By Aaron Blake February 16

We have the first indictment in the investigation by Robert S. Mueller III that actually has to do with Russian meddling in the 2016 election. The special counsel on Friday indicted 13 Russians in connection with a large-scale troll farm effort aimed at influencing the election in violation of U.S. law.

The indictment of the Internet Research Agency comes on top of two Trump advisers having pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI — Michael Flynn and George Papadopoulos — and two more being indicted on charges of alleged financial crimes that predated the campaign — Paul Manafort and Rick Gates. Nobody is in custody and Russia does not extradite to the United States, but the document from the secretive Mueller investigation does shed plenty of light where there previously wasn't any.

So what does the new indictment tell us? Here's what we can say right away:

1. It doesn't say the Trump campaign colluded with Russia, but doesn't rule it out either.

The words “in this indictment” mean Rosenstein's comments are pretty narrow.

Update: In a statement, Trump and the White House suggested that the announcement "further indicates ... that there was NO COLLUSION between the Trump campaign and Russia." Again, it doesn't provide any direct indication.

2. It just got a lot harder for Trump to dismiss Mueller's probe as a “witch hunt.”

At one point in the indictment, a price tag is put on the effort: $1.25 million in one month, as of September 2016. To put that in perspective, that's as much as some entire presidential campaigns were spending monthly during the primaries. And that lends credence to the idea that this was a large-scale effort connected to the Russian government.

President Trump has often sought to downplay the idea that Russia interfered in the 2016 election

And the document would seem to make pretty clear that the Mueller investigation isn't just targeted at taking down Trump, either.

3. We still have no idea whether Russia flipped the 2016 election (despite Pence's claim).

In his remarks to reporters, Rosenstein also specified that the indictment doesn't determine whether Russia's interference effort changed the results of the 2016 election. He said there was “no allegation in the indictment of any effect on the outcome of the election.”

Director Mike Pompeo and Vice President Pence. Even this week, Pence said at an Axios event that it was “the universal conclusion of our intelligence communities that none of those efforts had any impact on the outcome of the 2016 election.”

4. The effort wasn’t just pro-Trump or anti-Clinton.

The troll farm wasn't just focused on Trump and Hillary Clinton. In fact, it picked sides in both primaries and opposed and supported multiple other candidates.

“They engaged in operations primarily intended to communicate derogatory information about Hillary Clinton, to denigrate other candidates such as Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio, and to support Bernie Sanders and then-candidate Donald Trump,” the indictment says. It says the troll farm had decided whom it was supporting by February 2016, when the primaries were getting off the ground, and it instructed its specialists to "use any opportunity to criticize Hillary and the rest (except Sanders and Trump — we support them.)”

It’s possible the primary advocacy was simply meant to boost Trump and hurt Clinton, but it’s notable that the troll farm effort played in those primaries too.

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