, criticizing Hillary Clinton is not a crime. However, a state actor engaging in a massive propaganda effort to influence a foreign election seems like one to me. And if people come back at me with "but the United States does it too!", that's not an excuse and I don't think that should happen either.

This isn't about an APT hacking a server. This is about speech which does not rise to the level of a crime under the 1st Amendment. If we are to take your argument for what it is saying, the 1st Amendment does not apply to say Mexicans living in the U.S.

I really don't see what's so hard to understand about this. The elections in the United States should be carried out by people who have the country's best interests in mind. Is it a stretch to imagine that Russian trolls don't have the country's best interests in mind? There are laws all over the world (not just in the US) that govern the ways that communications and advertisements involving an election must take place. Just because that technically goes against a naive definition of free speech doesn't mean anything.

And, despite your best efforts to frame me as a racist, I didn't say anything about Mexicans and wouldn't have any problem with the 1st amendment applying to them assuming other legal questions don't come into play.

The indictment says:

- Russians lied on visa applications to get into the US.

- They should have registered with the US State Department as foreign agents before trying to influence the election

- They didn't report spending to the Federal Election Commission

Also to add onto this,

- they stole US citizens identities

- incited protests and staged rallies intended to sow discord

I’m not sure when the original law was passed, but it was reaffirmed by SCOTUS in 2012. Prohibited by the FEC:

>Making any contribution or donation of money or other thing of value, or making any expenditure, independent expenditure, or disbursement in connection with any federal, state or local election in the United States;

There’s more, but the above covers a good chunk of it.

[0] https://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/01/09/supreme-court...

[1] https://www.fec.gov/updates/foreign-nationals/

And that shows why it is a bad law as written - now criticizing Hillary Clinton on Facebook while being Russian turns out to be a crime. By using extremely broad definitions of "thing of value": saying "Hillary is bad, Sanders is good" is helpful to Sanders, so if you're Russian or Israeli or Moroccan or Indonesian citizen now it's a crime for you to say it. And using extremely wide definition of "in connection to ... election" - we hold elections every two years, so everything is close to the election and thus can be said to be in connection - any political expression can be prosecuted this way.

What would you say if in Putin's Russia somebody would indict an American for criticizing Putin on Facebook? Probably that Putin is a dictator and hates freedom of speech and of course he would do things like that. Now US justice system is doing that. For shame.

SCOTUS also decided Alvarez [0] in 2012. False statements are protected by the 1st Amendment unless they rise to the level of an enumerated exemption.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Alvarez

The illegal part is related to the fact that foreign Russian nationals were funding it.

It sounds extremely bizarre to me that it's OK to criticize Hillary Clinton, it's OK to do it when getting salary from, say, CNN (though not that it would ever happen... ok, from Fox News, right?) but not OK to do the same if you get the same salary from, say, RT. It's like freedom of speech suddenly depends on where your money come from and whether any of it were in hands of Russians before. That's one weird interpretation of the First Amendment.

Doesn't the first amendment apply to citizens of the United States and not to hostile foreign agents?

The problem is that the Russians do not have the country's best interests in mind when they try to influence an election. On the other hand, the anchors on CNN, even though one might disagree with them, do have the country's best interests in mind because they're invested in the situation as citizens.

No, the First Amendment applies to Congress, and by the 14th Amendment, to the States. It does not apply to persons, regardless of their citizenship or friendship status with the US.

"Congress shall make no law..."

> Doesn't the first amendment apply to citizens of the United States and not to hostile foreign agents?

It was supposed to apply to every US person, regardless of citizenship. For non-US persons it's a bit theoretical since there's no real way to prosecute anybody outside the US, but activities protected by 1st amendment for a citizen still shouldn't be a base for prosecution by the US government, even against non-citizen. But it turns out that if you declare someone "hostile foreign agent" - on basis as strong as "criticizing Hillary Clinton" - it no longer applies. I am, frankly, extremely scared of the power of the state security to prosecute any non-citizen for as little as publishing an opinion about US political matters.

And if you remember what happened to surveillance - which was sold as applying only to non-citizens with extraordinary safeguards applied if a citizen happens to be involved, and turned out being routinely applied to citizens as a course of matters, with very little resistance or oversight - I don't see how this could not be extended to citizens too.

But even if it's not - does it mean any non-citizen immigrant which speaks for immigrant rights, or supports DREAM Act, or opposes Trump on immigration policy, or does any other political activity, can be declared a criminal now? Have you thought through which exactly powers you are supporting giving the state and how these powers can be abused?

The indictments are for pretending to be Americans, not properly disclosing their Russian ties as required by law, visa fraud, and other acts of deceit.

It's not for criticizing Hillary Clinton, but for lying about things they were legally obligated to disclose honestly.

Pretending to be an American on Facebook is not a crime as far as I know. In fact, it's not a crime almost anywhere except maybe on US border while talking to US border agent.

Then it's a good thing that's not what these 13 or so people are being indicted for!

The comment I answered to specifically said "The indictments are for pretending to be Americans".

The indictments spell out clearly the circumstances of breaking the law for all the actions you asked about.

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