Stone Orb

Roger Jason Stone Jr. (born Roger Joseph Stone Jr.; August 27, 1952) is an American conservative political consultant and lobbyist. Since the 1970s, he has worked on the campaigns of Republican politicians, including Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, Jack Kemp, Bob Dole, George W. Bush, and—most prominently—Donald Trump. Stone co-founded the lobbying firm Black, Manafort, Stone and Kelly in 1980 with Charles R. Black Jr. and Paul Manafort, later recruiting Peter G. Kelly in 1984. Drawn to conservatism after reading Barry Goldwater's book The Conscience of a Conservative (1960), Stone supported Goldwater's 1964 presidential campaign as a child. He attended George Washington University but dropped out; while there, he was hired to spy on rival presidential campaigns during the Democratic Party presidential primaries for Nixon's 1972 campaign as part of a clandestine operation that became part of the Watergate scandal. Stone worked in Reagan's unsuccessful bid for president in 1976 and became the president of the Young Republicans in 1977. Known as the "keeper of the Nixon flame", he advised Nixon following his presidency. Stone continued to work for Reagan in his 1980 presidential campaign under the behest of John Sears and was "instrumental" to his 1984 campaign. Black, Manafort and Stone became one of the most prominent lobbying firms by 1990, although it gained notoriety for its clientele such as dictators Ferdinand Marcos and Mobutu Sese Seko, being known as "the torturers' lobby". In the early 1980s, Stone began working with Donald Trump through Black, Manafort and Stone, who was the firm's first client. He began working with Trump more directly in the 1990s as a lobbyist for the nascent Trump Hotels & Casino Resorts. In 1999, Stone became the campaign manager for Trump's 2000 presidential campaign. He served as an advisor for Trump's 2016 campaign until August 2015. Business partner Paul Manafort served as Trump's campaign manager. During his time working for Trump, Stone repeatedly communicated with WikiLeaks and its founder, Julian Assange. Despite his departure, Stone's support for Trump intensified in the years since and, in April 2016, he founded the pro-Trump activist group Stop the Steal. During the 2020 United States presidential election, he supported Trump once again; following Trump's loss to Joe Biden, Stone spread multiple unproven allegations of voter fraud. He was subpoenaed by the House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack in November 2021. Stone has reaffirmed his support for Trump in his 2024 campaign. Stone's communications with Russian officials and WikiLeaks received scrutiny. During the 2016 presidential election, John Podesta, the chairman for Hillary Clinton's 2016 presidential campaign, accused him of having knowledge of Podesta's emails before they were released. Conservative publication The Washington Times reported that Stone had contact with Guccifer 2.0, the persona of a Russian hacker or hacker group that gained access into the servers of the Democratic National Committee. On January 25, 2019, Stone's Fort Lauderdale, Florida home was raided by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and he was arrested in connection to Robert Mueller's special counsel investigation. He was charged with one count of witness tampering, one count of obstructing an official proceeding, and five counts of making false statements to Congress and indicted in November 2019; Stone was sentenced to 40 months in prison. His term…