Michael Caputo, a former Trump campaign adviser, is managing director of Buffalo-based Zeppelin Communications. He is a 30-year veteran of Republican and international campaigns.

If you believe Attorney General William Barr, the special counsel report issued March 22 found no evidence that President Donald Trump’s campaign staff conspired or coordinated with Russia. As a former Trump senior campaign adviser and as a witness ensnared by the congressional and special counsel investigations for two years, that was vindication. I was elated.

But Barr angered a man in nearby Buffalo, N.Y., so much that he threatened my life a few hours later on Facebook. I filed criminal charges against him Tuesday.


For a Trump associate trapped in the Russia collusion maelstrom, this is the norm, not an exception. This was the 58th threat of violence I received since the drama began two years ago, when my name was first brought up in a nationally televised House Intelligence hearing. Most of the perpetrators cloaked their identities. Some didn’t, and they got hit with criminal charges. I know many investigation witnesses who have lived the same nightmare of dealing with the unhinged.

Unfortunately, it won’t stop anytime soon: A criminal psychologist advising me through this period told me we’ve entered the danger zone. The mentally ill who have made Russia collusion the center of their lives will become unhinged. Some may attack.

That’s the life we’ve lived for two years—my wife, my young daughters and me. I had a tooth knocked out by Antifa at the president’s inauguration. After a televised congressional hearing during which my wife was mentioned, a man made a credible threat to burn down my house with my children inside. As a result, my office and home are wrapped in security measures, I’ve installed shotgun stations in my home, and I carry a concealed weapon wherever it’s legal.

The remarkable vitriol impacts everyone. My teenager was harried by students and teachers alike; parents of my toddlers’ friends shied away. My wife carried us all on her shoulders, exponentially stronger than I am.

To deal with my anger, I turned to my church. We live across the street from our Roman Catholic parish, 39 steps away from the holy water, so close that the church bells mark every moment of our day. We wake up to the pealing, we pause several times a day to hear the beautiful songs ring out.

My parish priest regularly rebuilt me in counseling sessions with remarkable and simple advice. “It’s OK to pray that they fail, Michael,” he once said.

So I prayed and prayed for their failure. In that, I found peace and strength. Even when a USA Today columnist tweeted that my toddler daughters should be raped, I was at peace. (It helped that she was fired for it.)

Much of the impact is material. I lost most of my clients, lost staff, closed offices, nearly lost our home, drained my children’s college fund and struggled to pay the smallest bills. All of that will sound familiar to my Original Trump friends also caught up in this mess.

J.D. Gordon, a retired U.S. Navy commander, was interviewed multiple times by several investigations. His legal costs were significant; the blow to his communications business was even more so. But the far greater cost was his inability to serve in a senior Trump administration post. A surefire pick for a senior role in the national security team, he was cut off from working in the administration. This was a great loss for our nation.

Carter Page, with his bucket hat and sunny disposition, was destroyed. He endured unexpected legal costs while his oil and gas consulting business dwindled to nothing as reporters, investigators and well-placed partisans ripped him to shreds. Of all the people the United States of America failed in this investigation, Carter Page had it the worst.

But our nation also failed George Papadopoulos, who was destroyed, and I am ashamed to know I helped. A young man trying to make the most of a big break, he fell into traps spies set for him overseas. With news of his arrest, I called him “the Coffee Boy” on CNN, trying to spin his marginal influence on the campaign. My description was dishonorable, and fueled a fire from which he and his wife are only now recovering.

The list goes on and on: A hardworking travel aide from the campaign was subpoenaed, which rocked his young family. Others—a house painter, a translator and more—didn’t particularly care for candidate Trump, but their lives were dragged through the muck anyway.

Courtesy of Michael Caputo

For two years, most of the Trump associates involved as mere witnesses have been unable to speak with friends from the 2016 campaign, convention and transition. Now, with the Mueller investigation complete, we’re all talking again, and the stories of cratered lives are innumerable. Many lost their jobs or shed clients; the husband and wife in one family lost their jobs.

Today, now that the special counsel has cleared the campaign and all of us of allegations of Russian collusion, we are all celebrating. The final report emerged in time for my birthday party, and a friend gave me a T-shirt to mark the occasion: “I survived the Mueller investigation and all I got was this lousy T-shirt.”

The shirt got a lot of laughs that night. But, as I swirled the last of my final birthday drink, I had to wonder if the widespread personal destruction is permanent. If so, everyone else needs a T- shirt.