MSNBC explains why Don Jr's outreach to Israel shows intent in Trump-Russia

The latest report by The New York Times that Donald Trump's 2016 presidential campaign sought proposals from an Israeli private intelligence firm to create fake online personas to manipulate U.S. citizens could increase the legal liability facing Donald Trump, Jr.

Joel Zamel, the owner of Psy-Group, the company in question, met with Donald Trump Jr. in August 2016. The president's eldest son also attended the infamous Trump Tower meeting with Russian operatives in June of 2016.

"We've been talking about that blockbuster new report in The New York Times about Robert Mueller's interest in the Trump campaign's efforts to engage an Israeli firm to sow discord," noted Nicole Wallace, host of "Deadline: White House" on MSNBC.

Guest Ben Rhodes was targeted personally by a smear campaign after serving as Deputy National Security Advisor in the Obama administration.

"It was a kind of shocking and jarring thing, and I wondered at the time, 'Who would do this?' And it was never established who was behind it," he noted. "It makes it pretty obvious to me who was behind targeting me and my family."

Senior Washington Post political writer Aaron Blake observed, "it all speaks to the intent."

"You know, we have evidence sitting right in front of us, staring us in the face, of groups of people getting together and agreeing to achieve an illegal outcome and that's pretty much the heart of conspiracy," explained former federal prosecutor Joyce Vance.

"It's the formation of that agreement or the intent to -- as a group -- work together toward a goal that turns out to be illegal and to take one significant step toward that goal," she explained. "And Donald Trump Jr.'s ignorance and innocence, notwithstanding, ignorance of the law tends to be no excuse in this area."

"So what I think we're seeing evolve in realtime is just the tip of the iceberg of the evidence that Mueller is compiling beneath the surface," she concluded.

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