The campaign of former President Donald Trump on Saturday said it had been hacked following Politico’s receipt of internal campaign documents from an anonymous email account.
Documents sent to Politico included vice-presidential vetting materials related to Ohio Sen. JD Vance, who Trump selected as his running mate shortly before the Republican National Convention in July.
So far, Politico has been unable to pinpoint the identity of the person behind the email account or the individual’s reasoning for sending the materials to their outlet.
The Trump campaign, in a statement to BI, didn’t offer direct evidence supporting the claim of Iranian involvement in the breach but pointed to a recent Microsoft report referencing Iranian hackers sending a “spear phishing email” to a presidential campaign in June.
“These documents were obtained illegally from foreign sources hostile to the United States, intended to interfere with the 2024 election and sow chaos throughout our Democratic process,” Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung told Business Insider in a statement. “On Friday, a new report from Microsoft found that Iranian hackers broke into the account of a ‘high ranking official’ on the US presidential campaign in June 2024, which coincides with the close timing of President Trump’s selection of a vice presidential nominee.”
Cheung did not disclose to Business Insider whether the campaign had contacted Microsoft or law enforcement officials.
What the Microsoft report said
Microsoft did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider, but in its assessment report found that groups tied to the Iranian government had laid the foundation to “stir up controversy or sway voters,” especially in key swing states.
The report said that an Iranian group tied to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps in June sent a phishing email to a top campaign official that originated from the “compromised” email account of an ex-advisor.
The report did not identify the presidential campaign that was targeted.
“The email contained a link that would direct traffic through a domain controlled by the group before routing to the website of the provided link. Within days of this activity, the same group unsuccessfully attempted to log into an account belonging to a former presidential candidate,” the report said.
Emails from an AOL account
In late June, a user calling himself “Robert” began sending emails to Politico from an AOL account with what looked like internal documents from a top Trump staffer.
Two individuals verified to Politico that the documents — which were from late February — were genuine. An individual with knowledge of the matter told the outlet that the Vance file was an early step in examining the Ohioan’s record. Some of Vance’s public critiques of Trump before the senator’s political career were labeled as “POTENTIAL VULNERABILITIES” in the file, per Politico.
“Robert” also sent a portion of documents that included information on Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, who Trump also considered as his running mate.
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