Dear CNN: It’s a Terrible Look to Ambush Trump Supporters Who Accidentally Talked to Russians
Screencap via Twitter

By now, you’ve probably thoroughly digested the DoJ indictment implicating thirteen Russians and their affiliated Internet organizations in attempts to sabotage U.S. democracy and help Trump win the 2016 election. For our purposes today, I want to direct your attention to one particular spot on page 22 of that indictment:
Now, if you’ve ever read Paste before, you know that we find Trump and his supporters objectionable for a thousand different reasons, and it’s tempting to use any available ammunition against them. But let’s look at what actually happened here:
1. One group of Trump supporters reached out to another group of Trump supporters in Florida, attempting to promote pro-Trump rallies.
2. The second group of Trump supporters gladly accepted, since they wanted Trump to win the election.
As far as the Florida Trump supporters are concerned, that’s the end of the story. They were practicing democracy, and even though we find their beliefs abhorrent, there’s nothing illegal or suspicious about any of this. And, of course, there was no way for any of them to know—or even begin to suspect—that they were dealing with Russians.
In a perfectly legitimate story about this bizarre scenario, CNN outlined the story of one woman who got caught in that web.