WikiLeaks on Wednesday added to its release of material allegedly stolen from the email account of Hillary Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta, publishing more than 1,100 new emails on its website.
The release follows similar publications over recent days in an apparent bid to follow through on founder Julian Assange’s promise to release an “October surprise” in the final weeks of the presidential campaign.
{mosads}It’s unclear how much longer the anti-secrecy organization intends to continue the steady release of messages. So far, around 6,000 emails have been released, but the archive appears to go back years, and there could be many times that number still in reserve.
So far, much of the damaging material — such as alleged excerpts from secret speeches Clinton gave to Wall Street or indications that the former secretary of State’s presidential campaign received a debate question in advance — have been buried by an escalating divide within the Republican Party and explosive details about Donald Trump’s past behavior toward women.
The Clinton campaign has refused to confirm any of the leaked material and claims that WikiLeaks is acting as a front for the Russian government.
U.S. officials last week said Moscow was directing a cyber campaign to interfere with the U.S. election cycle and suggested that WikiLeaks was being used as a mouthpiece.
“The recent disclosures of alleged hacked emails on sites like DCLeaks.com and WikiLeaks and by the Guccifer 2.0 online persona are consistent with the methods and motivations of Russian-directed efforts,” the Department of Homeland Security and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence said in a joint statement on Friday. Other allegedly stolen material has appeared on DCLeaks.com and by a person identifying themselves as Guccifer 2.0.
WikiLeaks has pushed back on the allegations that it is aligned with Russia.
“Journalism is at an end if press let the Clinton campaign endlessly get away with dodging questions using ‘we were hacked’ on every issue,” the organization said on Twitter on Tuesday.