On Friday evening, The Wall Street Journal reported something that's being described as "a turning-point in the Trump-Russia probe."

The news: Special Counsel Robert Mueller has "obtained a search warrant for the contents of Facebook accounts associated with Russian operatives trying to undermine the 2016 presidential election."

This is a big deal because, as a former federal prosecutor explains in Newsweek, Mueller's warrant...

tells us that the special counsel is closing in on specific foreigners who tried to undermine our democracy, that he's serious about going after Russian interference and he is far enough along to convince a federal judge that he has good evidence of such a crime.

The news could have serious implications for the president’s associates because it is a crime if you know a criminal act is taking place and help it succeed. That's called "aiding and abetting." If someone in Trump's orbit knew about the Russian "contributions" that Mueller is investigating—and helped them in a tangible way—they could be charged.

All of that is a turning point in its own right, yes, But it also seems this could also have serious implications for how people and government regulators view Facebook, which, as we've learned in recent days, knows that its platform was used for apparent Russian interference in US politics—and that it can still be used for a lot of unsavory, poorly regulated aims. Just take a look at these recent stories:

• According to The New York Times, Russians created fake Americans and gave them Facebook identities in order to "influence the election."

• According to Business Insider, it looks like Russian operatives used Facebook to "organize a series of anti-immigrant, anti-Hillary Clinton rallies across Texas last November, three days before the election."

• According to The Daily Beast, "Russian operatives hiding behind false identities used Facebook’s event-management tool" to, among other things, organize "an August 2016 anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim rally in Idaho."

• And according to ProPublica, Facebook's ad service allowed users to target "Jew haters" for specific outreach—until ProPublica exposed the situation.

Given the growing centrality of Facebook in our public and private lives, the odds are good that you found this very post via Facebook—which only highlights what a powerful intermediary the company has become between Americans and their perceptions of what's going on in our democracy.

We talked about the real problems this poses, and about a great new book on how Big Tech is undermining our democracy, on the current episode of the Blabbermouth podcast.