WASH­ING­TON—Spe­cial coun­sel Robert Mueller's in­ves­ti­ga­tion is scru­ti­niz­ing how a col­lec­tion of ac­tivists and pun­dits in­ter­sected with Wik­i­Leaks, the web­site that U.S. of­fi­cials say was the pri­mary con­duit for pub­lish­ing ma­te­ri­als stolen by Rus­sia, ac­cord­ing to peo­ple fa­mil­iar with the mat­ter.

Mr. Mueller's team has re­cently ques­tioned wit­nesses about the ac­tiv­i­ties of long­time Trump con­fi­dante Roger Stone, in­clud­ing his con­tacts with Wik­i­Leaks, and has ob­tained tele­phone records, ac­cord­ing to the peo­ple fa­mil­iar with the mat­ter.

In­ves­ti­ga­tors also have ev­i­dence that the late GOP ac­tivist Pe­ter W. Smith may have had ad­vance knowl­edge of de­tails about the re­lease of emails from a top Hillary Clin­ton cam­paign of­fi­cial by Wik­i­Leaks, one per­son fa­mil­iar with the mat­ter said. They have ques­tioned Mr. Smith's as-sociates, the per­son said.

Right-wing pun­dit Jerome Corsi was also ques­tioned by in­ves­ti­ga­tors about his in­ter­ac-tions with Mr. Stone and Wik­i­Leaks be­fore a grand jury in Sep­tember, ac­cord­ing to a per­son fa­mil­iar with the mat­ter. Mr. Corsi de­clined to com­ment. A lawyer for Mr. Stone said he hasn't been con­tacted by the spe­cial coun­sel. Mr. Smith died last year.

Mr. Mueller's of­fice de-clined to com­ment.

Through­out 2016, Messrs. Stone, Smith and Corsi, who long worked on the mar­gins of Re­pub­li­can pol­i­tics, tried to dig up in­crim­i­nat­ing in­for­ma­tion about Mrs. Clin­ton, the De­mo­c-ra­tic nom­i­nee for pres­i­dent, ac­cord­ing to emails and some pub­lic com­ments. A lawyer for Pres­i­dent Trump didn't im­me­di­ately re­spond to a re­quest for com­mment.

Sam Nun­berg, a for­mer Trump cam­paign staffer who in­ter­acted with Mr. Stone, said he also was ques­tioned by Mr. Mueller's team about com­mu­ni-ca­tions he had with Mr. Stone re­gard­ing Wik­i­Leaks. New York ra­dio host Randy Credico also said the spe­cial coun­sel asked about his com­mu­ni­ca­tions with Mr. Stone and Wik­i­Leaks. Mr. Credico in­ter­viewed Wik­i­Leaks founder Ju­lian As­sange in 2016 and has known Mr. Stone for years.

The role Wik­i­Leaks and Mr. As­sange played dur­ing the 2016 elec­tion as the chief pub­lisher of stolen De­mo­c­ra­tic emails has been of en­dur­ing in­ter­est to in­ves­ti­ga­tors prob­ing Russ­ian elec­tion in­ter­fer­ence in 2016 and whether there was col­lu­sion with Trump as­sociates. Pres­i­dent Trump has de­nied col­lu­sion, and Mos­cow has de­nied med­dling in the elec-tion. The Mueller probe has re­sulted in more than two dozen in­dict­ments as well as guilty pleas by five Trump as­sociates.

Mr. Mueller's of­fice has be­gun shed­ding staff and has in­di­cated that key wit­nesses are ready to be sen­tenced, a sign that their co­op­er­a­tion is no longer needed.

It couldn't be de­ter­mined whether Wik­i­Leaks or Mr. As­sange are tar­gets of the probe or if in­ves­ti­ga­tors are pri­mar­ily in­ter­ested in those who in­ter­acted with the or­ga­ni­za­tion. As Mr. Mueller fo­cuses on hack­ing and Russ­ian in­ter­fer­ence, in­di­vid­u­als or groups who may have been in­volved could be ex­posed to charges such as con­spir­acy to aid in a hack­ing op­er­a­tion.

A July in­dict­ment of 12 Russ­ian mil­i­tary in­tel­li­gence of­fi­cers that de­rived from the spe­cial coun­sel's in­ves­ti­ga­tion al­leged that Wik­i­Leaks ob-tained stolen ma­te­r­ial from Russ­ian mil­i­tary in­tel­li­gence through an on­line per­sona known as Guc­cifer 2.0. Much of that ma­te­r­ial was hacked in the spring of 2016, ac­cord­ing to the spe­cial coun­sel.

Wik­i­Leaks didn't re­spond to a re­quest for com­ment. Mr. As­sange has said that Rus­sia wasn't the source of the emails.

The scru­tiny of ac­tiv­i­ties re­lated to Wik­i­Leaks sug­gests in­ves­ti­ga­tors be­lieve the or­ga­ni­za­tion's im­por­tance to the Rus­sia probe may ex­tend be­yond its deal­ings with Guc­cifer 2.0. A list of ques­tions Mr. Mueller wanted Mr. Trump to an­swer and gave to the pres­i­dent's le­gal team ear­lier this year in­cluded one about the pres­i­dent's knowl­edge of com­mu­ni­ca­tion be­tween Mr. Stone, his as­sociates and Wik­i­Leaks, The Wall Street Jour­nal has re­ported.

Ac­cord­ing to the July in­dict­ment, Wik­i­Leaks re-ceived an en­crypted at­tach-ment from Guc­cifer 2.0 on July 14, 2016, that held "in­struc-tions on how to ac­cess an on­line ar­chive of stolen DNC doc­u­ments." More than a month ear­lier, on June 12, Mr. As­sange said dur­ing an in­ter-view with a British tele­vi­sion sta­tion that he had ob­tained Clin­ton-re­lated emails that were pend­ing pub­li­ca­tion.

The per­son fa­mil­iar with Mr. Smith re­called him re­peat-edly im­ply­ing that he knew ahead of time about leaks of Mr. Podes­ta's emails. The Jour­nal pre­vi­ously re­ported that in the fall of 2016, Mr. Smith told friends and wrote in an email that he di­rected hack­ers to give emails from Mrs. Clin­ton's pri­vate server to Wik­i­Leaks. It is un­clear whether hack­ers ever ob­tained the emails be­long­ing to Mrs. Clin­ton, which she had said were deleted be­cause they were deemed per­sonal. Those emails have never been made pub­lic.

The per­son fa­mil­iar with Mr. Smith re­called him re­peat-edly im­ply­ing that he knew ahead of time about leaks of Mr. Podes­ta's emails. The Jour­nal pre­vi­ously re­ported that in the fall of 2016, Mr. Smith told friends and wrote in an email that he di­rected hack­ers to give emails from Mrs. Clin­ton's pri­vate server to Wik­i­Leaks. It is un­clear whether hack­ers ever ob­tained the emails be­long­ing to Mrs. Clin­ton, which she had said were deleted be­cause they were deemed per­sonal. Those emails have never been made pub­lic.

In Au­gust 2016, Mr. Stone told Alex Jones, a right-wing provo­ca­teur who runs the web­site In­fo­Wars, that he had a "fore­shad­ow­ing" of the ma­te­r­ial that would be re-leased by Wik­i­Leaks. Days later, Mr. Stone tweeted that it would soon be "the Podes­ta's [sic] time in the bar­rel." Sev­eral days be­fore Wik­i­Leaks be­gan to post the hacked ma­te­r­ial from Mr. Podes­ta's email ac­count, Mr. Stone tweeted that he had "to­tal con­fi­dence" that Wik­i­Leaks would "ed­u­cate the Amer­i­can peo­ple soon."

Mr. Stone has since said the mes­sages were "be­nign" and that he had no ad­vance no­tice of the web­site's plans. He also has said his tweet ref­er­enc­ing "the Podes­ta's" was about the lob­by­ing ac­tiv­i-ties of Mr. Podesta and his brother, Tony.

It isn't clear to what de-gree, if any, Mr. Stone's and Mr. Smith's ef­forts were con­nected. Messrs. Smith and Stone had mu­tual as­sociates in Mr. Corsi as well as for­mer Wall Street fi­nancier Charles Or­tel, who was re­search­ing the Clin­ton Fam­ily Foun­da­tion, emails and pub­lic com­ments show. Mr. Stone said he wasn't aware of Mr. Smith's work. Mr. Or­tel said he wasn't aware of a re­la­tion­ship be­tween Mr. Stone and Mr. Smith.

Mr. Smith re­ferred to his project as the "Clin­ton Email Re­con­nais­sance Ini­tia­tive." He com­piled a long list of busi­ness-men, ac­tivists, lawyers, re­searchers and Trump cam­paign of­fi­cials who he wanted to work with to ob­tain Mrs. Clin­ton's 33,000 emails. While many peo­ple on that list say they never gave Mr. Smith per­mis­sion to use their names, some were copied or named in emails cir­cu­lated by Mr. Smith in 2016. Oth­ers got un­so­licited ap­proaches from Mr. Smith they say they never re­sponded to.

Wall Street Journal, October 19, 2018

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October 18, 2018

Post Script. This report from The Wall Street Journal suggests Mueller is getting closer. If we all do all we can do to create a #BlueWave on November 6, Dems in Congress will be there to help him. #DoAllTheGoodYouCanDo.#Midterms2018