Elliott Broidy and the GOP’s Bad Hacking Karma

When Los Angeles attorney Robin Rosenzweig got an email on Dec. 27 that appeared to be a Gmail security alert, she offered her password as requested. But instead of sending it to Google, she handed it to a group of hackers. Their target wasn’t Rosenzweig, but her husband, Elliott Broidy, a top Republican donor, defense contractor, and friend of President Donald Trump. Rosenzweig’s mistake made it easy. With her password, the hackers accessed her Google Docs account, where she kept a list of more passwords, including one associated with a corporate account from her husband’s money-management firm, Broidy Capital Management.

If that sounds familiar, it’s because John Podesta, Hillary Clinton’s campaign manager, fell for a similar ruse during the 2016 presidential race, resulting in a devastating, weeks-long leak of private emails that arguably helped put Trump in the White House. But it’s not just the fake Google security alert that is making Republicans feel as if they’re suffering a bout of hacking karma. Whoever took Broidy’s emails has doled out curated selections to media outlets, including the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and Bloomberg News.