Clinton camp head alleges Russian hack & release of DNC emails to aid Trump, cites ‘press & experts'

After Hillary Clinton’s campaign manager alleged that Russians “stole and released” the DNC emails to help elect her opponent, Donald Trump’s son said that if a Republican told “lie after lie” like the Democrats, “they would bring out the electric chair.”

Nearly 20,000 emails and over 8,000 attachments from the Democratic National Committee (DNC) were released by WikiLeaks on Friday. Many of the emails indicated that top DNC officials were hostile to the Bernie Sanders campaign.

Clinton Campaign Manager Robby Mook has voiced a theory of who is behind the leaks and hacks.

“Experts are telling us that Russian state actors broke into the DNC, stole these emails, and other experts are now saying that the Russians are releasing these emails for the purpose of actually helping Donald Trump,” he told CNN's ‘State Of The Union’ on Sunday. “I don't think it's coincidental that these emails were released on the eve of our [Democratic National] Convention here. And that's disturbing.”

“I think we also need to be concerned that we also saw last week at the Republican Convention that Trump and his allies made changes to the Republican platform to make it more pro-Russian and we saw him talking how NATO shouldn't necessarily intervene to defend our Eastern European allies if they are attacked by Russia. When you pull all this together, it's a disturbing picture,” Mook said.

When CNN's Jake Tapper wondered what evidence Mook had that the “Russians were behind this in terms of the hacking or the timing by WikiLeaks,” the Clinton staffer replied, "Well, we need the experts speak on this. It's been reported on in the press that the hackers that got into the DNC are very likely to be working in coordination with Russia.

“They [the emails] are being released at this time to create maximum damage to Hillary Clinton to help Donald Trump," Mook added.

"You're basically suggesting that the Russians hacked into the DNC and now are releasing these files through WikiLeaks to help elect Donald Trump," Tapper intervened.

"This isn't my assertion. There are a number of experts asserting this," Mook replied.

If a Republican 'lied' like the Clinton camp 'they would bring out the electric chair'

Donald Trump Jr. has slammed the Russian involvement theory, saying that Clinton campaigners “will say anything to be able to win.”

“I mean this is time and time again, lie after lie. You notice he [Mook] won’t say, ‘Well, I say this.’ We hear ‘experts’. His house cat at home once said this is what’s happening with the Russians. It’s disgusting. It’s so phony.

“I can’t think of bigger lies, but that exactly goes to show you what the DNC and what the Clinton camp will do. They will lie and do anything to win. You hear it with the DNC where they’re leaking emails about Bernie Sanders and his Jewish heritage, to be able to try to destroy him in the South. It’s a rigged system. It’s disgusting and the people who should be fed up because when I heard it, I certainly was. I don’t mind a fair fight, but these lies and the perpetuating of that kind nonsense to try to gain political capital is just outrageous and he should be ashamed of himself. If a Republican did that they would be calling for people to bring out the electric chair,” Trump Jr. told Tapper.

READ MORE: Trump slams DNC for ‘vicious plan to destroy’ Bernie exposed in WikiLeaks emails

Trump Snr. has also piled in on the DNC, saying that the “Leaked e-mails of DNC show plans to destroy Bernie Sanders. Mock his heritage and much more. On-line from Wikileakes [sic], really vicious. RIGGED."

“The Wikileaks e-mail release today was so bad to Sanders that it will make it impossible for him to support her, unless he is a fraud!” Trump added in another tweet.

The leaked emails, released Friday, cover a period from January 2015 to May 2016 and purportedly come from the accounts of seven major figures in the DNC. Many of the emails relate to Bernie Sanders and dealing with the fallout of many Democrats opposing Hillary Clinton and calling the system “rigged.” One email, for instance, indicates that the DNC was in close contact with news websites on articles related to the Democratic Party.