--- title: Donald Trump Officials Cited in Clinton Email Document description: A Republican activist who last year and led a hunt to track down Hillary Clinton's emails cited several top members of the Trump campaign canonical: https://time.com/4843087/peter-w-smith-donald-trump-hillary-clinton-emails/ author: Aric Jenkins article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-07-01T18:56:01.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-23T16:24:54.794Z article:section: Politics og:title: GOP Operative Seeking Clinton Emails Cited Top Trump Campaign Officials og:description: Among the Trump aides named were Stephen Bannon, Kellyanne Conway and Michael Flynn og:url: https://time.com/4843087/peter-w-smith-donald-trump-hillary-clinton-emails/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt4627ab1eda273ee6/6988b38b196cf45e2003e562/gettyimages-613703202.jpg?branch=production&width=1024&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1024 og:image:height: 576 og:image:alt: Candidates Hillary Clinton And Donald Trump Hold Second Presidential Debate At Washington University og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: GOP Operative Seeking Clinton Emails Cited Top Trump Campaign Officials twitter:description: Among the Trump aides named were Stephen Bannon, Kellyanne Conway and Michael Flynn twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt4627ab1eda273ee6/6988b38b196cf45e2003e562/gettyimages-613703202.jpg?branch=production&width=1024&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # GOP Operative Seeking Clinton Emails Cited Top Trump Campaign Officials > Sponsored content. 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Brief is free at time.com/newsletters. by [Aric Jenkins](https://time.com/author/aric-jenkins/) ## Aric Jenkins Jul 1, 2017 6:56 PM UTC  ST LOUIS, MO - OCTOBER 09: Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump (L) shakes hands with Democratic presidential nominee former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during the town hall debate at Washington University ST LOUIS, MO - OCTOBER 09: Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump (L) shakes hands with Democratic presidential nominee former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during the town hall debate at Washington University Scott Olson—Getty Images by [Aric Jenkins](https://time.com/author/aric-jenkins/) ## Aric Jenkins Jul 1, 2017 6:56 PM UTC A Republican political activist who last year led a hunt to track down personal [Hillary Clinton emails](http://time.com/4550523/james-comey-hillary-clinton/) that had been deleted from a private email server cited several senior members of President Trump’s campaign, including some who now serve as top officials to the President, in a recruitment document. The activist, Peter W. Smith, created the document in his effort to assemble a team of tech experts, lawyers and Russian-speaking investigators to locate the 33,000 emails Clinton used while Secretary of State, [according to the _Wall Street Journal_.](https://www.wsj.com/articles/gop-activist-who-sought-clinton-emails-cited-trump-campaign-officials-1498872923) Among the Trump aides named were Stephen Bannon, now chief strategist to the President, then-campaign manager and current presidential counselor Kellyanne Conway, and Lt. Gen. Mike Flynn, a former campaign adviser who controversially [resigned](http://time.com/4670450/donald-trump-michael-flynn-leaks/) briefly into his tenure as Trump’s national security adviser. It remains unclear why these Trump officials were listed in the document, dated Sept. 7, 2016, but they were named under a header labeled “Trump Campaign,” followed by: “in coordination to the extent permitted as an independent expenditure,” according to the report. Smith and others suspected that hackers might have obtained the missing emails and thought them to contain potentially damaging information, according to the _Journal_. Smith, who died last month shortly after speaking to the paper, said he and his team were in communication with several hacker groups, two of which he believed were directly connected to the Russian government. Special Counsel Robert Mueller is [currently investigating allegations of collusion](http://time.com/4828081/robert-mueller-special-counsel/) between the Trump Campaign and the Kremlin regarding interference with the U.S. presidential election. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4843087/peter-w-smith-donald-trump-hillary-clinton-emails/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4843087/peter-w-smith-donald-trump-hillary-clinton-emails/"},"headline":"GOP Operative Seeking Clinton Emails Cited Top Trump Campaign Officials","datePublished":"2017-07-01T18:56:01.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-23T16:24:54.794Z","description":"They were named under a header labeled “Trump Campaign\"","url":"https://time.com/4843087/peter-w-smith-donald-trump-hillary-clinton-emails/","keywords":["politics","hillary clinton emails","onetime"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt4627ab1eda273ee6/6988b38b196cf45e2003e562/gettyimages-613703202.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Aric Jenkins","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/aric-jenkins/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt4627ab1eda273ee6/6988b38b196cf45e2003e562/gettyimages-613703202.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Candidates Hillary Clinton And Donald Trump Hold Second Presidential Debate At Washington University","caption":"Candidates Hillary Clinton And Donald Trump Hold Second Presidential Debate At Washington University","creditText":"Scott Olson—Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/politics/","name":"politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4843087/peter-w-smith-donald-trump-hillary-clinton-emails/","name":"GOP Operative Seeking Clinton Emails Cited Top Trump Campaign Officials"}}]}] ```