The Mueller report concluded that there were multiple and repeated contacts between the Trump campaign and the various Russian individuals. These conclusions were confirmed by the Republican Led Senate Intelligence Committee. The Mueller report did not find sufficient evidence of actions by the Trump team which violated election laws or constituted conspiracy to violate those laws to support a prosecution. The report did not comment at all on the activities of Cambridge Analytica or the NRA, on activities by countries other than Russia, or on the subject of money laundering.
The explanation of those contacts most consistent with the findings of the Mueller report is that Russians were working hard to cultivate members of the Trump campaign (including Trump himself) as unwitting agents, and were at least partially successful. Their success lies in the fact that they were able to establish contact, convey their desires, and make it clear that the campaign could “expect it would benefit electorally” from their efforts, and the Trump campaign did not report any of this to law enforcement or take any other action to impede Russia’s activities, while some of the information shared by Trump campaign staffers with their Russian-affiliated contacts aided Russia’s efforts.
The New York Times Editorial Board summarized in August of 2020:
“A bipartisan report released Tuesday by the Republican-controlled Senate Intelligence Committee cuts through the chaff. The simplicity of the scheme has always been staring us in the face: Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign sought and maintained close contacts with Russian government officials who were helping him get elected. The Trump campaign accepted their offers of help. The campaign secretly provided Russian officials with key polling data. The campaign coordinated the timing of the release of stolen information to hurt Hillary Clinton’s campaign.
[…]
The Intelligence Committee report shows clear coordination between Russians and the Trump campaign, though there is no evidence of an explicit agreement. The evidence the report lays out suggests Mr. Trump knew this at the time. Whether or not it can be proved that he ordered this interference or violated the law in doing so, the fact remains that neither he nor anyone else in his campaign alerted federal law-enforcement authorities, as any loyal American should have.”
While the Mueller report determined that these repeated contacts and passive acceptance of help did not rise to the legal standard for “conspiracy” charges in a way that could be proved beyond a reasonable doubt, it is behavior that is inconsistent with most Americans’ expectations that their elected officials will act in the public interest rather than their own. Afraid that this embarrassing information would become public, President Trump took actions that Congress could legitimately find to be obstruction of justice. These actions continued even after the release of the Mueller Report.
Intelligence experts had commented on this possibility prior to the release of the report.
Ex-CIA chief John Brennan: Russians contacted Trump campaign by Tom LoBianco reporting on the testimony of John Brennan for CNN (May 23, 2017)
Brennan was speaking to the House intelligence committee on the extent of Russia's meddling in the 2016 elections and possible ties to the Trump campaign, where he was asked about how Moscow recruits sources "wittingly and unwittingly."
"Frequently, people who go along a treasonous path do not know they are on a treasonous path until it is too late," Brennan said.
[…]
Brennan cautioned lawmakers that although he could not definitively say if those contacts amounted to "collusion," he knew that Russians were actively cultivating US contacts and, very likely, did not present themselves as Russian spies.
Trump Jr.’s Russia meeting sure sounds like a Russian intelligence operation by Rolf Mowatt-Larssen (former CIA officer and DOE Intelligence Director) at the Washington Post (July 14, 2017)
[E]verything we know about the meeting — from whom it involved to how it was set up to how it unfolded — is in line with what intelligence analysts would expect an overture in a Russian influence operation to look like. It bears all the hallmarks of a professionally planned, carefully orchestrated intelligence soft pitch designed to gauge receptivity, while leaving room for plausible deniability in case the approach is rejected. And the Trump campaign’s willingness to take the meeting — and, more important, its failure to report the episode to U.S. authorities — may have been exactly the green light Russia was looking for to launch a more aggressive phase of intervention in the U.S. election.
[…]
And here, the deal should have been obvious to everyone. Moscow intended to discredit Clinton and help get Trump elected, and in exchange it hoped the Republican would consider its interests — in sanctions relief and otherwise. The Russian government appears to have signaled its direct involvement and real intention in advance of the meeting, presumably to avoid the possibility that its offer might be misconstrued, perhaps naively, as an innocent gesture of support and nothing more.
An ex-CIA officer: the Trump Jr. meeting shows how the Russians exploit intelligence targets by Sean Illing interviewing Glenn Carle at Vox (Jul 14, 2017)
It also seems certain that Trump is uncontrollable and would not ever consider himself a spy, but many spies don't consider themselves spies and often don't even know that they're spies. And intelligence services couldn’t care less about that.
What matters to them is exploiting people, and that is what is happening here.
Trump's shady and inept campaign team was a perfect target for Putin's spies by Zack Beauchamp at Vox (Nov 1, 2017)
Trump ran a chaotic and disorganized campaign, as one might expect from a complete political novice. That, combined with unorthodox policies that included attacks on traditional allies and kind words about traditional US adversaries, led most mainstream Republican operatives and experts to shy away — attracting a cast of inexperienced, shady, and/or pro-Russian characters like Manafort and Papadopoulos.
The basic set-up created an irresistible target for Russian intelligence, one that they repeatedly attempted to penetrate. We know, Trump’s protestations aside, that they managed to successfully make contact with several Trump campaign officials, ranging from junior figures like Papadopoulos to at least one member of the inner circle, Donald Trump Jr.
For Russia, Trump Was a Vehicle, Not a Target by Clint Watts (former FBI agent) for the New York Times (Apr 3, 2018)
In Trump and his campaign, Mr. Putin spotted a golden opportunity — an easily ingratiated celebrity motivated by fame and fortune, a foreign policy novice surrounded by unscreened opportunists open to manipulation and unaware of Russia’s long run game of subversion.
We note that in his August 2016 endorsement of Hillary Clinton, former CIA Director Michael Morell also warned of this outcome:
President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia was a career intelligence officer, trained to identify vulnerabilities in an individual and to exploit them. That is exactly what he did early in the primaries. Mr. Putin played upon Mr. Trump’s vulnerabilities by complimenting him. He responded just as Mr. Putin had calculated.
Mr. Putin is a great leader, Mr. Trump says, ignoring that he has killed and jailed journalists and political opponents, has invaded two of his neighbors and is driving his economy to ruin. Mr. Trump has also taken policy positions consistent with Russian, not American, interests — endorsing Russian espionage against the United States, supporting Russia’s annexation of Crimea and giving a green light to a possible Russian invasion of the Baltic States.
In the intelligence business, we would say that Mr. Putin had recruited Mr. Trump as an unwitting agent of the Russian Federation.
Also notable: James Comey: No ‘treason.’ No coup. Just lies — and dumb lies at that Washington Post (May 28th, 2019)
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We preserve here for the record some links to discussions of other possibilities released before the Mueller report findings.
Trump lawyers say no income from Russia, with exceptions CBS (May 12th, 2017)
Trump Lawyer ‘Vehemently’ Denies Russian Collusion New York Times (August 30th, 2017)
Jared Kushner's statement on Russia to congressional committees CNN (July 24, 2017)
One year into the FBI's Russia investigation, Mueller is on the Trump money trail by Evan Perez, Pamela Brown and Shimon Prokupecz at CNN (Aug. 3, 2017) (Includes statements by representatives of Carter Page, Roger Stone, Michael Flynn, Paul Manafort, and Donald Trump)
Another explanation has been put forward by a hacker who was tried in Russia for breaking into bank records. He confesses to the DNC hacking under the direction of the FSB, but distances himself from the Kremlin. It is unlikely the confession letter would have been leaked without Kremlin approval.
Putin Ordered Theft of Clinton's Emails from DNC, Russian Hacker Confesses by Cristina Maza at Newsweek (Dec. 12, 2017)
Some reflections on the word “collusion” and what it might imply:
The Art of the (Trump and Putin) Deal by Robert Reich (July 11, 2017)
Oh, Wait. Maybe It Was Collusion. By John Sipher and Steve Hall at the New York Times (Aug. 2, 2017)
We’re Back to Manafort by Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo (Aug. 4th, 2017)
Russian Leverage Over Trump Is Not Just a Theory. It’s Now Fact by Jonathan Chait at New York Magazine (May 8, 2018)
Donald Trump Gave Russia Leverage Over His Presidency by Conor Friedersdorf at the Atlantic (Nov. 29, 2018)
There is Only One Trump Scandal by Adam Serwer at the Atlantic (May 21, 2018)
Will Trump Be Meeting With His Counterpart — Or His Handler? A plausible theory of mind-boggling collusion by Jonathan Chait (July 8, 2018)
Putin's Payout: 10 Ways Trump Has Supported Putin's Foreign Policy Agenda by Max Bergmann, James Lamond, and Talia Dessel at the Moscow Project (July 10, 2018)
An Epiphany Article on the Trump/Russia Story by Joshua Marshall at Talking Points Memo (July 10, 2018)
What everyone’s forgetting about Paul Manafort by Diana Pilipenko at the Washington Post (Sept 18th, 2018)
Hidden Motives behind Key GOP Leaders’ Cooperation with Trump & Russia: An Evidence-based Examination of Irrational Behaviors & the Republican Congress Members Who Exhibit Them by Richard Painter and Leanne Watt on Medium (Nov 4th, 2018)
The Mueller Investigation Nears the Worst-Case Scenario by Garret M. Graff at Wired (Dec. 7th, 2018)
Here are 18 reasons Trump could be a Russian asset by Max Boot at the Washington Post (Jan 13, 2019)
Trump's job was to unlock the house for the thieves. He did not need to know what each thief was going to take by Larisa Alexandrovna on Twitter (Feb 6th, 2019)
Trump’s businesses are full of dirty Russian money. The scandal is that it’s legal. by Craig Unger for the Washington Post (March 29th, 2019)