A lawyer for Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign was found not guilty of lying to the FBI about the identity of his client when he provided a flimsy tip on then-candidate Donald Trump two months before the election.
The jury verdict in favor of Michael Sussmann, a prominent cybersecruity lawyer with deep ties to the Democratic party, was handed down Tuesday in Washington. His two-week trial rehashed bitter divisions between the rival presidential campaigns and shined a light on the dark side of opposition research.
FBI officials said Sussmann falsely claimed he wasn’t representing a client when he handed over what he described as evidence of a suspicious communications link between computer servers at Trump Tower and a Russia-based bank tied to the Kremlin. The agency debunked the theory, but not before the media held it out as possible evidence of collusion.
