Federal judge dismisses DNC lawsuit over email hacking that shook presidential race

A highly publicized Democratic National Committee lawsuit against the Russian Army, WikiLeaks and the Trump campaign over email hacking that roiled the 2016 presidential election was unceremoniously dismissed by a Manhattan federal judge Tuesday, just over a year after it was filed.

U.S. District Judge John Koeltl said Russia is protected against being sued in American courts by sovereign immunity, and — even without considering Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report — conspiracy theories did not amount to “plausible” claims implicating anyone else.

“The DNC raises a number of connections and communications between the defendants and people loosely connected to the Russian Federation, but at no point does the DNC allege any facts … to show that any defendants other than the Russian Federation participated in the theft of the DNC’s information,” Koeltl wrote.

The judge said claims that WikiLeaks, Trump’s campaign and one-time officials such as Donald Trump Jr., Jared Kushner, Paul Manafort and Roger Stone should be liable because they helped distribute stolen emails violated the Constitution.

“The First Amendment prevents such liability in the same way that it would preclude liability for press outlets that publish materials of public interest despite defects in the way the materials were obtained,” Koeltl wrote, “so long as the disseminator did not participate in any wrongdoing in obtaining the materials in the first place.”

President Trump tweeted that the dismissal was "complete vindication & exoneration from the Russian, WikiLeaks and every form of HOAX perpetrated by the DNC, Radial Democrats and others."

The DNC lawsuit was filed in April 2018, alleging Trump’s campaign and aides engaged in a sprawling racketeering conspiracy with the Russian government and WikiLeaks to steal emails and tamper with the 2016 election in a “brazen attack on American democracy.”

In a hearing two weeks ago, lawyers for the Trump campaign urged Koeltl to dismiss the suit, based in part on Mueller’s findings that there was insufficient evidence of a Trump-Russia conspiracy. The DNC asked the judge to ignore Mueller, and Koeltl said he didn’t need the report.

The lawsuit itself, he said, only accused the Russians of being directly involved in unlawfully hacking into DNC, but the legal doctrine of “sovereign immunity” protects countries in most circumstances from being sued in another country’s courts.

“The remedies for hostile actions by foreign governments are state actions, including sanctions imposed by the executive and legislative branches of government,” Koeltl said.

While the lawsuit laid out at length suspicions that WikiLeaks was in league with Russia, and meetings — such as one at Trump Tower — between Russian emissaries and Trump aides, Koeltl said, none of the claims came close to showing others “participated” in the theft.

And even allegations that WikiLeaks knew materials were stolen from the DNC before publishing them and soliciting them from Russia, Koeltl said, were insufficient.

“A person is entitled to publish stolen documents that the publisher requested from a source so long as the publisher did not participate in the theft,” the judge wrote.

Koeltl denied a request for sanctions against the DNC, finding that the lawsuit was not frivolous, but said he was dismissing it with prejudice — subject to a request for reconsideration — because he didn’t see any way that amending the allegations could cure “fundamental defects.”

In a statement, a DNC spokeswoman complained that Republicans are ignoring warnings about potential intrusions in the 2020 election and said Koeltl's ruling raised "serious concerns about our protections from foreign election interference." 

"This should be of concern to anyone who cares about our democracy and the sanctity of our elections," said the spokeswoman, Adrienne Watson.