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WASHINGTON – A Trump campaign leader in 2016 asked an Israeli company to offer to create fake identities online, manipulate social media and gather information to help defeat Republican opponents and Hillary Clinton, according to interviews and copies of the proposals.
The interest of the Trump campaign for work began when the Russians stepped up their efforts to help Donald J. Trump. Although Israeli society's arguments were narrower than the Moscow interference campaign and seem unrelated, the documents show that a Trump advisor saw the promise of a disruption effort aimed at tipping voters in favor of Mr. Trump.
Campaign leader Rick Gates has called for a proposal to use fake characters to target and influence 5,000 delegates to the 2016 Republican Convention by attacking Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, Trump's main opponent of the campaign. 39; era. Another proposal outlines opposition research and "complementary intelligence activities" regarding Clinton and her relatives, according to copies of the New York Times proposals and interviews with four people involved in creating the documents. .
A third proposal from the company, Psy-Group, made up of former Israeli intelligence agents, outlines a plan to help Mr. Trump for months to use social media to help expose or amplify the division between campaigns and rival factions. The proposals, which were part of what Psy-Group called Project Rome, used code names to identify players. Mr. Trump was "Lion" and Mrs. Clinton, "Forest". Mr. Cruz, whose Trump campaigners feared a revolt over the Republican presidential nomination, was "Bear."
There is no evidence that the Trump campaign has followed up on these proposals and Mr. Gates was ultimately not interested in the work of Psy-Group, said one person familiar with the discussions, in part because other collaborators of the campaign were developing a social media strategy. Psy-Group owner Joel Zamel met in August 2016 with Donald Trump Jr., Trump's eldest son.
Investigators working for Robert S. Mueller III, a special adviser to investigate the Russian campaign to disrupt the 2016 election and determine whether Trump associates have conspired, have obtained copies of the proposals and interviewed employees of the group Psy-Group, according to people close to these interviews.
The reach of social media campaigns, essentially a massive effort to spread misinformation among Republican delegates and general election voters, was broader than the work typically done by campaigners to spread the candidate's message across digital platforms. The proposal to gather information about Clinton and her collaborators includes elements of traditional opposition research, but it also contains an encrypted language that suggests using clandestine means to build "intelligence files" .
Gates first heard of Psy-Group's work at a meeting in March 2016 at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel along Washington's waterfront with George Birnbaum, a Republican consultant close to the government and former officials of the Israeli government. Gates joined the Trump campaign a few days ago with Paul Manafort, his long-time partner, to prevent a revolt by Trump's Republican delegates against Cruz, the party's preferred candidate. .
According to Mr. Birnbaum, at this meeting, Mr. Gates expressed his interest in using the influence and manipulation of social media as a campaign tool, for the immediate purpose of persuading Republican delegates. to Mr. Trump.
"He was interested in finding the technology to achieve what they were looking for," Birnbaum said in an interview. Through the intermediary of a lawyer, Mr. Gates declined to comment. Someone familiar with the story of the meeting by Mr. Gates said that Mr. Birnbaum had for the first time mentioned the problem of hiring an outside company to lead the campaign on social media.
The special council office indicted Mr. Manafort and Mr. Gates last year for multiple counts of financial fraud and tax evasion. Mr. Gates has pleaded guilty to several charges this year and is assisting Mr. Mueller's investigation.
It is unclear whether the Rome Project's proposals describe work that would violate the laws governing foreign participation in US elections. Psy-Group commissioned Covington & Burling, a Washington-based law firm, to conduct a legal review. Stuart Eizenstat, a former US diplomat and a partner in the firm who participated in the legal review, declined to comment on his findings.
Mr. Birnbaum was a protégé of Arthur J. Finkelstein, the legendary Republican political officer, and worked for years as a consultant working on behalf of candidates for elections abroad. In 1996, he helped Finkelstein, an engineer, win Shimon Peres, an engineer, by becoming Israel's prime minister.
Since then, Mr. Birnbaum has worked extensively as a consultant for the campaign with Israeli politicians and has developed a network of contacts with current and former Israeli security officials. He was a foreign policy advisor during the 2016 presidential campaign of Ben Carson, the neurosurgeon who is now secretary of housing and urban development.
Mr. Birnbaum appeared to be contacting Mr. Gates, requesting his e-mail address from Eckart Sager, a political consultant who had worked with the two men, to present Mr. Gates with a technology that could be used by Mr. Gates and Mr. Gates. . Manafort customers in Eastern Europe. Mr. Sager's name Mr. Mueller's team said this year that Mr. Manafort had tried to influence Mr. Sager's testimony in court in the case of the special advocate against Mr. Manafort.
After meeting the hotel with Mr. Gates in March 2016, Mr. Birnbaum worked directly with Psy-Group employees to refine the Trump campaign proposals, according to people familiar with the job.
The proposals all promise the most absolute secrecy, including the use of password-protected code names and documents. Filled with jargon and buzzwords, they outline a vigorous campaign in which Psy-Group employees would carry out the tedious job of creating messages that can influence delegates based on their personalities.
The first document, dated April 2016, stated that the company "had the mission to" offer intelligence services campaign and influence. "Psy-Group promised that" veteran intelligence officers " would use a variety of methods to assess the trends of 5,000 delegates to the Republican Appointment Convention.
After browsing the social media accounts and all the other information available to build a psychology record of any persuasive delegate, more than 40 Psy-Group employees would use "authentic" online fake identities to bomb up to 2500 targets with messages specifically designed to win them to Mr. Trump.
The messages describe Mr. Cruz's "ulterior motives or hidden plans", or seem to come from former supporters of Cruz or influential individuals with the same background or ideology as the target. The flow of messages would continue for months and include "both online and offline" approaches, even phone calls.
Psy-Group also stated that it would obtain "unique information" by various means, including "secret sources" and "personalized avatars".
Each approach "would seem authentic and would not be part of the paid campaign," promised the proposal. The price of labor was over $ 3 million. To carry out this plan, Psy-Group was planning to double its size, hiring 50 additional employees – including some US citizens – and renting new office space, according to former employees of the company. .
A second proposal was to gather information about Ms. Clinton and 10 of her associates through publicly available data and "unspecified complementary intelligence activities". Psy-Group has promised to prepare a complete file on each of the targets, including "any exploitable information". . "
A third document focused on "third-party personalized messaging" for minority voters, suburban women and undecided women in battlefield states. He promised to create and maintain fake characters online that would convey messages highlighting Mr. Trump's merits and Ms. Clinton's weaknesses or revealing "divisions and rivalries within the opposition".
Although it appears that the Trump campaigners did not accept any of the proposals, Zamel presented the services of the company in general terms at least at a meeting held on August 3, 2016 at Trump Tower. with Donald Trump Jr. This meeting, revealed in May by the Times, also assisted George Nader, emissary of the ruler of the United Arab Emirates, and Erik Prince, Republican donor and founder of the private security company previously known as Blackwater.
Former Psy-Group employees said that in the run-up to the Trump Tower meeting, Zamel had asked them to prepare an updated version of the third proposal. A lawyer for Mr. Zamel said that he did not personally discuss specific proposals with Donald Trump Jr. or any other Trump campaign participants.
"Mr. Zamel has never presented, nor discussed in any way, any of the proposals of the Psy group regarding the US elections with anyone connected with the Trump campaign, including with Donald Trump Jr., except to describe the capabilities of some of its companies in general terms, "said attorney Marc Mukasey.
Nader and Zamel made differing statements as to whether Mr. Zamel had finally deployed social media efforts to help the Trump campaign and why Nader paid him $ 2 million after the election, according to people discussed the issue with both men.
The reason for the payment aroused a lot of interest for Mr. Mueller, according to people familiar with the subject.
It is unclear when and how the special council office began its inquiry into the work of the Psy group, but F.B.I. agents spent hours interviewing company employees. This year, the federal investigators presented to the Israeli police and the Israeli Ministry of Justice a court order to confiscate computers in the former Psy-Group offices in Petah Tikva, east of Tel Aviv.
The company is now in liquidation.
Mark Mazzetti reported from Washington, Ronen Bergman from Tel Aviv, David D. Kirkpatrick from London and Maggie Haberman from New York.
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