Stone Jr., an off-and-on adviser to President Trump for decades, has acknowledged that he had contact on Twitter with Guccifer 2.0, the mysterious online figure that is believed to be a front for Russian intelligence officials. American officials have said that Mr. Stone is one of several Trump advisers under scrutiny over their ties to Russia. He still advises Mr. Trump at times, and shares the president’s view that Democrats’ allegations of collusion between the campaign and Russia are a smear. During the campaign, Guccifer 2.0 used social media to invite individual reporters and Republican operatives to request specific caches of documents. Still, that did not stop journalists and Republican operatives from dealing with Guccifer 2.0, and Mr. Stone was hardly alone in having contact with the hackers.

Source: New York Times March 11, 2017 21:08 UTC